This is absurd. Why should it matter the amount of tables the player you are losing to is playing? if anything, you want to play against a 24 table more than vs a 1 tabler, for obv reasons, unless you were some kind of poker table attention whore.

HUDs are unstoppable.

As long as you allow players to have hand histories, then there will be software to managed databases of hand histories. They can still use that database even without a HUD, and the DB will be able to display live stats on current players at current tables in in it's own windows, and automatically keep it's display windows alongside the table windows.

The HUD is just a tiny piece of software that puts relevant stats on top of the poker tables themselves to make it a bit quicker and easier to read.

The only way to stop HUDs would be to stop the collection of hand histories. That itself is almost impossible, because anything that can be displayed on your computer screen can be recorded and saved in a database, etc.

But not allowing players to easily access hand histories also would promote fraud, theft and a lack of trust in the integrity of the sites. You wouldn't have guys on 2p2 being able to statistically analyze the behavior of cheaters to prove they were cheating, you could only hope that the NGC's audits and staff were so super smart they couldn't be fooled by the UBs and APs of the world, let alone rings of colluders, bots, etc.

Poker sites have a lot of tools at their disposal to change how their games play, and how profitable it is for nits to mass multi-table. First among them is their VIP programs. The FPP/VPP accelerators built into PokerStars programs is one of the big incentives for the mass multitablers, but PS can turn these incentives down or off any time they think they are bad for games.

If there is a ton of competition from licensed sites and players prefer to play on the sites that have VIP programs and game features that don't give extra benefits to mass multitablers, then PS will be forced to tweak their VIP benefits to compete.

But PS may actually have the business model right. In reality is their VIP program is an excellent replacement for Props, both because it's cheaper for them and creates more games. In live poker, Props often make way over 100% rake back in exchange for being forced to start games and work certain shifts, etc. With their VIP program, PS essentially created a cadre of independent contractors who could make a fine living, earning up to almost 100% rake back, by simply playing a ton of tables at once, ensuring that PS always has a huge selection of games running to attract casual players.

This is why "rake free" poker never makes sense as a business model. Casual players rarely care about the rake, they mostly care about being able to get action and play games whenever they want to log in. Professionals care about the rake, but in a rake free type of environment the house doesn't have any incentives to get professionals to play often, so it's really difficult to get games started. So they have the chicken/egg problem. Lots of pros would love to play "rake free" if there were games, but there are no games so no one plays. At PS there are always games, even now.

But you can reduce the effectiveness of them, such as through anonymous tables. Anonymous tables also eliminates bum hunting.

Better yet, just release hand histories after you leave the table.

don't need HHs for a HUD...all you need is to see a table and scrape the actions. You CAN reduce effectiveness as you mentioned w/ anonymous tables. Bum hunting has more than one meaning. Anonymous tables wouldn't stop me from only sitting at soft games. Anonymous tables would prevent me from chasing Player XYZ.

Again, HUDs should be up to the site, we do NOT need government telling the business how to run them. It should be up to them what they can or can't allow.

The #1 biggest reason for this is: If there is an error or something that needs to be changed... A business can implement the change as soon as they want. Government regulations?? LOL It will take FOREVER!! Don't put things like this in the hands of the government let the free market figure it out, please!

Exactly. In addition, sites can do what FT originally did with Rush Poker and later did with its regular tables, make it impossible for 3rd party sites to track players' profit.

Anonymity should make the fish feel less intimidated/stupid, and much more confidence/comfortable/welcome knowing that they don't have software stuck up their ass.

I'm in favor of sites pursing options like anonymous tables or accounts, as long as they think through the issue properly. But there are a lot of potential problems. If UB had anonymous accounts, Russ Hamilton never would have been exposed.


But the sites should at experiment with those options. I think most players won't care, because they like having an online identity.


Looks like they'll allow play from other states and from foreign players, as long as it's legal in their home state/country.

All these are good ideas, but the NGC should be writing the regs to ensure internet poker is fair, honest, and trustworthy, no more. They shouldn't try to make business decisions for the site, such limiting max rake, requiring rake caps, anonymous accounts, restrict HUDs, or multi-tabling.

There is far too much risk of unintended consequences when a regulatory body gets involved in making decisions about features, products, etc.

What if they decide the max rake should be 50 cents per hand, and it kills off every site, who did they benefit?

What if they ban multi-tabling and the sites never get much traffic or games because of it?

What if they require anonymity and ban HUDs in ways that players don't trust so no one will play on the sites?

etc. etc.

Regulaters will have their hands full ensuring that the licensees safeguard our monies, and properly test their software to ensure it's safe. They shouldn't be spread even thinner trying to force sites to use business models the market can much better choose on it's own.

Just so it's clear...I don't think anybody was advocating HUDs and such be addressed by the govt

I am referring to the organization and that would be a business decisions for the site whether to implement any kind of format that would benefit any particular set of player needs. So please leave thing like HUDs and Number to tables to the sites and not up to the Government.

Mellow Yellow brings up a very good point here

5A.110 (3) (e) implies that players will be able to wager before their registration information is verified. This is unwise.

30 days seems like an unreasonably long period for verification of registration information.

The amount of time within which an operator must comply with a request for withdrawal is defiend only as "reasonable". Some resonable specific maximum number of days should be specified.

The regulation does not seem to specify when an amount starts or stops being in a player account. IOW, it is not clear whether the reserve must cover funds in transit to or from the player, in a payment processor account. The reserve should cover the player money from the moment the player makes a deposit request until the moment the player receives the money.

Any operator who is operating with a regulatory requirement that has been waived under 5A.230 should be required to publish on its webiste the nature of the waiver.

Players found to be running bots and/or colluding should be banned from being an authorized player on any site, subject to an appeal process.

This is where the meat is, IMO.

Various comments:

This will be a bit of a change from what we're used to. It'll mean waiting to get payments processed if you want to do it electronically (as opposed to going to a casino with cash, which is allowed).

It's cool that they've considered this. I don't know that requiring it is really appropriate, and I don't think that having it happen at withdrawal is really correct. As we know, the actual danger of hacked accounts doesn't come from withdrawals (since withdrawals can be reversed easily and need to be in the name of the account holder anyway) but rather from joyridden accounts.

A more appropriate regulation would simply require sites to provide free multi-factor authentication to anyone who has made a deposit.

So that's cool. Obviously 7(a) is going to be a challenge, though...

6.120(7) doesn't allow for collecting blinds from a player who is sitting out at a tournament table:

(A "game" is defined to mean one hand of play, so it doesn't cover tournament play.)

Does this mean that me, being a resident of Wisconsin, would be able to Legally play on the site once it is up and running? I do not believe WI is one of the states that has any penalties for playing online poker.

WI is probably one of the 10 states that won't be allowed:

Illinois
Indiana
Louisiana
Michigan
New Jersey
New York
Oregon
South Dakota
Washington
Wisconsin

Not that all the others will, but even microgaming wouldn't serve these states.

Not sure why some states would opt out once all these other states start raking in tons of tax dollars.

I think the idea for limiting huds and number of tables is because bringing in poker would be more for the general public (recreation). This is not about the 2p2 community. Poker online is not going to develop into 8 regs multitabling 12 tables while 2 recreational players sit in on each table slowly giving away all their money. Maybe I am wrong but we will see.

I don't want to derail this thread as it pertains to the regulations, but 6max cash online poker is already 5-6 multitabling regs with 0-1 recreational player

ABSOLUTELY!

Dear family friend of Professionalpoker and regulation writers,

Please REQUIRE the sites to have multi-factor authentication on all accounts. This is critical to help prevent hackers from logging in to another person's poker account and then intentionally losing the victim's money.

Seemed like the HUD mufti-tabling discussion needed its own thread so I moved those posts here:
http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/20...tions-1146698/

That's consistent with what is working in France and Italy and elsewhere.

The biggest consequence of such rules is to make players leave anyway (because they don't want the hassle of completing identification).

The penalties should not be prescribed by the rules, there are many situations where "collusion" (for example) should not result in permanent barring from all sites.

The world is not black and white, there are many situations that are grey and require judgement.

This is another high cost rule that will create a heap of costs on all sites and players. It is reasonable for players to have the option of multi-factor authentication, but the vast majority of account balances are tiny and not worth the hassle. The best people to make such judgements about whether multi-factor authentication is worthwhile are the players themselves.

For example, it costs ~$96 (including shipping, handling, etc.) to deliver a RSA Security Token to a player.

ok, I retract that...make a minimum balance requirement or at least ensure the sites offer the option to those with balances above $X

Why wouldn't we let the free market decide such things? There's a huge chunk of players who don't want the hassle of such devices (I, for example, chose my current bank for various reasons, one of them being that it does not force me to carry a stupid device with me if I want to do banking) and further, there are various technologies (phone call, text messaging, etc.) that provide similar competitive services.

Currently, a player can choose a poker site on a variety of attributes - and one of those attributes is whether or not they provide different tokens. Some sites use the original RSA Security Token, some sites provide cheaper imitations, some sites provide other technologies. If you proscribe a certain technology, it also precludes new developments and someone coming along with a better idea.

I wasn't suggesting the regulations specify the type or technology of multi-factor authentication. I assumed this would include things like text messages/phone calls or I even had the iPod app for Full Tilt (though I almost always used the token as it was more convenient).

Multi-factor authentication is required to do a payout and required if you fail to login properly 3 times in a row (I believe). I don't really understand the reasoning behind the payout requirement. I can understand for login needs.

As a player, my main reasoning for supporting legislation/regulation is to get some consumer protections and get some confidence in online poker restored. It seems like protecting bankrolls would be the main issue. Stories of hacked accounts aren't going to sit well with the recreational players.

Almost no one gets money cashed out during a hack, if that's the rationale for having some sort of multi-factor authentication, it is stupid and based on a misunderstanding of how hackers and fraudsters work in online poker.

If you want to stop hackers from cashing out money, you simply require money to be cashed out to accounts in the name of the account holder. It's not rocket surgery.