[frommagio]

Well, I'll agree that Party wasn't 100% either, but the accessibility and the basic corporate ethics were there. Their problem seemed to be a pervasive incompetence from management to marketing to engineering to support.

Now I'm not questioning FT's core ethics, beyond the simple observation that they don't really give a damn about their customers' rights. When their management begins to perceive it as a growing business problem, I suppose they'll grudgingly improve. One way we can help make that happen is to demand more as consumers. That means playing at places that respect us, that try to earn our business - and not at the others.

In another thread, somebody mentioned going to the newspapers with the story of FT's casual attitude towards an actively unfolding scam that cost a player $25K, much of which could have been prevented with reasonable action on FT's part, and another poster said (paraphrasing) "no, that's the last thing you want to do, the papers will run a story about the evils of online gambling". But maybe in the long run, that's exactly what the online poker community needs. The player demand won't go away, and the market is potentially huge for US gambling providers; it's only a matter of time until it's legal and regulated. So let's get the story out and get moving. We're not going to see many poker providers with the integrity and competence of typical companies until then.

For now, we're stuck with a bunch of companies that we ordinarily would refuse to business with - if we had a choice. Doug's presence here is a hopeful sign, but why should we need to beg for what should be automatic?