Hi folks -
I want to address Perfection's post individually...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Perfection
I dont think anybody doubts that the rake paid (as in, total money taken from the tables) has decreased compared to last year with the new changes.
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In fact, a vocal minority have claimed to doubt that very thing. We have spent a great deal of time and energy trying to prove that.
Quote:
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But when we talk about 'effective rake,' which you specifically mention, we are taking about rake paid minus rakeback ie. the total amount I pay to PokerStars to play poker there.
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To the question of effective rake: in
my original post in this thread, I pointed out the following two things:
- In January, we reduced the VIP rewards by 1.5%-2.0% of our total rake.
- In February, we made rake structure changes which reduced our incoming rake by about 3%.
Quote:
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All players care about is 'effective rake.' If a site charges twice the rake of Stars but offers everyone 100% RB, you can trump out your 'we take less rake' argument all you want, but everyone would be playing over on that site.
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Proof by WPEX.
To your comments about what we said back in December and January, let's go back to the original posts. On
December 28th, 2011, we wrote:
The total number of VPPs given out as a result of each hand is the same using the ‘weighted contributed’ and ‘dealt’ calculations. While each player is different, overall the weighted contributed method will reward players with lower VIP statuses more and players with higher VIP statuses less.
And then on
January 1, 2012, we wrote:
It’s difficult to predict accurately how much savings will this change generate, but our preliminary assessment, if play remains the same, is in the range of 1.5% to 2% of gross rake for the ring games. We planned to use this money to reduce the rake and invest in marketing and other initiatives that bring recreational players to the site.
It is true that we never explicitly said that the total reward value was going down in the original message, but the two sentences from the December 28th post, taken together, pretty clearly implied that the total player value was going down. Particularly in light of the discussion that broke out when other sites changed to WC, we thought that everybody would get to that point immediately. But we never implied or stated a denial of the overall reduction in value and we provided the amount in a post just four days later.
I'll grant this: we could have done a better job with the original message. We certainly regret making the announcement as late as we did; we'll never do that again. As it worked out, things were a bit frantic, as we had many wheels in motion - both making specific decisions about what we were going to do and how to explain those changes. All of that wrapped right around the holidays. Also, we could have been more blunt about the changes we were making rather than trying to soften the blow. In retrospect, I wish we had done that. But we
never lied or misled about anything.
Look, we are going back and forth arguing about who said what five months ago; we all have more productive ways of spending our time. As I noted in my OP (though not without some assistance from my colleagues), we've made a number of changes that were requested by the players, including some rake reductions. Changes such as these don't come overnight, but they are happening. Furthermore, we are still listening and looking for ways that we can make PokerStars a more desirable place to play poker.
It is time to move on. Let's have a constructive conversation that benefits everybody rather than a verbal war of attrition that leaves everybody exhausted and only a handful of people reading.
We do,
deeply appreciate your playing at PokerStars.
Best regards,
Lee Jones
Two Plus Two
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