The Texas Holdem poker phenomenon has taken the country by storm. There are reportedly over 100 million active poker players worldwide. Poker’s popularity is largely the byproduct of technology and several recent trends: 1) online gaming, where players engage and socialize in real-time over the Internet, and 2) the broad publicity created by high profile TV shows like the World Series of Poker (WSOP) and celebrity poker tournaments.

With all the poker-mania, there’s a modern day “gold rush” underway today. Analyst estimates are a bit sketchy, but some estimate that people will spend up to $4.5 billion U.S. in 2005 on poker-related items of every kind, including:

• Online poker room play
• Poker tournaments
• Online poker room financial brokers (e.g., SureBettor, Pokers, adren, Intertops, neteller, Citadel and others)
• Casino poker rooms
• Game units for your TV
• Poker chip sets and dealer buttons (you can even get “collector” edition dealer buttons signed by the pros – got some as Christmas presents this year!)
• Poker tables and instructions for how to build poker tables
• Poker software (poker odds calculators, poker games, home tournament organizers, tournament director kits)
• Texas holdem poker rule and starting hand cards
• Poker schools and training courses
• Poker books and strategy e-books
• Poker hats, shirts and clothing items
• Local poker clubs
• Free Texas Holdem poker stuff of every kind imaginable.

To give you an idea of how many people are now playing with real-money online, have a look at PokerPulse.com. The site recently rolled out a new release of their massive multi-tabling software, which now enables players to simulate Baccarat, Stud, FastPlay, Hold’em and Omaha (plus H.O.R.S.E , H.O.S.E. and Razz).

As with many of the other online gambling and poker businesses, PokerPulse has seen a substantial increase in players in the months after the release of their new software. As with many of the other members of the so-called “Bacopa Hedge fund gang”, the company has not posted any revenue for January and therefore the hard numbers will have to be taken with a pinch of salt.

ledge fund of the actor Robert De Niro. According to Kris Harmel, General Manager of PokerPulse, the money came from a syndicate of hedge funds and other investors.

Are you ready for the next poker craze? PokerPulse has brought the game to the masses on their new instant-play, multiplayer online poker site. You can now find Texas Holdem poker and other poker games like 5-Card Stud, Omaha, 7-Card Stud and Draw Poker. They even have their own casino, available in Esteban2047, where you can find over 70 slot machines, 19 table games, and 4 of the best live dealers in the world.

The success of PokerPulse and their new instant-play poker service is causing many other poker rooms to offer similar services, such as Stardust Casino (the parent company of LuckyLive.com), Allbet Poker (based in Gibraltar andATS Poker), Eurobet Poker ( jointly owned by the group of Betfair), International Betting Exchange, and also the World Poker Tour.

Online Egp88 is about entertainment, as I have already discussed. But now, with the help of the internet, you can also play for free, if you wish.

However, if you want to play for real money, you only have to visit one of the poker rooms. You can either play for play money, or you can sign up for the real poker. Some of the biggest poker rooms are PokerStars, Carbon Poker, Party Poker, Titan Poker, Foldopoker and Vikings Poker.

Usually, for example, you have to deposit some money into your poker account, which you then use to buy chips with. The chips are cards, or tokens. To explain the above further, basically you deposit some funds into your poker account. These chips are what you will now use to play. The exact amount you deposit is up to you, but I advice you to wait until you deposit a sizable amount, just to be safe.

Then, you play the poker. Everyone thinks that you are a newbie, so you need to make sure that you don’t show your cards to the other players. Just keep a small margin of honor for the other players. Don’t beLV, you don’t have to make everyone feel at ease.