Poker theoreticians and PokerTracker/Hold'emManager users will definitely want to stop by Outflopped.com and pick up ~70 gigabytes (GB) of online poker hand histories covering Absolute Poker, Full Tilt, IPN, ONG, PokerStars, and Party.
While you're there, do yourself and the rest of the poker community a favor and sign up for an account. Powered by the same StackExchange engine that powers the (okay, arguably) most popular programmer Q&A site in the world, Outflopped.com is organized poker Q&A.
If that sounds like a sales pitch, it is. I'm not affiliated with Outflopped.com in any way, shape, or form; but I do have an ulterior (and selfish) motive here. I want Outflopped.com to succeed because I ask and answer dozens of poker-related questions a month, and Outflopped provides a formal and user-friendly mechanism for airing and resolving poker-related questions in a way that makes them easy to ask, easy to answer, easy to search for, and easy to link to. It's a resource I want, and it's a resource you should want.
It's like...
A giant candy store full of all the unanswered questions you always wondered about but never bothered to ask. Oh, and the candy is 100% free.
If you can dream it up, and if it's relevant to poker, you can ask it.
I know from experience how well the Outflopped.com discussion format works in other domains, like programming, and ever since StackOverflow.com went public I've been thinking somebody should do this for poker. Although traditional forums like Two Plus Two and PokerAI.org will remain the source for hard-hitting up-to-the-minute poker information—because that's what the traditional forum format encourages—Outflopped.com provides a different and complementary service.
- Outflopped.com allows you to ask questions about poker without getting sniped at by a twelve-ring circus of demented leprechauns cartwheeling from the trees in crotch-hugging leotards and homemade Superman capes. You can ask a simple question or an obscure question without getting carpet-bombed and projectile-vomited into shag-carpeted oblivion with snarky rejoinders.
- Outflopped.com rewards you for answering (and asking) questions with an engaging reputation system based on points, badges, and abilitites (such as the ability to edit other people's questions).
- Outflopped.com doesn't force you to register or sign up for an account unless you want to and until you're ready.
- Outflopped.com organizes questions into distinct keywords giving you a clean way to see all questions on a particular topic.
- Outflopped.com exposes all questions and keywords via RSS allowing you to see new questions/answers as they roll in.
So I was happy when I got an email, a few months back, informing me that Outflopped.com was going live. Finally! The StackExchange model has been applied to many, many, many walks of life, from business travel to video gaming, but I think it's particularly well suited to poker. Poker inspires a freakishly large number of questions, some of which are complex and nuanced, almost all of which are helpful to people other than the person asking the question. Outflopped.com provides a pipeline for those questions, which would otherwise swamp a typical forum, where many questions (especially simple or off-topic ones) are regarded as "noise" and a violation of RTFM or RTFFAQ anyway.
I liked the format so much I left my hermit cave and signed up for an account.
And even though, as always, I stand before you today beholden to no human corkdangler, and even though I have zero connection with or vested interest in the site, I'm hoping you'll do the same. Because of all the questions I'd like to see asked on Outflopped.com...
Where the hell is everybody?
...isn't one of them. So stop by, say hello, unburden yourself of those burning questions, contribute some of that hard-won wisdom and studied technique, complete the circle, improvise, adapt to the environment, Darwin, shit happens, I Ching, whatever man, we gotta roll with it, before plunging back out into the poker wilderness to do battle with those pesky-but-profitable Rush Poker heathens. And I'll see you there. Lookin' like a fool, perchance, with your pants on the ground?
[Disclaimer: Needless to say, I'm not employed by or affiliated with Outflopped.com. I'm recommending it (Outflopped.com) because it's a useful site based on the Stackoverflow/StackExchange format of which I've been a long-time fan.]
Posted by James Devlin 14 comment(s)
