Online journalist Rich Ryan, who was one of many journalists this week writing about the Nolan Dalla expose on the part veteran poker pro Dewey Tomko allegedly didn’t play in an op-ed article by Bill Byers in the Press of Atlantic City (see previous report) startled everyone this week with a counter claim from anti-online poker activist Jim Thackston.
Having read Ryan’s contribution to the growing debate on the article, Thackston used a series of Twitter posts to claim that Tomko willingly shared the byline with Byers after sitting down with Thackston and reviewing edits.
Speaking earlier to Nolan Dalla, Tomko had vehemently denied this.
Thackston tweeted:
“I’d like to take an opportunity to clarify the events surrounding the Tomko-Byers op-ed. I sat down with Dewey at his office to discuss the op-ed. He pointed out the changes that should be made and, with the condition that edits were made he agreed to author the piece. He didn’t want to be the one to pitch it to newspapers. I asked him if he was willing to share the byline with Bill Byers and have Bill submit it. He agreed.”
Thackston does not confirm that any changes required by Tomko (assuming his version is correct) were made before publication.
Unfortunately for Thackston, who is a supporter of Sheldon Adelson’s Coalition to Stop Internet Gambling, his honesty has been questioned by the recent release through the PPA of emails that suggest he wanted to sell his anti-collusion software to major online poker firms and only turned to the ‘dark side’ of seeking a ban on internet gambling when he was rejected.
Dalla wrote in his expose on the authorship of the Press of Atlantic City op-ed that, if this deception is true, everything Thackston and Byers have presented on the subject is thrown into question.
“”Someone is lying. Someone is making things up. Someone needs to be exposed a soon as possible,” Dalla rightly observed.