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[Closed] What the balls, iPoker?!

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caltabiano
Joined: 09.03.2007

So, I received this e-mail from an iPoker skin where I have an account. Luckily I don't play there anymore. I'll refer to this skin as "skin" =)

"Dear Felipe,

If you are not already aware iPoker will be implementing a new policy in the New Year which will categorise players depending upon certain criteria. The new policy will also impose penalties upon card rooms that in essence, have a high proportion of winning players in relation to losing players.

Regrettably therefore, we are being forced to restrict a number of accounts in order to comply with the new policy and to avoid penalisation by iPoker and it grieves me to inform you that we have no option for the time being other than to restrict the cash game stakes at which you can play on "skin".

We sincerely regret having to take this action and hope that the policy will change in the future so that you may once again enjoy playing cash games at "skin". In the meantime, please accept our apologies for any inconvenience that this action will cause but know that you can still play in our tournaments and on any other of the "skin" suite of products."

So, they're banning winning players? Is there any way in which this makes sense? It's not like they lose money to winning players.
Anybody else received a similar e-mail from any iPoker skin?


10 replies
suvalgysiu
Joined: 09.06.2007

:f_biggrin: :f_biggrin: :f_biggrin: :f_biggrin:

And they say poker sites don't care if you win or lose _evil:


All I can say is WOW!


vladnz
Joined: 17.01.2007

i hope they go bankrupt because of this


SoyCD
Joined: 20.02.2008

Hey caltabiano,

I can only guess that the skin which wrote you this is a smaller skin - most likely one that only advertises through its affiliates and VIP deals.

These kind of skins will be hit particularly hard by the new iPoker regulations - since unlike other skins - they don't actually contribute to the network growth.

Some background on Network Ecology:

In general one can differentiate between two types of skins; contributing skins and parasitic skins.

Contributing skins are skins that invest in marketing to bring new players into the network, or have large non-poker player basis that they can cross market poker to. Best examples are large sportsbooks like bet365, BetFred, Mansion or casinos like Titan Poker (which invest heavily into winning new players). These skins invest large amounts of money into bringing fish and new players to the network - and thus supply the livelihood for sharks (the fish).

Parasitic skins on the other hand don't worry about creating new players or bringing players into the network. They rely on offering superior VIP deals to exisiting iPoker players in attempts to poach them from whereever else they might currently be playing. They attract especially high volume and winning players and don't worry about bringing fish to the platform. Examples of former parasitic skins that were kicked out from iPoker include NoIQ & Propaganda poker.

The resulting imbalance caused by this is quite obvious:
Parasitic skins which focus only on sharks and winning players have lots of high volume players that produce a lot of rake. They poach or 'steal' these players from skins at which they were originally playing. They don't actually contribute anything to the network however.

Contributing skins bring fish - which generally go broke quite quickly and don't produce a lot of rake. They spend a lot of money on these fish - yet the sharks who are eating the fish are for the most part playing on other skins (often poached from the original contributing skin that brought them to poker). That means if a contributing skin spends e.g. 5 Million in marketing for attracting fish - which results in 15 million in deposits. These fish are eaten and since the sharks that ate the fish were playing on other skins only 1,5 million of rake actually end up being produced the contributing skin which makes a loss of 3,5 million. Most of the profit and up with the parasitic skins (hence the name parasitic).

The outcome

The result of such an imbalance is quite obvious. Since contributing skins cannot actually make a profit on fish marketing - they simply stop their marketing efforts. This results in negative network growth, less fish and generally worse tables. In the long run it also results in a downward spiral and collapsing networks.

One solution

One solution to this problem is to simply ensure that skins need to contribute to the network in order to not be faced with penalties. Contributing skins will welcome this change since they bring more than enough fish into the network to weigh out the winning players.

Skins that do 0 marketing and only rely on poaching winning high volume players from other skins however will suddenly be forced to rethink their business strategy. They are forced to also invest into fish marketing. The result is therefore two fold positive

#1 Parasitic skins need to re-think their business strategy and start bringing in fish (--> more fish)
#2 Contributing skins will have a larger portion of their marketing money actually return to themselves - making it more attractive to do fish marketing (--> more fish)

This change is one of several by the way - and just a piece of an overall strategy with which iPoker wants to ensure that it continues to be a growing and thriving network.

Hope to have given some insight :)

Best regards
SoyCD


SalamiandCheese
Joined: 16.07.2008

I saw this in a 2+2 post the other day. Didn't want to post something here without being sure about it. iPoker, wtf u doin? :f_mad:

Edit: Just read Soy's post. These parasitic skins seem to be a problem for the bigger, heavy advertising skins. Interesting situation to say the least. :f_eek:


SoyCD
Joined: 20.02.2008

A lot of of these cases are also being reported by players who had "illegal rakeback" deals at some of iPoker's more problematic skins.

One of the skins most heavily affected was Victor Chandler who was offering widespread rakeback deals to players. Through this it generated a huge fish/shark discrepancy and now restricted the cashgame availability of many of its top rakeback players.

This is why PokerStrategy always picks its partners well and makes sure to only work together with sites & skins that are operating with an own self sustaining business model and that follow network policies.

Best regards
SoyCD


kubernetes
Joined: 13.02.2008

However, this is material for the poker is rigged theorists.


caltabiano
Joined: 09.03.2007

Originally posted by SoyCD
Hey caltabiano,

I can only guess that the skin which wrote you this is a smaller skin - most likely one that only advertises through its affiliates and VIP deals.

One of the skins most heavily affected was Victor Chandler

A lot of of these cases are also being reported by players who had "illegal rakeback" deals at some of iPoker's more problematic skins.

Nailed it like a pro
Thanks for the insight Soy ;) It was very clarifying


andreibalint
Joined: 11.04.2009

So basically networks like iPoker and Cake will always be fishier than PokerStars and FullTilt?