Comments on: The Poker Ethicist: PokerStars Acquires Full Tilt Poker https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/ Weekly poker podcast hosted by Andrew Brokos and Nate Meyvis featuring interviews with famous and behind-the-scenes figures from the poker world as well as an in-depth poker strategy segment. Sat, 04 Aug 2012 08:07:49 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.0 By: Zoltz https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31491 Sat, 04 Aug 2012 08:07:49 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31491 In reply to foucault.

I tried to post links but the comment didn’t get through. But I can find the pages by typing into Google “Alarming news about botting on OnGame” and then going to the 2+2 thread (“Action vs poker bots”) in the News, Views and Gossip forum. It is a follow-up thread to the “Alarming news about botting on OnGame” thread and provides a link to it in the first post.

I got the 100BB information from page 3 of the “Alarming news” thread. 5/10 seems not explicitly mentioned in this thread but “midstakes” is 2/4 to 5/10. An explicit reference to 5/10 (although these could be different bots) appears on page 2 of the “Action vs poker bots” thread.

The threads are actually from last year. I don’t know what happened since then but surely any improvements in the situation would be temporary only.

]]> By: foucault https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31460 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 17:24:18 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31460 In reply to Keith.

No bad beats are impossible to believe. I would be beyond shocked if your losing streak had anything to do with the botting accusations – I would find that much harder to believe than any string of bad beats you could show me. I’m not trying to be rude, but you’d have to produce quite a lot of data to convince me of this.

]]> By: Eric https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31459 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 16:41:06 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31459 oops you said ultimately…so I guess that’s a yes 🙂

]]> By: Eric https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31458 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 16:39:58 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31458 Sorry if I missed it, does anyone know if Full-tilt is going to re-open?

]]> By: Keith https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31457 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 16:26:18 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31457 In reply to foucault.

I would like to know more about this topic. I was accused of botting by Pokerstars after having a couple of winning months with a new TAG style I started using that was paying off. Basically, I refused to play in 3 bet pots OOP without a top 5% hand. I started to win. It was then I was asked on 2 separate occasions to identify myself in the chat box immediately to prove I wasn’t a bot. It wasn’t long after this that I started to lose. I thought it was variance, but the bad beats I took are almost impossible to believe. Time after time. I have left pokerstars over this and am a winning player once again on my new site. Is this how Pokerstars fights automated botting? This tells me that they are manipulating the cards. I play 25NL to 100NL. I’m not a big winner and don’t have the first clue as to how to implement a bot system. It’s too bad, because I did like Pokerstars, but if they think I was cheating, I have no way to prove to them that I’m not.

]]> By: foucault https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31455 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 15:06:45 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31455 In reply to Zoltz.

Do you have a link to discussion/proof of bots beating 5/10 NL? Botting isn’t a topic I’ve kept up with but I was surprised to read that.

]]> By: Steve https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31450 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 12:47:34 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31450 PokerStars settled the civil case for less than the government was seeking. Perhaps that would have happened regardless of FTP acquisition. But, they did profit by the deal that was made as they paid significantly less to the US government.

As for ROW players, many will just pay rake to PokerStars. So that is money that will be injected into the poker economy. That vast majority of that will end up in PokerStars’ hands as rake.

So, in the end, its about money. This is a +++EV for PokerStars for sure.

]]> By: Zoltz https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31448 Fri, 03 Aug 2012 09:57:48 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31448 Glad to see a happy ending to the Full Tilt saga and people getting their money back. But I’m not sure how much sense it makes to think about a “long haul” in online poker when there are already bots that beat 5/10 NL with 100BB stacks. In light of this, I also find all the talk about online poker regulation in US and other countries somehow pointless. PokerStars, unlike some competitors, does fight automated botting but nobody has ever managed to explain to me how people could be prevented from simply entering bot decisions manually.

]]> By: Dana https://www.thinkingpoker.net/2012/08/the-poker-ethicist-pokerstars-acquires-full-tilt-poker/#comment-31439 Thu, 02 Aug 2012 16:32:49 +0000 http://www.thinkingpoker.net/?p=8719#comment-31439 Nice post Andrew. Who drew the picture?
You say “no matter how benevolent the owner (who, by the way, is stepping down as a condition of this settlement)” – to me though this wasn’t a sacrifice as his son is still in charge and it was probably his intention to have him take over the business. A better punishment would be not allowing any family members to be involved in the business, but that’s probably not legally possible if they aren’t culpable. Any thoughts on that?
Also, how have you liked Klosterman as the new ethicist? I’m not sure if I agree with all his answers, but have liked his practical approach.

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