Should increase their membership dues to 50$ and instead start showing people how to effectively lobby better.

Instead of the low cost model of like a 10-20$ membership or voluntary donations...there should be more of a forced membership fee yearly that is higher....

That higher fee would then allow the PPA to pay professional lobbyers (cough cough ) to teach the average poker enthusiast or hobbyier poker player how to negociate and influence and communicate better.

This could be done in the forms of more extensive efforts by the email crew at the PPA etc in terms of kind of distributing the higher end lobbying work that they do unto the more average poker playa?

Thoughts..

PPA is a group of professional lobbyists, why do you want them to recieve more money to get 0 accomplished?

A better idea- PPA refunds me the membership dues I've payed over the last 5 years.

It's not like that a $50 membership fee would change anything. How many members does the PPA have?

If you are talking about effective lobbying, you reach the 8 digit neighborhood very fast.

Well the strength of the PPA is the base. It isn't so much about getting huge lobbying dollars to the top...its about making the average member of the base more effective.

I could be way off too cause politics and lobbying is all about the benjamins.

If lets say 30 more dollars a year were contributed to the PPA's fund...

and they lost x amount of members for it...and they shifted their resources spent towards using emails and already people there as full time workers for the PPA to teach people how to communicate better instead of they themselves lobbying...I think they would be a little more effective.

Although its hard to cause lets face it...the average person who wants to sit down to play poker wants nothing to do with politics normally.

AAdynasty

what you suggest makes sense.


slightly off topic but its sad that in most other countries lobbying goes by a different name.

almost everywhere except america its called corruption and people go to jail.

For some reason here in 'murica we call it lobbying and it feeds many pockets and leads to a dysfunctional govt. nobody goes to jail.

Call lobbying what it is.... legalized bribery, pay to play.... corruption in most other parts of the world.

/rant

Sign me up to pay $50 so that the PPA can have more money to be absolutely ineffective. I mean, what could go wrong with "daily action plans!" that include super sick emails to the most conservative lawmakers who would cut off their toes before supporting online poker.

Need to be a little more public imo

Well now the ppa is opposing the California poker bill. Seems like they only have poker stars best interests at heart. To a California player any internet poker is better than none.

wait, wut?

if true, could someone from PPA explain.

I remember playing at Commerce with 2 of these guys and I made some statements about online poker having some issues (no regulations, kids playing the game) and we went back and forth (they were nice guys). A week later Black Friday happened. If either of you happens to be reading this, I was right

didn't follow it closely, but the 'most promising' assembly bill was changed last minute and got a 'bad actor' paragraph. PS and the partners (morongo band of indians if i'm not wrong and some of the biggest card rooms) now say gtfo, b/c they want to earn money too.

PPA says #sad just b/c PS spent prolly more than a $50 fee and b/c it's prolly not in the best interest to let some other lobbyists dictate, what's okay and what's not (second part is obviously up for discussion ^^)

tl;dr: many different group with different interests tried to focus on one goal, some saw the chance to get rid of a competitor within the last minute and did so. PPA can't live on angry nvg posts, facebook likes or retweets, so someone has to pay the tab

@PTLou humans are coin-operated and Amaya pays the PPA's bills.

Amaya continues to make such short-sighted changes that I'm convinced the company's strategy is just to "flip" the PokerStars asset as soon as possible.

At this point, I have to think there is online poker fatigue creeping into the CA legislature, and you have to wonder how much longer people will pay attention to an issue that perennially goes nowhere.

A company with a long-term plan would realize that there is more money to be made in entering a California market 5 years late than never entering it at all. That's without even mentioning the possibility of CA driving other states - where Amaya could compete right now - to do the same.

The only reason not to let this go through is a fear of having to respond to a potential buyers question: "Why should I pay this price when you aren't even in the largest US market?" sometime in the next five years.

based on @nerds and @trustin's posts above, assuming they are mostly accurate, then the PPA is dead to me and needs to change its name.

If in fact, PPA turned against the CA bill because of the bad actor clause for Amaya, then PPA is misrepresenting themselves to individual members who donate to them thinking they are helping promote online poker in the U.S. If I had I sent money to the PPA, as a player, I would feel scammed.

what am I missing here ?

any response on this from PPA?

1) Did you in fact lobby against CA Online poker bill once bad actor clause was inserted?

2) What % of your revenue / donations came from Amaya in the last 12 months?


P.S. From Amaya's perspective, I guess I could argue either way on supporting a bill with 5 yr ban, vs scorched earth on bill if they are excluded from market.

I'd like my money back as well. Back in the Party Poker days, when you cashed out, there was an option to donate to the PPA before you pressed confirm. I donated a lot. PPA is complete and utter dog****. Worthless.

I can't take it seriously when the head guys name is Rich Money.

Based on it's actions over time PPA is a Pokerstars (+Tilt etc) lobbying organisation dressed up as a player interest group. It needs a low membership fee so it can pretend to represent large numbers of players. Pokerstars gets PPA to argue that poker is a skill game while it promotes the lowest skill forms of poker like spin and go, blurring the line with casino etc.

This is their spin fwiw:

The Poker Players Alliance (PPA) is the leading non-profit membership organization representing American poker players with the goal of establishing a safe and secure place to play poker. Formed in 2005, the PPA’s membership has grown to nearly one million poker players nationwide, enabling the PPA to serve as the unified voice on behalf of Americans’ right to play poker in all its forms.

On Capitol Hill and in state houses across the country, the PPA works with key lawmakers to raise awareness of the issues impacting the U.S. poker playing community and promote sensible public policies that benefit and protect all American consumers online and offline. As the recognized expert on the game of poker, the PPA is also an established legal resource, taking the argument that poker is a game of skill directly to state and federal courts.

The PPA’s mission is to establish favorable laws that provide American poker players with a secure, safe and regulated place to play one of America’s oldest past times[sic]. Through education and awareness efforts aimed at policymakers, the media and the public, the PPA will keep this game of skill free from egregious government intervention and misguided laws.

As the most prominent voice of the poker player community, the PPA is empowering thousands of enthusiasts across the country to deliver positive messages about the game and why it should be protected to federal, state, and local elected representatives. On behalf of our broad membership of American poker players, the PPA will defend the right of poker players through advocacy work in Washington, D.C., and throughout the nation.

John Pappas told me via Twitter that they would support 'any form of the bill that provided player protections' when I asked if they would still support the Gray bill if the Bad Actors line was put back at 2006 ....

They won't accept a five year ban, but they will drag out the legislative process year after year after year. They don't seem to be in any big hurry to open the CA market, so long as nobody gets a head start on them.

So instead of Pokerstars waiting five years, EVERYONE waits, indefinitely

The one consistent thing with the PPA is that they are not interested in suggestions for change from the community. The PPA is DC lobbying firm, they know what they are doing, it just isn't what we are led to believe they are doing.

Raid

I read all your text, because you rarely post rubbish.

Honestly though the first time I read it I missed the "this is their spin" line and thought those were thoughts you agreed with.

So you agree there something somewhat corrupt in an organization like PPA soliciting money from millions of individuals purporting to promote those players interests when their actions make it clear that they in fact more support the interests of their handful of Corp customers ?

^ I should have put their part in quotes. I don't agree with it at all, just wanted to point out that is how they represent themselves. You can see it's nothing like the reality.

The quotes were taken from the PPA website ("About us" and "Mission").

Hmm this seems like a super standard mission statement though.

You are a fool if you continue to give them money after this. Its clear now that they are just pokerstars do boys. And pokerstars has shown they dont care about their players, they just care about money. California would probably be better off with their own new sites.

It did some time ago - to the PokerStars Players Alliance

When all of this first started on Black Friday I was outraged like everybody else that I could no longer play poker online. I signed up for PPA, but never got a cap,etc just more emails soliciting. And no results. I appealed to the ACLU. More solicitations, but no indication that this was even on their radar. I even suggested that the PPA engage with the NRA, since they are so successful.

I vented to all my friends about what had happened. Then I realized that no one I knew knew about or cared about online poker. They were sorry that I could no longer play, but it did not affect them in the slightest. This is why there has been no action in Washington. It is too far down the list for politicians to worry about it.

And think about it. What we had for a short time was the best of all possible worlds: poker sites that policed themselves with no government interference. We will never get a nationwide online poker site now, and if we did it would be so encumbered by regulation that it wouldn't be any good.

+1