Diary of a Poker Diva - Liz Lieu

This blog is going to be a little different than some of my previous entries. I wanted to talk about the Twitter phenomenon and how that has impacted my life but also get some feedback from you as well. So, I hope you guys participate in this and give me some feedback.

If you aren’t already familiar with Twitter, it’s a free social networking and micro blogging web site. Tweets as they are commonly called, are text based posts up to 140 characters long. You can follow somebody else by clicking on their profile and clicking “follow”.

If you follow me at all, you know that I Tweet regularly. (or at least I try to)  I also post poker updates when I am playing in a tournament through Twitter. I can update my tweets directly from my blackberry phone, so it’s easy for me to post updates on big hands or chip counts. And occasionally, I snap a photo and post that as well. It’s a way for me to send and receive message.

I was just curious how many of you reading this blog use Twitter and what are your overall thoughts about it. I personally think it’s the single best social networking tool. I chat more with fans and friends via Twitter than I ever have through email, Facebookor MySpace. I don’t know why it’s more conducive to back and forth chatter but it really is. Other people tell me they feel the same way.

I actually came across a YouTube clip of Ashton Kutcher on Larry King Live and he was talking about the benefits of Twitter. If you don’t know the back story. Here it is. Ashton Kutcher was on his Twitter account one day and he realized that CNN only had 25,000 more subscribers or “followers” than he did. He thought that was pretty amazing because never before in the history of mankind did a single person have the type of following as a major news network.

Ashton thought it would be amusing to issue a challenge to CNN and see who could get to a million subscribers first. Subscriptions are “free”. You don’t even need to do a friend request like you do on Facebook or MySpace. You simply find the person you want to keep tabs on and click follow. However, the person on the other side does have the freedom to “block” you. Most people don’t actually block anyone. And celebrities and news organizations almost never do.

Back to the Ashton Kutcher challenge. Well Ashton did beat CNN to 1,000,000 subscribers and Larry King invited him on his show to congratulate him on his victory. The part I found intriguing about the challenge was the significance of Ashton Kutcher having more followers than CNN. In the past, celebrities never really had a way to defend themselves against gossip, rumors, etc. Except for the occasional press release or interview.

Twitter comes along and gives everyone an opportunity to have a bigger voice. Not just celebrities, but really anybody. In the interview with Larry King, Ashton mentioned how much more in touch he was with his fans. He would find himself messaging back and forth with some guy in Iowa that he had never met before in his life. It was a completely different level of connection. And Twitter gave him the ability to say exactly what he wanted to say throughout the day, completely unfiltered. If a media outlet quoted him wrong. He could tell his 1,000,000+ followers instantly that the news story was wrong.

On a lesser scope, I’ve kind of experienced some of the same stuff. I find that I’m much more connected to everyone. I can keep people posted daily on stuff that is happening in my life. I try to avoid the really silly updates like what I am eating or what I am watching on TV. Sometimes I don’t really have anything to post but I still try and keep from boring you guys to death!! I don’t know. Maybe you guys want to know that stuff? LoL. Let me know!! But as much as I can, I try to post interesting or noteworthy stuff on my Twitter. Some of it is just silly or uninteresting and really depends on my mood. But most importantly, it’s my voice. It’s what I want to say and tell everyone that particular moment of that day.

There is a downside to all of this social networking, however. I know people who have become kind of addicted to Twitter. They spend more time on Twitter posting tweets than they do living their life. I was talking to a friend of mine who has a Miley Cyrus crush. Don’t ask!!! Lol. And he mentioned to me that Miley Cyrus had 2,000,000 followers at one point on Twitter and quit recently, because she was getting very addicted to it, posting as many as 40 tweets per day and she was accumulating stalkers and news organizations that were quoting her Twitter account as gossip news stories. Basically using what she posted on Twitter against her. Eventually it became too much for her and she posted a 1 minute Rap on her YouTube account, explaining why she quit Twitter.

Even during the Kanye West and Taylor Swift debacle at the MTV Music awards. Later that night, news organizations were pulling tweets off of Kanye’s twitter account posting his response to what he did earlier that night. I’m not nearly as famous as Kanye or Miley but I kind of understand why Twitter can be a distraction or how it can possibly be used against you. So, I kind of have this love/ hate relationship with Twitter right now. I like keeping in touch with my fans. I like keeping people updated on stuff. But I also have had a couple of negative experiences with some people who might pursue me a little “aggressively” and because of the public nature of Twitter, it’s hard to screen them out.

I also have to be careful about posting too much personal information on my Twitter. I am still a very private person at my core but because of Poker persona and my relationship with my Sponsors, it’s also important that I stay connected with people and stay visible. And I do enjoy it, mostly. So how many of you are using Twitter? How many of you like it? How many of you dislike it? I would love to have this conversation with people if you want to do that. Post your comments below. I want to know what your thoughts are.

I also want to let you guys know I will be in Vancouver, B.C. next week for the BC Poker Championships. I went last year and stayed in a Penthouse Suite with Lacey Jones, Tiffany Michelle and Maria Ho. We had a ton of fun and even went out a couple of nights to Vancouver to party with close friends. Daniel Negreanu won that event and we celebrated with him afterwards at a private party. Lots of big names came out to play in the event at the River Rock Casino in Richmond, B.C. in 2008, so I’m hoping a similar field will come out in 2009. And if you follow me on Twitter, I will keep you posted on chip counts and tournament updates. So, stay tuned!!

Cheers!

Bonjour everyone! So much going on this month, I am not sure where to start. I’ve been playing a fair amount of poker in the last couple of weeks. I spent some time at the Commerce Casino playing in the limit games and I also played some poker online. I plan to play some more this week to warm up for the Dream Team Poker Tournament March 27-29.

The Dream Team Poker Tournament takes place at Caesar’s Palace and is a team format. Every team is made up of three players and a ton of big names have committed to the event. Including Mike Matusow, Phil Helmuth, Jerry Buss, T.J. Cloutier, Tom McEvoy, Dennis Phillips, Todd Brunson, Jerry Yang, Jamie Gold, Kenny Tran, Shawn Sheikhan, Actor Mehki Phifer, Hoyt Corkins, Tiffany Michelle, Quinn Do, NBA Player Chris Mills, Jeff Madsen, Joe Sebok, Maria Ho, Lacey Jones and a ton of other well known players.

More than 100 teams are expected to enter. You can view the format or get more details on dreamteampoker.com. It should be a fun event and I haven’t participated in many “team” formats so this should be pretty interesting. My team is made up of Quinn Do, Matt Stout, and myself.

So, what else is going on with me?? Well I want to report that I am officially a trendsetter!! LoL. Actually my friend Chesty Kemper called me this, because I’ve been trying to get him on Twitter for the past year. He told me this week he saw Twitter being featured on the TV news 2 times and once on MSN.com as the newest craze!! I told him he would be addicted to Twitter because he’s pretty good about keeping up on his facebook account. I tried to get my girlfriend Lisa on Twitter as well. Both of them have refused to participate on Twitter out of stubbornness and Chesty admitted to me last week that it’s becoming tougher because so many people are joining Twitter every day.

Liz Lieu Twitter

I also want everyone to know there has been a Liz Lieu Fan page created on Facebook if you haven’t had a chance to check it out. I approve of the page and I encourage those of you who are not linked to my facebook account to go there. I have had a ton of requests to my Facebook account lately and I am only adding friends. I feel like I need something personal for me. People can get a hold of me on my website and myspace among other places and I want to continue to keep my facebook page for my friends and family. I hope nobody is offended if I turn them away. 

Liz Lieu Fan Page

So what’s going on in this crazy topsy turvy world? Hopefully we’ve hit rock bottom on falling stock prices. It was good to see the stock market go up for a couple of days last week. It was getting pretty depressing. On top of that, AIG is paying out more than $160 million in bonuses to company executives after they received almost 200 billion in bail out money from tax payers!! That was crazy. Congress just passed a bill to tax them at 90% to penalize their greed. It was about time somebody in govt. did the right thing to stop some of this nonsense.

This economy is affecting everything! I’ve noticed the bigger games are starting to slow down and Vegas suffering a little bit in their tourism. I’ve been playing at lower limits than I have in the past just to get a good game. I also spend more time online because the games don’t last as long or run as frequently as they used to 3-4 years ago. I might need to look for another job!! HaHa … JK!

I don’t think I would make a very good employee. I’ve been playing professional poker since I was 18 and have always been self-employed. I don’t know how long I would last taking orders from somebody else. I was going to play in Bay 101 but the week before that tournament, I was running so badly online and live cash games, so I decided to take a break and play in the Caesar’s event instead and prepare for my trip to Monte Carlo for the EPT Grand Finale. Before that I will also be participating in the Five Star World Poker Classic at the Bellagio right after the Caesar’s event.

Keep an eye out for me on the poker updates. I’ll update everyone soon and hopefully I’ll have some good news to report. And don’t forget to add Twitter!! If you haven’t heard of it yet, you heard it here first. And yes, that includes you, Chesty and Lisa!! You know you want to do it!!

Cheers!