Open Side Menu Go to the Top
Register
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure

05-09-2016 , 01:36 PM
Indeed its going only worse and worse, me as a microstakes rec grinder used to beat nl5 zoom no problem 6bb/100 over 150k hands or so even without HUD, now last 60k hands BE (after last rake change) with HUD and everyone in the table is more nittier than ever. Most players 19/16 and 23/18 type. Sometimes even 0 fish in 4 zoom tables, things are the worst ever in online poker. Cashed out my BR and thinking about if I even should play somewhere online, it's not even fun anymore. :P
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-09-2016 , 01:40 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Humble Beast
Indeed its going only worse and worse, me as a microstakes rec grinder used to beat nl5 zoom no problem 6bb/100 over 150k hands or so even without HUD, now last 60k hands BE (after last rake change) with HUD and everyone in the table is more nittier than ever. Most players 19/16 and 23/18 type. Sometimes even 0 fish in 4 zoom tables, things are the worst ever in online poker. Cashed out my BR and thinking about if I even should play somewhere online, it's not even fun anymore. :P
I don't think you are a rec. Recs don't know what 19/16 mean. Also you refer to yourself as a grinder.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-09-2016 , 01:46 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Keruli
how can a 6 month graph like the one on pokerscout be meaningful when a) we know that traffic always declines towards summer and b) online poker has been shrinking overall since 2009 or so?
This
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-09-2016 , 02:12 PM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Keruli
how can a 6 month graph like the one on pokerscout be meaningful when a) we know that traffic always declines towards summer and b) online poker has been shrinking overall since 2009 or so?
The decline since 2009 could be an indication that too high a rake might be A contributor to the decline, since markets contract when prices are too high. Obviously there's other reasons, such as market segregation including Black Friday.

One reason to think that too high a rake might be A factor though is that Pokerstars doesn't seem to agree with the idea though that people play poker to win money, and that if games are unbeatable then people will stop playing, and that if games are beatable then more people will start playing.

People have been complaining for years now that games are getting too hard. So there have been people who have stopped playing - and that's not the type of environment that encourages a lot of fresh interest.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-09-2016 , 02:32 PM
Mods: I think my thread title is bad and too unrelated to the content of the post. Could you change it to something along the lines of "Stars Changes Harmful to Depositing Players" or anything you think is appropriate and more on subject.

It is getting far too derailed by a causation/correlation discussion that is a bit of a sidetrack to the main point that the 'rec friendly' changes are terrible for recreational players and that many of us think Stars is very misguided on the effects these changes will have on future deposits.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 05:38 AM
OP what do you want stars to change immediately?
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 05:42 AM
Perhaps Stars recognized its best not to have any professional players.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 06:33 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by falldown
I don't think you are a rec. Recs don't know what 19/16 mean. Also you refer to yourself as a grinder.
I would identify myself rather as a rec than grinder, played 200k hands maybe with 1 year nl5 and some other donking, point is there is no real "recs" almost left. Even at so low lvl dudes be discussing hud stats in chat vs some hands each other etc, most people playing solid abc preflop. like a year ago there was atleast 1+ fish in a table @ micro zoom pool, now maybe 1 fish in 4 tables tho.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 06:56 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Humble Beast
Indeed its going only worse and worse, me as a microstakes rec grinder used to beat nl5 zoom..
1st why do you play zoom then? There are 116 regular NL5 tables and I'm pretty sure you can find enough fishes to make money in those games.

2nd you know there are other sites with zoom games. Oc if you can't play due to laws etc then I understand. You dont have to quit online poker if you can't beat ps games.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 08:24 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Humble Beast
I would identify myself rather as a rec than grinder, played 200k hands maybe with 1 year nl5 and some other donking, point is there is no real "recs" almost left. Even at so low lvl dudes be discussing hud stats in chat vs some hands each other etc, most people playing solid abc preflop. like a year ago there was atleast 1+ fish in a table @ micro zoom pool, now maybe 1 fish in 4 tables tho.
There are recs left. I know a few.

Pretty well anyone who frequents this board doesn't qualify.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 08:30 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Snoopy5
Perhaps Stars recognized its best not to have any professional players.
Again, a sentiment I don't take issue with. The problem is, for them to create an environment terrible for making money, they are creating an environment that will encourage losing players and depositors from making future donations to their company. Their biggest priority is getting as many future deposits as possible. As I discussed earlier, I do not believe their actions are going to achieve this goal as their changes are extremely detrimental to the recreational player. There is no way to have a thriving site if people can't win. They can make changes to clean up the lobby without just turning into a rec vs king battle everywhere. They can actually give legit rewards to recreational players. They can offer any game a depositor wants to play. Or they can make the games extremely hard, rake the hell out of them with less rewards, and take away games people deposit to play. I believe the latter will path will cost them money.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 08:39 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by ESW
The decline since 2009 could be an indication that too high a rake might be A contributor to the decline, since markets contract when prices are too high. Obviously there's other reasons, such as market segregation including Black Friday.

One reason to think that too high a rake might be A factor though is that Pokerstars doesn't seem to agree with the idea though that people play poker to win money, and that if games are unbeatable then people will stop playing, and that if games are beatable then more people will start playing.

People have been complaining for years now that games are getting too hard. So there have been people who have stopped playing - and that's not the type of environment that encourages a lot of fresh interest.
You know....the MTT schedule has changed drastically since the "decline" began in 2009-2010. New markets of fish have entered the player pool since the exodus of Americans...so Black Friday doesn't explain it.

Micro stakes players have 1/10th of the opportunities in 2016 to bink 5 figures on an MTT costing $10, or less than they had in 2009-2010. Maybe, this factor prevented the common recreational fish player to stop logging on to the site because the tournament directors at Pokerstars screwed up the MTT schedule (the one that appealed to the vast majority of players- $20 depositors) and it's had a negative impact on the cash game poker ecosystem ever since.

You can't go change the MTT schedule as much as Pokerstars has done....acknowledge there is a decline in popularity...and then blatantly ignore the significant changes made at the EXACT time the decline in popularity began. This is what Pokerstars has done.

If the schedule in 2016 is unappealing to players like me from 2009...then, why do you think people aren't playing in 2016?

Last edited by LeakyChips; 05-10-2016 at 08:48 AM.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 08:44 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by insidemanpoker
lol, hard to argue with someone who 'proofed me wrong' by saying that software changes that quickly lead to a drop from 4 to 14 in an extremely short period of time is not something they should be judged by. Keep drinking the kool-aid I guess..

FTP was certainly struggling post relaunch but they made software changes that almost overnight destroyed the site even further.

Again, like FTP, online poker does not have a bright future. That doesn't mean there aren't better and worse outcomes. You ignore everything I said about how the changes are horrible for depositing players and just regurgitate the PS media line of "rec model!". Yea, ok. Fleecing the recs is the rec model. Interesting.

Pretty sure you chose to ignore the fact that my entire post was discussing the interests recreational players. I guess you believe that making depositing players have much worse winrates is actually good for them because PS Twitter told you so.

The one area everyone, site included, should have common ground on is wanting to get as many new depositing players as possible. In my opinion, creating an extremely difficult/unbeatable situation for new deposits is not the best way.

I do think my title is flawed as the post is more about the future than anything else so if people just read the title they may assume the wrong message.
you really try hard, not to understand, what i've written [okay, i'm not a native speaker so maybe it isn't as hard as i think ^^]... i never said, that the changes were good for recs. you're headline is a rambling about the 'numbers decline' and the 'FTP failure' and that's what i've written about

@ PS numbers ... besides the seasonal drop and the decline over the years, i even said, that the changes added an additional drop ... BUT atm we don't know the numbers and we don't know, if PS even wanted this drop ... b/c lowering the volume was basically an announced plan

@ FT 'failure' ... you still bring this 'drop from 4 to 14' as if it would be worse, than the drop from #2 to #4 and this shows you're ignorance imo

FTP 2.0 was an attempt to sell a 'pre BF product' - something that should appeal the mass grinders and high stakes grinders. and this is imo the real 'failure', b/c the market wasn't simply big enough. the result was, that FT dropped from #2 to #4, which is not only a huge drop (in player numbers), it was the point where it was official, that FT wasn't needed any more!

still you claim the real failure was the 'rec model', which caused the drop from #4 to #14. leave aside that number-wise it wasn't worse than the drop from #2 to #4 (which showed that the old model didn't work either) and focus on the 'why'.

i don't have any insights, but i'm pretty sure the rushed change of policy wasn't that voluntary and like i've written before, i think it was a hail mary ... a very risky and very desperate attempt. so it seems to me, that 'not changing anything' wasn't an option at that time and implementing similar changes over a longer period of time either (like other rooms successfully did)

so comparing the FT changes, with the PS changes and thinking PS will make the same 'mistakes' won't work. PS not only has far more time, it also has far more recs.

and since this thread is about your concerns about the 'recs' anyway, here are my two cents ... the main problems with all the theories in NVG and other forums is, that no one has numbers. all the theories about 'oh, the good players drop down the limits' and 'recs also pay more rake' only tell half the story.

we also could discuss hours about what influenced a win- or loss-rate more (HUDs, rake ... et cetera), but bottom line is, when you have less players, who are taking money out of the industry, you can rake the deposits a bit longer.

i think it's pretty simple ... the market is declining and less money is deposited and rooms are facing higher costs. all poker rooms basically tried to get rid of the 'leaks' and headed for the 'rec player model'. and since you can't deny, that the market is shrinking, you shouldn't think about what's wrong with the changes, but what are the alternatives.

tl;dr

- PS #'s drop might be wanted
- FT changes were far from optimal, but it seems w/o options they had to throw a hail mary
- i agree that rec model isn't rec model, but the RPM isn't mainly about levelling winrates, it's about to keep money in the system

last but not least
- just because i think you're wrong (in some parts), i don't say they're (100%) right ... geeeee, i really don't like this attitude in NVG, that when i point out something, which i think is wrong, others always assume i'm totally in favour of the opposite ...
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-10-2016 , 09:58 AM
LOL when you look at the graph the traffic is about the same as it was the beginning of last hot season. Now if it keeps on with this downward trend thru the next 6 months, then we have something to talk about.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 02:53 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by uradoodooface
LOL when you look at the graph the traffic is about the same as it was the beginning of last hot season. Now if it keeps on with this downward trend thru the next 6 months, then we have something to talk about.
You probably aren't noticing Pokerscout's automatic scaling because its not even close (the y axis scale changes, sometimes daily). Its down probably around 25% vs last year. The low point for last year was a daily average of I believe 14.7k, but that was the absolute low point. Anyway traffic started in Jan last year at a daily average of 19k dipping to a low of 14.7k. There was an article written about the low point of 14.7k so that may not be representative of the average traffic during the summer trough since it was newsworthy. But assuming it is and assuming a linear seasonal decline which should be close to accurate, with a summer low point date of Aug 1 (seems reasonable given cited article was written on July 22) then daily average traffic last year declined by 690 players per month.

So at the beginning of May we would have expected traffic last year to have declined to about 16.25k daily avg players, representing a 23% yoy decline based on the current daily average of 12.5k.

There are a few fairly strong reasons to believe the decline may actually be quite a bit larger than that, selection bias already mentioned being one. But this post is already too long. And that's a catastrophic decline for anyone wondering. Someone reading this probably has detailed Pokerscout historical data which would be very cool to see and a lot better than guesstimation, if they were kind enough to share.

Also I haven't had time to go back but seem to recall tournament revenues being a minor part of total poker revenues, like 30%. Anyone remember that number? On top of that Amaya said the annualized growth rate in the first two months for casino/sports had slowed to just 50%, indicating a sharp decline in not just absolute growth rate but growth per time unit i.e. casino growth has topped out hard with all low hanging fruit in last years punch bowls.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 03:00 AM
you can set cash game revenue to zero and spin and gos still makes up for it
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 03:10 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by fightingcoward
you can set cash game revenue to zero and spin and gos still makes up for it
That's a whopping falsehood. Seriously though, do you know what percentage of total poker revenues are currently from tournaments? Or anyone?
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 04:00 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by JudgeHoldem1848
That's a whopping falsehood. Seriously though, do you know what percentage of total poker revenues are currently from tournaments? Or anyone?
not sure, but i think pokerfuse/Poker Industry PRO and OPR had articles about this topic. the only article i can recall was about the italian market and SaGs definitely took a lot of traffic away from ring games.

but anyway .. let's say PS introduces a stricter table cap (which wouldn't surprise that much), then the traffic would obv drop. but thinking this is a bad result, would be naive ...
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 04:02 AM
Nvg, where 30% of something is a minor percentage
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 05:13 AM
according to spintrackers stars made bout 600k last week w spin rake across 15-100 limits. if u also add the micros it prolly becomes close to a mil per week, cause micro spin volume is very high.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 05:19 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by insidemanpoker
Again, a sentiment I don't take issue with. The problem is, for them to create an environment terrible for making money, they are creating an environment that will encourage losing players and depositors from making future donations to their company. Their biggest priority is getting as many future deposits as possible. As I discussed earlier, I do not believe their actions are going to achieve this goal as their changes are extremely detrimental to the recreational player. There is no way to have a thriving site if people can't win. They can make changes to clean up the lobby without just turning into a rec vs king battle everywhere. They can actually give legit rewards to recreational players. They can offer any game a depositor wants to play. Or they can make the games extremely hard, rake the hell out of them with less rewards, and take away games people deposit to play. I believe the latter will path will cost them money.
You sound like you only care about stars not going downhill than you actually care about the players. Seriously, all you talking about is how terrible changes are for future deposits as if you are a shareholder or sth.
Why care so much about stars` bottom line bro?
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 07:21 AM
spin&go's are draining all the fish from other formats. Amayastars stated that the avg fish depositing $20 is losing faster than previous years. hmmm i wonder why that is??
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 08:16 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by insidemanpoker
tl;dr

http://www.pokerscout.com/SiteDetail...rs&ab=46841649
http://www.pokerupdate.com/news/indu...th-pokerstars/

I am sure you can get more detailed data, but it is clear that the traffic on Stars has declined significantly since making many hated changes over the last few months. After a discussion with many people saying similar things in a skype group, I figured I'd make a way too long thread!

The restricted lobby, the removal of heads up, and the increase of rake/reducing of rewards has caused a reversal in what had been a steady year for traffic on PS. General traffic declines over the last years were inevitable as the boom wore off but the degree of the decline is certainly effected dramatically by how the sites operate and treat customers.

While we all understand and can respect their goal of making the most $$$ as a public company, the way they have attempted to do this, similar to what they did with FTP, is costing themselves money and ruining the games for everyone that enjoys them. It's a lose/lose for everybody and perhaps that is why people are so vocally opposed to what they are doing. If the changes were going to cause the site to grow and make them a bunch more money, most of us would understand the nature of the beast and accept it even if it made for a worse playing experience for those displeased by the changes.

The problem is the same phenomenon as occurred with FTP. They *THINK* what they are doing is good for themselves. In this case the removal of game selection, heads up tables, rake increases, and reward removals/reductions, makes them believe they are going to make more money by forcing people to battle more and raking more off of everyone. The latter is certainly true as they will rake more per hand but many of us believe they have vastly underestimated the cost of doing so in lost depositing customers. It's not a coincidence that recreational players originally flocked to the site known for having the best support, lowest rake, good rewards system, and widest selection of games. That is how PS got to where it is. It is also not a coincidence when a legitimate percentage of recreational players leave the site, or online poker altogether, when no company is able to satisfy that demand that PS once offered.

A good analogy is slots. Slots are obviously a terrible EV play yet many recreational gamblers enjoy them. And you know what they often care about most when picking a place to play? The edge the house takes and the rewards offered. They want to feel they have the best chance to win even when they know they are still -EV. This notion that recreational players can just be herded like sheep into whatever games Stars want and then get fleeced by rake is a flawed one. As seen by the numbers both on FTP and Stars, when unpopular changes were made, many people, recreational included, left the site.

Depositing players want to feel they are getting a good deal even if they aren't pros. They want low rake. Many of them like playing games that have been removed, like heads up, and have left the site because they can no longer play the game they enjoy. There were definitely some 'special' players that continuously deposited money, hundreds of thousands or more, to play heads up for many years only to have their enjoyed games removed. Their deposits stopped. The site loses significantly when a customer that can deposit so much takes his business elsewehre or quits when their is nowhere for him to play what he wants.

Finally, the lobby changes that eliminated 'bumhunting' have been a relative disaster for recreational players. The games they are now stuck with are, as many top players on 2+2 have pointed out (WCG/Kaby to name two), dramatically harder now that the lobby is severely restricted such that just the absolute best of every stake holds the tables for any recreational player that wants to play. The notion that WCG, Kaby, or anyone else at the top will beat a weak player at the same rate as a random reg is absurd.

It is common to see a guy that will battle anyone at 5/10 or 10/20 also sitting at 2/4 or even 1/2 sometimes and even if it's just the best 1/2 player, it's still far worse than before when many random weaker regular players started tables. This isn't a question about who 'deserves' what. It's an issue of making the player experience good for depositing players, and creating the dynamic of a site wide king of the hill where recreational players are left with the 'kings' of every game and stake, is not good for encouraging deposits as they will get totally destroyed.

You can be sure the current games are far far tougher for the average recreational player, and like slots, that matters. If someone was -10bb/100 6 months ago, he's likely closer to -20bb/100 with the new lobby that gives all games to the best players. This dramatically increases the hopelessness feeling for depositing players and deters people from playing on the site.

I agree bumhunting can be very damaging when it makes new players feel stalked, but the solution isn't to avoid having recreational players be able to get into games with weaker regular players. Changes that make a nicer atmosphere are totally fine but removing game selection has made the games much harder so the real objective should be to allow for weaker players to sometimes start tables while making the atmosphere less predatory feeling. The best players will still and always make the most money but the site is better off with a lot of weaker regs making some money than being dominated by the best of the best.

I'm sure this last part will be more contentious and receive the usual 2+2 hate but let's avoid this thread deteriorating into a bumhunting debate. That is the least of the issues here. Removing games people enjoy and raising rake/reducing rewards are causing the site to decline and that is bad for everyone, Stars included.

And before people say "they are a public company, they can do what they want, they are smart, and have data!" Of course they can. But they did what they wanted with FTP. It was a solid number 4 in the world at the time. They made software changes players disliked and vocally argued against on 2+2, including removing heads up and game selection, and within 6 months it was number 14 in the world. Stars is dominant enough that I doubt their number 1 position is in jeopardy any time soon, but the overall numbers can still go down dramatically which is why I do see a purpose in 2+2ers speaking their minds on these changes in the event Stars listens. They might not, but it isn't impossible. Amaya does not have a great track record so if they aren't completely stubborn, they may be open to seeing the mistakes they are making and changing them in the interest of turning around a declining site. This doesn't have to end like it did with FTP.
lol @ saying you want these changes reversed in order to stop recs losing too much. You're just another selfish, self-entitled reg who only cares about his bottomline. You couldn't give a **** how quickly a rec loses his money - as long as that money goes to you, not Pokerstars.

The difference is that Pokerstars have all the power. They are the ones with the monopoly. They can raise prices pretty much however they want and suckers like you will continue to play there, because you have nowhere else to go and no other qualifications/life experience to get a job in the real world.


In before I get called a shill, even though I'm just telling it how it is.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 10:40 AM
Shill? Nah, just ignorant. Not worth my breath. Great arguments!

Quote:
Originally Posted by coach999
You sound like you only care about stars not going downhill than you actually care about the players. Seriously, all you talking about is how terrible changes are for future deposits as if you are a shareholder or sth.
Why care so much about stars` bottom line bro?
Hmm, you really can't figure it out? My argument is that Stars has one interest in common with most online players. They want to get as many future deposits as possible. If they do, that is good for winning players as well. This is the great failure in their logic. They want to remove peoples ability to make money off of poker but it is that ability that is a key component to why people deposit in the first place. Take away the former, and you risk losing large numbers of the customers you care about most.

My opinion is that their changes are going to cause a shrinking of the online poker market as a whole which is bad for anyone that plays as well as for their bottom line. No amount of 'data' will be able to demonstrate how depositors are going to react to these kinds of changes but it'd be naive as hell to believe there won't be real negative responses from those that called the site home for their many deposits. There are already some huge depositing losing heads up players that have left the site. Yes, it's a cost/benefit analysis when they decide to remove a game like heads up. Will losing x % of players be worth it to herd Y % into the games of our choosing? Their initial guess was obviously yes. But like with their FTP changes, I disagree and believe that decision, along with the others mentioned, are going to do more harm than good for their business and whether you like it or not, players are better off when Stars is doing well. When they aren't, that is when it gets desperate and ugly.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote
05-11-2016 , 11:16 AM
Without info regarding Spin n Go traffic the decline of cash games could be a mute point. From a business standpoint if there's a 10% drop in deposit ($) but 50% more of those deposits are used for Spin n Go's then it's a net positive for Stars as they enjoy higher margins for that game format.

The talk about Full Tilts relevance on Stars' business is a mute point imo. From the day of re-launch Full Tilt was terribly run. Over the first year they changed gears/marketing strategies countless times and only a few ideas actually worked.
Their biggest error was due to delayed disappointment by the customer. For example they'd put an offer out that on paper was confusing but could fool the rec player into a deposit thinking that it's worthwhile. After the promo ended the player was left with the feeling that he was duped and ignored the next offer (which could have actually been good).

From the onset they tried to run their business as is BF didn't occur and the online landscape hadn't changed worldwide. They failed miserably. I agree that the last minute change to encourage a recreational environment was a desperate hail mary and I agreed in principle that it was a good for the simple fact that a bad plan is better then no plan at all. Prior to that change they were sinking and even though the change didn't bring about the result they wanted it at least gave them a chance whereas the former plan was guaranteed to fail.
Traffic on PokerStars Goes Down Significantly After Software Lobby/Rake Changes and FTP Failure Quote

      
m