Both in this vote are limit players.

I'd be very concerned if NDA was so broad. I hope we see the NDA before arrival so we can know for sure. I expect it is to prevent us from discussing the specifics of their business and the numbers we will have access to, but not the general outcome of the meeting. We will be able to report back on the broad successes and failures of the meeting, I don't think our lips will be so tied that Stars can just claim we wanted something we did not.

If we were so restricted, I would have issue in the meeting taking place.

No, just 2-3 days of discussions with the goal of coming to an agreement on rake structure changes that will bring a slight rake reduction to all. I'm sure Stars has some specific concessions in mind.

Beyond that, I think it's a great opportunity for PokerStars to get very detailed customer feedback from one of their most important customer groups that make up an integral part of their liquidity. And it's a great opportunity for this community to nominated representatives to give that feedback.

both should go

THIS

Was gonna snap vote the earlier date, but I thought that was a bad idea in the long run and went with hood. Don't want most of the panel to be made up of SNE nits, Hood just better represents my interests imo.

+1, both seem like they would be very good representatives IMO.

Just to clarify for undecided voters: neither candidate is either an SNE or a nit, so far as I'm aware.

voted for hood for the reasons I stated in my previous posts (good overall knowledge and analytical skills, up to date with the industry and its developments etc etc)

this would be great!

Steve told me many days ago that he would get me the NDA to look through. I even asked him publicly in the thread(s), but still, there has been no reply. I am not getting on a plane before receiving the NDA.

Neither person is a SNE and both play limit.

I choose Sect7G, because I am a Low Limit FL player and I think he could represent our interest the most. And Pokerstars Steave said that we should have sent an FL player. And Hood wrote some days ago, that he could not be the best FL representative, he would go as a general player advocate:

But actually I like Hood's ideas as well, I just dont really understand why would he go INSTEAD of Sect7G, who was the only FL player among the poll winners.

Basically because I wasn't included in the original poll due to error/misunderstanding.

I would much prefer us both having the opportunity to go.

if pokertsras now backs up and asks you for 1 more member 2+2 should say:

F*** it 2 members more or nothing.

So i had a few hours free this evening so I started working on a little script to easily compare rake structures. It's a work in progress but the basic concept is it goes to your HM1 database, and pulls out the distribution of pot sizes based on filters you define (date range, # players, game type and stake). e.g:



It can then use this data to to compare different rake structures on the fly. E.g. here's a simple demo comparing 5-handed $5/10 FL in the existing rake structure:



To the proposed/scrapped pure-percentage rake:



It's all still a work in progress, i haven't checked the calcs yet so they could be off (it's a bit late here so excuse any obvious mistakes). It needs some work so it's easy to store structures and compare across multiple scenarios easily. I need some hands to test it with big bet games, that have continuous rather than discrete pot sizes.

Obviously pokerstars will have their own proprietary data they will want to use, but this should be useful for both preparation before and verifying figures with our own data.

Regardless of poll i will open source the script and i hope also release a binary so people can use it without too much difficulty (ghetto interface aint going anywhere though!). In theory it could be useful for other things in the future like comparing different structures across sites, calculating rewards etc.

+1 to both should go. Popularity contests are over rated.

Nice work Hood! This should definitely help. Being able to see frequency of pot sizes across different games/stakes will be critical to correcting rake structures.

I don't think repeating this over and over changes:

Well we're obviously not getting everything we want in 3 days. At least I'm pretty sure we won't.

So start on the 16th. Keep going (NBA took 100+ days). On the 23rd Hood showes up and gets it done.

Problem solved.

^ Sect hasn't said he can't also go on 23rd to 25th

Both should go

Yeah, I may have worded that really badly. That was completely unintentional. Sect7G (I believe) can go on any dates as well. I would certainly have no problem with both.

If Hood wins the poll as he's likely to at this point, then I don't think anyone objects to having them both come since we'd be doing it on the 23-25 anyway.

There is decent support for that idea that Stars will see, but they did already slide on letting 5 come instead of 3-4, so 6 would be a stretch. It'll be up to them.

Ah, I see then. It certainly would be a shame to see Sect7G get left off since he was so close on the last vote, and isn't that far off this time either, so he obviously has strong support. But as chisness said, they've already stretched to allow 5, so 6 doesn't seem likely.

From PS Steve at the end of the locked thread:

i think that the person that goes have to be able to look at the big picture and not only in terms of what is best for the microw/low limit players or grinders for that matter. the person that goes need to know to compair rake at different stakes, and know what is a winning player can deal with for the long run, and i think the best person for this would be Hood.

The best way to keep 'grinders' happy is to keep the recreational players happy as they are the lifeline for serious players who are essentially competing with Pokerstars for this money. I have posted many suggestions and asked for feedback on how this could be accomplished so I feel very in tune with the recreational players needs.

What is really bothering me is that Pokerstars has invited players to 'let us see their books'. I could be reading into this too much but I took from Steve's post that they were pleading poverty to us. Well not quite poverty but they wanted to show us how much they were making and show us the costs that they have to incur and tell us this is why we need to pocket the money from the switch to WC.

This would be my greatest asset to the panel and I can guarantee that no other player on the panel would be able to crunch through the numbers that are shown and or not shown and spot discrepancies as well as I can.

.

Can you please elaborate on that? I do not mean to question that you would also be a great asset to the team, I am just curious about this statement. Are you referring to numbers in their books? Are you a certified auditor/have you worked several years for one of the big 4 (and if so, do you know that no other member of this group has similar experience?)

Or do you mean number crunching in general (did you study statistics more than any other member of this group?)

stand alone your statement just seems a little bold and weird imb.