De in alle hevigheid losgebarsten strijd tussendatatrackingsite PokerTableRatings en pokerroom PokerStars gaat nog even door. PokerStarsHome Games Manager Lee Jones stuurde een verklaring naar PTR als vervolg op de dreigingmet gerechtelijke stappen. Hierin zet hij uiteen wat PokerStars heeft tegendatamining en trackingsites. Lees de statement in dit bericht.
Statement van Lee Jones (PokerStars) richting PTR (in het Engels):
For a few years now, we at PokerStars have worried about theeffects of data-mining sites such as Poker Table Ratings (“PTR”) on the healthof the online poker ecosystem. “Our legal team is reviewing PTR’s statement andwill decide how to proceed. “ Such sites provide massive databases that allow aplayer to know a huge amount of information about a specific opponent the firsttime they play a pot together. We have many concerns about data-mining:
- It allows a poker player to have information and data aboutopponents against whom he has never played. Even acknowledging the differencesbetween live and online poker, we believe this is contrary to the spirit of thegame.
- New and/or weak players often don’t even know that they’resitting in their opponents’ cross-hairs. So the most vulnerable players areunaware they’re being targeted.
- A small (but noticeable) boorish minority of players routinelytell weaker players at their table how bad they are, based on these data-minedstatistics. This creates an unpleasant environment and is bad for the players,bad for the game, bad for the community. We have a responsibility as theleading enterprise in this industry to stop that kind of abuse.
Furthermore, we’re not the only ones who see it this way. Manyonline poker industry professionals and (most importantly) a majority of theplayer community see such data-mining as a potentially existential threat tothe entire online poker world.
PokerStars’ steps to prevent data-mining
PokerStars has consistently said that if a player wishes toshare his online playing results with the public that is a matter between himand any site which provides that data. But if a player doesn’t want his resultsshared in public, they shouldn’t be. We have codified this in our Terms ofService regarding prohibited programs. We have taken a two-prong approach against data-mining sitessuch as PTR.
- First, we have taken technical steps to prevent sites fromdata-mining our hands. Without going into detail, we have modified the softwaremultiple times to make it more difficult for third parties to record handhistories from our tables. Every time we have done this, PTR has responded bymodifying their software to neutralize our change. We could take drastic stepsto win this “arms race”, but such steps would harm the playing experience ofour legitimate players. Obviously we would prefer not to do that.
- Our second prong has been through legal channels. We haverepeatedly contacted sites such as PTR and asked them to stop providing dataabout our players unless those players opt in to their program. PTR has neverresponded to these requests. There have been a number of updates in the last 24hours, which I will cover at the end of this document.
Conclusion
PokerStars is the largest enterprise in the online pokerworld. We have a responsibility to ourselves, our industry, and mostimportantly to the online poker player community to care for the entire onlinepoker ecosystem. We have made every effort to get PTR to “play by the rules”;they have ignored us, and actively countered our defensive efforts, at everyturn. But we are committed to providing our players the privacy that theydeserve and the online poker industry the protection it needs.
Update as of April 18, 2012
On April 18 the ISP hosting Poker Table Ratings (“PTR”)agreed to PokerStars’ “cease and desist” request and stopped providing servicefor PTR. The ISP agreed that PTR was infringing on PokerStars’ intellectualproperty rights. Shortly thereafter, PTR resurfaced on a different ISP.However, late on April 18th, PTR published an announcement on their blog that“[W]e will fully adhere to the cease and desist notice by Stars, though we donot believe that we are a disservice to the online poker community.” As of 2:00AM British Summer Time (GMT+1) on April 19th, it’s not clear whether PTR isonline or not.
Our legal team is reviewing PTR’s statement and will decidehow to proceed. We will, of course, continue to communicate with the pokermedia and player community about this matter.
Lee Jones is a poker author and currently holds the positionof Home Games Manager at PokerStars. Previously he held the position of CardRoom Manager at PokerStars from October 2003 to April 2007. From 2007 to 2010he worked for the European Poker Tour, was COO of CardRunners and Card RoomManager at Cake Poker Network.
