ReefAquarium

Does anyone still have cash in cheating sites like Absolute or Ultimate bet?
If so... Why?

My strong suggestion is to take all money off these sites before the run starts.

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Not smarter than a grade 5 or Kristy Sea

Graham

My thoughts... your money is safe, there will be no "run" like you suggest. The majority of players are casual players that don't read poker forums all the time, and probably have no clue what is going on at the site (which is really sad). Most of the issues stem from old management, and the new management seems to be much better (though they still have some kinks to work out). What you should do is move your money to a site where YOU feel more comfortable, but I really don't think there are any trust issues with them doing anything with your money.

Now, would I rush to make a deposit on these sites if I could play somewhere else? HELL NO! The fact that they let these incidents go on for so long, took from March to discover that there was an actual problem (after initially denying it), and haven't announced plans to take legal action against the individuals involved is enough reason for me to avoid them like the plague

_obv_

To me the issue is more than trust. The owners of AP and UB are the same people and they have stolen money from users on there sites. Despite what the UB press release said, there is no evidence that there is new management or new owners. So they cheated players, got caught, tried to cover it up through a series of lies, eventually returned the stolen money and are still the owners of the site. So by playing on UB/AP you are paying rake to the site and allowing the owners to still make money off the site. There is no real disincentive for other sites to cheat since if they get caught they will simply pay the money back and it will be business as usual. The fact that people know this stuff happened and still play on these sites disgusts me as it hurts online poker that these sites are still in existence.

actyper

I sold out.

AP bribed me to come back and play on their site, so I did.

UB hired Annie Duke to help out with their tourney scheduling and structures and she did, so I started playing some there.

AP/UB is still the shadiest sites of all, starting from the top.

Monteroy

I do not play on Absolute because I was never able to get rakeback after doing a PSO promotion 4 years ago for a couple decks of KEM cards (which are nice, but still...). I also have not played on UB for years as well.

I think what happened was serious, but realistically it will never impact 99.999% of the players, nor will it likely happen again (and even if it does it will not impact the low level players).

This does not mean that regular players should think there is nothing ever wrong, but if it happens it will more likely be collusion or bots rather then super user accounts grabbing that 5 buck pot.

Canadians certainly have better options, but if some Americans find the games there to be the best for their income, I think they should keep playing there, and ignore the moral high ground people.

westside8

FWIW, Rizen and Bax recently both signed on to UB as part of their "Stars Players" (or whatever they call it).

Graham

I wrote an article about that on one of my sites yesterday:

Rizen and JohnnyBax Sign Over Their Souls

Graham

Though the number affected was small, that does not take away from the seriousness of the issue. If the people doing this were smart, they WOULD have gotten away with it. By smart, I mean maybe lose a few hands, but greed can be a powerful thing.

Could it happen at low stakes? Why not? $5 pots add up over time, there is much less chance that it would get noticed, and the players aren't as smart as those playing the high stakes games.

Monteroy

Could it happen at play money tables? Sure, why not. Could aliens attack the earth tomorrow? Sure, why not.

I am not dismissing what happened as trivial, it was quite the opposite as a lot of money was involved. However, that does not mean that this type of crime is likely to happen at the smaller stakes, since it just does not make as much sense in terms of time/risk/return.

Yes, the people who cheat and are caught tend to be the dumb obvious ones, like what we saw here and when Raymers account got hacked and started dumping money at the 5k HU sit and gos, and no doubt there is collusion and botting that takes place in a less greedy manner that gets away with it at times.

Still, to go with the premise of believing the unlikely happens because technically it could happen is a bit flawed, and is generally the weakness behind most rigged theories (ie: the belief that the site is rigged since it could happen).

I am not implying you are going with the "OMG its RIGGEDZORS" belief, but the fear based "it could happen" needs to be balanced with the is it worthwhile or likely to happen, which for most low/mid stakes strikes me as unlikely.

The flip side to this is I think very high stakes players should always be concerned and take measures to ensure the game they are playing is fair, since the risk of bad things happening to them is real and has been shown to happen.

GTA Poker

You have to be an idiot to still play on AP or UB, period.

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That level 5 trap really paid off...ship him the cookies.

_obv_

This is a terrible attitude... by playing at UB you are supporting cheaters. The old argument that sites won't cheat you was that there was too much risk because they can make so much money being fair and risking that by cheating would be dumb. Well 2 sites owned by the same people have cheated players and people are still playing there so to me that argument doesnt work anymore. So if im pokerstars and see this what is stopping me from going and cheating (and actually being smart about it).

If i was a low stakes player would i be worried about getting cheated on UB? No. But why would i support cheaters when there are a dozen sites our there with good reputations.

Monteroy

Though it does not matter, I do not actually play at UB or Absolute, but I do not agree with this simplistic analysis. First of all, I doubt all of us have lived a pristine life avoiding all things "dirty." Do you know how all of the clothes you own were made? Have you ever ordered pizza from Pizza Pizza after the way they defrauded many of their franchisees?

I suspect many of us would have to give up a very long list of products we enjoy if our lives were put through the evil analyzer.

The moral high ground approach is simplistic and in fact online gaming in general suffers from it in the US. Remember, many there believe all forms of online gaming is evil and a sin that should be punished, and in their eyes a person who merely plays poker online supports greater evil then "cheaters"

Are they right? They certainly believe so and they would call anyone who disagrees with them an idiot.

Personally, I think it is fine if a person chooses not to play at those sites for moral reasons or for any reason. I did not play at Absolute for years for financial ones - ie: no rakeback, but I still play in the PSO freerolls when they happen and won $100 last one with no guilt :P

I also have no problems if a player chooses to continue playing there if they make a good return. That is the reason for playing online poker.


Actually, the old argument is that the sites do not have anything to gain by cheating/rigging, and that is still a valid point. This was not Absolute and UB stealing to increase their profits, it was corrupt people inside stealing for personal gain. There was no upside for the sites here.

How UB and Absolute handled it was not ideal, but if anything this proves further why the sites themselves would not cheat the players, and it definitely shows that more stringent measures need to be in place to catch and punish employees that use the system to cheat.




You are free to choose to play where you want for the reasons you want. Again, realize that simply playing online poker is considered wrong by others, so I generally use financial reasons for where/how I chose to play online pokwer then moral ones.

_obv_

These "corrupt people inside" just so happened to be the owners of the site and they still are the owners of the site. You seem to have fallen for what was written in the press release which if you read all the information out there on UB/AP you would realize is just a bunch of lies and half truths.

Monteroy

With all due respect, I had to put up with a guy when playing once who went on and on about the "9/11 conspiracy," and those of us who did not see the "real truth" were pawns that only believed what was written by the news media.

The facts are that noone here knows the entire story yet, and we may never know the whole story. I am not dismissing what happened, but people are corrupt and stuff like this happens in all types of companies.

AM I buying your version of "the truth?" Nah, but I know you believe in it which is your right. As with the 9/11 guy I think emotion is more at play then logic, but that is part of the human condition as well.

Do I think that the old owners are secretly the new owners and no one will ever discover the secret evilness of their huge plots they made while cackling and moving their fingers in an evil Mr Burns like manner?

Nah, I suspect a couple bad people did bad things, which in the end is not good for the site as a business (correctly so), and I think if changes are not made to prevent it in future they will suffer more.

I also think if a player makes money there playing legitimately, they are free to continue to do so, and they can weigh the moral issues as part of the whole equation in that choice.

Just as all of us do whenever we play online poker which is not entirely legal to begin with .

_obv_

I'm not some sort of conspiracy theorist. Starting with AP... user 363 (the superuser account on AP) was observing potrippers table for the entire tournament that potripper won for all but the first 2 hands (which potripper folded)... user 363 had the same IP address as Scott Tom (the owner of AP). These are the facts that got this whole mess started. AP released multiple statements, first denying that any suspect play even happened then later lying about who was responsible saying it was a programmer then later saying it was a consultant.

Nat Arem went down to Costa Rica and investigated the AP situation... AP paid him to go down and help out and after the investigation he said that he believes Scott Tom is still involved with the ownership of AP/UB. He probably knows more about the whole situation than anyone so if he says something I would think it is fairly likely it is right.

There are many many issues with UBs story but to me the most suspicious is that the people doing the cheating were able to cash out millions of dollars without a problem when there have been many cases where people who have done nothing wrong get their accounts frozen and investigated just simply because they are cashing out a large amount of money. Also if this was all done under old management and the new management is paying everyone back why aren't they seeking legal action against the old people in charge. If you are looking for actual facts and documents on why UB is lying check out the thread on 2+2 because it is all there.

Also the "old" UB management has frozen accounts of players who were running hot at blackjack on the site. "New" management just did the same thing the other day. Seems to me UB is still as incompetent as they have always been.

Also, online poker is 100% legal (here in Canada at least) and anyone that says it is morally wrong is an idiot.