Gambling Guide

Poker television programs have been extremely popular in the last several years, especially in North America and Europe. This has especially become the case since the invention of the "pocket cam" in 1997 (and its first use in the United States in 2002), wherein viewers at home can see what each player has.

History

Poker has been appearing on television somewhat regularly since the late-1970s. In the United States, ESPN started airing the World Series of Poker (WSOP) as an annual one hour event around this time. For many years, the coverage was less than robust because viewers at home could not see what cards the players had. Instead, the coverage essentially involved the commentators guessing what cards the players had.

This all changed in 1997 with the introduction of the hole cam in Europe and later introduction into the United States in 2002. The hole cam was patented by WSOP bracelet winner Henry Orenstein and first used in the Late Night Poker television series. It was used again in the inaugural Poker Million tournament in 2000 which boasted the attraction of the first £1,000,000 poker game on live television.

The usage of the hole cam expanded from Europe to North America in 2002 when it was first used in the coverage of the 2002 WSOP. The World Poker Tour (WPT) was formed later that year and began airing in 2003, attracting numerous new poker fans and leading to increased numbers of entrants to live poker tournaments and increased investment in online poker.

Since the introduction of the hole cam, poker has become almost ubiquitous in the US and Europe. Whilst poker started on sports channels such as ESPN and Sky Sports has expanded to such "non traditional" networks as Bravo and GSN. Most of the shows that shown are poker tournaments with the exception of GSN's "High Stakes Poker", which shows a never ending cash game. All of the poker programs make heavy use of the aforementioned pocket cam plus a general format of a "straightman" and a "comedian" type, often a poker pro.

Poker's growth in Europe led to the creation of two FTA channels: The Poker Channel and Pokerzone. Both began broadcasting during 2005.