Top News – Isildur Is The Word, PokerStars Bring Home Games Online

This week we've got some very important poker news to report so let's head straight for the titles. Two largest poker sites PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker have announced the launch of some new site features that in their own words are both going to “revolutionize online poker as we know it”. Revolution or not, but the new toys are definitely worth your attention. PokerStars introduced the beta version of Home Games – the ability to start your own poker club on Stars and invite your friends over to play. Full Tilt, on their part, from now on allow users to multi-table the same tournament when taking part in the Multi-Entry Tournaments. Last week has also seen one of the biggest online poker mysteries being reviled – the identity of Isildur1 is no longer a secret (if it has ever been).

Isildur's Identity Finally Revealed

The online poker sensation of the end of 2009, Isildur1 has recently signed a deal with PokerStars and became the member of the site's pro team. However, as none of the PokerStars pros has yet managed to keep their identity a secret (mostly because none of them actually tried to), it was just a matter of time before all of the poker world would discover who the mysterious swede really was. Although the rumors of Isildur's identity have been surrounding the high-stakes psycho the whole time, no one could tell for sure that Viktor Blom was the real Isildur.

So when the man from behind the curtain appeared at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure stage during the Day 1a dinner break to play the $50/100 heads-up match against another PokerStars pro Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier, there were quite a few people in the audience (but most probably none), who were surprised that it was actually Viktor Blom to take Isildur1's seat at the table. When asked whether it was a relief for him to finally reveal his identity Blom replied: “I think a lot of people have known for a long time who I really am, so it doesn't make a big difference to me. But when I signed for PokerStars I felt like it was the right time to reveal my identity”.

You can read more on Isildur1 becoming Viktor Blom and a short interview with him at PokerNews.com.

Blom in Tax Trouble?

After revealing himself as the online poker nosebleed madman Isildur1, Viktor Blom might get into trouble with his native Sweden's government. According to Dagens Industri (http://di.se/) Blom could be under investigation by Skatteverket (Swedish Tax Agency) for 1 billion Swedish kronor or around $150 million in US dollars. Although Blom has moved to London last year in order to avoid being taxed for his online winnings, he still played for around $4.5 billion untaxed money while living in Sweden.

Apparently the Swedish tax system was the main reason why Isildur kept his identity a secret for so long and has finally decided to move to London in order to avoid paying taxes for his future online winnings. However, it didn't release his from the taxes for the past cashes. The Swedish government authorities are now leading an investigation on the online poker companies operating outside the country and the European Union as according to the Swedish law all the winnings on such sites must be charged with a 30% tax rate. Full Tilt Poker is considered to be operating outside-EU therefore Isildur's $4.5 billion turnover had to bring $150 million to the Swedish budget.

So wheather Blom will be fined with a multi-million tax bill or will he come out clean is still unknown. However, this sends a clear message to all Swedish high-stakes players – if you want to keep the winnings to yourself, don't play at home.

Home Games Go Stars

Another big news coming from the PokerStars side this week was the launch of Home Games. You may have already noticed the biggest poker news and affiliate websites being painted with PokerStars colors and saying “Home Games” all over the place, which signals that the whole thing is actually a big deal. So what all the fuss is about?

First of all Home Games is based on the idea of your regular poker home games, only played on an online poker site. Each PokerStars member is allowed to start their own Home Games club and invite up to 50 friends to join it. Every player can also join up to 3 clubs set up buy their friends. The club can host both ring games and tournaments and players can choose from all the types of poker games available on Stars. Players who set their own poker clubs can not only name them, but even put that name on the felt.

So Home Games is like the new best thing in online poker and if you check out the poker web – it's everywhere. PokerStars have really big hopes and expectations on this and apparently have put a lot of money and effort into the whole deal. If you want to give the hottest new thing in online poker a try, head to PokerStars now and check it out.

Full Tilt Launch Multi-Entry Tournaments

However, Stars are not the only ones with new cool features. The biggest rival Full Tilt is catching up with a different, but still a very interesting update – Multi-Entry Tournaments. The news is that form now on all Full Tilt tournament players will be able to enter the same tournament multiple times. Users can buy-in to the same tournament more than once with each entry being seated at a different table which means that the system under no circumstances would allow the same player to play at one table with two different entries. However, if the player happens to have more entries than there are tables left in the tournament, two entries would merge and stacks would combine. The entry to get removed from the game would pick up whatever cash prize would be due for being eliminated at that point.

This is definitely good news for all the Full Tilt tournament maniacs as well as those playing tournament poker on other sites, but seeking new ways of playing online poker as well as new challenges. Multi-Entry Tournaments are available in a variety of different tournament formats, including Rush Poker, Knockout and Rebuy variants. Just like most of the other Full Tilt features, Multi-Entry Tournament have their own icon in the main lobby which identifies the tournament and shows that it allows multiple entries.

To check out the new Multi-Entry Tournaments all you need to do is download Full Tilt Poker and start a new account, if you don't already have one. Being one of the largest online poker sites and with all the pros on the team Full Tilt's definitely the spot to be when playing tournament poker online.

And that's that for today. Next week we will come back with even more Top News from the ever-exciting world of poker.

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