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A couple of months ago, the hopes of poker fans all over the world were delighted by the news that many of the final tables that would not be televised on ESPN TV later this year would be streamed live on the internet. Twenty-four in all, these final events would be divided between Bluff Magazine and ESPN360. In the countries other than the USA, the ESPN360 events would be carried by PKR.com.

Probably most of us assumed that Americans could also get the PKR feed if we were unable to access ESPN360 on the Internet.......how wrong we were. While the rest of the world will be able to watch all 24 final tables, those in the USA who do not have the "right" cable company are out of luck. Many here in America do not have Verizon or the other companies that carry it. In my area, we have access to it but the switch is expensive and having this one feature would be the only benefit of making the change seems like something that should be unnecessary.

The forums have been lighting up with discussion on this issue. Seems rather arbitrary and you would think that WSOP and ESPN would like to garner as much goodwill as possible while this great event is going on so that interest would be heightened by the time it starts airing on TV.

The broadcasts that I have been able to watch so far have been wonderful........and thanks to Bluff Magazine for making those available to all of us. It was just lucky that the first night of the live feeds when Phil Ivey won, that I was able to find a link that did not block the ESPN feed. By the next day, that feed was blocked. I watched every hand for about 10 hours and loved it and if you see the numbers on the forums for that thread, it appears that. Last night, watched Daniel and his quest for a bracelet on the broadcast provided by Bluff Magazine. Thank you Bluff........

There is a lot of interest here by the poker community and think that ESPN is really missing the boat on this one. Instead of building favor and possibly a larger market for poker on TV, they are just pissing a lot of people off. The community I am speaking of was already ticked because of their decision to carry only three events on TV, and cutting out some of those most favored by the poker players. We were thrilled by the trade off of these events streaming live but that excitement was torn away from many of us with an exclusion determined by our ISP provider......

If the other countries are being accommodated by the PKR link, why do Americans not have an optional way to access? Why not offer it to us for a fee? It seems that Americans are not being fairly treated here. Is our goodwill just not that big of a deal?