[kiddj]

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the OP's original question is very simple, and noone has really addressed it:

Poker sites have a huge profit margin, why hasn't competition driven down our cost to play?

-Partygaming posted net profit of $350.1 million in 2004 and revenues of $601.6 million.
-In the first quarter of 2005 net profit was $117.4 million and revenues were $222.6 million.

i don't know how the other medium/big sites are doing financially, but you can bet your ass that big companies in other industries (General Moters, Dell etc) don't have profit margins like this. Why? Because competition doesn't allow it. That leads us back to the same question, why hasn't this happened in the online gaming industry yet?

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Is it possible that the massive influx of people playing online poker don't see/aren't concerned with the rake? Blockbuster got away with charging their late fees for almost 20 years before they ran into any problems.

This may seem like a simplistic answer, but they charge it because they can. Perhaps there will be a point where there are so many players and good, competing sites, that the competition will drive the fees down. But I think the sites are of the same mind set that we (winning players) are: as long as the boom is going, try to squeeze as much profit as possible.