Why is it that we always keep hearing about "certain big-name" is a great poker player because they have great math skills? Is math really that important to poker, more than player instincts? It’s been such a raging debate for years and years. Some think it is essential, and to some it’s just plain overrated.

This is actually a profiling video using some very well know, futuristic characters. Mix Gus Hansen into this and there are some rather interesting - I should say fascinating - concepts discussed here.  When learning how to become profitable in online poker, it is critical you use a logical approach that is fundamental based upon odds and math. You may even compare this winning logic to Commander Spock of the Starship Enterprise whose character would no doubt be a force at the poker table.

I have received a request for a view of my current HM preferences. You can see them in the poker forum. If anyone is having problems, sometimes it is caused by too many individual alterations and the only option is to remove all stats and start over again from scratch.

Tournament Indicator and Holdem Indicator have added new visual options that allow users to change the view of their poker calculator from the familiar horizontal layout to a just-introduced vertical display. All the Iindicator products have always had a mini-view option, and last year they added flexible resizing that matches Poker Stars and Full Tilts table resizing features.

Some of the online databases are getting whacked by PokerStars once again, this time having to do with limiting the information available to track random players in large field sit and go tournaments. As it is now, the stats may only be available if you have actually participated in the tournament. This will also effect (distort) many players performance percentages if winning from these tournaments are not included.

Some time ago it was announced that a new version of PokerOffice was to be released, which certainly was nice to hear. I’ve been beta testing for a while, and today I saw that the version was finally released publicly, so I thought I’d write a few lines of my thoughts so far. There are a couple of improvements I’m the most happy about:

Recently, the popular tracking databases online have expanded their reach, where their focus of the types of poker tournaments they track have overlapped and created more direct competition between each of them. Sharkscope, official poker rankings, and the pokerDB come to mind as those services that have taken on radical changes over last year.