Dancing Around the Truth About CardSpike

[Brandon]

If your talking about the one where he says its a continue from the locked one he wrote it is in the private section. It was move and shows that the post was edited by the prof.. dont know what changes were made if any but the post has been moved

http://www.casinoaffiliateprograms.c...360#post195360

What does it say? Says you have to be registered to read it? I can't read it because I was banned when I chose not to renew my CAP certification.

[ck8795]

He made a new post all together and moved the two posts over

Here is his message

CAP does not own any poker skins, casinos, bingo rooms or online gaming operations we have stated this over and over. I dont know what more we can do to address this. Bryan I hope you enjoy the awards and in the future I hope we can work together in a more positive light.

In the mean time can I respectfully ask that you not disrupt CAP until we have had a chance to speak personally. We have never been disrespective on your boards and I ask that you do the same here.

and here is CM's post. Like i said I dont know if changes have been made it just said edited by Prof.

Hi Lou - and everyone who has been following the Cardspike/CAP/ENG etc. thing.

The thread that I was commenting on was locked, so I didn't have a chance to respond to your last post. I hope you don't mind me doing so here. Please don't take this as an act of hijacking the forum - I just wanted to make one last comment.
http://www.casinoaffiliateprograms.c...330#post195330

Quote:

Originally Posted by Professor
...I assume you operate Casinomeister as a business. Imagine a very minor, but malicious, competitor spending weeks and months attempting to damage your brand and insinuating that by accepting paid ads from the casinos and then serving as a player advocate this presented a clear conflict of interest.

I understand running a business. And one of the most important things that I have learned in this industry is that it is not about money. Go ahead and laugh, but to me it's not. Money does not motivate me - dealing with people, assisting others, and being creative with my website does. The people who know me can attest to this.

I have also learned that trust goes a long way. Same thing goes for being transparent - especially when dealing with casino player and affiliate situations. And I don't feel that you have served your members (affiliates and programs) what they honestly deserve - a more transparent operation.

Comparing the way Casinomeister is set up to CAP is comparing bananas to bowling balls. You certify aff programs - I certify (in a way) casinos. That's comparible. If I were managing a casino that was listed on my site, well then yeah, then you could compare the two. But I'm not.

If I were to decide to manage a casino, I would damn sure tell everyone - and probably keep that casino off of my site just to ensure that there were no conflicts of interest.

And then I'd put the bong away; managing an entity that I am supposedly "Certifying" is just a dope smoker's dream to begin with.

Further: I was hoping you would directly comment on this CAP/Cake proposal, but you have chosen to not do this. That's your preogative - this is your business, not mine.

NOTE: We do not link out of private areas please.


Quote:

Originally Posted by Professor
...Bryan we have met on a number of occasions at the events we put on. Our members voted for you and presented you with a CAP Award. I would hope by now you had an inkling of what we do and how we support and develop the affiliate community and this industry like no one else. Can we get together in London and chat man to man and work out whatever concerns/questions you have? If I had questions for you, out of respect, thats the approach I would follow.

I was flattered to receive the award last year, especially since I was not a member of CAP - nor of any affiliate association. I'm sure you remember the falling out I had with the GPWA during the Slycin years...but that is another story.

I know what you do - I see the positive stuff...but recently, this EMG/Cardspike/conflict of interest has overshadowed everything.

We don't need to chat "man to man" in London. This issue is about transparency, and in my opinion would not be fair to your members to be confiding with me about this in private. My questions and comments were in the other thread, and actually they have been pretty much answered.

I'll be at the awards dinner, but that is about it. Like I mentioned in last nights video, I won't be attending CAP Euro this year.

[Brandon]

He made a new post all together and moved the two posts over

Here is his message



and here is CM's post. Like i said I dont know if changes have been made it just said edited by Prof.

I just don't understand why Rogers legitimate concerns would be deleted. They said they run the affiliate program, he is owed $15k, and now his posts asking about it are getting deleted...

Not to mention he asked for Lou to explain the PAL hacking incident. If they had nothing to do with it, they would have been vocal about it from the very beginning, not deleting posts about the situation.

[MichaelCorfman]

Welcome to the forum Betpartners, and thank you for your post. You will find that on the GPWA we welcome comments and criticism, even when they ask hard questions. I am a firm believer in transparency and honesty, and welcome dialogue to get to the heart of the truth. In these forums opinions are not censored, and threads with contrary opinions are not edited, closed, or archived away from view.

With respect to your comments about Casinomeister, I would like to point out that once you examine his interaction with CAP in his forum, you will find that he made a decision to not attend based on what he saw unfold and his own personal interaction and interpretation of events. I think you would find to a person that anyone you asked would say that was not a pre-formed opinion, but rather a reaction to what he observed and his own ethical principles around transparency and the right way to conduct business.

And I would also like to state for the record that the reporting we did here about this issue did not begin on our own initiative. Rather, others who felt there were issues came to us, and reported information to us that they felt needed to be exposed, but where they themselves were uncomfortable being directly in the firing line. I have a history of being trustworthy, so they were willing to confide in me. It actually placed me in a very awkward situation. I know far more than I have been able to say, and have been restricted in many cases from revealing some of the very information I have relied on in making statements I have made.

I would also like to point out that we were not the first to report a number of the issues. I could have reported many of them sooner, but avoided that for some time. The PAL forum in particular had some earlier comments, and Gambling911 broke the story, and they actually broke it before I even knew that they were aware of the issue and earlier than I wished they had since we were not fully ready to report on the issue ourselves at the time.

You state that it would have been better if the issue had been investigated by others. Personally, I would have greatly preferred for the issues to be brought forth by others for many of the reasons you mention. It is too easy to say this is just one competitor bashing another when we are involved.

However, there are not many choices here when the objective is to have affiliates participate in a discussion about the issues. There was a good amount of discussion of the earlier phases in the PAL forums, but that is a new forum, and so the number of participants is still limited. By its very nature, the people who care about this discussion are going to congregate either on the CAP forum or on a forum that is a competitor of CAP. There was really no way for a discussion to take place on other than an affiliate forum website. Since the early issues being brought up were crushed on the CAP and PAP websites that are owned by Affiliate Media, there was really no way for the discussion to take place away from a competitive site in my opinion.

From a personal perspective, I would have never had us assume the role we have here unless I firmly believed the issue was very real and important to the integrity of the industry over the long term. To pursue the matter otherwise would have been suicidal. Even where we are on solid ground, questions arise in the minds of others as they have in yours.

In terms of releasing information in parts, some of that was by choice and some of that was due to constraints placed on us by the confidential sources providing us with information. The part that was by choice was related to the fact that our sources firmly believed CAP was trying to engage in covering the situation up. When that is the case, this is best revealed by providing portions of the information available and seeing what happens. So we tried to provide some rope for them to hang themselves with. As we and our sources anticipated, they responded in ways that explained only what had been revealed at each point in time, and thus helped make the deception clear as we provided additional information.

Also, to give a specific example, the last document we released was provided to us by a confidential source some time age, but we were only given permission to release it this week because the confidential source finally agreed that releasing that information was important in terms of convincing folks what had gone on. You see, confidential sources generally want to be as discrete as possible. So we have been forced to explain the situation with our hands tied behind our backs in terms of the information we actually know. The fact that we are honest and trustworthy in terms of releasing only information after obtaining explicit permission illustrates our integrity. Believe me, it would be much easier for us to have lower ethical standards here and to have just released every bit of information we had, and it would have resulted in a lot less questioning about whether we had the story right or not. But that is not the way we work.

Michael

[CityGuard]

He made a new post all together and moved the two posts over

Here is his message



and here is CM's post. Like i said I dont know if changes have been made it just said edited by Prof.

I had not taken a screenshot of the original so I am not positive if there were additional edits, but the edit I do notice that would explain the "Edited By" note is removal of the link to the proposal to Casino Affiliate Programs from Cake Poker (http://www.gpwa.org/docs/CAP-Cake-Proposal.pdf). Although it sounds like this was initially posted in the public section, the link to that document was replaced with a note indicating linking offsite from the private section is not allowed.

It seems like moving the thread provided convenient justification for removing reference to important supporting evidence.

[matted]

There is so much here - so many things wrong with this relationship between CAP and CS - that so much gets lost.

To me, the most disappointing this is the desire to keep the facts hidden.

When asked if CAP/Affiliate Media has any interest in Cardspike, the answer is no. But a sister company with the same two executives, Effective Media, does have a relationship. when asked if they own CS, the answer is no, they just do consulting... I mean the affiliate program.... I mean, everything but some "private investor". It's pretty rediculous how far they've gone to reveal as little as possible, until the truth is uncovered.

If they are acting in good faith of the people who support their company, why wont they tell the whole truth to those same people?

[AmCan]

There are lots of legitimate reasons to be less than transparent, especially for americans who operate in the US. There are also lot's of illegimate reasons, such as hiding when something goes wrong and you can't pay the bill. But when you hide the facts, it causes your clients and competitors to want to know what you are hiding and why.

After you get caught, the idea that you should keep twisting the facts to keep this secret is insane. Didn't Bill Clinton prove it? How much better off would he, his family and his country would have been had he just said "I had hope to keep this private as to not hurt my family. I made a mistake, i'm sorry" on the first day. Instead..."I didn't have sex with that woman", turned out into years of fighting and millions of dollars in lawyers.

While it's legitimate to claim that different corporate entities, are in fact different entities, it doesn't change the fact that if the businesses are controlled by the same people, there is a conflict of interest. I run several corporations, with mainly the same shareholders, in different ratios, for a number of reasons. There is no wall between the management of each company, they all coordinate activities as to help each of the companies succeed, according to an overall strategy that i have.

I don't know what Warren and Lou were thinking, but before all this happened, they could have benefited by letting CAP members know they were involved in these affiliate businesses, because they had such high standing in the community. Now we're all scratching our heads, shrugging our shoulders watching them self destruct. I believe it's probably way too late for them to save that ship.

I do believe that the GPWA's part of this "expose" has clearly taken the group away from being a webmaster community, to being an online community for the Casino City media business. I'm ok with that, i read the NY Times and the Wall Street Journal, granted they don't do a lot expose's each other, but i have no doubt that if the NYTs had something on Rupert Murdoch it would be page one and would go on for as long as it was of interest to the readers and selling papers.

edited to add:
I personally like honesty and openess, for a few reasons: 1) I want others to be honest and sincere with me. 2) I'm too lazy to try to keep track of a bunch of lies/stories needed to cover something up. 3) I'd be afraid to face the wrath of my friends when they find out how i treated them. The Golden Rule always seemed reasonable to me.

[Betpartners]

Hi Michael, nice to meet you

Thanks for the response and the opportunity to discuss this further.

I do not call anyones integrity into question nor can i vouch for anyones integrity because i am in a position where i do not know any of the parties yourself included nor am i what one would call well versed with either website or organisation and i think that is the crux of this matter.

I came across both websites when i saw the authentication certification on a soccer portal, i thought this would be something that could lend a form of credibility to ones website, i fear that this assocation could become overshadowed by this ongoing saga.

As an example i came to one of your sites not sure which one to be honest and it was fairly obvious that something was happening so my immediate reaction was to read all about it and in doing so i found myself left with a very harsh choice.

Do i want to be certified by a site that carries out unethical acts that is widely critisiced by many people, ie, CAP or do i want to be certified by a site that is carrying out a form of vendetta.

Now i dont use the words vendetta or unethical literally, i make no judgements to that, my point in using these words is how this situation can be perceived and if i get that perception rightly or wrongly then surely it is starting to damage both parties.

If potential members come to either site and before they can apply for certification they are presented with this war then it simply cannot be any good to anyone.

Now dont misunderstand me, i am no one special and not having onlyme certified is neither here nor there, but imagine if i was just the tip of the iceberg and more and more felt this way.

Probably not explained that well, i hope you get my meaning, its about perception and the wrong perception cause harm.

Again being an outsider i can only tell you how it looks, i take on board what you have said and when all the dust is settled you may well be proven right and have done a good deed for the industry, time will tell on that, but surely you can see however right and justified you may feel, that you are a competitor and the prosecutor no matter how that came about.

A competitor even with the very best of intention and the highest integrity cannot be relied upon to be the investigator and prosecutor, it is all about perception.

If Burger King found out stuff about Macdonalds and brought it to light and brought out info slowly however damning the general public will always view it as one competitor having a go at another.

In addition if you are surrounded by forum members that generally are loyal to you they will back you up and take what you say at face value, were is the checks and balances that are required in this, were is the inpartiality.

You may say you are impartial, but so would burger king and that does not mean that you are wrong, it just means you are not best placed to carry this out, again its perception.

I have stated that i belive CAP have a case to answer but i also beleive that for all the will in the world GPWA is the not the authority to prosecute this.

Michael you say you have sat on info for months, you say others broke the story, that gives an impression that there are indeed others that could have carried out the investigation and that you could have provided documantation in support of your allegations.

In addition if you had info for months then you could have waited longer to gather a full report as opposed to this constant drip drip of info no matter the circumstances, no prosection in court would be allowed to do this and while you can does that make it right.

I think this is fast going beyond right and wrong and more about how it looks, if you took a step back, listened to someone outside the industry (not me of course) and asked for a frank assesment they would say the way you ahve gone about this has done you no favours at all.

Now i am not attacking you and i appreciate this platform for which i can espouse my opinion and i wont bother going to CAP forum to do the same because i suspect i will be deleted so why waste my time.

And like i stated earlier CAP is not looking good at all in all this but unless you take the high ground soon and do the right thing here you will find that it is a horrible place in the gutter.

No insult intended.

The perception will remain no matter how honest you are simply because you are a competitor, people that dont know you will never believe you dont have an agenda here, i am sorry i dont, i dont eman to be rude here at all.

I would think the same thing if it was General Motors and Ford or microsoft and apple or sony and panasonic and if you are honest you would too.

The industry insiders may know who is telling the truth and who is not and who to belive, but the public wont and surely it is the public that visit you and are potential members that are most important here.

Otherwise they will turn off.

Michael i honestly belive you need to hide for now all these forums, make a request to casinomeister to do the same and ask for an independent person or organisation to take over, wait for the final report and then act, not to do so while info is still being released and by a competitor undermines it all.

I apologsie for my spelling errors and i mean no insults whatsoever, i am just trying to explain how this looks and at the end of the day perception is everything.

[mojo]

Michael i honestly belive you need to hide for now all these forums, make a request to casinomeister to do the same and ask for an independent person or organisation to take over, wait for the final report and then act, not to do so while info is still being released and by a competitor undermines it all.

Welcome Betpartner,

With all due respect, I think it has gone beyond this point. What is needed here is truth, freedom of speech and transparency.

The 'third party' to 'take over' should in fact be affilates, affiliate managers and all of the other industry individuals as a collective group with the facts before us. We have come a long way to get where we are and we now have facts. They should not be hidden. JMO.

[MichaelCorfman]

Hi Michael, nice to meet you

Thanks for the response and the opportunity to discuss this further.

My pleasure. I do need to say, however, that I am leaving on a plane tomorrow for London, and have much to do before I leave, so I will likely become fairly inactive here over the near term.

I would also like to say that I very much appreciate hearing your perspective on the matter. And I would also like to say that I care very much about raising the level of integrity in the industry, so the extent to which it is perceived that the value of GPWA seals are diminished by this discussion is very distressing to me personally.

Michael i honestly belive you need to hide for now all these forums, make a request to casinomeister to do the same and ask for an independent person or organisation to take over, wait for the final report and then act, not to do so while info is still being released and by a competitor undermines it all.

A few comments. First, I have at the present time released all of the information I plan to release. I do have some additional information, but I am not free to release it at the present time, and right now I have no expectation I will be free to release it in the future. If CAP has any information they would like to release they are free to do so either here or on their forum, or on any other platform of their choice. In this forum there is a history of letting comments from CAP management and CAP members stand for others to see, although the reverse has certainly not been true.

Second, it is the general policy of this forum, with the support of our members, to not censor or hide dialogue among affiliates. If it seems based on comments from others, that there might be broad support for your suggestion, then I would be happy to open a poll on the subject and allow the members here to determine if we should modify our normal procedures.

Third, I have no idea what sort of third party could act as an arbitrator or judge in this situation. The person in the industry I expect most folks would trust to be reasonable with respect to a matter like this is the Casinomeister who you would suggest to exclude. So you know, in 2008 he was voted by the members of CAP itself to be the best casino affiliate of the year even though he himself is not a member of CAP. I don't think we are going to find anyone who is as respected as he is and who has a history of trying to stay out of affiliate forum politics.

Fourth, I don't have any plans to act further on my own right now other than to let affiliates discuss the issues that have been raised, and to answer questions as they are asked of me.

Michael

[Betpartners]

Hi Mojo

In response to both Michaels and Mojos comments i think my use of the word hide was wrong, that gives the wrong implication, maybe locked with a disclaimer of some sort stating a thrid party was involved.

Michael i do exclude Casinomeister who i do gather from reading various posts (not on his forum) that he is indeed respected, and no reflection on him is intended in anyway, but he has drawn an opinion and it is not hard to see which way, though in all fairness he has asked repeatadly for answers and none have been forthcoming.

There are in fact many third parties they can be asked to become involved not just to resolve this situation but also to mediate, i could be wrong here but both CAP and GWPA are more casino pointed than sportsbooks and the sportsbook sector in europe has many respected particiapnats that can be vouched for.

There are other organisations that i respect, though that may count for squat in fact a quick look at both sites and i see gambling organisations on both, a quick word with one of those could easily recommend some one, i am sure if the affiliate manager at sportsbooks have been visiting the two sites they could not miss whats going and would be alarmed and would be able to recomend a good 3rd party that could speak with both sides and try and get a conclusion.

If Egypt and Israel can sort things out i am sure both sides in this matter can

Point is that Mojo may well be right it has gone too far, but not to hide info but to bring this saga to an end.

But i have given my opinion and i am just one indivdual and i may be well wide of the mark here, i am sure you gentlemen know what is best and will act accordingly.

I do however stand by my original statement that CAP have a case to answer and that GPWA should not be the ones to investigate and prosecute.

I will now bow out of this discussion and leave it to those that are better informed.

I shall peruse the site, i like it, its knowledgable and gives good insight, good luck and i hope this sorts itself out

[Integrity]

If Michael didn't expose this no one else would have.

Dat's a fact, Jack.

.

[Betpartners]

Hi Jack

Like your videos

Sorry had to respond despite my bow out statement, i was under the impression that gambling991 broke the story and others had reported on it,

I would also like to point out that we were not the first to report a number of the issues. I could have reported many of them sooner, but avoided that for some time. The PAL forum in particular had some earlier comments, and Gambling911 broke the story, and they actually broke it before I even knew that they were aware of the issue and earlier than I wished they had since we were not fully ready to report on the issue ourselves at the time.

Michael

Also its one thing to break a story and another to pursue it.

It could easily have been handed over to an impartial 3rd party to investigate after the story had broken and not undertaken by a competitor.

A simple statement saying we have asked so and so to investigate these allegations so that we are not accused of having an agenda or a statemnet saying we have handed a full dossier to so and so.

I dont question your integrity but it is difficult to 100% accept what a competitor accuses another competitor of wrongdoing no matter the eveidence.

[arkyt]

Personally, I'm at CAP in order to help the community as a whole not because I approve of what Lou and Warren does.

If someone didn't approve why in the world would they want to stick around and assist in glossing over the wrongs thereby further helping the site become bigger?

Possibly some dont see anything wrong - thats understandable - everyone is entitled to that opinion. But if someone said hey I see all that is wrong and I dont care - I personally think thats a problem.

IMO, if you see something wrong and you ignore that wrong - you are wrong yourself!

[GamTrak]

Professor Signing Off

After the all the negative press and activity of the past few months I have decided it's probably best for the community moving forward if I left. For whatever reason I create too much of a distraction and raise too many questions by even being here anymore. I know many believe I am some kind of monster now and even my old friends have fallen silent in support (Other than BB1 Thanks Steve). I will do whats best and simply move on. It's been a great run and I truly enjoyed it. I met some of the best people I have ever known through CAP and it's taken me wonderful places around the world. I would rather remember it fondly then grow bitter and forget all the good we have done together.

I have always loved this business and loved CAP, it's been my baby for so many years and it's hard to let go. But now its turned into a nightmare thats damaging my health and something I dread getting up to. Unfortunately I have already purchased tickets to London and have a hotel room booked so I may go, but even if I do this is my last appearance at the events. I will also be turning over the reins here to a younger team and staff with fresh ideas that can keep CAP moving in a positive direction. I sincerely hope everyone finds them more agreeable to work with. It's time for me to move on.

God bless all my friends and have a prosperous 2009. I am certain we will see a major surge of business in the latter quarters of the year and the new CAP will be here to help you make the most of that opportunity.

source

[GamTrak]

If someone didn't approve why in the world would they want to stick around and assist in glossing over the wrongs thereby further helping the site become bigger?

Possibly some dont see anything wrong - thats understanable - everyone is entitled to that opinion. But if someone said hey I see all that is wrong and I dont care - I personally think thats a problem.

IMO, if you see something wrong and you ignore that wrong - you are wrong yourself!

I could care less what you think so why don't you shut your pie hole when it comes to ME and find someone else to mess with because I don't answer to YOU.

[arkyt]

I could care less what you think so why don't you shut your pie hole and find someone else to mess with because I don't answer to YOU.

Great response LMAO - and its exactly what I expected.

[GamTrak]

Great response LMAO - and its exactly what I expected.

I know. That's why I did it you idiot!

[Integrity]

Sorry had to respond despite my bow out statement, i was under the impression that gambling991 broke the story and others had reported on it.

It's true that Gambling911 "broke" the story in the sense that it went public on their site first. Michael had a lot of the data well before the story was published (and many others were aware of the rumors) and we were in the process of investigating and verifying facts.

When the story broke at Gambling 911 we were forced to hurry up the investigation, and that's why it took several weeks to get all the facts out. There is a big difference between Gambling911 reporting something they heard and Michael bringing out concrete proof in such a way that it paints the picture.

That's what I meant be my statement.

[arkyt]

I know. That's why I did it you idiot!

Name calling too huh? Thanks.