I know, cheesy rhyme in the title… bear with me for a moment though. It is my job to keep up with the latest happenings in the world of online poker, and, well, to be honest a good 90% comes into the ‘interesting, but meaningless’ category… it is not usable. Then, there is the fact that I want to take a back-seat from being the chef, cook and bottle-washer here at SNG Planet by the end of the year - taking a back-seat role and focusing on the parts I enjoy (ideas and writing). Bringing those two things together lead to the idea of a weekly summary of the poker news which is actually useful for SNG Planet readers… This could be in one of several ways:
- Promos which are pretty good but not big or generous enough to warrant a post of their own.
- Changes in poker sites, networks or legislation which might require some action (could be taking advantage of some new site, or a warning to move from a dangerous one!)
- Poker Events, (both online and live) changes or satellites (again these are rarely big enough for their own post).
- Tools and Software, new games and so on…
Anyway, I’m sure you got the idea – I’ll decide which day to do it on later… the only criteria is that there must be an action possible coming from it – no celebrity nonsense or list of anonymous user names who won the Sunday Majors from me! Here is the first one – with 3 quick entries:
Poker News You Can Use – iPoker Split, Micro-Millions and Lock Issues
iPoker Table Split In September Some good news to start with. The iPoker Network, which include my favorite site Titan Poker, are making a big effort to make their games even softer than before (and they are pretty damn soft already!). What they are doing is splitting up the tables between the big sports-betting brands who provide most of the new ‘recreational’ players – and the ‘VIP skins’ who host more grinders by offering lucrative deals. From 1st September, any network member with less than 6000 active players, 850 new depositors and a good fish-to-regular ratio will only be able to access 2nd tier games (with all the other grinders). This is yet another acknowledgement that the ‘rakeback’ model’s time has come and gone… showing that sites are looking after their recreational players more and more. How to use this news: The big iPoker Brands like William Hill, Bet365, Titan and Betfred (+others) should be fine. If you are playing on an smaller little-known skin than you really should move to one of the bigger ones now… The risk is that a smaller skin realizes that they are about to go bankrupt and disappear with peoples deposits… I recommend Titan Poker as the biggest and best site on this network – read my review and info on how to grab $20 extra free cash here. Pokerstars – Micro-Millions To Return July 12th to 22nd sees the return of Micro-Millions, the smaller stakes poker tournament event, at Pokerstars.com. There are 100 events, from 11c through to a $22 main event which has $150,000 guaranteed for 1st place. Satellites are running now. This cool event sees the tournaments bigger and softer than ever – this is great for those players who do not want to spend the entry to the bigger games like the Sunday Million, and still want a crack at potentially career-changing money. Use this news by heading over to Pokerstars now and checking out the satellite qualifiers! Use Marketing Code PSP3108 when you register and bonus code STARS600 when you deposit to claim up to 3 welcome bonuses at 100% totaling $600!
Lock Poker – Transition Teething Issues? I’m delaying my planned introduction of Lock Poker on this site, hopefully just for a short while… This is due to a couple of issues which have been brought up on a business forum I frequent. One concerns some software glitches in the client (concerning showing bonus clearance) and the other some odd financial accounting for another website owner who is currently recommending them... Hopefully these issues will be resolved soon – as I mentioned in a previous post, I am actually looking forward to seeing some competition between sites for my US based readers! In the meantime I am recommending a watching brief for Lock and would not like to see any readers depositing money with them. Merge seem to have their house in better order at the moment, you can check out my 2013 Carbon Review for more information on this network. As I say, hopefully this is cleared up and we can bring in the Lock reviews and some more coverage soon.
GL at the tables, Mark
Submitted by Planet Mark on Fri, 06/22/2012 - 14:42