I just read Decent.Bet's white paper: https://cryptorating.eu/whitepapers/...whitepaper.pdf

There is quite a lot of sensible stuff in it and what appears to be a good business model for Decent.Bet coin holders. The problem is that it doesn't convincingly show how they were going to get a big volume of players, playing on their platform. It mainly talks about how as a coin holder you receive a percentage of the profits from these losing (imaginary) players. It does mention a marketing budget, but trying to break into such a competitive sector as online gaming and sports betting is extremely difficult.

Probably the only way to ensure quick player acquisitions is by offering extremely good free money or free bets, or spins, sign up bonuses, that have no or very little play through or wagering requirements, which of course is very expensive per player acquired. And this strategy may have worked quite well 15 to 20 years ago but nowadays it just gets exploited by most account openers and therefore player retention after the player has grabbed the free $20 or $30 etc is very low.

So all Decent.Bet really did was raise a large amount of capital with the IPO of the coins, which they spent on a multitude of different set up costs while bagging 18% of the circulation for themselves for free. It does say that the 18% was locked for 1 year, so looking at the price chart here https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/decent-bet/ they may not have made that much at all for themselves because the price tanked after a year, unless they went short on an exchange to lock in good prices, which is possible, although I would lean towards them not having done that, or very much of that, because every new crypto project seems to believe that their coin is going to the moon.

Regarding, Phil Hellmuth, as you say he does quite regularly take a role as an ambassador for various things, some of which don't perform well.

I just wonder, that perhaps when he does this if he has been insisting on the company he is working with putting something in the contract that either 100% indemnifies him against any possible legal action, or some similar type clause that maybe doesn't indemnify him as such but that categorically states that his endorsement of the product or service is solely based on facts that the company has attested to him are true. Such a clause, if it is possible to have one like this, and if this is how he does things, I think might be a powerful legal document for him to have should he ever be sued as an ambassador for something that he sponsored that then went wrong. It would be an "I acted in good faith" document, in one's defence.

Do you know if either or both of the things I described above can exist as clauses that can be put in a contract to protect a celebrity endorser and if they ever are in such contracts?

P.S. The total market cap of Decent.Bet is currently a miniscule $9,350 based on 188 million coins in circulation. The crazy world of new crypto projects.

It almost seems worth buying the lot and turning this project around!!!

Adding to the above post, obviously the owners took in all the cash they got from the IPO sale of coins so they may have pocketed a lot of that if they didn't spend it on development costs, running costs and marketing.

I think the IPO was at $0.18 meaning if the starting number of coins was 188M, it may have been less than this, that they raised an incredible $34M.

How did this kind of valuation that was taken up by investors even happen?

It was a company entering a very competitive sector that had zero customers and zero brand recognition, and possibly had no industry expertise within its ranks, being valued at $34M?

I realise that some of the valuation was "blockchain use for other gaming companies" potential, but it was still utter nonsense IMO, for the main reason that anyone can create a similar coin with similar blockchain technology.

Dunces. You need to get out the forums and get yourself in some PHD programs. You would excel at writing theses

Feels like I'm in a 20/80 here. 20% your complimenting me, 80% it's sarcasm.

*you're.

I was at their presentation/marketing push at the Aria. There was NO real plan on how to develop the "gaming" side of their proposed use case.

Their entire "gaming" pitch featured, seriously, an old, physical three reel slot machine. Their "gaming" expert spewed complete crap in my opinion. Absolutely nothing about anything in online usage for their coin.

I saw it as a cash grab in an ICO, something pretty common in crypto at the time,

Thereafter the investor expectation simply seemed to be , "you know, CRYPTO to the MOON".

Doug has redeemed himself today. His latest youtube might be the funniest poker content out there

Does he apologise for telling his loyal followers they should invest 50% of their net worth in an obviously extremely -EV crypto coin? If not, I doubt he has redeemed himself.

This................is an amazing video

I always had the impression Berkey was a total muppet. No surprise.

Polk made a funny video, so all the people he ripped off is now forgiven. The poker world is more cringe than ever.

If Henry Kilbane thought Josh Arieh was bullying Christoph Vogelsang.........I can't imagine what he thinks of this

Not sure how someone can rip you off without forcing you to do whatever it is you think caused you to get ripped off.

Doug, like many investors of the last decade, has proven he doesn't understand how DD is performed. This is no different than the business owners who didn't vet their bank at SVB or RE investors who took floating rate debt as JPow literally told ALL that rates would be going up continually. When sh** hits the fan, they act like history has not already taught us these lessons and attempt (sometimes successfully) to whine their way into a bailout.

In conclusion, I think Doug has returned to his roots by leaving crypto behind and doing something within his wheelhouse, such as trolling people online in hilarious videos, putting out good strategy content, and running a poker room.

If you lost money on Coinflex because of Doug, you should not be mad at Doug but mad at yourself. Remember: if it sounds too good to be true, it almost always is

the shots at berkeys co-workers was a bit over the top

I'm not dumb enough to listen to a grifter on the internet who is schilling a crypto scam. He knew what he was doing.

doug shilling scam tokens was proof he has no morals. now him attacking others is him being bully and trying to distract from himself.

doug polk is fine to scam his fans!

Scam/scammer most overused word in recent times.. let’s save that word for the actual scammers

The irony of a doug polk fanatic saying this in defense of doug polk is too much to contain

yea lul, literally scams his fans with a #scamcoin (many other influencers have been prosecuted for this recently!) then 1 week later calls robby a cheataer

I’m willing to entertain actual proof Doug is a scammer or bad guy. I have no dog in the fight other than standing up for what’s ethical.

People are complex and maybe doug did shill coinflex to his fans. But my bigger picture stance is that Doug usually stands for what’s right.

W all the actual scammers out there to go after doug seems unproductive.

The coinflex thing doesn’t sit right with me bc one guy didn’t meet margin call now Doug’s a scammer and anyone that points this out is a fanatic?

Especially since Polk is just as vulnerable to being deceived or failing to have enough financial knowledge as the investor. If you fail to do your own due diligence because you assumed Doug had omnipotent knowledge by the definition and use of the word in this forum you are also a scammer, a self scammer.

Could Doug Polk's actions re: CoinFLEX be characterised accurately as scamming? I don't think so. As you say, it may even have been an honest (exceptionally stupid) mistake! What bothers me is, if it was an honest mistake, why hasn't he apologised?

If you told loyal followers to invest 50% of their net worth into a scam coin[1], and it was an honest, stupid mistake, wouldn't you apologise to those people? Why has Doug not apologised?

[1]flexUSd can't be called anything else after CoinFLEX willfully misused the funds that were meant to form its backing in the insane, uncollateralised loan to Roger Ver.

He basically alluded to the fact he felt bad and wanted to apologize but couldn’t bc that could open him up to litigation.

Anyone saying he should have done more due diligence has never been scammed by someone for a meaningful amount. Purposeful deception is very hard to detect.

I’ll go as far to say they had to lie to Doug to get him on board in the first place. Very likely books could be faked. I have first hand experience with people having two sets of books and faked expenses.

Again my experience is irrelevant and Doug could have known more and maybe I’m missing the spot on this one and will gladly flip given more information.