I'm not thinking along the lines of a cheating or Full Tilt scandal. I'm thinking more along the lines of a new poker site, with incentives and trust to create a mass exodus from Amaya/Stars to a new place, with an opportunity to implement rules and TOS that are current and enforceable. What are the essential elements needed to take back the mountain? What are the biggest hurdles?

And please don't say bitcoin. It can accept bitcoin sure, but bitcoin doesn't reach 98% of Amaya's current market.

If a poker site launched that:

-Had lower take than Amaya.
-Had sports betting but no casino.
-Had higher VIP rewards than Amaya.
-Did not alienate any countries.
-Had strong financial backing to ensure player balances.
-Contracted a different auditor every quarter (3 months) to ensure transparency.
-Had top flight, knowledgable customer service, so we don't have to blast problems on 2p2 and hope maybe someone will respond.
-Got 3 well respected, well known Pro's for endorsement and required them to both play and make public appearances.
-SECURITY and Smooth software with all games offered.

Please make more suggestions and then we'll start a kick starter for 4.9Billion and make it happen!!!

daydreaming

Not even if you start with the 4.9 billions investment...
We the way poker market is going at the moment, you won't even be able to have a decent sunday major

Would this be before or after the mass exodus from Walmart and Microsoft?

I dont think theres anything wrong with Stars being the market leader, they are indeed the best with the lowest rakes and best games offer, i would however like to see other existing poker sites standing up and offering a better product, at least, more professionally in order to gain some of stars traffic. I would stop blaming Amaya for everything, no point, everyone is innocent until proven guilt, many accusations were made and we dont really know how much was decided from the previous admin so, raising hatred between parts brings no value at this point, at least no for us the players.

To stop catering to poker players and start turning it into a casino...oh wait.

orrr.....they are forced to leave Canada and Russia.

orrr....the FBI work out how proxies work and well, you know.

orrr...you all notice I've left and miss me so come to play at ipoker

hmmm

sign Gus, Durrr and Isi imo

Gonna be interesting to see how deeply they cut the VIP program in 2015.

I cashed out of Ongame 2.0 and self-excluded myself for the rest of the year but doubt I'll go back in 2015.

Spin n gos, all-in crapfests, negreanu, nothing done against seating scripts, now this:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/28...rates-1484001/

Gotta get that 5 billions back but I won't contribute to it.

VIP Club Changes 2015

There is one change to PokerStars.com and shared liquidity VIP Club rewards effective January 1, 2015: players earning 1 million VPPs will no longer be rewarded with $5,200 in WCOOP/TCOOP/SCOOP entries. Players who earn 1 million VPPs in 2014 will still earn this reward as advertised; in fact some have earned and used this reward already this year.

A substantial review of the PokerStars VIP Club was carried out this year. Significant changes are being considered for implementation in 2016. Details will be available in the second half of 2015.

In specific countries where regulation and taxation comes into effect, we will continue to reduce VPP multipliers, VIP Stellar Rewards, and/or Milestone Cash Credits. PokerStars UK and PokerStars.bg are two countries for which rewards will change slightly in 2015 as a result.

------------

Looks like we have one extra year before major net negative changes to VIP program.

One thing is for sure though. The fact that Stars has almost exclusive monopoly on the poker-industry is very unhealthy for the environment in general. We need more competition to start growing.

ALL it would take would be for internet gambling to be completely legalized in the U.S. and "CaesarsPalacePoker" or "MGMPoker" or "WynnPoker" setting up operations with rakes identical to PStars.

If that were the case I believe most players would prefer playing on a site regulated in the same way and by the same bodies that regulate casinos in Nevada with the knowledge that their money could always be claimed against an actual B&M entity if there was any problems.

Throw in FPP points that could be used or cashed in at the actual Vegas casino (with an equal ability to make deposits to your internet poker account while in the casinos in Nevada and the reverse) and PStars would soon become an also-ran.

I am surprised at the stupidity/corruption of the US government each day that passes in which this does not happen.

All it takes is for us to create a collective group, or union, and speak with our wallets. That forces a company to change immediately, or face massive losses.

Point in case Bank of America when it rolled out its monthly fee for debit cards. Everybody complained and a lot were ready to speak with their wallets and close their accounts down, and they snap changed their policies and apologized.

That is the only option consumers have, is to create a union, so they can speak with their money. Otherwise, we have no power against them, and they will never give in to our demands.

Are u starting a union? I'm all for unions.

At least you'd have one member.

One massive hack and a lot of missing money.

I guess what I am asking is, if you were an emerging site, trying to take on the Amaya monopoly, what would you do better? What would you do the same? What work it take to get a notoriously unmotivated group of individuals to play on a new site? 25% deposit bonuses every month? Major online pro endorsement?

I think there are much more sustainable models that better extend and grow the poker economy than what Amaya is doing. Normally, a walmart or Microsoft as suggested, have value in the products they provide. You can't take away the money Microsoft already made off of windows or the PC, even if the whole world switched to Linux and macs. However, Amaya's worth is completely tied to player account balances and the rake POTENTIALLY produced by those balances in the future. If 50% of player funds were transferred to another site, or just out of Amaya's greedy hands, the value of the company would immediately suffer proportionally. Granted the software and servers and the headquarters all give the company value as well, but nothing close to it's player balances. We absolutely could hit them hard and make them feel it immediately.

Either
a) you offer poker in the UK and not in any of the black markets
b) you offer poker in the black markets and not the UK (or other countries that may copy elements of the UK's licensing regime)
c) you offer poker everywhere on the Bovada model and hide in some country you hope won't extradite you but basically lack consumer confidence.

By the way, the above is the reason why there is opening up a lot of space for other companies to grow and develop in the rapidly increasing number of non-Amaya markets. They are losing their world monopoly anyway.

Basically, if Amaya dismantles the things that made Stars the industry leader and someone else implements those things they'll lose their market domination, otherwise they won't.

While there have been some worrying signs, unless Stars decides to double their rake, segregate their player pool, remove VIP programs/rakeback and stop advertising to new markets then they'll probably be okay.

Unicorn with brand of your new site to every VIP member. That should do the trick!

Low rake card rooms would do it for me, like in eastern europe, though i am fine w mexico, south sea brazil, vietnam, and south mediterranean. Malta and the uk has high costs problem, though less to no tax problems. Even card rooms as its still gambling.

Would be nice to leave stars dealing casino games, that i consider illegal, and am not one bit happy its now a casino or so.

Rake live is too high even in places like india and is hardly going to get lower in asia, so not much hope but it isnt impossible in eastern europe, partly run by corruption and mafias, as about everywhere, down to albania and italy, and some of the countries here are not euro so smoking and so could be allowed, though they wont be eu then, ever. Maybe russian card clubs, though the bigger cities are costly, but i think their casinos are in siperia or so now, making it lagging enough tourists. But i hope only card rooms and being skill games, in low rake places where even i might deal cards for the good salary.

What online site? Cant be some party etc. company, but more like a club, there being lots of clubs, and in some countries poker is a skill game. Then if all go just right, we have those clubs. If i had enough money, i would start to look into it, as well as figure out how to get the tougher rooms running and what the rake should be, like 2% plus vips, max per month and year, running ones.

What site now, well, cake could pay me out, anyway, i have raked at least a couple times of what i have there, been sold to intertops, and that would keep me busy there for a couple of years at least, the rest being about them.

Sportsbook that has an additional poker room with the low rake thing. Though i know sites w casinos and sportsbooks have went down w lack of poker action but i just cant believe it.

Maybe a mafia run card room in some cheap country, the problem just is that they are no humanitarians.

wat

It'll happen about the same time my aunty grows balls and becomes my uncle.

It wouldn't take much at all if there was a viable market for online poker. Pre-BF, Pokerstars was #1 and the market leader, but it's not as if FTP, UB, PartyPoker (pre UIGEA), etc weren't making a killing, and FTP and UB were run by morons. Of course, poker in general was much more popular in 2004 than it is now, and the market could bear so much more.

Still, it seems like PS having a good product is only a small reason why they absolutely own the market, and a lot more has to do with circumstance (Black Friday, UIGEA). I mean, pre-BF a lot of people preferred FTP's software and skin, so it's not as if the PS product/brand is so much better than their competition's.