TEL AVIV, Israel — Live Player Games, a software developer with labs in Israel, announces the fully functional release of Uncle Finney’s Poker, the world’s first Ethereum poker app for Android devices. The release of Uncle Finney’s Poker is the first live application of the E4ROW smart-contract, which enables players to bet and win Ether (ETH), the popular cryptocurrency. E4ROW will be launching a Contribution Campaign on May 2, 2017 at 12:00 A.M., GMT.

Poker is the single most popular card game in the world, with over 100 million players worldwide and more than 250 poker apps appearing in the Google Play store alone. Virtually all of these Android apps require that players bet virtual coins, that have no real value outside of the game environment. By contrast, Uncle Finney’s Poker enables Android users to bet and win actual Ether.

A Hybrid Solution

There has been a lot of speculation about making 100% provably fair betting games on the Ethereum platform by programming the entire game into a smart-contract. However, challenges arise when trying to reconcile the Ethereum platform’s slow block time (albeit faster than that of other cryptocurrencies) with the high speed required of a live poker match.
The founder of Live Player Games, David B. Rosen, explains, “We chose a hybrid solution, wherein our back-end server adeptly manages the flow of the card game but all the actual bets are deposited directly to — and paid out by — the E4ROW smart-contract in real-time. Our servers and our company never touch the players’ funds. This marks a major departure from the multitude of online casinos which typically require players to take a leap of faith by setting up accounts with foreign companies and depositing funds in advance of playing.”
By separating the card game from the bet management, Uncle Finney’s Poker provides a responsive and fast paced game, while providing the enhanced security of an Ethereum contract handling the escrow function -that is, holding the bets and then paying them out to the winner.

Rosen continues, “We are not an online casino or a poker website. When you deposit your funds with an online casino you need to wonder: what if the casino steals my money or my credit card information? If I leave a lot of money in my account, what happens if the casino shuts down? What if I forget my password? Will I lose my funds if the casino is hacked? At what point will they close my account for inactivity? Besides all that, when games are against the house, the casino has an all-too-obvious incentive to cheat. None of the forgoing concerns apply to Uncle Finney’s Poker: since the E4ROW smart-contract handles all the bets and resides wholly on the blockchain, the back-end server does not attract hacking. Also, the fact that the funds do not need to be deposited into some off-shore casino ahead of time makes it much simpler to start playing, and hopefully far more trustworthy in the eyes of the millions of poker players.”

E4ROW

The Ethereum smart-contract that handles the critical escrow function for Uncle Finney’s Poker is called E4ROW, which stands for “Ether for the Rest Of the World”. The goal of E4ROW is to rapidly expand the universe of Ether-users by tapping into the massive global online/mobile gaming markets.

According to Rosen, “There are literally millions of poker players around the world, and we believe that many of them would love to use their smart-devices to play head-to-head poker. By giving them the opportunity to play on their device, and bet and win real Ether instead of silly cartoon coins, we hope to greatly expand the Etherverse, which is our ultimate goal.”
Uncle Finney’s Poker is just the first app that utilizes the E4ROW contract. Live Player Games is developing additional games that use the E4ROW contract to enable players to bet and win Ether in other fun, head-to-head contests.

E4ROW is launching a Contribution Campaign, enabling those wishing to support E4ROW’s mission to purchase tokens beginning May 2, 2017 at 12:00 A.M., GMT and ending 3 weeks thereafter. Every escrow transaction handled by the E4ROW contract collects a 2% escrow fee. These fees are proportionally divided among the E4ROW token holders and payed out as perpetual distributions. While the primary goal of E4ROW is to promote Ether and rapidly expand its user base, the developers believe that the limited number of token holders have the potential to earn significant ongoing returns due to the massive global market for poker and the other games in development.

About Live Player Games

Live Player Games (LPG) is a Nevis LLC with labs in Israel. LPG is comprised of a loosely organized group of dedicated engineers who are fanatical in their mission to expand the Ethereum user base.

Learn more about E4ROW — www.E4ROW.com
Learn more about Uncle Finney’s Poker — www.unclefinneyspoker.com
Learn more about the E4ROW Contribution Campaign — www.E4ROW.com/contribute

Media Contact

Contact Name: Jason R. Stavis
Contact Email: [email protected]
Location: Tel Aviv, Israel
Company name: Live Player Games, LLC
Company site: www.e4row.com

This press release is for informational purposes only. The information does not constitute investment advice or an offer to invest.