Very nice thread.

WARNING: Just a personal hunch

I symphatize with you Royal, and its difficult for me to hear about your broken dreams.

After a while here on this site I have smartened up- I realized that my major upswings was probably a combination of good skill and a set up from the poker site. Virtually all players I have spoken to started their online poker adventure with a nice upswing.

IMO- the poker sites (share holders) have little to lose by manipulating the deck and remove some of the skill gap between players thus keeping the rake coming in. They may very well hurt the poker industry at large, but that have not stopped businesses from acts of greed in the past.

Points:
1. Those players I rank as excellent at my site/level is still stuck on the same level after several months. They should, with the amounts of hands they put in, pull out a profit of 3bb/hour*#table.

My theories is that
1) They cash out so much they dont rise in level.
2) A very subtle "doom switch" makes it harder for winning players to win pots, at the same time new players and losers are given a subtle "boom switch".

Every since I was regarded as a "valuable player", I have been running waaaaay below expectation. One 7 outer is my only suckout since Jan 1. And when I got sucked out I was still happy- making money right...!

Now I am getting all paranoid about the poker industry. They have the means to cheat and they have the incentive. We must certainly be fundementalists to rule out the possibility of a dirty game.

Since no governments are controlling the industry- I have a feeling that money speaks. Cigital and Kahnawake is probably very reputable controllers, but since there is no governments who overlooks the investigations I think that stamps of approval can be bought.

Stating that the poker industry is "rigged" is a statement without evidence- but the same can be said about the those who claim it isnt. I am becoming sceptical, and hope that poker will become legal and run by firms in respectable countires- not Malta and Gibraltar...

Please consider this rambling as whining from a player who is experiencing his first long downswing. But if we can detect some subtle manipulation of the game we can take advantage of that knwoledge.