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Joint strike on the 1st–3rd of December .... (REGISTRATION), other Amaya/Stars protests Joint strike on the 1st–3rd of December .... (REGISTRATION), other Amaya/Stars protests

11-30-2015 , 12:09 PM
count me in, georgexploit, supernova 15$sng's
11-30-2015 , 12:10 PM
Corba2301 MTT ABI 10$
Josip1313 MTT ABI 15$
Pantelija1 MTT ABI 15$
Malisha13 MTT ABI 15$

Writing for them cause they don't have 2p2 acc.

Last edited by BanicIvan; 11-30-2015 at 12:16 PM.
11-30-2015 , 12:15 PM
in. 11mn1886 7$,15$ sngs
11-30-2015 , 12:16 PM
In

KTPOKP ( HS HU NL Cash , Supernova )
11-30-2015 , 12:16 PM
RPerfumo, HU and 6max NL400+
11-30-2015 , 12:17 PM
In. $100 spins
11-30-2015 , 12:32 PM
thanks_m8, plo z200&500
11-30-2015 , 12:37 PM
sharkh0
MTTs abi ~20$, 40k vpps this year
11-30-2015 , 12:45 PM
Hi, I'm in.

Ceewyl (plo z50-100, 200k vpps in this year)
11-30-2015 , 12:51 PM
in . donkeycarl husng 60$
11-30-2015 , 12:54 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by biceps
It should also be stressed out that anyone joining not only stop playing but also don't participate in any promotions, no matter how sweet they look.
I've thought for a couple days now that the best thing to do would be to withdraw a significant portion of ones roll and then logout and not log back in until 12/4. ****'em until it's over.
11-30-2015 , 12:55 PM
I'm in, playing a live series instead.
Naslund44 - ms mtts
11-30-2015 , 12:59 PM
In

Majo360 - stt 7$ - 15$
11-30-2015 , 01:02 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by blopp
You guys should make an offical twitter account about this strike, so people can follow it more closely and also get information about updates, time to it start, milestones archieved etc.
agreed

Quote:
Originally Posted by sandr1x
tiny url.com/strikestars (delete the space)


this really should be called a boycott and not a strike

one of the definitions of a strike:

a concerted stopping of work or withdrawal of workers' services, as to compel an employer to accede to workers' demands or in protest against terms or conditions imposed by an employer.

Boycott

to abstain from buying or using
11-30-2015 , 01:20 PM
mamamamama70 nl1k->
11-30-2015 , 01:22 PM
Butttters8 plo50
11-30-2015 , 01:24 PM
Amaya stocks down 2.16% today... keep up the boycott!!! Make the giant pay!
11-30-2015 , 01:25 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by SageDonkey
These are now very impressive numbers who have joined the boycott on Dec 1st and no doubt it will lower the traffic significantly on the site but I don't think it will stop cash games starting at Pokerstars' target market of weaker to average players playing smallish stakes, it will just mean there are less active tables and smaller pools in Zoom.

When the number of boycotters reached about 700 there was a noticeable sudden safety in numbers effect, obviously because when the numbers were lower and just building some players not yet enrolled were more wary of damaging their account in some way by joining the action.

I don't have the desire to do a full analysis but speed reading through this whole thread, this is still largely a cash game players' boycott.

There are many MTTers on the list but I feel they are joining as an act of solidarity and because any restoration of previous rakeback etc will help them as well but I am not convinced that MTTers will go the whole 9 yards and properly commit to a week end boycott etc, as MTTers have way more to lose by "biting the hand that feeds them".

Indeed, I randomly looked up, on Pokerprolabs, some MTTers enrolled in this action and found some for example whose last 10 games played on Stars included 5 or 6 sats to EPT/PCA/UKIPT live comps which means that some MTTers even if they do carry on the action would be clearly cherry picking their disdain for Amaya/Pokerstars.

I watched Dani Stern's podcast with Joe Ingram and I have total respect for his work on getting a better deal for players and I had some Twitter exchanges with him in which he was very polite and in which we exchanged views in a nice way.

The area in which I think there is a possible blind spot on the part of players, or either an unknowing or possibly a deliberate lack of recognition is that, any player who is not a net depositor is in effect paying zero rake to Amaya.

So it makes no difference at all whether you have a trillion VPPs lifetime or are SNE or anything else, if you are not a net depositor then other players are paying your rake.

Yes the rake deducted from MTT buy ins or cash game pots per session is eating into your ROI but if you are not a net depositor that is all it's doing as it's the losing players who are paying your rake for you.

So be it as it may that Amaya apparently have very little empathy for pro poker players or for the last 15 years of growth of poker as a legitimate mind sport profession or for the stable future of any of this, and that the way they are bringing in changes may be bordering on dirty, their rationale is that net winners are simply not paying them any rake in effect, so they are trying to address this somewhat by reducing rake back benefits and therefore diminishing the ROI of winning players.

Amaya are relying on enough disgruntled players eventually accepting a lower ROI on their current playing volumes and/or players increasing volume to achieve the same bottom line P & L but at a lower ROI.

The point that Dani makes in the podcast about Amaya dissuading winning players having the effect of reducing liquidity as you need winning players/grinders/pros/aspiring pros to open cash game tables and to bolster MTT fields, I think *is* the one big area where Amaya are taking a big gamble.

It has to be true that even if a lot of cash game players take their ROI being reduced on the chin, that a substantial amount of players won't be able to take it on the chin either financially or psychologically and will change playing platforms or give up pro/full time poker all together.


I mainly play on Full Tilt and it is very noticeable there that there are way fewer cash games since they removed the option to open tables and rail them and to see who was at each table and table select, and Full Tilt's non NLHE and PLO poker variant games have virtually disappeared all together.

So yes they have lost loads of cash games, but bear in mind most/many of these cash games were at higher stakes with either pros playing pros but only being charged <$3 per pot in games up to $1K/$2K (so rake similar to that charged in small stakes games like $1/$2), and many of the other higher stakes cash games and poker variant games were tables of 5 pros and 1 fish (or 4 and 2), with the fish getting destroyed.

So if all of Amaya's strategies are deliberately planned and thought out, and not guess work, then it appears that they don't particularly want to offer games or stakes that rake relatively small amounts compared to the size of the pot, or where the playing edge is too huge for the pros.

For sure, by them doing this it is killing a lot of the romance of the game and the excitement of the game and discouraging the dream of cash game players to one day move right up the stakes to play nose bleeds and generally to be able to build some financial security for themselves through poker.

But perhaps Amaya are not at all bothered by this because their desire it appears is to mainly rake micro, small and medium stakes cash games and to put their main focus into earning tournament juice and to encourage their account/player base to also spend money on casino games and on other forms of gaming.

They of course have a huge advantage with on line MTTs and the promotion of these and the procurement of new players by their very strong position in the live poker market place, and if you guys are going to start your own poker platform then in my opinion a live poker tour along side it is essential from a marketing, growth, visibility and credibility point of view.

A big unknown is if Amaya trying to kill off a lot of the bigger predators at the top of poker food chain will have a significant trickle down effect on the volume of smaller cash games and if it does whether they can recruit new account sign ups fast enough to compensate for this.

I along with some others on this thread have given some of our view points, one of my main ones being to all start your own poker site to challenge Amaya's market domination, but at the same time I do respect and admire the collective action everyone is taking but I am still not sure if it will have a positive long term effect.

It will certainly be very interesting to see what Amaya's next move will be after the boycott and I wish you all well with the outcome.
Excellent post, you bring up a lot of points that need to be discussed more thoroughly

If you are correct about this being largely a cash game players boycott, then we do need another one in which MTTers and Cash Game players both take a stand and send a strong message to Stars

You hit on something really big here, on what seems to be Amaya's perspective on us, something that I think a lot of us haven't really thought out too much, that us pros are not "Net Depositors" and it's the fish who are paying the rake, not us.

Quote:
Originally Posted by SageDonkey
For sure, by them doing this it is killing a lot of the romance of the game and the excitement of the game and discouraging the dream of cash game players to one day move right up the stakes to play nose bleeds and generally to be able to build some financial security for themselves through poker.

But perhaps Amaya are not at all bothered by this because their desire it appears is to mainly rake micro, small and medium stakes cash games and to put their main focus into earning tournament juice and to encourage their account/player base to also spend money on casino games and on other forms of gaming.
I think you're right. Poker isn't as big as it was before, it's much easier to argue that raking Small-Medium cash games is a much safer sustainable alternative than allowing high stakes to run.

It's the easier choice to make than to think of ways to reinvent the game such as incentivizing pros to play against each other and improving the edges for fish, etc.

I like your idea of players getting together and opening a poker site but that one seems too idealistic to pull off, where would we even start?
11-30-2015 , 01:30 PM
jntjntjnt200 PLO200 -> 10/20, IM IN!
11-30-2015 , 01:32 PM
in, RayJing. HSNL 6max
11-30-2015 , 01:32 PM
Im in. For the future of online poker!
cassiopak - midstakes mtts
11-30-2015 , 01:34 PM
I'm in

Mainly z500 (plo), Supernova
11-30-2015 , 01:37 PM
In

HU PLO 400-10k, mrw8419
11-30-2015 , 01:39 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Syous
Excellent post, you bring up a lot of points that need to be discussed more thoroughly

If you are correct about this being largely a cash game players boycott, then we do need another one in which MTTers and Cash Game players both take a stand and send a strong message to Stars

You hit on something really big here, on what seems to be Amaya's perspective on us, something that I think a lot of us haven't really thought out too much, that us pros are not "Net Depositors" and it's the fish who are paying the rake, not us.



I think you're right. Poker isn't as big as it was before, it's much easier to argue that raking Small-Medium cash games is a much safer sustainable alternative than allowing high stakes to run.

It's the easier choice to make than to think of ways to reinvent the game such as incentivizing pros to play against each other and improving the edges for fish, etc.

I like your idea of players getting together and opening a poker site but that one seems too idealistic to pull off, where would we even start?
I think it could be done through a combination of players' own investments and crowd funding.

It would be a big project to pull off, and very much like a game of chess, if a players' collective were to do this, then Amaya would respond in some way to try to counteract the projected effects on their business.

The biggest question for me though is whether a large new site would even be financially sustainable without it itself resorting to also offering casino games and unattractive levels of rake.

I think it is something worth considering though, with the first step being a feasibility study.

So the first logical step if players are serious about creating their own poker playing platform (open to all players to play on of course) is to raise the funds to commission a feasibility study.

The quickest route to market is to just launch a takeover bid for an existing poker provider and then once ownership is achieved to evolve that platform into the desired one.

Last edited by SageDonkey; 11-30-2015 at 01:51 PM.
11-30-2015 , 01:39 PM
In

HU PLO and 6max PLO 400-5k, deagledan

      
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