Montesino Casino

The Montesino Casino is hosting the first World Poker Tour (WPT) Vienna event this weekend, starting today, Friday 25th March and will run until 30th March.

The Main Event has €3,500 buy-in and will be televised from after the two starting days. Players will begin with 30,000 in chips and the Blinds at 50-100 with 60-minute levels and a 15-minute break after every two levels. The final table will take place on March 29.

The WPT Vienna is also holding a €10,000 High Roller event which will play out 28th to 30th March.

From Vienna, the WPT heads Easy across the Old World, 500km to be exact, to set up camp in Bratislava, Slovakia. The the Golden Vegas casino will be the host for the WPT Bratislava, the Main Event will feature a €2,500 + 220 buy-in and run from 30th March 30 to 3 April.

Zynga Poker

The hacker who went through Facebook’s instantiation of Zynga Poker‘s software to cyber-steal 400 billion virtual poker chips and later sell them on ebay and through a number of social networks has been given a jail sentence of two years by a British court.

Ashley Mitchell saw his chance and went for it in 2009, hacking into Zynga’s Texas Hold’em Poker application on Facebook and giving himself 400 billion virtual poker chips. Numerous Facebook accounts were used to store the chips which he then sold on eBay to Zynga poker players for a total of £53,000, or $85,870 at the time.

During the trial, prosecutor Gareth Evans revealed that Mitchell would have earned as much as £184,000, almost $300,000, if he had managed to sell the whole stash. As Zynga Poker players can purchase chips directly from the company, the value of the stolen chips is a cool $12 million if sold at Zynga’s legal prices.

Mitchell was found guilty to four charges of converting criminal property and one count of violating the Computer Misuse Act. Mitchell’s attorney told the court that his client suffered from a gambling addiction during the period that crimes were committed and spent as much as £1,000 per day on gambling sites. Mitchell offered to pay back the money he had made from funds earned selling chips on a similar Facebook play-money application, Gambino Poker.

“People rely on computer systems. Anyone who has managed to get into these systems for their own ends should expect a stiff sentence.” Said Judge Philip Wassail, who added another 7.5 months to the sentence for Mitchell’s crime of hacking local council servers in 2008 in order to modify his personal details.

EPT

The Grand Final of Season 7 of the European Poker Tour (EPT) organised by PokerStars will be played at the Casino Gran Madrid in the Spanish captial for the first time in its brief histsory.

The EPT Grand Final will commence on 7^th May and will run until 12^th May. The five-day festival of poker will feature the €10,000 + €600 Main Event and showcase the the €25,000 High Roller event.

The move from the glamorous, tax-free haven for the super-rich, Monte Carlo, to the Spanish capital, has been explained to the press by EPT chief executive John Duthie: “It is with the greatest pleasure that we are able to announce Casino Gran Madrid as the new venue for the EPT Grand Final. We wanted somewhere new, dynamic and inspiring, and knew that Madrid would tick all the boxes for the travelling poker player, regardless of age or desires. The same familiar team will be running the event and the schedule will, I am sure, provide something for everyone.”

Predictably, or even contractually, Team PokerStars Pro Daniel Negreanu commented: “I’m excited about the move to Madrid and I’m looking forward to seeing what the capital has to offer. Poker is booming in Spain so you can expect a decent number of local players to attend and ensure a juicy prize pool.”

To leave the directly paid-for poker arena for a moment, Carlos Galbeño, the Mayor of Madrid, Torrelodones, said: “The fact that the Casino Gran Madrid Torrelodones has been chosen to host the Grand Final of the seventh season of the European Poker Tour is great news for the Madrid community. However, it is especially important for our town, because not only will the event have a huge economic impact, it will also allow us to project our city as a prime tourist spot in Europe. I am sure that Torrelodones will rise to the challenge.”

The organisers have estimated that the total profits made from EPT Madrid could be grow to more than 10 million euros; €5 million coming from direct EPT-related expenditure, plus a potential further €5 million to be earned from top-end media exposure such as TV rights and broadcast options.

PokerStars also confirmed the dates for the EPT San Remo. The Italian stop will begin on 27^th April and be played until 3rd May at the Casino San Remo. English professional, Liv Boeree, won last year’s EPT San Remo to waltz home with €1,25 million for out-lasting 1,239 unworthy opponents.

Dusk Till Dawn Poker Tournament

The Dusk Til Dawn Poker Club in Nottinham, England, has raised the number of competitors in tits annual Grand Priz tournament to 1,600 for this year’s event.

The same event held last year attracted 900 players – the maximum capacity at the time – that still holds the record for the largest poker tournament held in the United Kingdom that also had a televised final table with a five-figure first prize. This figure is compared with the European Poker Tour (EPT) London in 2010 that comes a close second with 848 players in the Main Event that saw David Vamplew beat John Juanda to take the title. There is an important difference in that the Dusk Til Dawn Grand Prix has a buy-in of £55, whereas the EPT London has a buy-on £5,000 + £250 and generates a prize pool of £4,112,800 and a first prize of £900,000.

The next Dusk Til Dawn Grand Prix will retain the £55 buy-in but will offer a guaranteed prize pool of £80,000 from the 1,600-player-strong field. The event will get underway on 16 May and will include five equivalents to Day 1. The final table will play out on 22 May. The new structure will mean the first prize will be around the £20,000 mark.

Paddy Power Poker today congratulates Phil ‘flukesfla’ Flavin on his $110,000 Sit’n’Go Jackpot triumph, the biggest jackpot prize ever won by a Paddy Power Poker player.  Phil captured this massive prize by finishing in first place in six consecutive Fort Knox Jackpot Sit’n’Go tournaments, each with a buy-in of $55.

The first tournament was played during the evening of Friday, February 19th, with the sixth finished in the early hours of Saturday morning.  The Fort Knox progressive jackpot starts at $50,000 and gets bigger and bigger each week until it is won.

Phil is a long-time Paddy Power Poker player and well-known on the Irish poker circuit; he recently won an Irish Open 2010 package on Paddy Power Poker and therefore will be competing for the €100,000 Sole Survivor prize at Ireland’s biggest tournament, in addition to playing for the Irish Open title and the estimated €2,500,000 prizepool.

“I’m delighted to have awarded Phil with this massive sum,” said Paddy Power, Communications Manager for Paddy Power Poker.  “Taking down six consecutive Sit’n’Go tournaments is no mean feat, especially when you play all six of them on the trot!  Hopefully we’ll have another few jackpot winners to congratulate in the next few months; the prizes are ready to be awarded!”