Is poker a sport or entertainment?

Or both?

Whatever the case, America’s Entertainment and Sports Programming Network–ESPN for short–has made a bundle televising poker for the past few years.

And now it has a new angle–the Net.

Earlier this month, ESPN started an Internet poker show on its website, www.espn.com, called “Inside Deal.”

The new web-only program, which is sponsored by online poker room Poker Stars, is co-hosted by Laura Lane, Bernard Lee and Andrew Feldman.

The show features interviews with professional poker players, as well as news from the world of poker.

In addition, viewers who e-mail questions to the show about poker have their questions answered on the show by experts.

The show, which debuted on August 4, 2009, is scheduled to run for three months, which is up till the 2009 World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event final table plays off in early November.

On the show’s first episode, accountant-turned-poker pro Chris Moneymaker, who won the WSOP Main Event in 2003, was interviewed.

The show has also interviewed Joe Hachem, who won the WSOP Main Event in 2005, and Daniel “Kid Poker” Negreanu.

(E-mail Tom Somach at tomsomach@yahoo.com.)