5 Years Ago Today

[BeerAndPoker]

It was five years ago today and I remember it very well. I woke up around 11am, showered, and ate some breakfast preparing myself for a long day of grinding Pokerstars. I've gone through several phases as far as what games I play online over the years and at this time I was 20+ tabling the 180 man sit n gos.

I get to my computer around 1pm and log into the Pokerstars client only to see this weird message saying how I am no longer allowed to play on Pokerstars due to legal changes in my country.

At first I thought maybe it was just Pokerstars so I log into Full Tilt and see the same thing. In that moment I was in a state of shock thinking that the cash cow known as online poker was finally over. The previous two years I dedicated a lot more time playing poker then back in the golden era prior to UIGEA passing in 2006 that forced the publicly traded sites like Party Poker out of the US market. I call this the golden era because it is when the games were the softest by far and wish I played more in that time I just would quit up a few buyins in mid stakes NL after an hour or two and call it a day when I should have went for more money.

UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act) was something snuck onto a safe port security bill at the last minute. This didn't make playing poker online illegal for Americans (except for sites like Washington) but it was supposed to prohibit sites outside of America from accepting our business so I wasn't committing a crime by playing.

Getting back to the story...

My natural instinct after what I've seen this early afternoon was to go read what people were saying on various poker forums and do a google search of news in the past 24 hours for online poker to see what has been going on. Later that evening I remember listening to emergency Donkdown Radio and then a new site Quadjacks that decided to copy the idea making it a 24 hour, around the clock thing for the next several days.

It was a bit surreal for a few days that I no longer can do something I loved and made money at in the comfort of my own home. This really upset me and still to this day I feel disgusted in the way our political system works here in America which goes way deeper then internet gambling but their isn't much we can do about it.

While I was upset and still in shock the reality is after UIGEA passed in 2006 anyone who played online from America should realize their was always a strong possibility something like this might happen and it did.

The most positive thing for me in this moment was that a majority of money I had online was on Pokerstars because a week after Black Friday happened I loaded up the Pokerstars client seeing this popup box:










I immediately cashed out everything and was paid a few days later directly into my bank account.

The next few months I followed all the new legal stuff hearing about all the shady things that went on with the big poker sites (Pokerstars/Full Tilt/AP/UB). The DOJ was building a case for years and waiting for the most opportune moment of slip up before handing out indictments and they did just that when their was enough proof of money laundering going on (buying/bribing banks, falsifying transactions as something other then gambling,etc.).

Once Pokerstars paid out so fast everyone that had money on Full Tilt was wondering what was taking them so long?

Why can't they just send us the money we are due in a timely manner like Pokerstars did?

The truth is Full Tilt was always a little slower with things then Pokerstars and their support wasn't as good BUT now they were about to become the next conspiracy when it comes to light that Full Tilt has no money.

Full Tilt was a company spending way too much in a lot of ways from TV Poker shows, overpaid pros, poor accounting, having money stolen from shady processors,etc... When you look at their business model it's not really a surprise they didn't have that much money, however, if Black Friday never happened FTP would have lasted a bit longer since they made enough per month to cover expenses.

A huge percentage of players on Full Tilt were Americans so this was a damaging blow to to a site that was handing out money all over the place with their horrible business model. . I'm not saying FTP could survive forever without making cuts but they still had more time if Black Friday didn't happen when it did.

Eventually, Pokerstars buys FTP and a bunch of money due to players gets paid but it took a few years for this to happen. The UB/AP money was gone forever but anyone who had a lot of money on those sites at this point I don't feel that sorry for. If you felt the risk was worth it fine but after the hole card scandal I refused to give UB/AP my business.

I also have a hard time feeling sorry for people who left 90% of their net worth on a poker site unless you just binked some huge scores. Pokerstars and Full Tilt was never designed to be your personal bank.

Black Friday was a dark era for poker in America and the truth is who knows if it will ever return country wide. The fact is online gambling is not that big of an issue where people want to throw enough money into lobbying to make it happen legally. We've seen a few states legalize it which is a start but the problem is the player pools are so small. When you have small state populations this is bound to happen and you also have to take into account the damage Black Friday did in regards to putting a bad taste in the average individuals mouth with online poker.

We have seen a few states legalize online poker in their jurisdictions over the past couple of years. This is the first step but the problem is the player pools are so small. A lot of this has to do with state populations being so small but other things such as people being left with a bad taste in their mouth not wanting to play online anymore are big keys too. Many top players left the country to continue the grind and Pokerstars has grown a ton Internationally ever since Black Friday happened. They are by far the biggest site and will continue to be even after all of the bad changes they've made that hurt players.

Ever since Black Friday I've played less poker in general but still dabble on the sites accepting Americans. It's a different process with slower payouts, less rakeback, tougher fields, and even some cashout fees. I've also played more live poker then I did prior and will be getting back into doing that soon since I haven't done much of that this year.

Will their ever be another online poker boom?

I don't see it happening for several years, if ever. We've made very little progress over the past 5 years on a federal bill when online poker was still relevant but anything is possible I suppose.

[snake_in_the_ass]

Lot of folks were in denial that day. I checked the whois and noticed the DNS info changed for the major sites. And then I started that thread on 2+2 with the bye_stars_tilt handle. http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/29...bling-1020606/

[sah_24]

It was five years ago today and I remember it very well. I woke up around 11am, showered, and ate some breakfast preparing myself for a long day of grinding Pokerstars. I've gone through several phases as far as what games I play online over the years and at this time I was 20+ tabling the 180 man sit n gos.

I get to my computer around 1pm and log into the Pokerstars client only to see this weird message saying how I am no longer allowed to play on Pokerstars due to legal changes in my country.

At first I thought maybe it was just Pokerstars so I log into Full Tilt and see the same thing. In that moment I was in a state of shock thinking that the cash cow known as online poker was finally over. The previous two years I dedicated a lot more time playing poker then back in the golden era prior to UIGEA passing in 2006 that forced the publicly traded sites like Party Poker out of the US market. I call this the golden era because it is when the games were the softest by far and wish I played more in that time I just would quit up a few buyins in mid stakes NL after an hour or two and call it a day when I should have went for more money.

UIGEA (Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act) was something snuck onto a safe port security bill at the last minute. This didn't make playing poker online illegal for Americans (except for sites like Washington) but it was supposed to prohibit sites outside of America from accepting our business so I wasn't committing a crime by playing.

Getting back to the story...

My natural instinct after what I've seen this early afternoon was to go read what people were saying on various poker forums and do a google search of news in the past 24 hours for online poker to see what has been going on. Later that evening I remember listening to emergency Donkdown Radio and then a new site Quadjacks that decided to copy the idea making it a 24 hour, around the clock thing for the next several days.

It was a bit surreal for a few days that I no longer can do something I loved and made money at in the comfort of my own home. This really upset me and still to this day I feel disgusted in the way our political system works here in America which goes way deeper then internet gambling but their isn't much we can do about it.

While I was upset and still in shock the reality is after UIGEA passed in 2006 anyone who played online from America should realize their was always a strong possibility something like this might happen and it did.

The most positive thing for me in this moment was that a majority of money I had online was on Pokerstars because a week after Black Friday happened I loaded up the Pokerstars client seeing this popup box:










I immediately cashed out everything and was paid a few days later directly into my bank account.

The next few months I followed all the new legal stuff hearing about all the shady things that went on with the big poker sites (Pokerstars/Full Tilt/AP/UB). The DOJ was building a case for years and waiting for the most opportune moment of slip up before handing out indictments and they did just that when their was enough proof of money laundering going on (buying/bribing banks, falsifying transactions as something other then gambling,etc.).

Once Pokerstars paid out so fast everyone that had money on Full Tilt was wondering what was taking them so long?

Why can't they just send us the money we are due in a timely manner like Pokerstars did?

The truth is Full Tilt was always a little slower with things then Pokerstars and their support wasn't as good BUT now they were about to become the next conspiracy when it comes to light that Full Tilt has no money.

Full Tilt was a company spending way too much in a lot of ways from TV Poker shows, overpaid pros, poor accounting, having money stolen from shady processors,etc... When you look at their business model it's not really a surprise they didn't have that much money, however, if Black Friday never happened FTP would have lasted a bit longer since they made enough per month to cover expenses.

A huge percentage of players on Full Tilt were Americans so this was a damaging blow to to a site that was handing out money all over the place with their horrible business model. . I'm not saying FTP could survive forever without making cuts but they still had more time if Black Friday didn't happen when it did.

Eventually, Pokerstars buys FTP and a bunch of money due to players gets paid but it took a few years for this to happen. The UB/AP money was gone forever but anyone who had a lot of money on those sites at this point I don't feel that sorry for. If you felt the risk was worth it fine but after the hole card scandal I refused to give UB/AP my business.

I also have a hard time feeling sorry for people who left 90% of their net worth on a poker site unless you just binked some huge scores. Pokerstars and Full Tilt was never designed to be your personal bank.

Black Friday was a dark era for poker in America and the truth is who knows if it will ever return country wide. The fact is online gambling is not that big of an issue where people want to throw enough money into lobbying to make it happen legally. We've seen a few states legalize it which is a start but the problem is the player pools are so small. When you have small state populations this is bound to happen and you also have to take into account the damage Black Friday did in regards to putting a bad taste in the average individuals mouth with online poker.

We have seen a few states legalize online poker in their jurisdictions over the past couple of years. This is the first step but the problem is the player pools are so small. A lot of this has to do with state populations being so small but other things such as people being left with a bad taste in their mouth not wanting to play online anymore are big keys too. Many top players left the country to continue the grind and Pokerstars has grown a ton Internationally ever since Black Friday happened. They are by far the biggest site and will continue to be even after all of the bad changes they've made that hurt players.

Ever since Black Friday I've played less poker in general but still dabble on the sites accepting Americans. It's a different process with slower payouts, less rakeback, tougher fields, and even some cashout fees. I've also played more live poker then I did prior and will be getting back into doing that soon since I haven't done much of that this year.

Will their ever be another online poker boom?

I don't see it happening for several years, if ever. We've made very little progress over the past 5 years on a federal bill when online poker was still relevant but anything is possible I suppose.

+1 had a very similar experience post BF , and also my entire view of governement has changed since then after seeing the absolute pure corruption that is what happened to the online poker industry. It exemplifies that we don't have capitalism or any form of free markets in good ole USA anymore . . .

[Shizzmoney]

I remember the day well. It was a Friday. I was sitting in a cubicle at one of the various soul sucking jobs I have had in my life, waiting for the day to end so I can go home and multi table MTTs for the weekend. I had twitter open in the A.M. and saw in some initial tweets that no one could access the poker sites. "Big deal", I thought. "Service interruptions happen all the time".

I go back to doing work tasks, and around midday a co-worker runs over to my desk and goes, "Hey! Did you hear about Pokerstars and Full Tilt?". I reply, "Yeah, the site is down. Happens sometimes." He responded, "Well, my buddy Shankar (Pillai, who has won a WSOP braclelet) said he's getting a message saying that no one in the US can access the site."

I look into it, and as the twitter feed slowly updates...and I start to realize what the fuck is happening. The day of reckoning is here. DonkCon1. A day, even after the stupid UEIGAY law passed in 2006, we thought would never happen because, well....its America. Why the fuck would they give two shits about online poker enough to actually take time and try to shut down poker sites?

I have acute high anxiety, and I start getting worried at work and sweating like I am Artie Lang at a rehab clinic. I can't focus. I have a low 5 figure sum online and I don't give a fuck who you are, the potential of losing dimes makes most men shit their pants. I really thought, "Welp, the government finally made their stand....and the money. Well, it's gone."

I rush home and immediate go on my netbook to see for myself. I log on to Stars and see the dreaded screen beerandpoker posts above. My jaw drops like I just saw a pair of nice titties at the strip club. I immediately go on donkdown and druff, micon, and drexel are are in the middle of the emergency cast. I call in and ask about what they think happens to our money, and while folks are hopeful, no one really knows if our cash was truly gone. After the DD podcast, QuadJacks did something like 96+ hours of straight podcasting, with various poker players from all walks of life calling in and sharing their sorrows on what just happened. No matter what you thought of those snakes in the grass on that site....I'll never forget that weekends podcasts. I had the thing on a perpetual loop and it really gave me a sense of being connected to a community, poker (online and otherwise), who just realized we just lost something really great. And for a lot of us, we also just lost our jobs. God, was it a shitty feeling.

Of course we would learn in the years later, that it would be FTP having issues cashing us out (and a big reason on how we got here), and not (just) the government being the usual greedy dick it is. Stars paying out ASAP saved their brand, even if they still fucked US customers over on FPPs. With the aftermath of what followed, they would be rewarded a monopoly as result of the US governments' pursuit. We would of course find out that it was FTP who snitched on a payment processor, who in turn snitched on the poker sites to the DOJ, that triggered this entire domino. It, to this day, is one of the dumbest things I have ever witnessed in the history of American business.

FTP obfuscating ("your funds are safe a secure") was really modern American business ethics 101, and in the end, the only good of the Black Friday was the fact it exposed all those frauds like Howard Lederer, Furst, Ferguson, and Bitar for the disgusting corporate negligence they committed, as well as the fact that 99% of the "pros" who ever represented that brand never had the balls to say anything while thousands were wondering when they would get their money.

FTP is a perfect example of the reason why I don't think online poker will ever succeed in the long run in the US. There will always be shady characters involved with cash to grease the wheel however they please (unless sites like this one uncover the grime). Look at Iovation getting licensed in Nevada despite Greg Pierson's involvement with the UB scandal. Or Baazov and insider trading with Pokerstars/Amaya (another symptom of why monopolies are bad).

We should of saw it coming. Especially after the UB scandal and FTP ad blitzing on NBC left and right (think DK and FanDuel and how over marketing got them in trouble). Like most of those caught up in bubbles, you never do. Western societies are too focused on the short term. Especially us grinders; we're more worried about trying to fade 5th street than flawed government bureaucracy or poker company fail.

In the end, there is a benefit that Black Friday was such a story that it did hit the mainstream and got casuals to have a opinion on it and acknowledge it. Tom Dwan was on Fox Business and it was pretty lol. I still find to this day that people can't believe online poker is illegal or banned in the US. I think part of the recent live poker resurgence is the fact that players are sticking it to the "man" and want to play the game they love. Bovada and ACR have done OK keeping the system alive, but barely due to cash flow issues as well as a much more austere player rewards program. I think people don't realize how much poker welfare was handed out during the poker boom.

There is a really great article by former PS blogger Pauly McGuire on this day, and the hypocrisy of the DOJ letting Wall St gamble left and right (with our money) while we can't even legally chase a flush draw online. Preet Bharara has some pretty big balls when going after Ray Bitar....but somehow can't prosecute HSBC when they help Mexican drug cartels and ISIS launder money and use it to behead people. And on top of it, Bitar is not in a jail cell and just had a lavish wedding. Fuck them.

It's abhorrent. Ever since this day, I agree with snake_in_the_grass...I have looked at the government at a more negative light than I even did before. Trust was 100% broken, which honesty probably a good thing; it prepares me for the fall thnaks to this outward corruption more easier. I'm glad Harry Reid didn't get to pass his online poker bill. Fuck him. And Bill Frist too. Fuck him, too. And Eric Holder, who is probably the worst Attorney General in the history of forever, fuck him as well.

At least I got my FTP money back 4 years later. We ended up losing a robust and liquid poker ecosystem that has, and probably will, never come back. It's fucking depressing but at least there is always another place to get action like Bovada.

For now.

[OSA]

For 14 weeks straight, every Friday and Saturday night, I played live and left with at least a 300% profit post BF.

I was buying in for 100 or 200 and leaving with 6-800 every night.

I dont think I ever had a losing session. Good times.

[chinamaniac]

I woke up and saw a thread on donkdown. I didn't think it was huge at first, I thought I would be able to snap cashout later that day and everyone told me I was crazy and they were right.

However , I did get to sneak a xfer thru on ftp for 3-5k or something to a PFA members friends account. FTP then took the money OUT OF my friends account AFTER IT WAS IN THE ACCOUNT and put it back in my account. This is when I knew it was really bad because I knew something was not right with full tilt poker to begin with.

Anyhow I emailed them and told them that I owed the kid the money and needed to pay him and they manually did the xfer for me. That guy was then able to cashout the money for me and he was one of the very few to get cashouts so I got very lucky there. However I still had like 6k or something on there but eventually got it back.

I knew something was wrong there for a few reasons. They were not processing echecks, Usemywwallet cashouts were taking up to 30 days. Echeck cashouts had disappeared for some people and I heard checks were taking a while. At the same time I was getting Usemywallet cashouts in 48 hrs on another site so over the first 4 months of the year I started aggresively moving money to stars as I won at FTP

I had a good bit on stars somewhere in the neighborhood of 15k and was pumped when they payed but at the same time I was kind of bummed out because I was starting to move up to the 50-100 games right around this time and was crushing any limit below that.

Also for the games I was playing I had a low roll online. One good thing is I was never lazy when it came to cashing out. Always keep bare minimum on any site u play. Reload if you need to. Unregulated sites will not last forever whether it is their own doing which causes the demise or the governments.

[chinamaniac]

For 14 weeks straight, every Friday and Saturday night, I played live and left with at least a 300% profit post BF.

I was buying in for 100 or 200 and leaving with 6-800 every night.

I dont think I ever had a losing session. Good times.

My last xfer on stars


4/13/2011 7:54:43 PM USD -25.00 boyd81

[OSA]

For 14 weeks straight, every Friday and Saturday night, I played live and left with at least a 300% profit post BF.

I was buying in for 100 or 200 and leaving with 6-800 every night.

I dont think I ever had a losing session. Good times.

My last xfer on stars


4/13/2011 7:54:43 PM USD -25.00 boyd81

Wow, that's hilarious. Charity poker rooms are the best though. I sometime miss Michigan.

[zealanddonk]

For 14 weeks straight

That sounds like the start of a remarkably different story

[FPS_Russia]

5 years!!!! Are you sure it wasn't three...

[ftpjesus]

For all those who like to blame the Republicans for Black Friday, do I need to remind everybody who was President and therefore who was calling the shots at the DOJ? Guess who Preet Bahara answered to as US Attorney (heres a hint most US Attys tend to come and go into office based on who the President is)? So yes ,you left wing cocksuckers who continue to drink Obama and the Democratic party koolaid, it was OBAMA who you can thank for Black Friday. If you honest believe Holder and Co did that shit without Obamas blessing your fucking stupid.

[4Dragons]

For all those who like to blame the Republicans for Black Friday, do I need to remind everybody who was President and therefore who was calling the shots at the DOJ? Guess who Preet Bahara answered to as US Attorney (heres a hint most US Attys tend to come and go into office based on who the President is)? So yes ,you left wing cocksuckers who continue to drink Obama and the Democratic party koolaid, it was OBAMA who you can thank for Black Friday. If you honest believe Holder and Co did that shit without Obamas blessing your fucking stupid.

It wasn't a politically based move, it was based on revenue.