Quote:
Originally Posted by 7OAD
One thing I'm interested in from a purely business perspective is the market segmentation they used:
1.Very losing players: -5 bb/+
2.Pretty losing players -2-4 bb/
3.Barely losing players 0--1bb/
4.Barely winning players 0-1 bb/
5.Winning players 2-5bb/
6.Crushers 6bb+/
Of those players, it's likely that most 1-2s barely follow poker online beyond maybe watching a stream here and there or watching some highlights, whereas the people that really follow online are 3-6.
And between them, if you're already a loser, losing a bit more doesn't hurt that much if we're being honest, whereas if you're barely a winner or barely a winner this crushes you, winning players (5) can somewhat weather it and crushers will keep playing no matter what.
So IF Stars thought they were just going to remove the 1-2bb WINNERS, this could actually improve the poker eco system in terms of making it even easier, however obviously I am not for it, but I have posted my graph and I crush at $5ABI so all this means for me is less turbos and no hypers going forward.
This is the sort of parasitic and seemingly spiteful move we are getting all too used to in the western world and it could be disastrous if people started some initiative where when playing they typed something like "POKERSTARS INCREASED THE RAKE, THAT MEANS THEY ARE TAKING 10% MORE FROM YOU THE PLAYER, COPY AND PASTE THIS SO OTHERS CAN KNOW" as news would spread quickly and a good chunk of players would find out and we would then see what the TRUE consequences, not just the consequences they desire, are.
Eliminating marignal winners and marginal losers is pretty much a wash from their perspective.
By charging more in rake they eliminate the low to zero value groups 3/4 and capture a greater share of the money made by group 5 off of 1/2. It's definitely a win for them. Even better if group 5 ditches the game out of frustration.
Most casino business models are built so no one wins at any game. Not sure why we should expect poker to be treated any differently.
