Just to entertain your ego you attracted unaware nvg to such "solver videos" which are "epedemic" so must be good, while you could've said nothing.

agreed 100%

who teh **** was charlie carrol, aka epiphany77 , the guy that won a 25k high roller for more than a mill recently and the sunday million a few years ago? god damn right, a guy who was a newbie and fun player

look where he is now and I can gtd you there are tons of other new players turned bro the past few years.


Just takes hard work

This is so much up to the point. 100% agree.

I mean poker is quite unique - it's probably one of it's kind actually. A skilled occupation that:

a) Individual occupation that do not require any tools, capital or organization to run (self employed).
b) Do not produce any kind of goods or benefit society
c) Rely 100% on presence of new, uneducated, unaware people who do not understand what is going on. (see rake explanations above - -5bb "fish" and 5 regs = nobody makes money even in rake free game).
d) And legal.

Let's think further. Let's take being a plumber - there's a lot of free plumbing information around from real educated plumbers who want to contribute to society. Why is it? Because it do not shrink economy - no matter how much plumbing knowledge around there's going to be a need of plumbers from part of society who do not want to spend his time and efforn and since (c) is not a matter it do not hurt "plumbing business" in general.

Now we taking to interesting zone - most occupation which are (a) (b) and (c) are not legal if you think about it. Poker is an oddity there. But if we pretend that legality is not an issue you can figure out that information about a lot of "stuff" is scarce and kept secret. Let's say there's not much open educational videos/books on pickpocketing or bank-robbing or for a sake of it making meth. There's a lot of fiction but you will not find a lot of good reliable information that is made and distributed (that's a key) by people who actually make money doing something. I mean you can find how to make drugs on internet but you will not find a place where people who do it for living discuss and provide educational materials for uneducated to get better and question is not about anonymity there - it just dosent make sense.

I guess a lot of poker education came from people who treated it as a videogame which is fun and it's good to educate other people about how to win because by doing that you will keep interest of public high and hell - you need other people to play with. But same people did not realized that without (c) there's going to be no video game.

Except it basically is illegal to play online poker in the US, which the US represented 30-40% of the entire economies net losses. Take into account that black friday removed 100% of these american losers and kept a certain % of american winners and its pretty damning. Would people still be complaining if there was 40+% more money in the current landscape?

Seems the answer is no. Cardrunners was 2005.

Why troll?

No, but they complain that the plumbing is no longer such easy pickings as it was in 2003 because too many people from Eastern Europe are doing it now without requiring a high earn to keep going.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_Plumber

Trade secrets, universally held in the, er, trades, I guess are a special case of the idea that information has value. These were trade secrets dispensed with unmeasured liberty. Its really that simple. The two groups against which there can exist legit grievances, or at least legit criticism, is A) players who handed out trade secrets like croutons at the soup kitchen for single cigarettes and nickle rocks and B) money guys like galfond who could have and possibly even from a self interested perspective, should have prevented mass dissemination of high quality trade secrets which had immediate, obvious and perfectly predictable deleterious effects on the state of their chosen trade.

Most of the financial sector, which is to say most of the modern economy, can be reduced to a game. In fact modern economics itself is heavily buttressed by game theory. So at some point "just a game" becomes tantamount to "just a life", see?

Look All, the Puritan/Protestant bootstrap self-reliance meme worked ok for about 400 years but its going to stop working for a malignantly large portion of the population here soon enough. All these dudes railing itt and others about misguided entitlement complexes might want to start mentally preparing for the day when the only thing keeping the benighted hordes from machete-chopping through your front door on a school night is entitlement, and a well cultivated, well rewarded sense thereof.

You missing a huge, astronomical difference in this analogy. In any game which is played for fun you want you opponents to be as good as possible for you to have somebody to play with. If you a pro-gamer you want coach others because you will make more money if more people will play on a serious level since it will attract fans/viewers and will benefit you indirectly. In poker there's no advertisement money, and no "fun". I do race bicycles for fun, it's hard and tough and there's no money, still people do it because it's fun and rewarding. Poker is not - otherwise there would be as much serious play money leagues/tournaments etc as real money but such thing do not exist. Imagine people who crunch numbers in gto solver to became little bit better to win Saturday duplicate poker/0-variance tournament in local town and bring home brag t-shirt.

And while I don't revel in unpleasantries the front door may be the other's though it hasn't crossed your mind.

There use to be some decent money in making videos for mediocre players.....I use to make MTT vids in 2010 for about a year and half and was paid 1k/mo for 3 videos......each video took about an hour to make so to make a guaranteed 1k for 3 hours was a nice boost each month.....today videos are a mix of high level pros (runitonce) who are prob paid reasonably well, and mediocre/breakeven/losing players who make videos for peanuts trying to survive in between the swings......its amazing these training sites are still in existence but just like losing players selling action at markup in the marketplace, there's always a sucker.

Some people like giving back and teaching. It's human nature for most non-sociopaths.

Video type learning is more passive in general. It can certainly help people who want to learn, but it doesn't have nearly the impact the naysayers in this thread talk about. And this is coming from someone that has ran a video site for 7 years. Believe me, if it was worth 30k to players it wouldn't cost $50mo or a one time fee of $300.

Videos are particularly good for new, learning, struggling and aspiring players.

This wasn't as true 5 years ago, but it's pretty much the case these days.

These days, for HS players to learn more they don't go to videos, they go to private coaching, and even that is often behind a wall of staking (so the coach/stable gets a % of profits). Or they work together (form a sort of study team, which has a similar impact as any of those other relationships).

The short answer to "why do people teach" is to make money. Nobody has real secret cheat codes (not even the internet marketer poker products!), so if you're say a top 200 player in a game, meaning you're really good and make a solid income, if you're not coaching or doing videos or staking, it's not like that's going to impact anything. Someone else will be taking the marketshare you would've had and will make money.

And if say 195 of those top 200 people decide not to coach or teach, the 5 that do will just make that much more money.

I think it's human nature to try to "freeze time," when you're doing well and want to keep doing well or to find reasons for why you're struggling to win. The former isn't realistic and the latter is not the reason most people struggle.

It's fine to say poker is a selfish game, there's no reason YOU should want anyone to teach. Nor stake, nor coach. Nor even play the game if they are profitable. But no real legitimate reason to hate on them either. I can see the point if you think guys that get paid like $800hr to make a video are costing the games hundreds of thousands in profit per year, expediting the learning curve/avg skill level. But it's not really the case at all. They're having an impact, but it were a million dollar impact they would be getting paid a few hundred thousand dollars per year minimum.

A good example from my neck of the woods (HUSNGs), is Olivier Busquet. Hard working HUSNG player, was easily the best for years in the HS turbos. He took Dan Colman under his wing, taught him a great deal (was obviously very talented as well from the start), and Colman took millions off of players in HUSNGs over a few years. He had years where he earned more than all 6 years of revenue from my training site combined.

If I could reliably teach a talented person to take millions out of HUSNGs, I would probably be working full time with less than five players. But I can't do that, I can't put people together to do that (almost nobody really can). The type of teaching going on is really effective at turning losers into winners if they work hard, help winners plug some leaks and think about situations different, but whether they make 30k, 100k, 300k or 3 million has very little to do with videos. You can argue that the bar to being a winner is raised because of this, but it's nowhere near high enough to even be worth talking about or complaining about. The bar to winning is not that high... high stakes is a different thing, but what HS guys do that makes them that successful they didn't learn from videos. They may have went from losing to winning earlier on because of videos, they may have fixed some leaks on the way up through videos and they may learn new perspectives through videos, but the primary reason for their huge success is not poker videos.

It's not a sexy viewpoint, and doesn't mesh well with most "coaching/videos are great" vs "coaching videos are terrible/kill the games" but the answer just isn't so black or white.

@ChicagoRy

The problem is that in many games on small stakes and below the rake is so high that the skill gap required to win is bigger than almost anyone realize. Currently even on mid stakes cash the rake is around 30bb/100 per table on many sites.
No one says that training sites make everyone a huge winner but if the fish goes from 60/11 to 22/5 thanks to watching couple of vids thats huge. Suddenly fish loss rate goes from -60bb/100 to -20bb/100 and suddenly everyone makes little to no money

The benefit of teaching that most people overlook is how much you learn yourself.

i doubt watching training vids is gonna cause them to start limping hands they should be raising

The answer is ego end of story/

Don't be so nitpicky. What I meant is that watching vids can have a huge impact on recreational player if Villain is suddenly not opening 40% of his usual trash or so suddenly everyone else at the table is far worse off.
Doesn't matter whether he moves from 63/11 to 22/5 or 25/13.
Add the rake to the equation and suddenly no one is winning money except for the poker room.

I'm struck by this line of argument that you can't hate on people who make training videos because the impact is minimal and because if those video makers hadn't done it then someone else would've instead. At least this line is coherent and doesn't contain flawed premises (training sites are good for the poker economy; it's easy to teach someone to make $25 or more per hour playing online poker) and rambling emotional assignation ("you all have a sense of entitlement") that previous training site operators in the thread presented.

However, one of the first things we learn in poker is not to tap the glass and even today people put value in creating a fun environment at the poker table. We do such things "for the good of the game" and (to some extent) expect other players to do the same. Surely we have seen over the past ten years how ruthless self-interest has hurt poker. Someone has the right to act like a douchebag at a poker table. But I can dislike them for it and they're not exempt from criticism just because it's allowed.

This is not about all like all the people affiliated with training sites are on one side against everyone else. I said some of the things you mentioned. I wasn't contradictory or inconsistent though. You aligned things others said with things which I never said myself. I don't at all agree that training sites are good for the economy. I also don't think the impact is "minimal". Games are getting tougher and state of poker is declining in general. There are many reasons for this which I've listed extensively. Some people feel an urge to blame "someone" - in this case training sites. They imply training sites are doing something "wrong" (compared to deforesting, over-fishing etc). Make no mistake, there is for sure some sense of entitlement amongst many people in this thread and poker players in general. People seem to take exception to me saying this, but seem to continually show they feel owed this opportunity. Training sites, software developers and scientists have no reason to sacrifice EV for the community. As others have said before, poker is a relatively selfish game. Anyone who says "this is bad for poker", really means "this is bad for ME, and MY long-term poker earning potential".

25 was just an arbitrary example of something relatively easy to achieve. How good of an opportunity this is depends of course on where you are geographically but in most countries this ranges from a good to amazing opportunity considering the time and money investment necessary if done wisely. Compare this to "real life" options, you often have to study years/pay education and would be lucky to have that (or even close in many countries). Poker can't and won't be a golden goose for everyone forever, this is obvious and inevitable.

Of course, for those who work hard, many achieve much more than that. Many people who put time and effort in continue to increase their expectation despite a downward poker environment. This is true of newcomers and long timers alike.

This is not about me being defending training sites due to my affiliation with them. This is about some basic common sense and pointing out insane hypocrisy. I'm not proud about this but I've wasted plenty of time posting in nvg threads (or threads in general) that have nothing to do with me lol
Software developers and scientists are both hurtful for my bottom line and long-term earning potential. I would prefer they found other jobs but don't have anything against them at all, let alone call them out for doing something "wrong".

There is a mountain of hypocrisy in this thread and a lot of people either won't admit or realise it. Almost no one in thread wouldn't make videos for the right price, in many cases that price would be what most posters would consider "low. No one in the thread would turn down a free $1k if it meant others in the thread randomly get distributed $5k or $10k or even more.

Forums have been huge in making games tougher, they created huge communities and especially years ago provided tonnes of free, solid information to improve players. Most of the complainers in the thread are video watchers (no watchers = no videos!), wouldn't be in the situation they are in if it weren't for training sites and of course forums like 2p2. The very people they are against educating are in most cases people in the same situation they were before they became educated by the same resources.. Most of them contributed plenty to the strategy discussions here (which I have nothing against)
Yet, after me bringing this up multiple times, the best someone could finally do was say "the past doesn't matter!" lol

People have the "right" to be angry with training sites, software developers and scientists. It doesn't mean it isn't a waste of energy which accomplishes nothing (for the community or their own bottom line) whilst being amazingly hypocritical. There is also a difference between "not liking" something someone does (which actually makes sense) and blaming them for doing something "wrong".

Especially when you don't know what you are talking about.

I honestly don't get what the connection is between programmers/scientists and your bottom line but surely the relationship between a scientist and someone in a random unrelated profession is way thinner than the relationship between a poker pro who made training videos and a poker pro who did not.

I feel like the correct hypothetical here is that no one in the thread would turn down $1k even if it meant others in the thread would lose $5k, $10k, or even more.
Surely there is a big difference between people who discussed poker strategy while they were learning the game for zero compensation and people who made training videos for direct compensation after they had achieved expertise. These are the sort of false comparisons dotted throughout the thread that I find tilting.

I won't speak for anyone else but for me it's about not liking the people who created training sites more so than thinking what they did was wrong. I've been annoyed at CardRunners since the day it started. I don't think I've ever written anything about Taylor Caby before in my life and rarely spare a thought his way. If he makes the final table of the Main Event I won't be rooting for him, though.

The only real hypocrisy is this (and it's not insane, amazing, or mountainous): You're undoubtedly right that essentially everyone who complains about training sites would've accepted $X if someone offered it to them to make a poker strategy video. If I'd gotten that hypothetical offer I would've taken it. I'd have more money in the bank and then I wouldn't be able to spout off in threads like this. But when you got that money and you voluntarily enter a thread where those of us who didn't are spouting off about how much money training sites cost us don't act like you're getting the raw end of the deal. Being able to spout off is the only remuneration we'll ever get from that bullsht. And a bunch of flimsy comparisons and speculative filibustering about how we're entitled and angry certainly won't succeed in moving us off those positions or convincing any observer that we're wrong.

haha

You must be out of your ****ing mind if you actually deluded yourself into believing this.

At the end of the day, apart from the people who run the site (who it's probably worth for) its just a bunch of people wanting to jerk themselves off in front of an audience, and the site owners taking advantage of that.

don't need to draw more attention but others mentioned significance of software. it's a huge part in the development of poker theory and modern gameplay.. since it seems it wasn't clear enough i obviously meant poker software developers and scientists or people who study poker academically, game theorists etc. the academics are working to solve poker (and have successfully done so with Fixed limit HU confirmed already). ofc as poker gets closer to being solved, games will die off for obvious reasons. the academics and programmers are closely related, some are more motivated by finances, others for academic, personal interest or personally recognition and such. regardless, they obviously hurt players bottom lines are long term especially will be way worse than any forum or training site ever will be. I think it doesn't make sense to be mad at them (even "if/when" they solve poker) although a lot of the ppl in this thread would be.

why does it matter people get paid or not? people mentioned multiple times that the reason they think it's dumb is because the video makers got paid so little, people who posted (including some after they "reached expertise") did so for free whilst "killing the games".
I actually posted a tonne of strat because I enjoyed it and genuinely wanted to give back to the community, at some point i stopped like many others. so regardless to what you think of the fact that I've made videos the forum point doesn't apply to me.

also I obv bring this upon myself by writing so much but people really like to cherry-pick specific parts of what I say to reply to whilst ignoring key facts. for example it's hypocritical to attack training sites so hard - how many complainers have had a Sub/paid for videos before? as I said, no customers, no videos. sure, we will see them argue "I don't want to support them but I had to so I could compete"

your analogy is better than mine but still - a lot of that money "lost" also goes to newcomers (and again important point - newcomers are exactly like you or I once were. they were welcome and helped, and as said you can see from the decline of good advice on 2p2 forums and this thread that it's less the case now since people see them as a threat now)

and lol as you say yourself if spouting off makes you feel better then be my guest.. btw there is a big difference between complaining for the sake of it that training sites cost you and having personal feelings towards the people involved for their "wrong-doing" - especially if you admit yourself you'd do the same had you the opportunity?

from an irrational/emotional perspective I completely understand why people are reacting the way they do. esp with mob mentality etc, being part of an illusory group and such. finding someone, anyone to blame is always the easy solution. I doubt many of the complainers itt can honestly say they have worked really hard and yet still have declining results. no coincedence

when games get to the point where you either quit or are forced to quit maybe you'll regret not making more out of the opportunities you once had.. or maybe you'll just blame video makers, or whoever else. honestly there are a tonne of ways I could complain too.. asides from it being hypocritical I just feel my energy is better spent trying to work on my game etc and trying to win whilst i still can/its worthwhile. to be fair I am wasting a lot of time here and like most in the thread will achieve little to nothing with my posting here.. but let's call it entertainment :/
it's obvious that if I post in a thread like this regardless of I am a video maker or not that people won't agree or like an opinion contrary to popular belief, so I don't expect anything different.

Strangely anybody affiliated w some sort of education site defending it:

Joe tall: dc created more fish than regs (my personal fav so far)

Omgclay: you are all entitled, i think we would be better of w/o video sites but i still choose to make videos for ivey league bc if i dont take teh chumpchange for producing videos somebody else will

Chicagory: im the main guy in rgds to hu sng education but let me assure you that videos and education had only very minor influence over the year.


This whole industry is just overrun by idiots and i will make sure to troll every thread once the people responsible for all tis start asking for advice on how to get a lolrealjob - its oreddi starting

do you have or have you had a video sub Tim?

also lol maybe you stopped now(?) but every post you make is already trolling since you write "teh"

and nice job demonstrating yet again a wonderful selection of two quotes (amongst endless valid arguments which you clearly can't defend, lol at "yeah we did it too but it's in the past!!!", this is worse than the three quotes in your above post) taken out of context ignoring everything else