Poker Player Pledges to Donate 100% of His WSOP Winnings to Charity

Michael Karnjanaprakorn, an entrepreneur from New York, has come up with an interesting proposition. The player has agreed to pledge 100% of his World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event winnings to charity should he be able to raise enough funds to pay for the $10,000 buy-in.

His fund raising effort recently went live on KickStarter (a site dedicated to helping people raise funds for creative project) under the name “World Series of Good,” and already the player has raised nearly $2,000. Karnjanaprakorn hopes that by donating all of his winnings to charity he can encourage other players to donate some portion of their future winnings to charities, “the real goal is to encourage other poker players to donate at least 1% of the winnings to charity too. (In 2009, the WSOP awarded out over $175M in tournament winnings.) Who wouldn't pledge at least 1% if there was someone else pledging 100%?”

If Karnjanaprakorn is able to raise the $10,000 buy-in, he will receive some of the best training on offer. Not only has Rafe Furst agreed to help but Annie Duke herself has also stepped up to the plate and so has “Poker After Dark” host Ali Nejad.

Karnjanaprakorn has chosen two charities to be the main recipients of any of his winnings. They are the Langston Hughes Academy and Bad Beat on Cancer. The latter should sound familiar to poker fans. Founded by Furst and Phil Gordon back in 2003 as part of the Prevent Cancer Foundation, the charity has raised over $2 million from players who’ve agreed to donate a portion of their winnings from tournament events. Poker players who’ve already dedicated 1% of their winnings include Phil Hellmuth, Andy Bloch, Phil Ivey, Howard Lederer, Chris Ferguson and Duke.

Those who donate will get some say in where the money goes. Those who donate $1,000 or more will get to decide what charity they want 5% of the money to go to.

If you’re interested in helping out the cause or just want to see exactly what it’s all about then click here and see the full “World Series of Good” listing on KickStar.com.