Cheating at AP, updated cliff notes

[0evg0]

I would trust Lee Jones with my life.

[steve1127]

Not a high-limit player, but I think that your suggestion sounds reasonable as far as satisfying the cheated players, but wholly implausible as far as keeping AP's name and reputation unsullied. The story has gotten too hot, gone too far, and been reported on in too many places for it to just dry up at this point. I would be very surprised if major media didn't pick up on it soon.

Beyond the logistical difficulties of trying to keep it somewhat quiet assuming AP refunds the ill-gotten gains - this no longer appears to have been just one rogue programmer. It involves at least one senior ex-employee and possibly one of AP's most public faces (Seif). AP's official statements at the very least hint at a widespread attempt to cover-up what happened, if not at complicity with the scam.

Maybe some will say that if they refund the money lost, that will show their good faith. Personally, I don't know how anybody could trust a company that showed such contempt for their players with their previous statements, and who only begin to hint at admitting something might be wrong when confronted with absolutely (no pun intended) overwhelming evidence. Why would we have any faith that they'd catch future cheats? As has been mentioned ad nauseum, if the superusers had been a little smarter, they might still be making lots of cash right now. Do we really trust Absolute to police cheats in the future?

[egj]

[ QUOTE ]
Therefore, if the money from these accounts could be returned to those they won it from, on the basis that the accounts were closed for chip dumping, this would be a way that AP could legitimately return the money to the victims without admitting that a superuser account exists. Basically, they'd just be confiscating money from shady accounts (based upon the chip-dumping) and returning it to where it originally came from (instead of just keeping it on AP). Nobody has to admit to a superuser. Nobody has to admit that cheating went down. The affected parties will have their money back. There's no ideal solution to this mess, but I feel that this is probably the closest we can get to it.

[/ QUOTE ]

I would still hold out for a full admission from Absolute. I think it's possible that Absolute can survive this. As far as I can tell, *current* Absolute management was not aware of, and did not condone, the cheating. It was a couple of rogue ex-employees. If they make this as clear as possible, some customers may be able to take their money there again.

To be sure, they're in for an avalanche of negative publicity. But that's coming *no matter what* (indeed, is already coming). Half-measures, like returning money that was chip dumped, will not stem the tide. Best to come clean and take their medicine, and rebuild from there.

[gumpzilla]

Also, everybody is talking about what AP has to do to survive. I really don't think they can, and if they can survive it isn't going to have anything to do with what people do or don't do. Does anybody give them more than a 10% shot to come through this at this point?

[suzzer99]

If AP comes clean, they die. I just don't see anything else happening. No player is that entrenched in a poker site that they wouldn't just pick up and move. Even if someone plays micro-stakes, they're still going to start to worry about cashing out from a crooked company.

If Absolute really owned UB, I would say they should just dissolve AP and try to move everyone over to UB as quietly/quickly as possible. But it sounds like AP's purchase of UB is actually contingent on more gigantic payments over the next 5 years or something - which would presumably all come from AP poker revenue.

Then again if they don't come clean, they probably die as well. Just a little more slowly.

So they really are stuck here.

The good news is every other site out there is definitely sitting up and taking full notice.

[nath]

[ QUOTE ]
wow, reading the comments on digg is very depressing and why I wish this never would have made the front page.

so much for any new fish anytime soon

[/ QUOTE ]
imo it's not as bad as you think it is

lapoker is right, fish who want to gamble will still play. people who thought it was rigged before will still think it's rigged, and weren't going to play anyway.

imo the vocal group is going to be the latter. that's expected. christ, it's the digg comment section, i wouldn't call it an accurate cross-section of the casual poker player demographic

[Dan Druff]

They already have suffered, and will continue to suffer, regardless of how this concludes.

This whole thing made them look both stupid and dishonest on so many levels.

You guys are living in a dreamworld if you think AP will admit to a superuser. They won't. They might as well turn off their servers and shut down if they admit that. Perhaps doing so might be the best plan of action for those of us at 2+2, but it would be suicide in regards of how it would relate to the casual poker player. If AP admits, "Yeah, there was a superuser", every donkey who lost money on the site -- all the way down to the $.02/$.04 games -- will attribute their losses to being cheated by a house account. It would be a complete disaster for them.

We have to find a compromise here, if we want any sort of resolution.

If you're not going to be satisfied with anything but a complete mea culpa on AP's part, you'd have a better chance waiting to see flying pigs and hell frozen over. You ahave to look at this from a realistic perspective, and what we can honestly expect and not expect from this.

Let's be serious, guys. The return of the money would mean far more than just a goodwill return of funds. If AP determines that they will suffer MORE from doing the right thing than their current platform of denial, then they will continue down the road of denial.

Why do I think lightning won't strike again? Everyone will be watching. Everyone will be suspicious. This whole thing almost brought them down once. Trust me -- if they get themselves out of this, there's no way they will ever risk this happening again. Even if security wasn't competent enough to catch this initially, you can bet they will make the necessary adjustments now.

[Zorglub]

The only way for them to survive now is to come perfectly clean, make sure it can never happen again and hire a truely independent security company to take care of thing from now on

[niss]

[ QUOTE ]
Druff, any solution whereby they come out and tell more lies is unacceptable. They to take tell the truth, whole truth, nothing but the truth. They need to get rid of anyone and everyone involved in the debacle, refund all parties, and implement sweeping security changes.

[/ QUOTE ]

Exactly. They may be able to save themselves by coming clean and attempting to assure the public that, as a result of this, their security measures will be tougher than any other site. They cannot save themselves by winking at us with a refund. So the AP fella's notion that they are damned if they do, damned if they don't, is not true. They are damned because of how they handled this from day 1 ... but it may not be too late for them to save themselves with the correct approach.

[albedoa]

Dan, we appreciate your work, but your motives are completely elsewhere. How could you ever trust them after this? The main problem is not that they were damned no matter how they responded to the original accusations, but that they didn't expect any new evidence to come out after they made their blanket response. They thought they could get away with covering this up.

That is what will have the worst effect on online poker. Not the $700k that some people are out (though obviously we want to see that money returned).