February 14, 2011
Are books still of value to a poker player?
After the comments I received regarding my first post i thought i would put down my thoughts on books and wether they would still be useful today even though we have wonderful video sites and forums like deuces cracked...
When you consider those that have been playing for a long time would not have had access to resources such as DC's video's as well as the 2p2 & DC forums. What a lot of the older players would of used to learn would be books. I'm sure a lot of the coaches originally studied the books and a lot of their idea's of play probably started with the older books and then evolved as they learned. I have found more then once that after watching a video on DC; I proceeded to read a book and suddenly i could see what the coach on the video was talking about. By studying what others have studied or being exposed to the information in a different form it re-enforces it or helps you to learn the material better.
Can we learn everything we need from the video's alone? I'm sure we can. However one thing I do find is that things are not always covered in an order. You can watch a beginner series like "From the ground up" and get almost everything you need to know; Then combined with asking your questions in the forums you can get a very good grasp of things. Books are structured in a different way and often present information in different ways.
I think books are still valid as a learning material in poker especially the older ones that have a history of being read by those that came before us.
No knowledge is wasted. All learning is beneficial. You may not believe some of the things you read and that's fine, you just take what you need and expand on it. If something you read in "Super system" conflicts with something you see on a DC video you are probably more likely to think about it and make up your own mind. You are free to try both methods or create your own hybrid.
I don't think books are outdated. They may contain many things that no longer apply but that does not make them outdated and/or useless. I think they are a valuable addition to your poker study along with the video's and the forums. If you don't like reading books then there is more then enough in the DC video's to teach you to become profitable however you will possibly learn things to a deeper level if you read the great books as well. Just as a military officer studies past battles and ancient wars.
Please comment with your thoughts.
