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Originally Posted by TheFly
All fair points Schneids, and if I'd lost in the neighborhood of ~$50K I'd still be salty too. I was under the impression when Stars bought FTP out, and with the help of DOJ, arranged for the payout of everyone's account balances that most were made whole. I know I received a check for my account balance after filling out the necessary online paperwork. I just assumed not many were stiffed since that was the whole point of the Stars buyout, right??
I thought exactly this for a good year or so after I got my money. Just figured okay, everyone got their money back, it wasn't the best manner in which that could happen (i.e. see Srsly's analogy about insurance above), but at least people were remunerated. This saga is over, right?
Then there was some article saying something like "94 percent of players have gotten their money back." It was made out to be a positive thing (which overall, it is) but the glass-half-empty side of me couldn't help but think about the other $30 million or whatever had never been repaid. The GCG remissions thread on 2+2 is a reminder that there are still some frustrated parties out there.
As for this Ferguson video...
I work in the PR business, so intellectually, I do get the whole apology statement thing. Doing one is far better than not ever doing one. There literally is no time at which Ferguson could have apologized and received any significant forgiveness from most of the poker community. If he had done this exactly a year ago, before playing in the WSOP, it wouldn't have sat much better with most of us.
That said, an apology without contrition is hardly an apology. (This is why I hate the "released statement" thing that is far too prevalent in the PR world.) If he had sat in front of the camera and spoke extemporaneously, this would have at least been somewhat easier to swallow. And for all I know, Ferguson does feel actual remorse but is simply not eloquent enough to express it. Doesn't change the fact that I hate this kind of statement.
These apology statements are almost the equivalent of "I'm just here so I don't get fined," like the person is simply fulfilling some sort of social contractual obligation. Again, Ferguson might actually be genuinely repentant. But by reading a scripted statement off a makeshift prompter, he might as well be saying "I'm just saying I'm sorry because I've been advised to do so."