Who's sitting out?

[The Camel]

DTD has been looking after the recreational players properly for years. 3/4 years ago, a few of the professional regulars got together with Rob etc and we said "hey Rob, how about some rakeback (effective) scheme for the cash game players?".

He was on board and there were a few months with a great scheme that we were very happy with. The recreational players were happy with it too I think.

However the results showed no increase in cash game traffic, actually a decrease, lulls after each month (players played so much to get the monthly bonus and did their disposable £ quicker) and negatively affected the tournament numbers too (hazy about the details but as far as I remember that is all true).

Now who won? The pros? Sure, in the short term. But the games dried up and before too long the scheme was scrapped.

Maybe I'm talking out of my arse here, but in a small player pool like DTD, have we seen the affects there of SNE-type schemes under a microscope? Pro's swarm around like bees trying to get the volume in, add 3rd party software to get more tables and the recreational players get eaten up quicker.

DTD realised ages ago that the recreational players are their #1 customers, and grass-roots poker has been the focus for a while, with a trickle-up system just like DNegs alluded to (all about getting the XXL players into the deepstacks, into the UKPC, WPT etc).

And the pros? Some couldn't make it pay and have quit the game, some moved their business elsewhere, but the best ones have stuck around and made the adjustments, and are making it work, without complaints. That's exactly what will happen at stars.

(I fully understand the anger behind the communication of the changes, and get how people feel lied to and the money grab of the FPPs etc, that's all a different issue and I sympathise)

Surely it's a balancing act.

Yes, the recs are the number one priority, but the recs are soon going to stop turning up if they arrive for a game and there isn't one for them to play in.

I remeber someone on Facebook moaning because they'd driven for over an hour to DTD to play a specific tournament (I think it was a seniors event) only to discover there were only 7 players registered.

The pros start the games and keep them running. If they disappear, there will be no games for the recs to play in.

[SuuPRlim]

you are right Kieth....

IF the pro's really are going to quit, which lets be honest they will not, providing that stars will keep the recreational player pool fresh.

If the player pool was smaller like the DTD seniors event then it would be a worry for stars that there offerings might get damaged but the player pool is so vast and people will always step up. If recreational players cant find action at 10 20 anymore after the changes then likely they will find games at 3/6 instead and thats great for stars.

They've got ya, basically.

[NigDawG]

i don't understand why we need to have all these analogies online poker isn't snooker or a gym or internet explorer. they have a monopoly and they are increasing their pricing. that's about it.

[SuuPRlim]

http://www.economicsonline.co.uk/Business_economics/Monopoly.html

[doubleup]

When I was about six I got really fucking annoyed when I ran bad at Monopoly

[SuuPRlim]

Everyone has lost thier temper at some point during a monopoly game.

When only a 9 Fucks you up and you have to suffer some obnoxious  family smugly grinning at you whilst they count your money...

[rfgqqabc]

Jakally, you are absolutely wrong with the statement that only regulars are affected by these changes. Any recreational player that plays a hand @ 5/10 or above will be affected. That is probably 85%+ of hands played at these stakes...

If that's the best you can do to find other people affected apart from the Pro's, then your are clutching a massive bag of straws.

I get why you, and other people are annoyed with Stars. I think, on the issue of uncommunicated removal / reduction of benefits, you have every right to be very annoyed with them.
What I don't get is how a very intelligent person, cannot understand why people not directly, or immediately, affected by the issue, do not see things in the same way.

I would be very happy for you if you managed to get Stars to change their minds on any of this, I genuinely would. However, I think it's a waste of your time and energy, trying to get the wider poker world to do anything to help you.

Anyone with an fpp in their balance is affected too.

[Doobs]

Jakally, you are absolutely wrong with the statement that only regulars are affected by these changes. Any recreational player that plays a hand @ 5/10 or above will be affected. That is probably 85%+ of hands played at these stakes...

If that's the best you can do to find other people affected apart from the Pro's, then your are clutching a massive bag of straws.

I get why you, and other people are annoyed with Stars. I think, on the issue of uncommunicated removal / reduction of benefits, you have every right to be very annoyed with them.
What I don't get is how a very intelligent person, cannot understand why people not directly, or immediately, affected by the issue, do not see things in the same way.

I would be very happy for you if you managed to get Stars to change their minds on any of this, I genuinely would. However, I think it's a waste of your time and energy, trying to get the wider poker world to do anything to help you.

Anyone with an fpp in their balance is affected too.

I guess those that live in a hole on Mars will be badly affected, the rest have been told to cash in.

The whole strike strategy has been wrong. They have games that run now with 1 paying four times the rake of the other 5 at the table.  And the fella paying 4 is the one that keeps going.  Rather than saying we can all pay 1.5 or 2, the strike has been about we want to carry on paying 1.  Ansky admitted on day 1 of the strike he didn't really give a toss about any redistribution, and only cared about retaining his current position.  

I think people should just recognise supernova elite is terrible for the game, admit as much, and move on to try and get the rake reduced in games that will not work without SNE next year.  

[rfgqqabc]

Jakally, you are absolutely wrong with the statement that only regulars are affected by these changes. Any recreational player that plays a hand @ 5/10 or above will be affected. That is probably 85%+ of hands played at these stakes...

If that's the best you can do to find other people affected apart from the Pro's, then your are clutching a massive bag of straws.

I get why you, and other people are annoyed with Stars. I think, on the issue of uncommunicated removal / reduction of benefits, you have every right to be very annoyed with them.
What I don't get is how a very intelligent person, cannot understand why people not directly, or immediately, affected by the issue, do not see things in the same way.

I would be very happy for you if you managed to get Stars to change their minds on any of this, I genuinely would. However, I think it's a waste of your time and energy, trying to get the wider poker world to do anything to help you.

Anyone with an fpp in their balance is affected too.

I guess those that live in a hole on Mars will be badly affected, the rest have been told to cash in.

The whole strike strategy has been wrong. They have games that run now with 1 paying four times the rake of the other 5 at the table.  And the fella paying 4 is the one that keeps going.  Rather than saying we can all pay 1.5 or 2, the strike has been about we want to carry on paying 1.  Ansky admitted on day 1 of the strike he didn't really give a toss about any redistribution, and only cared about retaining his current position.  

I think people should just recognise supernova elite is terrible for the game, admit as much, and move on to try and get the rake reduced in games that will not work without SNE next year.

If stars didn't won't gain anything from changing fpps to stars coins at a none parity rate, why would they do so? They are praying on the naive. If you go to the stars website it won't tell you that they value is different.

I've said I didn't think the strike would be effective. I said I didn't want to do nothing,  so chose to do something.

Everyone who isn't exactly a chrome star is worse off. I couldn't be bothered explaining all this to people who haven't read about it

[nirvana]

Wiiiiiiiiiiiii, I'm a chrome star but don't display it to brag like

[TightEnd]

PokerStars' Lee Jones Responds to Controversial VIP Changes

video interview on http://www.pokernews.com/news/2015/12/pokerstars-lee-jones-responds-to-vip-changes-23635.htm

[tikay]

Alex Millar "sitting out" as he quits 'Stars.

Alex Millar ‏@Kanupoker  3h3 hours ago
I’d like to apologise to the players for my complete failure to be able to help in any way with the recent pokerstars VIP changes (1/2)

Alex Millar ‏@Kanupoker  3h3 hours ago
With @RealKidPoker eventually failing as well I no longer feel I can represent the company and I have now left Team Pro Online (2/2)

See @kanupoker

[Rexas]

Alex Millar "sitting out" as he quits 'Stars.

Alex Millar ‏@Kanupoker  3h3 hours ago
I’d like to apologise to the players for my complete failure to be able to help in any way with the recent pokerstars VIP changes (1/2)

Alex Millar ‏@Kanupoker  3h3 hours ago
With @RealKidPoker eventually failing as well I no longer feel I can represent the company and I have now left Team Pro Online (2/2)

See @kanupoker

wpsir, seems Vicky Coren wasn't the only stars pro with a bit of integrity.

[GreekStein]

Very much doubt I would leave one of those very cushy team online deals so hats off to Mr Millar

[rfgqqabc]

The most annoying part for me is that I think its terrible business for both me and Stars. I'm not sure how many times I can write this but I will try again. If you remove my rakeback, you are increasing the rake, if you increase the rake, you force me to look for better games, which means I will play less poker and win at a higher win rate off the recreational player. Bear in mind, the rakeback the SNEs guys get is money that Stars have already collected. Job done, they are just giving some of it back. Without this, they have to collect the money somehow, and presuming your most economically aware customers aren't going to change their habits is obviously a mistake. A SNE hyper guy will go from paying Stars 200k and getting 110k back for his income, to playing mtts and winning at a 20% roi post rake, whilst Stars collect somewhere between 7-10%. It is so so so stupid. They would do much better by encouraging poker players to play as much poker as possible instead of forcing them to win off recreational players instead of rakeback. I have no idea how they cannot see this. I also have no idea why people think they are a smart company. They leveraged capital to buy a business and then decide they need to change the whole business model to get things to work. If I tried to buy Rolls Royce and turn it into Ford would people on this forum tell me it was a good idea simply because I managed to convince someone to invest the capital to allow me to do so? They can't even handle the PR for major changes like this, I see absolutely no reason for me to think this is the best route for Amaya to take. I understand they think it is, and honestly I think I'd get over it if that was the case. I think what they are doing is burning the ship down and I'm a passenger.

Arb, they sold because they couldn't get it into America. They also wanted to stop working. I think you would think it was a lot more ridiculous if I demanded they continued working, instead of hating on the new owners. Do I wish they had sold to someone who cared about poker or had the vaguest idea of what to do with the business? Absolutely, but I'm not going to expect them to dedicate their lives to poker.

I also don't know why you expect people to not be angry. That is one of the most absurd things to me. You seem surprised that online pros are pissed off. I play virtually every site you could have access to and a few more you don't. This doesn't mean I'm going to applaud someone for making "excellent business decisions".
I'm not sure Stars will exist in five years tbh.

Listening to Dnegs on the Joey podcast its actually pretty clear they don't understand poker (as in the new execs). Which is really very very worrying they seem to be treating Poker as any other gaming product and it really is way more complex and different to the majority of casino/sports betting.

From what he was saying a bunch of stuff they thought would do X will actually do the complete opposite Y.

I think the example he gave was that they thought reducing rakeback would make SNE/SN mass grinders player differently in regards to actual style. Suddenly they thought these guys would be playing 30/10 and splashing around for some reason.

Obviously it will have next to no effect on how they play. In fact it might even make them play tighter in some spots in theory if effective rake is higher less hands are profitable to see flops with.

Similarly they seem to think removing VPPs for example at 5/10 cash will protect the fish from being hunted. when actually the opposite is very likely true. Those games will only run with a big fish in the game and he will be hunted to extinction very very quickly. Also the big fish who likes to play high now doesn't get a bit of a kickback when he does play the games.

Much better would be if they gave the fish a much higher % of RB than the regs imo but it seems they are not going down this route

By the way your analogy with ford/rolls royce reminds me of when General motors bought Saab and totally balled it up trying to make it run like GM did. Feels like Amaya is trying to shoehorn on their general business model onto Poker.

As a general aside it always baffles me how companies are allowed to raise tons of capital to buy a business and then load that same business with mountains of debt. I recall Man UTD had the same thing when they were bought out also quite a few years back now.

Its something that happens in the business world all the time. So many mergers and takeovers are unprofitable because of both the premium paid and because the incoming management overestimate their ability to manage. This case is even worse than the norm, as we have to presume the old management was successful, and even more so if like Arbboy states, that they were bringing in the changes slowly anyway. And then add to that they had spend to get the capital for the deal and seemed to pay a bigger premium than normal. They paid 11.1x Stars 2013 EBITA which is just outrageous for a shrinking market, even if it is the market leader.

http://www.amaya.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/Amaya-Oldford-Investor-Presentation-FINAL.pdf

"Brand awareness, players want Stars and Tilt to come back to US" LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. I'm sure all those Americans that had their funds seized for years are desperate to get back on Full Tilt.

Amaya's business model is fairly interesting. They do have a history of buying up poker networks and stripping them of value before selling them on to a company that they pay to take on the failing asset. They managed to  sell Ongame to NYX Gaming Group, some newly emerged Swedish firm. To do this they had to lend them the money and give a minimum revenue guarantee.

As the Corporation focuses on its B2C operations, on November 24, 2014, Amaya divested Ongame Network Ltd.
(“Ongame”), its B2B poker and platform provider, to NYX Gaming Group Ltd. (“NYX Gaming Group”).
Concurrently with the transaction, Amaya made a strategic investment in NYX Gaming Group via a subscription of a
$9 million unsecured convertible debenture, which matures two years after the date of issuance and bears interest at
6.00% per annum, payable at maturity. Interest and principal are payable in kind in NYX Gaming Group common
shares at Amaya’s option.
The Corporation derecognized the net assets, resulting in a loss of $ 32,219,000 that was recognized in net loss
from discontinued operations in the consolidated statement of earnings (loss). The Corporation has provided for the
full minimum revenue guarantee of CAD $4.2 million payable within the next 12 months

http://www.nyxgaminggroup.com/for-investors-dashboard/stock-chart-and-quote/


On February 11, 2014, the Corporation announced that pursuant to a Share Purchase Agreement dated November
27, 2013, one of its subsidiaries has completed the previously announced sale to Goldstar Acquisitionco Inc. of all of
the issued and outstanding shares of WagerLogic Malta Holdings Ltd. for $70 million, less a closing working capital
adjustment satisfied through cash consideration of $52.50 million and a vendor take-back in the form of a promissory
note of $10 million, bearing interest at 6.0% per annum payable semi-annually in arrears.


http://www.amaya.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Amaya-2014-Financial-Statements.pdf

So who are Goldstar? Goldstar are a private company that is fairly difficult to find information about. However, I did find a company filing.

http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1595949/000114036114001105/xslFormDX01/primary_doc.xml

Keith Laslop is the contact name for Goldstar and the Intertain CFO. Both building are registered within 10 minutes walk of each other in Toronto. You can see the Intertain Annual Report for 2014 here; http://2014ar.intertain.com/about


So somewhere along the line Goldstar became Intertain. Where have we seen Intertain before?

Lets go back to the Amaya 2014 Annual Statement; During the year ended December 31, 2013 the Corporation acquired subscription receipts exchangeable into
1.35 million common shares and 353,000 common share purchase warrants of The Intertain Group Limited (TSX: IT)
for a total cost of $5.4 million and 38,500 convertible debentures (TSX: IT.DB) which have a maturity date of
December 31, 2018 and bear interest at 5.00% per annum for a total cost of $3.85 million. The debentures are
convertible at the Corporation’s option into fully paid common shares of The Intertain Group Limited at any time
prior to the maturity date at a conversion price of CAD$6.00 per common share. Each warrant is exchangeable into
one common share at a price of CAD $5.00. The Corporation exercised all the warrants during the year.


This is an example of the bullshit you read when searching through these company statements.

"The company completed its listing on the TSX in February 2014 and immediately embarked on a series of accretive acquisitions. Intertain is now one of the top 10 online gaming companies globally1, the largest online bingo-led company globally, has the highest percentage of revenue from regulated markets amongst its peer group, and is a major player in M&A activity – after only 12 months of operation.*


*1 BASED ON COMPARABLE ONLINE GAMING COMPANIES WITH A SIMILAR SCOPE AND NATURE OF OPERATIONS."
http://2014ar.intertain.com/letter/overview


This got really messy really fast and I'm not sure it will make sense but I hope it provides some people information about how shady Amaya is.

http://www.sprucepointcap.com/it-the-intertain-group-ltd/

Intertain lost 20% today on the back of this. Shame I didn't look into it more.

http://www.flushdraw.net/news/amaya-acknowledges-kentucky-judgment-hints-at-scheinberg-clawback-contingency/