Invincible
Enjoying some positive variance this past week. I played two 30-seat SNGs at Cake and won them both. I am not sure that the math on the bounty tournaments supports them being a wise choice, but the play is so awful that I routinely make the money in them.
I am also still whittling away at the Collegiate Series of Poker first deposit bonus. The level of play at the $50 NL tables is poor. I can usually get 2-3 tables going at full ring, but the pace of play is usually slow. Maybe 45-50 hands/hour. The software is a little slow, but mostly the players seem to take more time than is needed to make their bad decisions. Lots of europeans on that site, so maybe they are more attuned to a slower pace.
That chase has been a roller coaster. Currently way up with about 75% of my play requirement met.
Some big news seems to be brewing in online poker. Poker Stars may be set to roll out a revenue sharing plan for affiliates. Up 'til now PS would only pay affiliates a one time finders fee for new players - making rakeback impossible. With revenue sharing rakeback becomes possible, although the word on the street is that Poker Stars will not allow it. They can easily thwart rakeback by not providing affiliates with individual player stats. If your affiliate is not told how much you played (and paid) there is no way for him to get you your rakeback.
There are some ways to circumvent the lack of player stats. For marketing purposes many sites provide different "trackers" to affiliates. That way the affiliate knows if his newsletter is generating more sign ups or the review he posted on the website. You can get stats for each tracker - thus if you make sure each new player uses a unique tracker when they sign up, you can know the player's stats and provide rakeback. Many Party Poker affiliates were doing this a few years back, and Party slapped them down when they figured it out. It will be interesting to see how many "underground" deals pop up for Poker Stars if they allow revenue sharing.
Dog Daq is taking a beating this past week. A miserable 1-5 showing of late. We also had a shareholder vote on increasing the betting unit to 2%. The majority wanted it, so we will be doing that as soon as I can verify that the couple of non-responders are not unhappy about the decision.
I continue to churn at Just Bet. I am in no hurry now that busting looks unlikely. They have a 60 day hold for cashouts if you take their 20% cash, so I have 6 weeks before I can retrieve that money anyways.
I continue to investigate cashiering options as well. The slow turn I am taking on that ought to be an indication of how it is going - frustratingly. The lone stand out seems to be PIC club, who at least has had fantastic customer service, even if they want a cavity search before activating your account. More on that to come...
Happy Chasing!