Re: Where to play Backgammon now?

On 26 Dez., 00:19, rubber...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:

I can not understand why Games grid spent their time on a very bad and
ugly poker server while they had faraway the best backgammon
community. You never believed they asked a couple of years ago. They
also offered to sell it because they really wanted to get ride of it.


The basic problem they all have is, manager schools teach them:
A customer has a price

Thats already it, this is the root of the entire problem, this is what
makes them all go left
Whether they try to place TV spots all over the world, or pay free
money to new players, or bonus money for first deposits, or hold
freeroll tournaments or whatever else, they all try to follow this one
basic rule they learned
Spending a lot of money upfront is the key to success, there is just
no way anyone would even consider this rule #1 could be invalid in BG
The obvious consequence of this is, somehow they have to get their
investment back, and while they have only a handful of players
compared to millions invested, the only way they can think of, how to
get this back is, increase the rake to the sky and hope no one will
notice what kind of open street robbery this results in

Unfortunately BG players do the math before they play, meaning
everyone will come and play while there is free money to earn or a
bonus to cash, but same fast as they pop up, everyone disappears as
soon as they don´t get free money anymore, simply because the rake is
just too high

Gamesgrid has one of the best BG software, and as long as it was a
free server, for competitive free gameplay, it was quite successful,
it even allowed them to charge monthly membership fees
But then (same as MSN Gaming Zone) they discovered that the small
money they make there doesn´t cover the expenses or at least they
could make more profit if they implemented real money play
On that one they overlooked one little detail:
The presence of ratings kills real money activity!
While the software is still one of the best and the rake they charge
is by far the lowest on the web, the expected success in real money
play didn´t come true
In free matchplay a rating leads to competition and more activity, in
money play a rating leads to less, anyone is willing to challenge a
stronger player, but no one is willing to bet money on it
They didn´t make the usual blunders like spend millions in
advertising, pay bonus money, or hold freerolls
But they kept the ratings and that doomed the real money activity
Instead of finding their problem, they then went the same way all
others did, if it doesn´t work in BG, lets try Poker


Now online backgammon is messed up with only servers who think
backgammon is the same as poker and threat it like that.



As I said above, they all go for poker, because no one is willing to
even consider their rule #1 might be invalid in BG, how could they
ever find a solution, while they ignore the origin of the problem?


I cannot spend 100.000$ but that are also prices that make no sense.
Like what Melita is asking too. It doesn't make no sense at all. Now
they want to earn money by deceiving people who wants to start their
own server..



The prices for software are the result of their messing up, after
wasting millions in fruitless attempts to setup a BG server, after
they already switched to poker as their main source of profit, they don
´t care for BG anymore, but IFFFFF someone comes and asks for a
license, they smell an option to get part of their wasted investment
back
They all know, there is no cheap BG server software for sale on the
market, hopefully that will change soon, when my software becomes
available


Your own server is a nice idea but i think it will take you maybe 20
years to finish it properly if you have to write everything yourself
in your spare time. And will be the result ever be competitive enough?


I´ve spent a bit over a year on it so far, but that includes some long
breaks
First of all, I had no clue whatsoever about C++ when I started,
meaning I had to learn everything from scratch before I could even
begin
Second, while the program doesn´t pay me a dime, I have to make a
living, and since I make a living out of BG for money, I´ve spent
about 3/4 of this year playing instead of programming
If you subtract the time I spent making money and the time I spent
learning, the net time it took me to develop this software is less
than 2 months


Rather wrote down a complete functional plan and sort it out by cheap
developers. Then you ill find out it will take a lot of time too.



Believe me, I tried, I got in touch with a lot of people, from
developpers up to investors
The result is always the same, maybe the best way to describe it is
the following example:
I got into a chat on MSN messenger with 3 others, where one of those 3
was a (self nominated) professional programmer and the other 2 were
friends of mine
I had just developped V0.001 of my own software, a basic version in 16
color graphics, but already functional
The other programmer was just on the way developping a BG software for
some other server, a free project, where everyone volunteers and works
for free
My friends already saw the potential in my software and they suggested
we could work together
We discussed it a bit, and this other programmer kept pointing out how
difficult this all is, how much work it would be and how much it would
cost if one had to pay a regular programmers salary for the time it
takes
After a while I got sick of it, it was pretty obvious, this programmer
was trying to get into a paid job, where I was supposed to pay his
bill, while he would tell me fairy tales of how much time it takes
I´ve asked him a simple question:
_IF_ this is all so complicated, _IF_ this is so much work, how come
that I, without any kind of knowledge in C++, start learning from
scratch, am able to develop a first functional version of software in
under 3 weeks?
Now guess his answer ......
He logged off from that chat, blocked me from his messenger and has
never talked a single word to me or my friends again

A bit later I heard from the owner of that free server, the programmer
had dropped his volunteer job and left them with a buggy, incomplete
software, suddenly requesting, if they want him to continue his work,
they have to pay him for his time


By now I have a pretty good insight, how much work such a server
really is, and my point is valid
If I can develop a fully functional software within a net working time
under 2 months, even if my software has a few minor bugs left to fix,
a real professional programmer should be able to do far better in less
time
The problem on this is, good programmers is a rare species and while
they have plenty of options to get a well paid job, no one is
interested in anything that doesn´t pay huge money from start
Companies like Microsoft pay enormous salaries to anyone who can spell
C++
Other companies can´t find good programmers anymore, and while
Microsoft sets the guideline of how high the income of a programmer
is, even bad programmers have a very good chance to find a well paid
job
But what does a bad programmer do, once he has a good job and faces
the reality that he isn´t able to fullfil the job?
The managers of a company have no idea about programming, giving the
programmer the opportunity to make the job look much bigger than it is
and stretch the development time as much as possible
This situation leads to some kind of mass fraud
While the vast majority of self nominated programmers isn´t anywhere
near good, while companies can´t find the real good ones, managers by
now even believe the fairy tales and among programmers it is a well
kept secret, securing their jobs

I don´t depend on this secret, I don´t have to pretend how good I am
and hide the truth, I´m not looking for a job as programmer, I freely
admit, I´m a beginner in C++ programming, but my software in version
0.3 already exceeds the majority of other existing servers

Other servers jump into real money business with a messy software,
financing the bugs from their investors money, meaning if a player
loses money through a bug, they pay it back, hoping the player will be
satisfied and don´t tell anyone how messy the software is
In fact I´ve gotten quite a bit of money myself out of such bugs on
other servers, players actually look for them, try to enforce them and
then go to support for compensation, knowing they can gain some money
through this, which gives in the end the server a reputation as a good
one, not because the software is good, but because they pay good

I rather point out the smallest bugs in my software, I ask my beta
testers to check and report anything they can find, so I can fix it
Compared to other servers who rather pay than fix, this gives the
players the impression that my software has more bugs and subsequent
my software has less reputation, but from a realistic point of view my
software is already better than most others
IF I was able to work on this full time, I´d be able to develop about
anything you like, bug free, in under 1/2 year



Feel
free to contact me. Maybe if we, serious backgammon players who really
love the game, work together we cans ort something out..-



There was (or still is) a group of serious players who tried just
that, develop a good software and setup a user friendly environment
They got quite far, but then their head manager smelled money, dropped
the whole project and bought himself into a licensed copy of
Truemoneygames, pushing the rest of the group far backwards
I don´t know the current state of their project, haven´t heard about
any new progress they might have made lately

I for one will stick to my plan, after all it is just a hobby for me
and my income doesn´t depend on it, but I won´t allow anyone to mess
up what I have reached
I tend to understatements about my software, for me thats far better
than empty promises, where companies like BGR named their software
version 0.9 at a time where it didn´t even have tournaments
implemented, I name mine 0.3 where it already has
- chat in all rooms and at all tables
- private messaging
- real money play
- play money play
- free matchplay
- real money tournaments
- play money tournaments
- free tournaments
- user hosted tournaments
- all kind of tournament formats, from single elimination over swing
up to leagues
- scalable board
- 3 skins to choose
- 3 different logfile formats incl Jellyfish and Snowie4
- automated functions for bearoff, forced moves, etc

Of course, there is no real money play on my server, I don´t have a
license for that (yet)
Of course, there are not many players on my server, because I´ve named
it beta 0.3 and I don´t run any advertising for it
Of course there are a few minor bugs to fix in it, but I´m getting
there, in fact the current V0.3.1 has been online for a few days now
and no one reported the slightest bug yet

If you are interested in a licensed version of the software for a free
server, without money play, I can offer you a customized copy for a
fraction of the price the 2nd cheapest would cost
.

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