Las Vegas, probably – Earth-shattering news in the poker world this week: poker forum TwoPlusTwo has been sold. OK, maybe not earth-shattering… mildly interesting, though.

When we heard the news, we assumed the buyer would be one of the biggest companies in the poker world: the World Series of Poker, or the World Poker Tour, or PokerStars, or GG Poker.

…but it turns out that the buyer is Hand2Note. Hand2Note is a heads-up display, or HUD, like Hold'em Manager or PokerTracker. Basically: it's software that poker pros use to make the game less fun for the rest of us.

If you're familiar with Hold'em Manager and PokerTracker but have never heard of Hand2Note, it's probably a good sign that you used to be a winning poker player.

The History of Poker Getting Less Fun

Poker getting less fun – and players complaining about it – is an old pastime. In the 1960s, cowboys who drew their cards randomly complained about pros like Doyle Brunson for recognizing basic strategies and attempting to form winning hands.

Over time, players who learned from the likes of Brunson developed their own complaints about younger players who – selfishly, in our view – decided to apply low-level statistics to the game.

Eventually, those players themselves began to complain about online players who started to use game theory, and then those players started to complain about the even younger players who learned advanced strategy from the likes of the TwoPlusTwo forum and the company's books.

Then those players started to complain about the usage of HUDs like Hold'em Manager and PokerTracker. And then those players started to complain about the Hand2Note and PioSOLVER users.

And… we think that's roughly where we are today. BUT WHAT COMES NEXT?!

The Future of Fun Removal

Hand2Note is one of the tools used by the current wave of players who are making poker less fun for the most recent generation of winners, but the company behind the software doesn't want to allow the next step in the evolution to replace them.

In addition to their acquisition of TwoPlusTwo, our crack team of investigative poker journalists have discovered that Hand2Note is working on the following:

• A line of scents that players can wear to make opponents gag at poker tables
• A book titled “How to Piss Off Opponents Even When Not in a Hand” with contributions from Men Nguyen, Mike Matusow, and the Ghost of Eskimo Clark
• An auto-spamming Hand2Note feature that relentlessly types nonsense in the chat box on poker sites whether the user is winning or losing
• Software that allows players to strategically disconnect their internet access for exactly the amount of time that prolongs hands by the maximum amount
• Allowing all previously banned TwoPlusTwo users to return to the forum

We'll end on a more serious note: good luck, Hand2Note team, with the new venture – we look forward to losing to your users for years to come.

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