blonde, going forward.

[tikay]

It's a real shame things have come to this but I like to think if I were in a similar situation I'd act with the same integrity Tikay and the rest of the team have shown.

Better to cut back now and live to fight another day, than put the head in the sand and run up unsustainable debts before collapsing the company and stiffing a whole bunch of good people.

As has been said elsewhere I'm sure there will be plenty informal updating going on during the most popular events - especially now so many people have Blackberries, iPhones, G-Phones, etc.

My own tuppence on the revenue (as opposed to costs) side of things is I don't see any harm in a voluntary donate button on the site, or specific threads, and I also don't see any harm in being a bit more pushy about affiliate deals - be they for Amazon, Dell, or whoever - so long as the marketing is more along the lines of 'if you are going to buy here please use our link' rather than random spam.

Exactly that. It ain't goinna happen whilst I'm here, or Tighty's here. Painful, but necessary, it had to be done.

[Djinn]

I joined blonde to help tikay with the growing demand for content and updates, and managed the latter for over a year, during which time they became pleasingly popular - we didn't know at the time that they wouldn't help generate revenue and there was such a good buzz about following heartily-supported players in an interactive forum.  While I was booking things on my own credit card months in advance, there was a sort of cash-flow truce and we managed, but times are harder now and it is understandable that the ship needs to be steadied before it can continue circling the stormy waters of the poker industry.

I would just like to agree that we have always tried to help by cutting accommodation costs etc. and am sad that interest in far-flung not-so-stocked-with-locals events is not higher.  For a while blonde was checked by a decent swathe of Americans, Scandies etc. during these big events, and there would have been huge interest if our SEO had been higher earlier or we'd found a way to advertise/get our brand known abroad.  Possibly a foreign sponsor could even have been interested.

As it is, I just want to thank Snoopy and Homer for doing the majority of the planning/updating after I became a back-seat freelancer - they did a great job and would undoubtedly do it again given the chance.  I disagree that any site's coverage is, overall, superior in spite of any lagging in technological advancement.  A boring update with a separate chip count page is still a boring update. 

Separately from the updates, I reckon people will notice the lack of results/info/galleries in about a week or so - these pages consistently got excellent hits and are possibly a less visible, but more important loss that departs with the beagle.

[Dingdell]

Is it too cheeky to ask how much a two person GUKPT or DTD update costs?

Depends on whether we were using staff updaters or freelancers

There's a daily rate for each updater, a food allowance and then travel and hotel costs

For a four day GUKPT manned by two people, one a freelancer, both needing a hotel you are looking at £1,000-£1,500. In the good old days updaters shared rooms too which helped a bit

Less for a two day DTD-er

EPTs were horrific

This is quite simply not true, I'm afraid. I have never had my own hotel room while working for blonde - the updaters have ALWAYS shared rooms, whether there were two or three of us at any given event. The number of times I have shared a bed with Floppy makes me shudder (no offence, man, I'm certain you feel the same way about sharing with me ). At Monte Carlo the year before last, Jen, Floppy and Snoopy actually shared one bed between the three of them. In addition, the freelance rate that blonde paid us was roughly half that which we got working for other update sites. Every last corner was cut with the updates, and the fact that blonde could still not pay us on time suggests some very serious problems with the business plan.

Dana I don't think anyone appreciates what the updaters do - its bloody hard work and not always as luxurious as some might think but I think the theme here seems to be that Blonde would like things to be different but there just isn't any money. It's been said for some time that the business model isn't right but without the money it's not possible to change it, it's a real catch 22 situation.

You are at the sharp end, really getting affected by this, and we all just watch with sadness/horror/sympathy but none of us know what we could do at this point in time to make it better for blonde and the updaters. I was made redundant a few years ago and it's like a berievement, with anger, sadness, feelings of rejection and helplessness and if you're feeling that it must be horrible. I'm so sorry.

I really hope that it gets sorted out, and you might not feel too charitable at the moment but if you (from the sharp end) can think of revenue generating ideas that could help pay the wages and get all you guys back on board then get your thinking cap on. I understand if you're not feeling like it right now and i for one hope to see those red pigtails at an update near me soon xx

[ariston]

chilli is a 50/50 on his own though

[Tractor]

If the homepage is not going to get updated for a while then i would definatly get it to forward straight to the forum for the time being, if new people arrive at a homepage thats out of date i doubt they will ever get to the forum.
If things change it would be easy to get the homepage re-instated.

[Djinn]

If the homepage is not going to get updated for a while then i would definatly get it to forward straight to the forum for the time being, if new people arrive at a homepage thats out of date i doubt they will ever get to the forum.
If things change it would be easy to get the homepage re-instated.

That is a very good idea.  Nothing says Unprofessional like having a main site portal that is covered in dust.

[Graham C]

Did the link up with Poker Player Magazine not have any benefit to blonde?

[The Camel]

It's a sad thing to read but I'm finding myself agreeing with a lot of what Ariston and Flushy are saying, certainly from a business point of view.   The missing money from PT obviously didn't help, but Tikay has said that even with that it wouldn't solve the problem, so what will solve the problem is the question?   Is it not an option for the shareholders to invest more in to their business while their share holdings are worth a reasonable amount?  Without some investment things don't look too good, but even with it, what's going to change to stop blonde being back in this situation in a few months time?   Asking people to pay for the updates is putting a plaster over a gaping wound in my opinion.

I do hope you get things sorted, I'd be gutted if the place was go close.

1) The place is NOT going to close. I've explained that. It's here to stay, permanent. No question, no doubts. The Cardroom is profitable, so is the Site without the Update Costs. The Forum costs 250 per month, which I have now signed up to fund personally. They both stay. The Updates & Home Page, we'll have to see "if & when". I'm hopeful we will be "buiness as usual" asap.

2) People paying for Updates. It's not practical, or viable, imo, because of how the Internet works. It's free, everywhere, & Cut & Paste-able. I've always stated this position. Paying for Updates is a Plaster over a gaping wound? Not sure about that, there is no gaping wound. We just cannot Fund Live Updates at the mo, that's all.

3) Shareholders investing more? I've invested more than enough, far too much in fact, & the other major shareholders are not active any more.

4) The Site goes foward for now as Forum & Cardroom. If more folks play on the Cardroom, we'll restore the Home Page & Updates.

Some most interesting offers from big players to play on blonde have come in this evening - huge players. Some of them said they never realised playing on blonde would help, & have agreed to start rght away.

Let's hope they do.

Many have said, in Henrik's Poll, that they are not fussed about the Updates.

The homepage is going too?

All in all, a pretty sad day.

[Graham C]

Many have said, in Henrik's Poll, that they are not fussed about the Updates.

Many have said they didn't find blonde for the updates, I expect it's fair to say that most will miss them.

[TightEnd]

I have to break radio silence here

There are a lot of misconceptions on the thread

I am aware the business model is faulty. However to change it, possibly to a super affiliate model, requires two things

a) a sum of money to tide us over while we change, via income or shareholder investment otherwise we're busto and we have a non commercial forum only. Probably a neat solution for tikay and an easy life but not for shareholders of a limited company overall

b) a potential partner. Full tilt are spoken for, Stars uninterested and what other "must play" site is there that is a cast iron certainty to make us more money than we currently do? Always allowing for the fact that a lot of blondes will be signed up already with whoever we go with

We're suffering from

a) A hugely dysfunctional shareholder base completely limiting any prospect of investment to spend on IT, marketing, promotion, player retention, updates etc etc

b) wrong, very wrong, strategic decisions in 2005-2006

Updates? I hope they are back asap. Investing in them via gizmos and the like has been investigated by me any number of times. never had the money to spend on IT, or kit, to make them competitive in that way.

I treat blonde as a business, but a business that has to take the community with it. I have a successful track record in sales, marketing and business trategy

If we had any viable options apart from what we did, we would have done it

My leaving wouldn't have helped financially, as I am hardly paid anyway (a victim of the wrong business model) and I personally am down in blonde to the tune of £12,000. In effect I have been funding updates in 2008..paying for them rather than paying myself. I can no longer afford this.

I first suggested severe cost cuts last September, and its taken five months of worsening news to draw a line under things

Through that period the person who has suffered the most, voluntarily, is myself

[tikay]

I joined blonde to help tikay with the growing demand for content and updates, and managed the latter for over a year, during which time they became pleasingly popular - we didn't know at the time that they wouldn't help generate revenue and there was such a good buzz about following heartily-supported players in an interactive forum.  While I was booking things on my own credit card months in advance, there was a sort of cash-flow truce and we managed, but times are harder now and it is understandable that the ship needs to be steadied before it can continue circling the stormy waters of the poker industry.

I would just like to agree that we have always tried to help by cutting accommodation costs etc. and am sad that interest in far-flung not-so-stocked-with-locals events is not higher.  For a while blonde was checked by a decent swathe of Americans, Scandies etc. during these big events, and there would have been huge interest if our SEO had been higher earlier or we'd found a way to advertise/get our brand known abroad.  Possibly a foreign sponsor could even have been interested.

As it is, I just want to thank Snoopy and Homer for doing the majority of the planning/updating after I became a back-seat freelancer - they did a great job and would undoubtedly do it again given the chance.  I disagree that any site's coverage is, overall, superior in spite of any lagging in technological advancement.  A boring update with a separate chip count page is still a boring update. 

Separately from the updates, I reckon people will notice the lack of results/info/galleries in about a week or so - these pages consistently got excellent hits and are possibly a less visible, but more important loss that departs with the beagle.

Thanks Jen, all agreed.

Except the last para. We plan to continue with the Results Service for the forseeable future. Hopefully we won't get it in too big a mess before we can ask snoops to come back on board. If he agrees, that is.

I really am sorry, but it had to be done. We don't share Poker Trillion's morality or financial ethicacy. We are NEVER gonna run up debts to Staff that we cannot pay. And that was where we were heading unless we did something. We had been late paying the wages several times, & the Staff did not like that one bit - why should they? - so something had to be done.

There seems to be a view that poor management caused this, Maybe it did, maybe it did not. If someone wants to take over Tighty & my roles, they can PM me. I'd gladly step aside if someone will do what I have done - guarantee the site's future, & guarantee that nobody will get stiffed by blonde.

[JungleCat03]

So you're saying that if I'd volunteered to do an update at some point, I'd have had the chance to share a bed with either Jen, Dana, Floppy or Snoopy?

I wouldn't have minded risking that 50/50.

The party starts when you throw in junglecat

FYP.

[gatso]

I may have mentioned this about a million times before but please send out a bloody newsletter. how do you expect to increase cardroom traffic and therefore revenue if you don't tell people what's going on? you have a large database, use it

[TightEnd]

If the homepage is not going to get updated for a while then i would definatly get it to forward straight to the forum for the time being, if new people arrive at a homepage thats out of date i doubt they will ever get to the forum.
If things change it would be easy to get the homepage re-instated.

That is a very good idea.  Nothing says Unprofessional like having a main site portal that is covered in dust.

I will be updating it until Snoops can come back

[Ginger]

No, the homepage will still be there, but without snoop's content being provided.

I'm sure there will be a temporary solution in the pipeline.