Hello. Per our initial plan, we have made a few changes to the marketplaces. Most of them are now free of charge and also devoid of restrictions. Moreover, the forum structure has been reorganized and features a new section—“Online Poker Rooms & Marketplaces,” which includes the following subforums:

- The “Online Poker Rooms” subforum consists of official and non-official poker room threads. If you need to speak with representatives of Poker Stars or some other room, this is where you’ll find them. Any legitimate poker room can start an official thread.
- The “Coaches & Schools” subforum consists of poker coach listings as well as professional poker schools. Any coach or school can start a thread for free.
- The “Poker Software” subforum consists of official support threads. You can directly interact with software developers or their representatives. All software developers can now create an official support thread for free. Sticky threads will be provided to those who offer real discounts to 2+2 members.
- The “Staking” subforum consists of a set of subforums that facilitate offering/selling stakes and the purchase of MTT shares. Here, anyone is free to participate without restrictions. As always, members are advised to use their best judgment and be aware of the risks involved in staking activities.
- The “General Marketplace” subforum consists of “want to buy/want to sell” listings. All restrictions are lifted here too.

What do you think about these changes? Please share your thoughts, your feedback is much appreciated.

So the 6 month restriction is gone? Some random can just sign up today and start buying/selling things?

Lattimer - I believe so.

I predict this will not end well.

Indeed. Nobody with half a brain will use it to buy given scammers will have carte blanche, nobody reputable will use it to sell given it'll be full of scammers who they won't want to associate with, and it'll become one big cesspool of idiots being scammed.

Of course, if the end goal is to remove the forum completely, which would be perfectly justified when there's no legitimate traffic in it whatsoever, then that's fine I guess

Take a look at the responses in the general marketplace. The spambots are moving in.

To be fair, that's nothing new. Spambots have always replied to existing threads in there. I pop in there every now and then just to go on a OTBC-fest knowing it's always needed.

What IS new is that brand new poster being able to create a thread looking for ACR Venom tickets. I mean, caveat emptor and all that, but the concern is the front page getting filled with threads by new posters and drowning out the ones by established posters.

I am aware. I predict you will see an exponential rise there and throughout the site.

I want to emphasize that the current structure of the Online Rooms & Marketplaces is not final. We are collecting feedback, especially if it's based on reasoning.

Great change.

Max, can you please nuke this thread https://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/1...9617-a-803715/ since its obviously obsolete now.

Beep Bop!

After all the time and effort Mike Haven has put in to the Internet Poker forum, I hope he was consulted about the Online Poker Rooms forum

Hey this sounds like great news for money launderers.

I don't think so. Scammers, likely..... money launderers, don't see why you think that.

This is a courageous decision.

I don't think this will be catastrophic. After all, you are certainly able to refrain from trading with accounts that have less than six months of history on your own. Of course, vigilance should be exercised in considering who you trade with.

We will monitor the situation with "General Marketplace" closely.

I also wanted to hear your opinion about the following changes as well:
- allowing software developers to have sticky threads if they give a discount to 2+2 members
- allowing coaches to promote themselves for free, which should motivate them to start meaningful discussions in the "Poker Theory" "Beginners Questions" and other poker strategy related subforums

So you are saying that coaches can promote their services outside the Coaching Area? I see a change in BQ that will make that forum unreadable.

can i pimp my hoes in there now or is that still frowned upon?

A potential compromise is to have the user titles with links. So you don't directly promote your coaching in BQ by making making posts saying "I'm a coach, check out my thread" but every time you reply users will see above your avatar a link to your coaching thread.

That was started for staking companies (like the one in my profile here) and coaching threads years ago, as an extra incentive for buying the ads + participate in strategy forums.

I think with the monthly cost going down (to zero/discounts), it could make that component more effective. I think it hasn't worked lately bc there are far less staking and coach ads than there used to be. Particularly coaching ones (since the thread starter is a direct strategy thinker/teacher, whereas with staking sometimes an admin or marketing type person in the stable makes the thread).

Seems cool. Poker players don't do well with change. I commend the new owners for trying things to see if they work. I think collecting information after implementation is the correct strategy, instead of theorizing about what is/isn't good. The forums needs a refreshing, I'm happy to see changes are happening. This really could go either way, hopefully the new owners will remain flexible.