Online cardrooms rake too much for their own good

[Awesemo]

There is a distinct relationship between the change in population of an online site and the amount of rake charged per pot. This is intuitively true considering that as players bust out of the site, they are less likely to buy back in. This has an effect on the overall amount of profit of the site. Is it possible that online poker sites charge too much rake for their own profit? If this was true, the change to compensate would be a benefit to the whole poker community.

The image I have for online poker is put well by Snoop Dogg, "Paid tha cost to be da boss." There is a definite learning curve for playing profitable poker. The higher the rake, the steeper the learning curve. If the rake of online sites was lowered, the population would grow at a much faster rate. This would be great for online poker in general. I think Dutch Boyd is on the right track with his venture Rakefree.com. However, I think that the best step for the poker community would be a currently popular online site lowering its rake. Online poker seems to me like an oligopoly. All of the websites have approximately the same rake structures. If one site lowered theirs, it would cause the other sites to lower as a reaction.

If the rake in poker rooms were lowered, it would benefit everybody. Online poker rooms would have more players and the total rake could be optimized. The overall quality of players at the sites would diminish. Let's push for lowered rake structures in the new year.