Technology: Claremonters dealt a good hand

“Over the years, the game of poker has attracted more and more attention worldwide with the popularity of televised Texas Hold ‘em tournaments like the high stakes World Series of Poker. In the process, professional poker players have become celebrities, with catchy nicknames like Action Dan Harrington, Phil “the poker brat” Hellmuth and Doyle “Texas Dolly” Brunson.

Getting swept up in the poker craze, a local software developer and his friend created a poker program that took top honors in this year’s Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence Computer Poker Competition in Alberta, Canada. After going undefeated in the no-limit, heads-up category, Jay Cordes, 36, co-developer of BluffBot 2.0, took the news in stride.

Computer: In Poker Match Against a Machine, Humans Are Better Bluffers

“For anyone stuck on a casino stool, playing hours of video poker, rest assured: humans can still beat a computer.

Phil Laak pitting his poker skills against a software program. Mr. Laak, working with a partner, Ali Eslami, won two rounds out of three.

But computers may soon dominate on the felt-top table, as they have on the chessboard.

Computer: Poker hotshots narrowly defeat bluffing computer

“After two thousand hands and countless “flops”, “rivers”, and “turns”, two elite poker players have narrowly defeated a formidable computer opponent. The result means that, while chess world champions have fallen to computers, humans still hold sway in poker, a game where psychology plays a huge role.

Phil “The Unabomber” Laak and Ali Eslami took on Polaris, software developed by researchers at the University of Alberta in Canada, in a set-up designed to reduce the role that luck normally plays in a game of poker.

Academic: Poker Pros to Face Off With Computer

“Poker champion Phil Laak has a good chance of winning when he sits down this week to play 2,000 hands of Texas Hold’em _ against a computer. It may be the last chance he gets. Computers have gotten a lot better at poker in recent years; they’re good enough now to challenge top professionals like Laak, who won the World Poker Tour invitational in 2004. But it’s only a matter of time before the machines take a commanding lead in the war for poker supremacy.

Just as they already have in backgammon, checkers and chess, computers are expected to surpass even the best human poker players within a decade. They can already beat virtually any amateur player.

Computers: Poker pros to challenge computer in mind-vs.-metal match

“If you think reading the poker faces of your buddies on Texas Hold’em night is tough, try calling the bluff of an opponent with no face at all.

A $50,000 showdown between a poker-playing computer and two of the world’s sharpest poker players will take place on Monday in Vancouver, and it’s anybody’s guess who will take the pot.

Press Release: Poker Academy to Supply Software Platform for the First $50,000 Man Versus Machine Texas Holdem Poker Championship

“Poker Academy, the premier source for quality poker software (http://www.poker-academy.com), today announced it will supply the technological platform for the first $50,000 Man Versus Machine Texas Holdem Poker Championship, which will take place in Vancouver, Canada, in conjunction with the annual conference of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), July 23 and 24 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Vancouver, B.C.

The $50,000 Man-Machine Texas Holdem Poker Championship will pit a poker-playing computer program developed at the University of Alberta against two top-level poker professionals in a controlled scientific experiment with real money on the line. Polaris, the reigning world champion computer poker program, will challenge Phil “The Unabomber” Laak and Ali Eslami…”

Poker Academy (07/18/07)

Top poker players test skill against computer (Canada)

“University of Alberta researchers are betting their poker-playing computer program will beat two of the sharpest human professional players in the world and they’re not bluffing — yet.

The developers of the Polaris program have challenged Phil (The Unabomber) Laak and Ali Eslami to 2,000 hands of Texas hold ‘em.

The $50,000 man-versus-machine poker match will not only be fun, it will help test advances in artificial intelligence, said Jonathan Schaeffer, leader of the computer science team that created Polaris.”

The Hamilton Spectator (06/11/07)

Bots: Software learns when it pays to deceive

“Imagine being up against a poker player who can calculate the exact odds of a hand being a winner, play it with a straight face, and if necessary bluff with the best of them. Such a player exists, but you won’t find him wearing a Stetson or hiding behind a pair of dark glasses. This player lurks within a computer, created by a pair of academics who have succeeded in making a software agent that can bluff just like a human player can.

Poker-playing computer agents or “bots” are nothing new in themselves. Indeed, many online poker players, especially those who habitually lose, believe that poker sites are riddled with such bots – virtual players that can outwit even the best humans. “I hear this conspiracy theory about poker bots all the time,” says Clément Sire, a physicist and avid poker player at the CNRS, the French national research organisation, in Toulouse – but he doesn’t believe they are that good. “Given the current state of poker bots, if you are losing to them you should be ashamed,” he says.”

NewScientist (05/30/07)