blonde poker forum

Just got an email saying BF are to move to Ipoker - looks like Ongame will be just about finished if that happens.

sigh i quite like betfair on ongame. being on ipoker will just be same old same old i believe :(

Might have to try the Fast Poker out on this.

Any idea when the change is happening. I don't seem to have an email about it/

Sigh, looks like everyone jumping from the Ongame ship.  Its a shame, I think its a way better network for MTTs than Ipoker and Party before the Bwin Merge.  Hope they do something to recover.

It just stated

Dear David ,

New Betfair Poker on iPoker is about to arrive at Betfair.

Offering more players, more tables, cash games 24/7 and a greater range of tournaments - not to mention Speed Poker - New Betfair Poker will be an amazing experience.

New Betfair Poker will be the largest recreational network, and you'll be a part of it.

Watch this space – the future is just around the corner.

The New Betfair Poker team


http://www.casinochoice.co.uk/2013/01/07/betfair-to-leave-ongame-for-ipoker/

Betfair will offer Playtech’s iPoker products to all of its players this month, as it prepares to migrate all of its poker operations to the Playtech-owned network from Ongame by July 2013.

Poker players at betting exchange Betfair will soon have two poker sites to choose from. “New Betfair Poker” on the iPoker Network is set to go live later this month and will run alongside “Classic Betfair Poker”, which will continue to be provided by Ongame.

“New Betfair Poker” will offer customers enhanced tournament options, more tables to play on and more recreational players to play against and will include the increasingly popular “Speed Poker” feature. The iPoker network site will also feature a selection new, but as yet unnamed, promotions and a rewarding loyalty scheme. New players will also be offered a selection of sign up bonuses.


“Our intention has always been to offer our customers a rewarding and varied poker experience,” said Sam Hobcraft, Betfair’s Director of Gaming. “Launching “New Betfair Poker” on Playtech’s platform will help us to continue to achieve this goal. It’s a world-class product, offering unique and innovative features. This coupled with Betfair Poker’s renowned community and loyalty offerings will help us better retain our existing player base and attract a new audience to Betfair poker.”


Roei Gavish, Head of Playtech’s iPoker added, “We’re delighted to announce Betfair’s migration to iPoker.com. Our network continues to see positive development from both a liquidity and technological standpoint, which not only benefits a large operator like Betfair but also secures Playtech’s leadership in the Poker B2B market.”


iPoker is currently the fourth largest poker platform in terms of active players and currently has a total of 6 million customers.

Is there much of a consensus as to which is the best poker site for a 1/2 level player that likes to sit down holding circa £150?

all v similar imo but if you play on ipoker make sure you play on a ipoker2 skin (will hill, bet365, paddys etc) as otherwise you get a restricted player pool for $2/$4 and below in NLHE

Plo and 2/4+ nl aren't affected by this.

They are still on ongame till 2013

Really bad hangover? iPhone mistake? Not sure if you mean 2014?

oohhh, middle of 2013 then :D I thought it was the start of 2012 and they had 18 months left :D

After the departure of bwin which merged with Partypoker in late 2012, I think most big sites will leave Ongame as there is not that much liquidity anymore as close to 50% or even more of the liquidity was provided by bwin.

So I think this is a positive move for Betfair.

Also means more recreational players on the iPoker network.

:)

Next biggest skin on Ongame currently after betfair?

Betsafe maybe? Not sure

betsafe is gigantic yeh, but slowly moving to microgaming, they are already doing the dual network option. every room should do dual netowrk really.

yeh i dont understand betfair completely uprooting from ongame, just keeping up both options would be best.

Not from the business perspective. It means they have to pay TWO lots of Network Charges for roughly the same amount of traffic, so their gross margin gets severely diluted. That makes no business sense whatsoever, imo.

We should not forget why they run a poker room - to earn margin, & feed liquidity to the other platforms on their own Site via cross-sell.  

Wont be long until there is just 2 networks i think.

Bring back Tribeca  :'(

Not sure I understand that - network charges are a % of rake usually, no?

They're usually a sliding scale, so you pay proportionally more if the total rake is lower, as it would be if you were splitting your traffic between two sites. There are usually also minimum payments, regardless of rake.

Only part of them are Margin-based, some of them are Fixed Fees.

If you split liquidity between two networks, the fixed costs of the Room WILL rise as a % of the Margin* generated.

* "Margin" = total Rake & Reg Fees. Which you know, obv, but not everyone may describe it in those terms. 

You realise Tribeca is iPoker?

I think betfair probably only runs a poker room to stop their players playing poker elsewhere. I doubt they are focused much on cross-selling from poker.

http://pokerfuse.com/news/poker-room-news/betfair-goes-live-ipoker-22-01/

I think Suzanne means the old Tribeca software and community. I found it clunky tbh (tribeca that is)

Errrm, no. Tribeca was bought by Playtech which own ipoker. It is not the same thing.

<3 the Tribeca software.  Happy memories...

Ah OK, misunderstood the point. Thanks. And yep anyone craving 2007 software probably has rose tinted specs on.

Ermm, yes, I know that. And redsimon already covered this point in a more helpful way.

To clarify, I was just trying to point out you can't bring back something that already exists (the players and clients) and is owned by someone else (the software). But I got the wrong end of the stick in terms of what she was saying. My bad /derail

I certainly do.  It was a million times better than the software Playtech replaced it with :(

You think it's better than the 2013 version of ipoker? Genuine question. My memory of poker software back then was that nothing is as good as the worst network now. But I could have whatever the opposite of rose tinted specs is.

Im pretty sure we used to get loads of posts saying Tribeca crashed tourny cancelled on Blonde back in the day :)

They were definitely trying to make fortunes from poker in the early days.  Just because all the evidence points the other way doesn't make it untrue.

Sure. I don't doubt that for a second. I meant now.

Fair point.  I know the shareholders were expecting a bit more when they moved from crypto.  Has been a bit of a downward spiral since then.  Shame really, loved the old independent Betfair poker. 

I don't play on the 2013 version of ipoker.  But I can safely say that the quality of Tribeca back in 2006 was closer to PokerStars 2006, than ipoker 2013 is to PokerStars 2013...

With Betfair on Ongame you would get points on the exchange that reduced your commission rate.  They have stopped this with the ipoker version.  As a company they really do try their best to drive customers away.

It's a system issue. Contact them about it - they can credit points manually.

Will Ongame go under now? Was playing on Coral as 'JACK ELLWOOD' and it moved to ipoker, went back to Betfair and they're moving aswell. What skin is likely to stay Ongame for the forseeable future??

Great move dtd

DTD are good, but not that good.

This is the Betfair thread, I suspect you intended that Post to be on the thread linked below.


http://blondepoker.com/forum/index.php?topic=60341.0

goalwin.com

As you said, rose tinted specs but I recall absolutely hating ipoker and even now I dont like it much. It has improved hugely since back then obviously but I dont like that so many sites are joining the network. Its a bit like Asda and Tesco pushing out the competition and closing down the High Street.