The 4 biggest FAILS in recent poker history Part 2

When it comes to promotions and innovative ideas in the poker world they are usually so-so in terms of impact, most catching on as a niche format while others fade quietly into the night. On the other hand, every now and then an idea really catches on and is a game-changer, or possibly fails miserably and has an unintended consequence on the poker world -in Internet speak, a FAIL!

In this two-part series I’ll take a look at the four biggest FAILS in the poker industry in the past few years. I’m not going to talk about black eyes on the industry like the Super-User scandal or UIGEA legislation; instead I want to look at the ideas that were suppose to have a positive reaction or result but instead produced the exact opposite result.

Here are the four FAILS I’ve chosen as the biggest:

• 1. David Sklansky’s “Post you were waiting for”
• 2. The durrrr Challenge
• 3. Shaun Deeb in drag at the WSOP Ladies Tournament
• 4. The Professional Poker Tour

*You can check out Part 1 for a recap*

The Second Biggest FAIL in Recent Poker History: The durrrr Challenge

When Tom Dwan first started talking about the durrrr Challenge on High Stakes Poker the entire poker world was abuzz with the idea. However, it soon became apparent that the players involved were all extremely busy -making it hard to coordinate schedules-and more troublesome was the actual time it takes to compete in 50,000 hands!

Now over two years after the first durrrr Challenge began against Patrik Antonius the two are still 10,000 hands away from completing the match. And with a second challenge in progress, Dwan and Daniel ‘jungleman12′ Cates are moving at a slightly faster, but still snail’s pace.

The Biggest FAIL in Recent Poker History: The “Post You Were Waiting For”

In February 2008 David Sklansky made perhaps the strangest, creepiest, most thoroughly bizarre post in online poker forum history when he detailed his personal relationships with a couple of young women. If you don’t know the story, you simply have to read the entire post as each sentence is more bizarre than the next.

As one 2+2 poster stated:

“WTF?

Just WTF?”

Apparently Sklansky thought it would be a good idea to just “come clean” about his relationships after the late Brandi Hawbacker tried to blackmail him by releasing bits and pieces of his personal life.