2012: Details and Predictions
Well, the biggest news is that, according to loose modern interpretations of an ancient Mayan calendar, the world will come to an end. Other than that, we have a few definite details of what to expect from 2012…
- the International Mind Sports Association has officially recognized poker as a ‘mind sport’ and will be hosting poker among the other mind sports games at the 2012 World Mind Sports Games.
This is a major development, for both IMSA (which has still never officially indicated any interest in the game of poker) and for the ‘sport’ of poker. Aficionados, of which there are considerably more recently (not that I’m calling them impulsively trendy, of course), have increasingly campaigned to get people to call it a sport, or at least a ‘game of skill’.
- As you probably already know, the 2012 Summer Olympics will be held in London (the one in England). The Independent (the one in England) has actually stated that “the International Olympic Committee are said to be thinking seriously about” making bridge an Olympic event.
However, the International Olympic Committee spokeswoman Emmanuelle Moreau has rather unequivocally stated that ”mind sports, by their nature, cannot be part of the program.” Doesn’t sound like there’s much room to budge, but spokespeople have been known to change their tunes rather quickly with too much ill effect…
- Put these two items together, and it would be interesting to see poker become the first mind sport to be accepted as an Olympic event. Dramatic and controversial — exactly the sort of thing that the Olympic Committee prefers to avoid when possible.
Plus, if it was to be, it would have been in 2008; poker’s opportunistic admission into the mind sports realm would have served advocates much better during last decade’s trendy surge of popularity and associated media and marketing peak.
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