Re: Poker prophecy and its ilk

[hobbes9324]

And yeah, I know there are differences between the various programs.

What's worth noting is what I assume is PP's reason for barring, or threatening to bar, any or all of these programs - the ABSOLUTE necessity, from their point of view, of preventing even the slightest perception that some players have an advantage, beyond their personal playing skills, over some other player.

I'm a winning player, over my first 500 SNG's, which I know is a small sample size. I plan on continuing to be a winning player. But I don't have any illusions about where I stand as far as PP goes - I am, or hope to be, a parasite, sucking a bit of $$ off the sheep as they graze in the meadow that PP has provided for me. As long as I don't scatter the sheep, PP will leave me be. If I cause a stampede, well.....I'll get swatted.
Nevada casinos routinely bar players who can beat 21, not by cheating, but through their skills. Why would anyone think PP, or any other site, would hesitate to protect their income stream. Being that they are offshore, they are at least relativly protected from the scum-sucking legal system in the US, so I don't see how players have any recourse to whatever they want to do, in any case.

Flame away.....but don't have any illusions about your (and my) position in the meadow....and god bless the sheep.

[raptor517]

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Nevada casinos routinely bar players who can beat 21, not by cheating, but through their skills. Why would anyone think PP, or any other site, would hesitate to protect their income stream.

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this isnt why they ban people who beat blackjack. do you see why? holla

[bkbluedevil]

Vegas banning people who can beat blackjack is different than party poker banning people who beat their games in several ways. Most notably, the people who beat blackjack cost the casino money while the people who beat party poker games are it's biggest cutomers, and the people who pay the most in fees (I've already paid over 1100 in rake this month and I'm not even close to people like Gramps, Nick B and Raptor.) Also if vegas can litterally ban everyone who can beat their games consistently while if party poker bans the current sharks the breakeven players would then become the big winners. In other words: someone has to win in poker, no one has to win in blackjack.

[hobbes9324]

Players pay rake - if players BELIEVE (accuratly or not) that a site allows some players an advantage over others beyond their personal skill in playing, it would seem likely that players might choose to leave that site for another that doesn't allow it.

A player's interests, and PP's don't necessarily concide.
What I'm trying to get at is that for PP, any perception that the games are anything but totally honest would be a disaster. No matter how much a single player or group of players contributes in rake, it pales to the amount in total that they are taking in.

Additionally, where will the sharks go if they are barred from the aquarium?

And I agree that the comparison between card counters and online poker is a weak one - what I was trying to get at was
that the operator of a business will bar, or try to bar, any players that may have a negative effect on his income - directly as with a card counter, or indirectly, as above.
And I don't see anything to stop PP, or some other site, from doing so.

[bkbluedevil]

I see what your saying but I strongly disagree. If sites like Empire and Party don't want high volume sharks why do they set up promotions to attract them such as the tourney leaderboards and player points? Also the amount of fees a shark like Gramps pays in a month is def +EV for party even if he does kill a few fish along the way.

[hobbes9324]

Agreed - Gramps, and other sharks, who probably pay in rake what I make in my real job, are more than welcome - as long as they don't scatter the sheep.
But if a shark is caught cheating - or caught doing something that PP feels some players might view as cheating - and if PP thinks that it might lead to players leaving the site in any # - they'll grind up that shark and use him for fertilizer. I just checked - 53,000+ players - lotta rake - if 1% walked due to a perception that the games are unfair.....you do the math.

[citanul]

the point people are missing about your post is the main point, which is also a point i made in another thread on this subject. instead they are picking on the side stuff you chose to substantiate your argument. i don't know why it is exactly you chose to start a new thread to add your input to something that has 100 threads on it on this board already, but whatever.

the point is that they, the poker sites, have it in their best interests to not have people THINK that there is a useful piece of software out there that other people are using to take their money. the common man doesn't want to think "hey, for $20 i could be on even footing as the other people. he wants to think "there is no extraneous service that other people have, so this is just poker, and i like to play poker, it's fun, have my money."

even if we completely throw out the idea that they care if another company is making money by attaching it to their company, this makes sense. it just is in their financial interests to try to not scare away anyone, ever. the sharks are the sharks, software or no, and they'll be there no matter what happens. when you top this off with the fact that the sharks really don't care about the existence of prophecy, it becomes even clearer. the target audience of this product in particular is the player who plays a medium amount, maybe makes a little money, maybe loses a little money, but thinks that hey, $20 to give me an edge, booyah! boom goes the dynamite. those are the people that prophecy snookers into sending them $20 for a service that is nothing but wildly random numbers thrown on a screen. oh, i guess the service also includes as a free throw-in the possibility of having your account siezed because the software is against the site's T&C. but that's never told to you by prophecy.

if prophecy were a legitimate business, they would put in their webpage (or if they have a method of pushing a message to their downloaded client) immediately a note to their customers containing as good an explaination as possible of the current goings-on, as well as a note to not use their product until such time as the matter is clarified.

they should also, in my opinion, offer the money back to anyone who wants it.

citanul

[cha59]

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they should also, in my opinion, offer the money back to anyone who wants it.

citanul

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I sent this message to Poker Prophecy last night:

I got this message from Party Poker:

I’m sure everyone has seen the email from Party by now…….

I did not know that your software was not allowed by
Party Poker. I want a refund please.

Thanks,
Tom

This was the reply:

Hello Dan,

Today we have had several emails about the same
problem. Party Poker is not just targeting users of
our software, but also those of other software sites.

We are in the process of changing Poker Prophecy as we
speak to counter the hard drives scans that Party
Poker does(which are illegal) till then feel free to
use our online database at www.pokerprophecy.com.

We do apologize for the problems, but we are fixing
our software to meet the needs of the customers.
Version 6.0 which will have all the changes needed
will be coming out within four to five days.

We also feel this is a big scare tactic by Party Poker
because we have over 6,000 customers right now and
other software companies have thousands of customers
too. With how competitive the market is right now for
players there is no way they would turn away 15,000
users from there site.

If you would still like a refund please let us know

Best Regards,

Ryan Schultz



My reply:

Adam and Ryan,

My name is Tom not Dan.

Yes please I would still like a refund.

Since I sent the previous email to you, I spoke with a Party Poker representative about Poker Prophecy. In no uncertain terms, he told me that if the program was found on my hard drive while I am playing at Party, my account would be frozen and I would lose all the money in it.

I have deleted Poker Prophecy from my hard drive and you can cancel my account. I just don't feel comfortable with the situation here, whether or not what Party is doing is illegal. If Party tells me that the use of Poker Prophecy is ok at some point in the future, I'll consider using it again.

Please let me know what else I need to do to receive the refund.

Thanks,
Tom

I will let you know what happens.

[citanul]

congrats on getting responses from both places so quickly. it's almost unheard of.

good luck getting your money from prophecy. they are basically the essence of shady businesspeople.

i very very much doubt that what party does is "illegal." and further, i'm just going out on a limb here, but if the idiots from prophecy go around saying that sort of thing in public, it's probably lible, or slander, or whichever it is when you do it in writing.

something tells me that party has done some good "cover your assing" when it comes to whether or not you agree to let them do things like hard drive scans while running their program.

citanul

[hobbes9324]

Add in the fact that PP is operating out of Gibralter - and I suspect paying a pretty hefty fee to SOMEONE there to operate and I don't think they'd be too worried about any "legalities" in terms of scanning your hard drive...or much of anything else.