Poker Share

Forgive us for stating the blindingly obvious, but online poker sites make stacks of cash, including pokershare.

We live in a capitalist society, so there's nothing at all wrong with that, but when a poker site decides to go all altruistic on us and share a big slice of its profits with their players – as they have at Poker Share – we quickly sit up and take notice.

The home page of Poker Share tells you that it's, "the most generous poker site on the net!" and, "The site poker players have been waiting for!" Some people might take those statements at face value, but not us. Instead, we click on the "Free Download" option on the left hand menu and wait around 45 seconds for the 5.5 MB executable file to come through. Installation of the software is simplicity itself, and we're soon entering our details so that we can open an account. Poker Share send a verification e-mail which you'll need to wait for in order to log into your account (it took about two minutes to arrive in our case) and you'll also need to provide your passport or driving licence number before you can play with real money. This might seem a bit irksome when you're keen to get started, but there's no disputing the fact that Poker Share take player security very seriously indeed, and that's got to be a good thing.

Once all the preliminaries have been taken care of, you can either deposit some real cash into your Poker Share account or join a practice table for free. Either way you'll have plenty of poker games to choose from, including Hold'em, Omaha, 7 Card Stud and 5 Card Stud. There are also dozens of tournaments to keep you busy – including WSOP satellites and feeders. Stakes in ring games range from a minimum of 0.02/0.04 US$ up to 200/400 US$.

The play environment is perfectly functional, but won't win any awards for innovation. If you can imagine looking down on a fairly nondescript poker table situated in the middle of the polished wooden floor of a school hall, you'll know exactly what this poker room looks like. The sound effects are also fairly minimal, but at least the play buttons are clear and very easy to get used to. The bottom line here is that you can play some good poker at Poker Share, but in terms of aesthetics you won't find anything you can't get on an old Nintendo 64.

Of course, Poker Share has that special altruistic ace up its sleeve, and that's the share of the profits given to regular player. This is achieved by awarding Frequent Player Points (FPPs) according to the type of game you play. You can use FPPs to fund tournament entry buy-ins and obtain other goodies. In addition, for every FPP you earn, you will also receive one Share Point. This means that you will receive a cash payout if and when Poker Share is floated on the stock exchange. The more Share Points you have, the more you can expect to receive.

It's a unique concept, to be sure, and we believe one that is well worth taking advantage of. If the company floats on the stock exchange, we'll all be quids in. And if it doesn't? Then we'll play some good poker and make sure we're quids in regardless!

Either way, no serious online poker player can afford to look the Poker Share gift horse in the mouth.

Support:

24 hour customer service is available via a web-based e-mail form.

Money:

You can fund your account by all of the usual channels, including credit card, debit card, NETeller, and bank transfer. 128-bit encryption through Thawte Security is employed to ensure that your information remains confidential