Perhaps why you should care about bots and cheats

[DeadMoneyDad]

[ QUOTE ]

Don't let your knowledge of poker accounting get in the way of believing that you can eliminate 95% of humans from bots.

[ QUOTE ]
A few phone calls and some faxed documentation or even an affiliate vouching for accounts IMPO would get us 100% of the way to a workible solution.

[/ QUOTE ]

Affiliates vouching for accounts isn't going to get you 100% of the way there, for many, many reasons.

[/ QUOTE ]

I took enough accounting courses in University that with one or two more it could have been my fourth major. I have run quite a few profitible business and I hate to say this and don't mean it as an insult but I have likely paid more in accounting fees in my life than you make in a year.

I haven't written a computer program in many years, I learned programing on punch cards, since M$ added a third + to C++, but I'm told I can make an excel spread sheet or access data base sit up and beg.

I don't mean to be rude at all. You don't know me from Adam and the internet is fully populated with know-it-all blow hards, so your skeptism is likely fully earned.

But I don't make statements that I'm not fully prepared to back up.

Right now with what little I know and talking to a few rake back affiliates and from past conversations with poker site operators between the two I feel if they wanted to they could solve this little issue in a week with out one more utterance from me.

By the way any of you future Imagine.com poker site operators looking for a little venture capital. Between me and a few of my former clients I know where I can put my hands on a few million.


D$D

[DeadMoneyDad]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
IMHO, sites that don't guarantee a fair game will go out of business. It's that simple, especially if U.S.-based companies enter the market.

[/ QUOTE ]

YES, YES, YES, and YES.

This is why we need to convince those sites to take action NOW.

[/ QUOTE ]


I couldn't agree more. I hate bots as much as anyone here. My concern was lumping this and every gaming-related sob story into a master regulatory scheme. As D$D wasn't proposing that, it's all good.

So, now that we've gone through 1,000 posts to discuss something 100% of us agree on (bots are bad), let's write to FT and tell them so (this could have been accomplished in one five sentence post [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img] ).

[/ QUOTE ]


Sorry if you feel I slow played this........

Save us all the effort.

You're going to be on the PPA board.

Corner Howard Letterer and ask him to look into it.

Done deal,

D$D

[TheEngineer]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]


[/ QUOTE ]

Please take this poll down as it is it is an insult.

D$D

[/ QUOTE ]

I still don't see where it's an insult, as it was intended to be fairly worded.

I PMed Berge20 with a request to delete it.

[DeadMoneyDad]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]


[/ QUOTE ]

Please take this poll down as it is it is an insult.

D$D

[/ QUOTE ]

I still don't see where it's an insult, as it was intended to be fairly worded.

I PMed Berge20 with a request to delete it.

[/ QUOTE ]

That's fine we got to the end without it...

Thank you,

D$D

[Tuff_Fish]

[ QUOTE ]


I am asking FT to stop just looking at this week's or this quater's bottom line but look at the multi-year profits.......
.
.


[/ QUOTE ]

FT, PokerStars, et al are only looking at the short term bottom line because they are aware that they stand an excellent chance of not being here in a year or so.

Does anyone know if either of them have tried for a UK license or not. I can't imagine them getting one with their present business practices. If most non US players gravitate to the licensed UK sites, FT et al will only have the US nit grinders left. If, somehow US players are allowed onto UK sites (WTO etc) FT has...... nothing.

Just my own humble opinion.

Tuff

[DeadMoneyDad]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]


I am asking FT to stop just looking at this week's or this quater's bottom line but look at the multi-year profits.......
.
.


[/ QUOTE ]

FT, PokerStars, et al are only looking at the short term bottom line because they are aware that they stand an excellent chance of not being here in a year or so.

Does anyone know if either of them have tried for a UK license or not. I can't imagine them getting one with their present business practices. If most non US players gravitate to the licensed UK sites, FT et al will only have the US nit grinders left. If, somehow US players are allowed onto UK sites (WTO etc) FT has...... nothing.

Just my own humble opinion.

Tuff

[/ QUOTE ]

Well with FT perhaps we have the best chance of change, they have the most to loose and perhaps with a good corporate image gain an advantage...

Just a thought,

D$D

[RIIT]

[ QUOTE ]
I have received a number of questions on what my motives are in the bot issue. Here are my thoughts on why the affiliates and poker sites should as well as the casual players should give a $hit.

My suggestions are based on my on personal knowledge only of the limited amount of information I get from my own rake back affiliate. But even that limited amount of information gives me some idea of the accounting that goes on behind the scenes.

For example I never knew and many rake back earners don't know that FT charges a player a portion of the prize pool of any freeroll public or private. MTT's and regular rake are accounted for in two separate columns. I have a fee's charge for making a deposit. I have yet to make a withdraw but given my experience so far I'd bet there is an accounting charge for that as well.

Given the nature of the flow of information I would suspect that the amount of detail is greater for my rake back affiliate than the information they provide me.

Given all of that it seems the "poker accounting" is much more detailed than most people imagine, or it is on FT to a degree much greater than I imagined.

So if bots play something close to break-even poker and bank the rake, just given the limited information I have from my account I imagine I could spot the difference between a "casual player" and a bot almost with out effort.

Now getting in-between a truly dedicated multi-table grinder and a bot will be much trickier if the amount of rake back affiliate information is limited to only what I've personally seen. I'll admit I am a casual player. I looked into software enhanced with 24/7 data mined computerized multi-tabling grinding. I gave it serious consideration. Personally if my figures are even 1/2 way correct and my wife finds out I didn't do it I'm a dead man.

Don't take this the wrong way any multi-table grinders but I don't call that poker. I'm new to poker, but old school in my poker philosophy; if you can do it in a live event it has no place in my on-line game.

So if a number of multi-tabling software assisted data based HUD players get caught up in this mess and get their payments delayed I really don't care if it only catches one or two bots a month. The affiliates will have to make their own marketing decisions on what is best for on-line poker in general.

Personally I think the grinders are as much as a problem to the on-line industry as the bots, but currently grinding is legal. Well depending on how you read FT's T&C, but that isn't the issue.

The issue is some sort of legislation affecting on-line poker will come one day. Some time before that day their will be hearings to decide the regulatory burden placed on the industry in exchange for the licensing rights to once-again accept unrestricted "legal" US deposits. At that time the industry and the affiliates will make at least one claim that the industry is self regulating.

I'll tell you now as someone interested in that future legislation I am basing my decision on how much credibility FT and the industry really has on how it reacts to these types of issues now. Do not tell me then, how you are willing to stop whatever type of "made for TV sob story" the anti-gambling folks will trot out with some future computerized filter or highly developed security. I want to see action now.........

Or at least show a little concern for the future of on-line poker.

For you other casual players out there, who don't think this issue affects you, just consider who is ultimately going to pay for those fees, the cost of the regulatory burden, and any newly implemented filters or security!

If you think that FT or any one else in the poker "economy" is suddenly going to get charitable, you have a bad beat coming.........


D$D

[/ QUOTE ]

D&D,

The "natural" and "normal" characteristics of the internet poker environment are:

a) computers outnumber humans 2 to 1 (or more)
b) opponents are not physically visible to one another
c) sites cannot prove that they are not hinting any players

The desire for anybody to want to face human only opponents is understandable and it is very doable within the live game. But this desire goes against the natural environment of the internet. The bottom line is that the internet very much "favors" the computer assisted player and the teaming player and quite naturally so.

The acceptable rules for internet poker should have natural harmony for the environment in which it lives. And every human player that wants a definition of online poker that is contrary to the natural internet environment should be marginalized in everyway possible because that backward mindset is one of the greatest obstacles to progress.

RIIT

[DeadMoneyDad]

[ QUOTE ]




The "natural" and "normal" characteristics of the internet poker environment are:

a) computers outnumber humans 2 to 1 (or more)

[/ QUOTE ]

Footnote this please.

[ QUOTE ]
b) opponents are not physically visible to one another

[/ QUOTE ]

A given.


[ QUOTE ]
c) sites cannot prove that they are not hinting any players

[/ QUOTE ]

Please define, "hinting". I understand "hinting (or, more accurately, instructing) a font is a method of defining exactly which pixels are turned on in order to create the best possible character bitmap shape at small sizes and low resolutions."

Just let me know exactly how you mean this reference.

[ QUOTE ]
The desire for anybody to want to face human only opponents is understandable and it is very doable within the live game. But this desire goes against the natural environment of the internet. The bottom line is that the internet very much "favors" the computer assisted player and the teaming player and quite naturally so.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you mean a gambler will always look for any edge he or she can gain, I fully agree.

[ QUOTE ]
The acceptable rules for internet poker should have natural harmony for the environment in which it lives. And every human player that wants a definition of online poker that is contrary to the natural internet environment should be marginalized in everyway possible because that backward mindset is one of the greatest obstacles to progress.

[/ QUOTE ]

This seems like a mix of Plato and Maslow.

While I'd love to endlessly discuss philisophy with you this just isn't the place.

My bottom line is what is best, IMO, for the future of on-line poker. Yes the "camel's nose" or more is already in the tent. I get that. But if those of us want to live in the tent and have more "new" friends visit we just might have to b.tch slap that nose to keep the tent livable. I'm even willing to kill the stinky beast and find another mode of transportation.

Computer assistance (CA) in general terms, for me encompases all forms of assistance that is beyond what is allowed in a live poker room, from handheld odds calculators to the most sophisticalted sci-fi nighmare you or I can imagine.

The current level of CA is getting to the point where it just might ruin the game as most of us know it. Continuing down the current path will totally destroy the game long before we ever get a decent bill out of Congress IMPO.

Computing power doubles and drops in total costs something like every eighteen months. Internet communication is a world most people are both awed with and completely scared of due to the ever increasing "gee wiz" uses that pop up everyday.

Right now with a minimal effort and cost with my limited knowledge, programing skills, and even poker skills I could set up the following; a HU that puts any player of any length of time on a very small range of hands based on every hand they have ever played under that user name. This would not be an average player's range of hands but based on position, bet size, lenght of time in the player's current session, and a number of factors that I shudder to mention readily availible if just to keep these CA sharks from implementating. I don't even have to wait the former wait time of data mining any level for six months, I can lease a complete data base right now.

Given current T&C as long as I had a human hand doing some of the clicking and enough "stakers" willing to provide human ID's to back up the accounts I could have a bot farm up and running in less than a week. I could play as many hands at as many tables at any level I wanted and completly pass any poker site's security with out a problem.

I'd also be willing to bet $1,000.00 to a single cent there are such operations currently up an running.

If I wanted to totally violate both the spirit and letter of the T&C's I'd set up a back side communications net and use prop player bots to increase my odds calculations.

But what the hell is it worth in karma?

I've run the numbers and evaluated the risk reward including the ever increasing need to out "invent" the other bots farmers. If I was a different person I would have done it six months ago.

There is a funny photoshop pic of 8 robots sitting around an on-line poker table with one "live" player, entitled the on-line poker game in 200X, add your own year. My number is less than 10.

That is unless those of us who play "casually" don't do something. Given the current poker economy there is not one voice that isn't out there looking to cash in the most they can today and F! the consequences. From greedy self interested poker sites down to the greedy self interested average player.

There are plenty of things that are completely natural and the end result is something like cancer or aids that thrives on an organism up and until it destroys the host.

Some of the self destructive natural things can be stopped some can only be slowed down others are doomed to extinction.

I know what I think of the current un-checked evolution of on-line poker's end result is and I don't like the picture.

If you are in the CA camp and figure you can jump to another host and are unconcerned about the surival of the specises that too would be natural.

Me I can always find a live game and enjoy it more so ultimately I don't have nor will I ever have anything invested in the CA game.


D$D

[yahboohoo]

Stop the bots. Industry should self-police this issue, not the Feds, who really have zero reason to. It's not illegal, just not what poker is about.

As far as 'grinders' go, I have no idea on earth what D$D is talking about here. If you want to play 8 tables waiting for top set, that's your thing.

[RIIT]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]




The "natural" and "normal" characteristics of the internet poker environment are:

a) computers outnumber humans 2 to 1 (or more)

[/ QUOTE ]

Footnote this please.

[ QUOTE ]
b) opponents are not physically visible to one another

[/ QUOTE ]

A given.


[ QUOTE ]
c) sites cannot prove that they are not hinting any players

[/ QUOTE ]

Please define, "hinting". I understand "hinting (or, more accurately, instructing) a font is a method of defining exactly which pixels are turned on in order to create the best possible character bitmap shape at small sizes and low resolutions."

Just let me know exactly how you mean this reference.

[ QUOTE ]
The desire for anybody to want to face human only opponents is understandable and it is very doable within the live game. But this desire goes against the natural environment of the internet. The bottom line is that the internet very much "favors" the computer assisted player and the teaming player and quite naturally so.

[/ QUOTE ]

If you mean a gambler will always look for any edge he or she can gain, I fully agree.

[ QUOTE ]
The acceptable rules for internet poker should have natural harmony for the environment in which it lives. And every human player that wants a definition of online poker that is contrary to the natural internet environment should be marginalized in everyway possible because that backward mindset is one of the greatest obstacles to progress.

[/ QUOTE ]

This seems like a mix of Plato and Maslow.

While I'd love to endlessly discuss philisophy with you this just isn't the place.

My bottom line is what is best, IMO, for the future of on-line poker. Yes the "camel's nose" or more is already in the tent. I get that. But if those of us want to live in the tent and have more "new" friends visit we just might have to b.tch slap that nose to keep the tent livable. I'm even willing to kill the stinky beast and find another mode of transportation.

Computer assistance (CA) in general terms, for me encompases all forms of assistance that is beyond what is allowed in a live poker room, from handheld odds calculators to the most sophisticalted sci-fi nighmare you or I can imagine.

The current level of CA is getting to the point where it just might ruin the game as most of us know it. Continuing down the current path will totally destroy the game long before we ever get a decent bill out of Congress IMPO.

Computing power doubles and drops in total costs something like every eighteen months. Internet communication is a world most people are both awed with and completely scared of due to the ever increasing "gee wiz" uses that pop up everyday.

Right now with a minimal effort and cost with my limited knowledge, programing skills, and even poker skills I could set up the following; a HU that puts any player of any length of time on a very small range of hands based on every hand they have ever played under that user name. This would not be an average player's range of hands but based on position, bet size, lenght of time in the player's current session, and a number of factors that I shudder to mention readily availible if just to keep these CA sharks from implementating. I don't even have to wait the former wait time of data mining any level for six months, I can lease a complete data base right now.

Given current T&C as long as I had a human hand doing some of the clicking and enough "stakers" willing to provide human ID's to back up the accounts I could have a bot farm up and running in less than a week. I could play as many hands at as many tables at any level I wanted and completly pass any poker site's security with out a problem.

I'd also be willing to bet $1,000.00 to a single cent there are such operations currently up an running.

If I wanted to totally violate both the spirit and letter of the T&C's I'd set up a back side communications net and use prop player bots to increase my odds calculations.

But what the hell is it worth in karma?

I've run the numbers and evaluated the risk reward including the ever increasing need to out "invent" the other bots farmers. If I was a different person I would have done it six months ago.

There is a funny photoshop pic of 8 robots sitting around an on-line poker table with one "live" player, entitled the on-line poker game in 200X, add your own year. My number is less than 10.

That is unless those of us who play "casually" don't do something. Given the current poker economy there is not one voice that isn't out there looking to cash in the most they can today and F! the consequences. From greedy self interested poker sites down to the greedy self interested average player.

There are plenty of things that are completely natural and the end result is something like cancer or aids that thrives on an organism up and until it destroys the host.

Some of the self destructive natural things can be stopped some can only be slowed down others are doomed to extinction.

I know what I think of the current un-checked evolution of on-line poker's end result is and I don't like the picture.

If you are in the CA camp and figure you can jump to another host and are unconcerned about the surival of the specises that too would be natural.

Me I can always find a live game and enjoy it more so ultimately I don't have nor will I ever have anything invested in the CA game.


D$D

[/ QUOTE ]

Hinting occurs when a poker server sends privileged ev+ information to one or more players before during or after a poker hand or hands. This can range all the way from profile stats for the previous X hands to complete god level info for the current hand.

There is no "bad karma" for disobeying the "immoral" discriminatory sections of online poker t&c's - no more so than Rosa Parks' actions when she refused to sit at the back of the bus. You embrace the current typical online site TOS and as such you see violators as immoral and worthy of some kind of karmic consequence. I, OTOH, see the current typical online TOS as discriminatory and very wrong and so violating this type of TOS is a "moral imperative". If you're a "whites only" type of guy then I can understand your views.

In an internet environment, the computer assisted player is very normal and natural. There is not an adjective to correctly describe the mindset that expects these types of players to not exist within online poker - the best word I can think of is "backward".

RIIT