iPoker - 2 Billionth Hand promo - will be dealt today.

MrReaperMan

BigCityBanker wrote: »

ok - so here is what happened.

As no contingency was made for the event of the winning player originating from a non participating skin the winning prize just goes nowhere.

As in like a HGV on a Dublin hill?

It's a bit like doing the lottery from 50 numbers only for the draw to be made from 60. You didn't win why are you complaining?

BCB do you think if I sold you a ticket for a draw only to pull a ticket from another hat which nobody had a ticket for and then not pay out the prize you wouldn't be a tad unhappy?

BigCityBanker

Ste05 wrote: »

LOL, the moral of the story is don't play on iPoker, but I presume that's not the one you're thinking of. Could it be related to this part:)

No

Ste05 wrote: »

If you're a skin to iPoker, you must bend over and take whatever iPoker offers you, no matter the cost. And since it's not actually a network wide promotion, iPoker really should completely do away with using the term "network wide promotion" as clearly there is no such thing on iPoker.

The whole network really is a complete joke.

So in the end who keeps the 62k?? iPoker? Is it redistributed to the various participating skins? Was it put into the Freeroll? Do you agree with whatever the final decision was? (I presume it was iPoker pocketing it)

no, the concept of participation works really well. Most skins participate in everything - ECOOP, Monthly Million etc... The main reasons skins choose not to participate is for one of two reasons

a) they think its a bad promo and would rather do something specific
b) they are giving back so much money to their players in rakeback that they cant afford to bleed any more of their margin - I guess the winner of the hand can take comfort from his rakeback

Promotions are paid for after the event - so we would get notification of XXX charge once a promo is over. In this instance no charge comes through for the $62k. For the most part I am also satisfied with how iPoker reached their decision - there is no equitable alternative.

pgodkin

BigCityBanker wrote: »

Promotions are paid for after the event - so we would get notification of XXX charge once a promo is over. In this instance no charge comes through for the $62k. For the most part I am also satisfied with how iPoker reached their decision - there is no equitable alternative.

Which means big free roll for all ppp customers who took part tryin to get win the prize!;)

Ste05

BigCityBanker wrote: »

Promotions are paid for after the event - so we would get notification of XXX charge once a promo is over. In this instance no charge comes through for the $62k. For the most part I am also satisfied with how iPoker reached their decision - there is no equitable alternative.

LOL, I'm sure you are happy with that outcome.:rolleyes: It means the participating skins get the 62k back, instead of the players, whether you lot pay it before or after the promotion is irrelevant. That must have been a bonanza month for PPP, every other operator and the network. iPoker really does look after it's big boys, and this is close to genius from a business perspective.

TBH, it's kind of a genius business model. All front end operators, get to blame everything bad on the background monster that is iPoker, and then only have to give mouth service to disgruntled customers, and are never really held accountable, because " hey, it's not my fault, iPoker did it."

BigCityBanker

you realise that the 62k is chopped up between all the skins yea? you know there are more than 2 skins? your definition of a bonanza requires some fine tuning imo.

Ste05

BigCityBanker wrote: »

you realise that the 62k is chopped up between all the skins yea? you know there are more than 2 skins? your definition of a bonanza requires some fine tuning imo.

Don't think so... you expected to spend x/100k for the increased traffic/rake, instead you only had to spend x/38k, for the same huge increase in traffic, therefore, you should have had a bonanza month. If you don't consider a month that exceeds projections to be a bonanza, maybe it's your definition of bonanza needs fine tuning.

I'd have thought it was quite simple really.

MrReaperMan

BigCityBanker wrote: »

you realise that the 62k is chopped up between all the skins yea? you know there are more than 2 skins? your definition of a bonanza requires some fine tuning imo.

additional rake generated by poorly concieved/resolved promtion that cost the promoter......?

Your definition of a bonanza requires some fine tuning imo

premierstone

BigCityBanker wrote: »

I am also satisfied with how iPoker reached their decision - there is no equitable alternative.

And here was me mulling over it all morning, which site Boyles or PP will I lodge a few quid in an try and qualify for the IO think I'll stick to Stars and try and qualify live.

CHD never taught I'd agree with you but ipoker must die indeed!

The C Kid

Didn't want to have to post this but BCB's attempted cover-up is a joke.

He actually just bought himself a new Audi TT paid for by this promotion scandal, all the extra rake generated was paid out as Xmas bonuses to Noel and his like. Dreadful scenes, when i complained he was driving away shouting "Let Them Eat Cake".

careca

The C Kid wrote: »

He actually just bought himself a new Audi TT

Serves him right. Sure he won't get up any hills driving that in this weather.

bSlick

cardshark202 wrote: »

dvdfan there are tons of better sites than ipoker. pretty much no-one should be playing on ipoker. its almost as bad as ongame

What's so bad about ipoker? The interface looks crap but with minimaxmod you can make it look decent. And nowhere else gives the same level of rb. I heard stars and full tilt are just as reg infested as ipoker these days.

lucky-colm

i say kick BCB off for 6 months:mad:

RoadSweeper

Not having a contingency plan is either retarded or genius.

Samba

RoadSweeper wrote: »

Not having a contingency plan is either retarded or genius.

Or accidental genius

I miss Tribecca, would love to see the guys come out of retirement and buy back their old software, Ipoker would never sell, they know their software wouldn't stand a chance against a 10 year old piece of software....

lucky-colm

Samba wrote: »

Or accidental genius

...

or planned accidential genius:eek:

dvdfan

Ah its all cleared up now, so it wasn't actually ipoker who robbed their players it was just the skins who are making a big enough profit to be able to afford it. I know when a big company comes on here when they've done something questionable they're sitting ducks and people will take a pop regardless of whether your in the wrong or not but i'm pretty amazed someone representing Paddy Power has publicly stated they are satisfied with how this was handled.

I expected it from Ipoker as i know in a lot of situations the skins have to abide by ipoker's rules but clearly in this case Paddy Power is happy with what i think is as close to a scam as you can get. Its not like a promotion where someone has to win 6 sngs in a row, you advertised a $100k promotion, not up to $100k, you didn't specify if the winner was a non participating skin on this "Network wide promotion" that the money isn't paid out.

An to rub it in you didn't even include the $2k bounty in the freeroll, why not let the runner up have it or why not let the runner up win the whole lot. I'm not asking for extra money here, you said yourself that the only reason you wouldn't enter it is if you didn't think it was a good promotion, so obviously you thought it was a profitable promotion, so just pay out what you advertised.

It doesn't take a genius to see that this is a massive PR blunder which could have easily being avoided and in fact create positive PR, this thread and the 2+2 thread are all over Google, you can see the current feeling about ipoker even from current customers is appalling and one sided and to try and defend this is just disgraceful. I suggest since you advertised it so much on your site and all the other skins did too and your content with how it was handled that you post the results too on your website, but its obvious why you don't.

b) they are giving back so much money to their players in rakeback that they cant afford to bleed any more of their margin - I guess the winner of the hand can take comfort from his rakeback

You also give the impression that since the winning player was playing on a network that weren't in the promotion that he got what was coming to him as there on a network with high illegal rakeback, thats a bit harsh, were all looking for the best deal, do you really expect players to go to somewhere like Paddy Power instead of the other skins where you can get up to twice as much rakeback so we might have a tiny chance to win a promotion that probably wont be paid out. We dont make the rules, i cant get over 50% on Full Tilt, i cant get it on any other network, its not my fault the structure allows me to get a good deal, i can see why Paddy Power dont like this and i can see how it isnt good for the overall network in the long run but its not the players faults and the thing is if tomorrow you cut out rakeback and only offered 35% then ipoker would quickly lose a huge amount of liquidity.

there is a moral to this story people - though I bet nobody gets it right.

consequently he got zilch other than a high quality bad beat story

Funny and true story - when the 2 billionth hand occured the losing player, from the participating skin, was sent a pop up notifying him of what was as stake

Again a bit harsh and not very humble, promotions popup all the time on poker sites, i'm sure most players don't say, oh ill sit out all my tables and carefully read this latest promotion even though I've 10 decisions to make in 20-30 secs as not everyone was aware of this 2 billionth hand promotion in advance and its not as if he was caught cheating or done something wrong, he got extremely unlucky but i guess why not have a good laugh at him while your at it, very classy.

All other participants were paid accordingly.

What do you mean all other participants? There was 2 people at the table, only 1 got paid, of course theres the 20 people that won seats to the monthly million but you cant tell me for sure that all the people who were entitled to be part of the bubble tournament were from participating skins so im sure lots of other people lost out there too unless the winning player was conveniently the only person from about 400 people that was on a non competing network (there was close to 400 in the bubble tourney so i'm assuming at least 400 people were part of the 100 hands preceding the so called 2 billionth hand) are you saying all of these 400 people were on participating networks?

Heres a link to the terms and conditions, they conveniently allowed for every other possibility
http://www.pokerinside.com/files/resources/Two%20Billionth%20Hand%20Promotion.pdf

bSlick

dvdfan wrote: »

You also give the impression that since the winning player was playing on a network that weren't in the promotion that he got what was coming to him as there on a network with high illegal rakeback, thats a bit harsh, were all looking for the best deal, do you really expect players to go to somewhere like Paddy Power instead of the other skins where you can get up to twice as much rakeback so we might have a tiny chance to win a promotion that probably wont be paid out. We dont make the rules, i cant get over 50% on Full Tilt, i cant get it on any other network, its not my fault the structure allows me to get a good deal, i can see why Paddy Power dont like this and i can see how it isnt good for the overall network in the long run but its not the players faults and the thing is if tomorrow you cut out rakeback and only offered 35% then ipoker would quickly lose a huge amount of liquidity.

They might publicly frown about it but behind the scenes playtech are obviously in favour of the rakeback deals. I know there are some issues such as too many winning players on a particular skin but overall they are definitely in favour of it. If they wanted to stop it all they need to do is create a dummy account on twoplustwo asking for rakeback and they can catch every single skin that is offering, which is basically all of them - which they obviously know and endorse. These deals are the one single reason why people play on ipoker instead of stars or full tilt. If they got rid of it tomorrow they might as well shut up shop as most of the player base would be gone.

CHD

iPoker Must Die

Seriously.

Ste05

bSlick wrote: »

They might publicly frown about it but behind the scenes playtech are obviously in favour of the rakeback deals. I know there are some issues such as too many winning players on a particular skin but overall they are definitely in favour of it. If they wanted to stop it all they need to do is create a dummy account on twoplustwo asking for rakeback and they can catch every single skin that is offering, which is basically all of them - which they obviously know and endorse. These deals are the one single reason why people play on ipoker instead of stars or full tilt. If they got rid of it tomorrow they might as well shut up shop as most of the player base would be gone.

iPoker couldn't give a monkeys... they make their rake regardless of what skin/cage a player plays on. It's the bigger operators who have a problem with the RB deals and put pressure on iPoker to act.

dvdfan

Ste05 wrote: »

iPoker couldn't give a monkeys... they make their rake regardless of what skin/cage a player plays on. It's the bigger operators who have a problem with the RB deals and put pressure on iPoker to act.

Yeah agreed, funnily enough they dont realise that their loyalty bonus is only a par with full tilt and other networks that if they do eventually make it impossible for the smaller sites to offer rakeback deals the players wont go to them, they'll leave the network for another site as other than rakeback ipoker dosent really offer a lot compared to the other sites. At the moment the players are just being recycled to other skins

BigCityBanker

DVD - I stated that in the absence of an equitable alternative I was satisfied with how it was dealt with. If you can propose an equitable alternative please do so and I will send it direct to the head of operations in iPoker.

premierstone

BigCityBanker wrote: »

DVD - I stated that in the absence of an equitable alternative I was satisfied with how it was dealt with. If you can propose an equitable alternative please do so and I will send it direct to the head of operations in iPoker.

Firstly the promotion should not have been advertised as network wide when it was no such thing and secondldy if the winner was ineligible then surely the runner-up automatically becomes the winner simples

As for not having the $2k bounty in the freeroll that was simply beneath contempt tbh.

I appreciate the position you are in BCB and when this was kicking off I was actually feeling sorry for you and Ciaran, now im not sure whether I have lost more respect for you for trying to defend this sham or Ciaran for seemingly burying he's head and ignoring the issue ( perhaps there is a genuine reason for he's silence but it doesnt look good)

RegularGuy

I've been following the boards for a while but never really felt compelled to post. But having been following this thread particularly, I kind of felt it was time. At the risk of repeating some of the views already ITT and stating the obvious, here is my 2c.

Clearly, there should have been a contigency put in place for the winner coming from a non-participating skin. I don't think any party could disagree with that. More subjectively, I don't think skins should have been able to opt out from such a promotion. If this was allowed, then the phrase "network-wide" should obviously not have been used and those non-participating skins should have been forced to advertised the fact they were not participating.

With the above having been said, IF a player was playing hoping to benefit from this promotion then they have a degree of responsibility to ensure they understand the full T & Cs - FROM THE SKIN THEY WERE PLAYING ON.

However, the accusation that the sites that advertised the promotion are at fault is a little off the mark, I think. Afterall, these sites are advertising for the promotion AT THEIR site.

What I don't particularly understand ITT is the bashing of what I'm assuming is a representative of Paddy Power. Without wishing to come across as a shill, I'm reasonably happy with their stance on this. I think there is perhaps some unfortunate phrasing being used, but the jist of their point is valid. It's not like PP - or any of the participating skins - have misled any of their players and the deal would for sure have been honoured had the winner been playing on these skins.

*partil derail coming up

If a player is cute enough to search out the best %rb deal on the network, then they should be cute enough to realise the potential risks of playing on such a skin. I play on PP knowing full well I could get a better % of my rake each month but also run the risk of being kicked off for winning or having my deal not honoured. I can't be doing with constantly changing skins all the time so I get what I get and I accept it

/ partial derail

The comments about this situation creating a "bonanza" for the sites that DID participate is a little laughable to be honest. Assuming I understand correctly how it works, basically PP and the other skins have "saved" their % of the $62k that they would have had to pay had the winner been playing on a participating skin. Even assuming just half a dozen participating skins, thats a "gain" of $10k which I doubt qualifies as a bonanza for any of these organisations. And why should these organisations be concerned about a player from another skin missing out? Particularly if that other skin is one of the parasitic variety.

I certainly agree, though, that not having the $2k bounty in the freeroll was mischevious at best and - to paraphrase premierstone - contempteous at worst.

IMO, the mistakes were made at the beginning by not putting in a contigency for this situation happening, that shows a not inconsiderable amount of incompetency. However, it's the skins that were not participating that should be the target of players anger, not those that have done nothing wrong.

That having been said, if I was in charge of one of the participating skins, such as Paddy Power, I do believe they should be doing something - even if it's only an exercise in good PR.

Again making the assumption that PP would have been responsible for $62k/no. of participating skins - then I would suggest taking that $x amount and using it for some kind of freeroll/giveaway for the players ON THEIR SKIN, that did take part in the promotion - i.e. those that played around the time the hand was expected and/or put in extra volume during the promotion. If they were expecting to spend this money anyway had the winner come from a participating skin then they've already budgeted for it.

All in all, it's a pretty poor situation to have arisen but I am struggling to understand the reaction of some people in this thread.

Thus concludes what I think is my longest first post on any forum, ever.

Samoa Joe

premierstone wrote: »

I appreciate the position you are in BCB and when this was kicking off I was actually feeling sorry for you and Ciaran, now im not sure whether I have lost more respect for you for trying to defend this sham or Ciaran for seemingly burying he's head and ignoring the issue ( perhaps there is a genuine reason for he's silence but it doesnt look good)

Sorry I havent really been following this thread since it first started and just had this comment brought to my attention.

Being 100% honest I think this could have been handled better from a PR route by the network. This isnt ideal for us as an operator either as we have to deal with players who were/were not effected.

At that end of the day it wasnt covered by the T & C's at the start as the chances of this happening were slim. I think that major lessons were learned on this I would expect that every possible aspect will be covered in future.

phantom_lord

cardshark202 wrote: »

dvdfan there are tons of better sites than ipoker. pretty much no-one should be playing on ipoker. its almost as bad as ongame

pm if you're feeling generous plz! i'm outta the loop with this stuff.

colquhom

phantom_lord wrote: »

pm if you're feeling generous plz! i'm outta the loop with this stuff.

+1!

jtsuited

long time since I posted on this forum but I really have to ask (apologies if it's been asked already):

Did PPP (or any other participating skins) advertise (i can't find any of the original advertisements) this as specifically a 'network wide' promotion?

If so it's false advertising and if you really want to do something about, there's a convenient system in Ireland for dealing with it http://www.citizensinformation.ie/categories/consumer-affairs/consumer-protection/consumer-rights/consumer_advertising

lucky-colm

RegularGuy wrote: »

I've been following the boards for a while but never really felt compelled to post. But having been following this thread particularly, I kind of felt it was time. At the risk of repeating some of the views already ITT and stating the obvious, here is my 2c.

Clearly, there should have been a contigency put in place for the winner coming from a non-participating skin. I don't think any party could disagree with that. More subjectively, I don't think skins should have been able to opt out from such a promotion. If this was allowed, then the phrase "network-wide" should obviously not have been used and those non-participating skins should have been forced to advertised the fact they were not participating.

With the above having been said, IF a player was playing hoping to benefit from this promotion then they have a degree of responsibility to ensure they understand the full T & Cs - FROM THE SKIN THEY WERE PLAYING ON.

However, the accusation that the sites that advertised the promotion are at fault is a little off the mark, I think. Afterall, these sites are advertising for the promotion AT THEIR site.

What I don't particularly understand ITT is the bashing of what I'm assuming is a representative of Paddy Power. Without wishing to come across as a shill, I'm reasonably happy with their stance on this. I think there is perhaps some unfortunate phrasing being used, but the jist of their point is valid. It's not like PP - or any of the participating skins - have misled any of their players and the deal would for sure have been honoured had the winner been playing on these skins.

*partil derail coming up

If a player is cute enough to search out the best %rb deal on the network, then they should be cute enough to realise the potential risks of playing on such a skin. I play on PP knowing full well I could get a better % of my rake each month but also run the risk of being kicked off for winning or having my deal not honoured. I can't be doing with constantly changing skins all the time so I get what I get and I accept it

/ partial derail

The comments about this situation creating a "bonanza" for the sites that DID participate is a little laughable to be honest. Assuming I understand correctly how it works, basically PP and the other skins have "saved" their % of the $62k that they would have had to pay had the winner been playing on a participating skin. Even assuming just half a dozen participating skins, thats a "gain" of $10k which I doubt qualifies as a bonanza for any of these organisations. And why should these organisations be concerned about a player from another skin missing out? Particularly if that other skin is one of the parasitic variety.

I certainly agree, though, that not having the $2k bounty in the freeroll was mischevious at best and - to paraphrase premierstone - contempteous at worst.

IMO, the mistakes were made at the beginning by not putting in a contigency for this situation happening, that shows a not inconsiderable amount of incompetency. However, it's the skins that were not participating that should be the target of players anger, not those that have done nothing wrong.

That having been said, if I was in charge of one of the participating skins, such as Paddy Power, I do believe they should be doing something - even if it's only an exercise in good PR.

Again making the assumption that PP would have been responsible for $62k/no. of participating skins - then I would suggest taking that $x amount and using it for some kind of freeroll/giveaway for the players ON THEIR SKIN, that did take part in the promotion - i.e. those that played around the time the hand was expected and/or put in extra volume during the promotion. If they were expecting to spend this money anyway had the winner come from a participating skin then they've already budgeted for it.

All in all, it's a pretty poor situation to have arisen but I am struggling to understand the reaction of some people in this thread.

Thus concludes what I think is my longest first post on any forum, ever.

obviously working for "paddy"

dvdfan

I agree with a lot of the stuff you said regular guy, i have to be honest and say that it was a good thought out post but a bit surprising that someone would feel compelled to come on an defend paddy power as their first post and although they have never posted on boards they seem to know the boards lingo like ITT, rb% etc

Its probably unfair of me to be skeptical but you do have only 1 post and this quote isnt something id expect to hear from a player, sounds more like someone trying to defend why you should play with sites like Paddy Power instead of the sites with bigger rakeback deals.

If a player is cute enough to search out the best %rb deal on the network, then they should be cute enough to realise the potential risks of playing on such a skin. I play on PP knowing full well I could get a better % of my rake each month but also run the risk of being kicked off for winning or having my deal not honoured. I can't be doing with constantly changing skins all the time so I get what I get and I accept it

A $100nl player playing 15k hands a week could probably earn an extra $1k a month playing at one of the evil skins so i dont think its an inconvenience to move every now and then especially if your getting signup bonuses. Anyway thats neither here nor there, id love to see you post more if its not a shill as the post made a lot of sense albeit a bit one sided but probably not as bad as mine.

Im not on here to bash paddy power or ipoker because i like having a go, id challenge you to find any posts previous to the banning winning player episode where i said anything bad about ipoker, i like playing on ipoker, mostly for the rakeback and ease of mining and in fact you'll probably find me in several of the ipoker bashing threads saying i didnt have a problem with ipoker and disagreeing with the majority. In fact id say you'd struggle to find any thread where i bashed someone even when there was a reason to but lately after the banning of winning players and this fiasco now has really irritated me, simply because of the arrogance of ipoker and there lack of respect and accountability.

Ive absolutely nothing against BCB, seems like a nice lad and notice i didnt attack Boyles (again i think hes a boyle rep but not sure) or anyone else in particular until i seen what i thought was a smirk and arrogant reply to what clearly has a lot of people extremely angry. I would have expected better from a Paddy Power rep and im again not blaming paddy power poker for this problem but if you come on and defend how this fiasco was handled and smirk at the people who lost out a substancial amount of money and take a dig at people who decide to join the evil sites that give great rakeback deals as if were stupid then i felt compelled to let you know that its not a professional thing to do for a company like paddy power.

I accept your probably sick to death of being a target here for every little ipoker problem and to be fair you do reply to concerns unlike other skins and its just your job so i'm not making a reflection on you personally so maybe you let the thread get under your skin but your responses imo up to this just give the impression that you couldn't care less and everybody got what was coming to them for being part of a skin that gives good rakeback deals. This is fine as a personal opinion but as a rep of paddy power i think you let them down.

Regarding an equitable solution, id say do anything other than not pay the money would be fair, to the runner up or maybe re-run the promotion with the remainder of the prize money or invite the people who were online at the time of the 2 billionth hand into a freeroll with the prize money or give it to a cause like the people who are living in the streets rough during this weather or to charity but for gods sake don't stick it your pocket, that is the least equitable solution.

You were in a no win situation in this thread so i do feel for you and ciaran but i think you turned what could have been a professional response like regularguys posted for example into a response that just invigorated the thread with people clearly angry with what you said and specifically how you said it.

Paul Spillane

Ciaran_Corbett wrote: »

Sorry I havent really been following this thread since it first started and just had this comment brought to my attention.

Being 100% honest I think this could have been handled better from a PR route by the network. This isnt ideal for us as an operator either as we have to deal with players who were/were not effected.

At that end of the day it wasnt covered by the T & C's at the start as the chances of this happening were slim. I think that major lessons were learned on this I would expect that every possible aspect will be covered in future.

Also you can try this route http://www.ipoker.com/html/page/contact-us