I don't think they where ever owners.

Signed, former Biloxi WSOP Circuit Event attendee.

I hereby state that unless all FTP shareholders and those who currently owe money to FTP and have not signed a letter of intent to repay are banned from all WSOP events this year then I will not participate in any WSOP event

Wow, this must equal two votes

They were shareholders, that makes them owners, which makes them liable in my eyes

dumb thread.
Not bad though I guess if OP is a Venetian shill.

I personally have no problem lumping helmuth and especially Duke who stuck with that site through all of it's scandals in with these guys. They kept cashing checks while all their players were lied to and stolen from. Same with Sebok and the rest of the UB and AP clowns. There are a few people that came late to that party and did not benefit or clearly were duped. But someone like Duke or Sebok that actually spent time in the public eye defending these thieves owe everyone an apology and their best effort to make right what UB and AP did to it's customers.

and this is coming from a person that left UB and AP after the superuser scandal and refused to ever play there again. FWIW I think trusting that site was a little different than trusting FTP based on their track record, but the fact is the people that ran and repped that site were just as duplicitous.

Disregarding for a moment if being a shareholder makes them liable, can you post some link showing that they where shareholders?

two points on the subject:

1) if players are made whole obviously this protest would be dropped and these players names would be restored.

2) WRT the idea of alternatives to playing in something like the WSOP, I would only support an alternative if they also supported banning these players from playing or repping a site at their event. The WSOP is no different than the WPT or the other poker series in vegas over the summer. If players aren't made whole by that time OR FTP shareholders and loan-takers haven't taken steps to make good on their debt or restoring players I expect the poker industry to take steps to prevent these thieves from partaking or profiting in our events or our game.

I think this thread should prompt everyone to come up with some more valid and useful ways to name and shame and possibly financially/opportunistically harm FTP's owners and player-debtors.

How about someone make a bunch of t-shirts for people to wear at the WSOP this year shaming these guys??? Last year someone made shirts to support online poker.. this could be the move this year?

thankfully some people are getting the impetus of this thread. People that are writing pithy or rude comments should realize the ultimate goal of a movement like this is to raise awareness. If starting a thread like this or taking action like we've suggested gets people talking about the people and the issue we have with them than we've achieved our goal. Ultimately I want players to be returned their money, alternatively if that doesn't happen I want people that stole from players to be unable to continue to profit on their celebrity or name. Hopefully we get made whole. I have my doubts. But if I turn on the TV in 2013 and FTP players never got their money and I see Ferguson, Ivey, Lederer, or Benyamin playing in televised events with patches on I think we've failed as a community. We've failed to protect the last bit of integrity that the game has, and we failed as a community to make others aware that these guys are degenerate thieves.

Why on earth would these people want to pay back the money they owe to FTP? (its not gonna help us get our money) You're telling me that these guys who had a stake in FTP and HAD a high level of income because of a smart invesment should pay back a site that is now being sold and they are FORCED to sell their shares because of the idiots running the site? I know its obviously the correct thing to do but think about the guys that put their money up to start the site and started making a ton of money from it then all the sudden they have to sell their shares because of a bunch of morons... then say oh hey BTW not only are you not making money from the site anymore (nothing to do with them) but now you have to pay us money these idiots have in their bank accounts!!

So the people that we are referring to are would seemingly be:
Phil Ivey, Erick Lindgren (4 mill each ffs)
David Benyamine, Layne Flack (2 mill)
Mike Matusow, John Juanda
(I am shocked Gus Hansen wasn't on this list lol)

And obviously Lederer, Ferguson, Rafe Furst, Ray Bitar, although I very much doubt these 4 will show their faces anytime soon

I would exclude Greenstein and Dwan at this point because at least they have acknowledged the debt and seemingly want to pay it back at some point.

I think it's hard to include shareholders that don't owe FTP money and weren't directly involved with management. The debtors at least directly stole the money as a loan. Even if they got the loan as a part of their compensation package, a loan is a loan, and should be paid back

The six I listed at the top should be targeted the most. Am I missing anyone obvious?

Also, I think it is important that people do not forget about the UB/AP management and people that may owe money to them, if any

yeah let's give FT an even worse so it is more likely for Tapie to close the deal.

GTFO OP

OP, you lost me when you said morally it's a no trainer that they have to give the money back. That's such a terrible standard in a super gray profession.

That's all nice, but this last part is where I think you're missing the mark.

Here's the worst fact of reality: there is no more awareness to create.

All of the individuals who 1) care enough about the integrity of the (online) game and 2) care enough to make a statement about it, they already know about all of this. There are no more people who could be made aware, that either would give a **** on the level of everyone else, or who are in a position where they could do something about it (legal officials, government). Everyone who wants to know, knows, and everyone left are the type that wouldn't gain anything to the cause.

Let's assume that FTP was a legit business just run poorly (which would be the best case scenario for everyone), and not a ponzi scheme like it obviously is/was.

Bankruptcy type proceedings, especially ones in a billion dollar industry (pretty ironic) take a very long time. However, Debtors (FTP) can also be creditors while they go through the process. Guys like Greenstein and others are debtors to FTP, and while FTP goes through the process, the government will take a very long time to get all of FTP's lines of credit collected into the estate before they move forward.

The thing is, being is debt is not against the law. So there are no incentives for Greenstein et al., to pay. Even if FTP sued Greenstein et al. (which could take years), and won every judgment, there is nothing to force them to pay it. Especially if they weren't legit loans that could be reported to a credit agency.

Not to mention, there is an army of people who will be paid in full before any of the players. Legit employees with outstanding salaries or wages, anyone with a lien against any FTP property, preceding awarded court judgments, and attorneys fees will all be paid in full before the players see a dime, and I promise you there are TONS of dollars wrapped up in these categories.

This is the exact equivalent of if you had a bank that took their customers deposits, and poorly lost it all in investments, went bankrupt, and then all of the customers received little to nothing after it was all liquidated. This is what created the FDIC.

The players will never be paid, and if I'm wrong and they do some day, it will be ten years down the road and it will be for a negligible fraction of a single percent or two of what you had on there because 1) the Federal government is never in a hurry, 2) there is no money, and 3) there is no FDIC for FTP.

Almost an entire year has passed, all of the awareness, backlash, etc has been made, and nothing has happened or changed (for worse, or better). There is zero reason to think this should change any time soon.

It's a grim outlook, but I've seen the process work a thousand times, and this case is no different than the rest.

a letter of intent to repay on the condition that the new ftp is paying out all players, or something like that. maybe just on the condition that all $$ repaid goes to players, not sure the wording- but something like that needs to be in there.

edit: also swop probably couldn't do this legally as they'd open themselves up to goofy liability, not quite sure tho.

\
This is such a grim outlook, but currently the best summary of the situation. I don't completely agree with your notion that players will never be paid (at least a small %), but maybe I'm just being optimistically naive.

It sounds good, but it will never work or be legally enforceable. This is because it is illegal for debtors to leverage against creditors with contingencies, and if the thing goes full Bankruptcy, it is against Federal law to manipulate assets in your estate to ensure the guys you want get the better deal get it. It is pretty amazing the wrath courts put onto companies and their agents that pay out their "best interest" relationships right before they file bankruptcy.

Obviously as poker players, we want the poker players to win out, for camaraderie and for keeping dollars in the community, but imagine all of the employees or service people who were legit, and haven't been given a dime of salary or wage they are owed, and you've got guys like Greenstien posting on here saying that not only do they have all of the money to pay back, but they're going to sit on it because he wants a bunch of guys he knows to get it instead.

Barry is a goodfella, capiche, but he is spitting in the faces of a lot of honest people who got shafted just as badly as the players, people who were not customers, or investors, or people engaging in what was long time considered a risky gray area that was possibly asking for trouble. They weren't walking any lines they were just looking for a job.

This is why you cannot promise to pay on a contingency of where the money goes. And while noble in looking out for the community, the process and fairness will never work if we flex Barry's kind of logic.

The only way players ever see a dime is if the debtors pay up their dollar, so all of the people first in line can get made whole. Until this happens, we're stuck.

I also have to imagine that Barry's attorneys have told him that if he were to circumvent the process, and pay his big dollars out to the community, and then claim that this absolved him of his debt, that the Federal government would nail him to a cross (and this is by no means a Jewish reference). Which is why he will most likely never pay, because again he has no incentive to, and he's already declared he will not pay FTP in their current state, so that leaves just sitting on it ad infinitum.

The only thing left of interest to me is why the biggest creditors to FTP haven't forced them into bankruptcy, which is legal in the US. Their case in forcing it would be slam dunk, but alas I suppose it is because they know there is no money anyway.

what he said^^^


if you feel ripped off, you never should have put your money in an illegal gambling website! dont take this out on the wsop or the players!

first off how do try to collect a debt from these guys when the money never existed in the first place... drop the 16milly "debt" suck it BTG and make your move or dont!

does anyone know how much i can get for my chucky cheese tokens?

I owe $27! Deposited 200, lost it, then deposited 100, ran it up to 273, then asked for a cash out. FTP took there time, finally sent me a check for the 273, I sent it back, saying there never took the $300 out of my account. FTP said thank you, they will write off the $27. Maybe I shoudn't play the WSOP?

none of this is contrary or relevant to the point I've made or am trying to make. I'm not going to discuss it because it's a bunch of conjecture some with foundation some baseless, but has little to do with the aims of such a thread or protest. We've yet to see mainstream poker media deal with these players in a situation with a largely uninformed public. If players aren't made whole I want these guys to be branded as thieves and scum. I don't think that such a thread or such an attempt to raise awareness is going to get us back our money, or even necessarily succeed in barring these people from poker events. But if it even becomes a discussion then they'll no longer be able to trade on their likeness and may find that they're rarely if ever welcomed in the community.

If players aren't made whole I'd prefer that the FTP thieves never are seen in the poker community again. That they become pariahs in the world and a lesson as to what we don't want to see in our game. And if we can't bar them I want the discussion on this topic to be the number one thing that is brought up when we see them. If the FTP guys end up on a tournament broadcast next year I want the announcers to spend time talking about their theft and the thousands of people they hurt and laying out the damage they did. I want it to be an undeniable scarlet letter. The elephant in the room every time they show up.

If you're participating in this discussion and helping lengthen this thread and discussing the fact that these players (some willfully some not) absconded with player money then you are helping my cause. It's a shame you don't have any posts or comments of substance to add to thread, but I'd rather have you on here discussing the topic even if it's just to tell me how I won't be seeing my money (and fwiw I came to that conclusion without your help but ty).

your presence and your posting is appreciated. If for nothing else than providing me another chance to restate my goals.

Just because the prospect of players getting paid is very low doesn't mean that players can't decide to put forth an effort to shame those who abused Full Tilt for personal gain at the expense of players.

In fact, I am very very surprised that people haven't put up websites all over the place such as HowardLedererMostWanted.com ChrisFergusonWhereRU.com etc and have everybody contribute information on their whereabouts. This kind of shaming was done to CornellFiji as well as a few other scammers in the past so why can't it be done about these guys. A couple of months ago when I came into contact with people who work with/play in EPL I also let them know that they are working/playing in a league run by the sister of a wanted fugitive.

During this year's WSOP if I come across any of the Full Tilt sponsored pros who still owe FT money in the Rio hallways I will certainly be letting them know what I think of them and everyone should do the same. That's a tiny price to pay for them considering that they borrowed money from FTP that most likely came out of players' deposits, to play against these very players and profited.

Op your goals are fine. You just can't link the WSOP in any equitable way with the players owed money by FTP. Get More creative.