The End of Spinlyzer

RIP Spinlyzer

Last week Spinlyzer put up this announcement on their front page.

This happened after a Pokerstars update, it seems that they had done something to stop Spinlyzer from being able to track 2x multiplier games.

For those who don't know what Spinlyzer was, it was a website that if you paid for you were able to get information on a certain players results in Spin and Go's.

What was differentiated this from Sharkscope, was that not only were the results shown, but other things too like Chip EV, and graphs which were big determining factors into whether a player was a winning one or not. For as we know, there are a lot of variance in Spins and working out whether a player was good or not was not as simple as just looking at their results graphs.

It seems confirmed that this is the case on their site that their tracking was finished.

Pokerstars' Snail's Pace Response

What I find amazing is Pokerstar's slow response to solving this problem. The website had been up since last year May and I'm sure they knew about it but they have only just done something about it. It kinda adds to the confirmation of my theory that with Amaya taking over, they had lost a lot of key staff members that did the software programming as such.

How can this exist? Well for some weird reason, even if you were hidden from search, every 2x multiplier game was able to be spectated, and therefore allowed the website to be able to data mine constantly. This problem wasn't just in Spins, but also Zoom cash tables were also able to be data mined and hands were sold on other websites before they fixed it.

It really is amazing that the whole point of introducing Spin and Go's (and Zoom) was to make things "fairer" for the average recreational player. In theory there would be no table selecting, no possible way to scout information, and prizepools would be random so that they could also have a chance of winning big in the short run.

But along came SpinWiz for auto registering games to avoid other regs, and Spinlyzer to scout your opponents with all types of information taken from its ability to data mine every game played. SpinWiz took ages to be banned (why wasn't this done instantly?), and Spinlyzer over a year and a half.

SpinWiz was able to see every reg online, and allow you to avoid them when registering to Spin and Go's. No table selecting countered!!

Drawing the Line

I think most poker players will agree that these things are not good for the game, as every edge is squeezed out of all the recreationals, its not very inviting for them and doesn't help poker's popularity in the long run.

I would say that Sharkscope is a fine line to be drawn. This is because players have to opt in to it. Opting in seems fine because they are knowingly allowing themselves to have certain data about themselves be shared. Sharkscope only tracks results as well, and not things which are not known without sharing a database.

One of the biggest problems in Spin and Go's is huge stables. There is no way to check for a big stable that shares its hands with each other to gain an advantage. This would be their own "private" Spinlyzer effectively, and there is nothing stopping them from doing this... but when there is money involved this is a difficult thing to control.

Maybe Stars should create a more official form to fill in to let them know that a stable is being created? Then they can keep an eye on them, and distinguish between the "official" ones and ones that didn't sign up etc? Who knows what can be done.

It really does make me think about other Sports tho, when a scout is hired to get information on opponents. It seems silly to not even have this analysis on your opponents if you are playing on a professional level. However, if this information is sold to other pro's at a price, then the ethics of it goes out the window.

That's why HUDs imo are ok. This is information that is gathered by oneself, and anyone can do it. It is only when the information is sold and shared to others then it becomes unethical.

Either way, it has been a shit show by Pokerstars and it aint been pretty. They created Zoom and Spin and Go's to make it "fairer" for recreationals, but this was negated by allowing their software to have every hand get tracked and then the data sold off!

Btw its now July, and we're still waiting on what Negreanu has said would be "good changes" promotion to counter act the VIP changes implemented last year? 6 months to go guys... what could it possibly be?


Summer Games Done Quick

Just to end this post on a lighter note, please tune in and possibly donate to Summer Games Done Quick. This is a week long marathon raising money for Doctors Without Borders. These guys play all your childhood video games, and complete them as fast as possible using some interesting strategies and glitches! This is known as "Speedrunning". Last year they managed to raise $1.3 million! Its a great cause and it is highlighting to good that video gaming can have, not just the negative that the news love to keep talking about!



Please check them out!