Quote:
Originally Posted by SageDonkey
This is not a well thought out business model IMO.
There is a lot of free poker and free poker content out there. E.g. PNIA, Live at The Bike,
Kings Casino, Pokerstars Championship, Doug Polk YouTube, Alec Torelli YouTube, Joe Ingram Podcasts, Twitch streamers, free training videos, and various poker Vloggers. This is quite a crowded space.
Not to mention here on 2Plus2 and other poker chat forums, Poker Twitter and Poker News web sites, etc etc etc.
Plus TV shows that most consumers have already paid for through their TV/Cable/Satellite such as WPT, WSOP, Pokerstars Championship, Shark Cage etc. High Stakes Poker is also mooted to be coming back with a new series.
So I don't see many people paying a subscription for just a small portion of the total available content that is out there, other than a small number of total poker fanatics, and some top pro players for whom observing their adversaries' play is essential.
Most apps and services nowadays seem to be free, to gain a big subscription base, and then monetize themselves with premium paid for content options and advertising or sponsorship.
So for poker, which let's face it in the grander scheme of things is quite a narrow market, I don't see a paid for subscription service for only a small percentage of the poker that is out there, being too popular.
Also, a lot of potential subscribers are busy playing poker themselves a lot of the time, or busy with other work or with their personal lives, which is why free content is appealing as you can dip in and out of it when you want to and when you have time.
This right here.
Who has time to watch the limited original content, and can also afford it? I honestly can't believe they think they have enough to charge people for it. Especially when the majority of people who fall into this tiny group already know how ****ty Poker Central is. Whole site is often down, sound rarely works on the app, search function is practically useless, it doesn't save your place in videos(when u could be watching a 6 hour session and it has to buffer all over again each time you open it to get to the video).
And that's just what I know from trying to watch a couple of the Aria Cash games. I would put them at about 6-1 dogs to actually improve on the WSOP live stream experience.