Thursday, May 21, 2009 - APmedia
The thunderous ROAR of a bloodthirsty crowd as gladiators prepare for battle…
We’re excited to announce that Ultimate Bet has just wrapped a new commercial campaign that will turn the heads of our most formidable competitors. Welcome Gladiators! Keep an eye out for our new commercial this coming June!
Production was awesome! Picture this – lights, cameras, Hollywood action centered around a fiery theme of warrior meets poker player – Phil taking the spotlight (of course) cloaked in Roman gear from head to toe; decorated in mink and eleven knockouts dressed in togas – OMG… to be Phil. Cards tossed, chips stacked and dagger glares, as each movement at the table is overlaid with the clashing of swords, lion roars and a barbarous crowd, hungry for a victor. You’ve got to check this out!
What does it mean to be in this fight? Our writers and director carefully thought of distinct parallels between being a warrior and being a poker player – how could we relate it in the overall theme and what is our message? To be the best, you must train among the best; play at Ultimatebet.com … and LET THE GAMES BEGIN! We have the number 1 player, so that was our leverage! Let’s use it as the ultimate battle, and portray the players at the poker table the same as those on the dusty, blood-soaked ground of a roman coliseum; a fight for survival.
Here’s another cool thing about the commercial campaign – with it, we are launching a “Create Your Own Commercial” (using our footage). Shortly, we will have a banner and page for you guys to download some of our high-quality gladiator footage and toss it into your favorite movie maker to cut your own commercial for awesome prizes. DUDE!!!! Even if you don’t know how to cut a commercial, you have to try – this is too cool to pass up. Make sure to come back and visit the site for more details. We will have prizes for the top videos! Aruba seat, UB money and tons more!
We hope you enjoy our new commercial as much as we have had in making it. It means more to us than fancy filming – it’s a way of life here at UB. We are warriors at the table, and as Aristotle would say we are what we repeatedly do, therefore excellence is not act, but habit. Thanks for reading.
Tags: Aristotle, aruba classic, Commercial, Corporate, Hollywood, Phil Hellmuth, Roman, ub
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Thursday, January 1, 2009 - Pete
The December days of deals went very well. Players received some amazing prizes every single day in December. Flat screen plasma TV’s to double loyalty points.
The big hit for December was the rakerace. This was the largest rakerace in the history of online poker and it was a hit. We will have given out over $220,000 in cash.
It truly paid to be a player on Absolute Poker and Ultimate Bet this month.
I can’t wait to say Happy New Year as we have so many amazing promotions and technology enhancements coming out in 2009.
Keep your eye out for more amazing promos coming up in January. Especially, UBOC (Ultimate Bet Online Challenge) which starts Janaury 9th.
Tags: Corporate, day of deals, Executive, happy holidays, new year, poker promotions, rakerace, software updates, technology enhancements, UBOC, ultimate bet online challenge
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Thursday, December 11, 2008 - APmedia
Have you noticed one of the most popular advertisers these days on network TV is Etrade.com? That’s right,..soo easy a baby can do it..or that’s what they seem to imply. Does anyone see the irony in this? Essentially the worlds largest casino..the stockmarket, clearly legal and heavily supported by America’s government bailing out some of the biggest plummeting stocks/businesses..and yet with the market down almost 50% from where it was this time last year…where is the government protecting American consumers against these massive losses? Forget going through a major financial institution and professional stock broker….just go to Etrade.com and roll the dice.
Yet Poker… a game that has been proven to have a strong element of skill as equal to or more then the skill of speculating about future stock prices..get’s ridiculed time after time. If we are not funding terrorism we are money laundering, evading taxes or now harboring player to player theft. Doesn’t Etrade and other online retail businesses have the same issues with age verification, fraudulent or stolen credit cards? These are the two primary arguments for our government against legalizing online poker.
Well those and the fact of problem gambling. I don’t know…I think problem day trading is just as probable. And, I think we all know some problem shoppers..especially with the amazons, overstock and ebay’s of the world..is shopping not as much or more of an addiction as poker? Poker..come on. The most common games are still micro limits…25/50cent with average pots of $1.35. Let’s not let the government hide behind those weak arguments. Let’s face it..under age kids can buy cigarettes and alcohol all they want because the government receives those lovely taxes. Why is poker illegal? Well once the government gets their head around regulating it and sees exactly who much money they are leaving on the table by not taxing it…they wont’ care how many people play and what they play. So we’ll just have to be patient with their slow learning curve in regards to the futuristic and mind boggling world of the internet our government can’t seem to get their head around. A little embarrassing as our friends across the pond have embraced all of online gambling (not just poker) and have enjoyed the millions of dollars brought in via taxation along with the job/biz creation for all industry players.
Maybe if the state of Minnesota had taxed poker sites..they could have funded their state bridge project and done something prior to it’s collapse. With costs of health care, poor education, unemployment coupled with cut or underfunded state programs wouldn’t it be nice if your state lessened your tax burden by simply taxing poker operators on the money earned from gambling in your state..you know..like they already do with all land based casinos, tracks and lotteries? Just think what your state could improve for it’s residents?
As an operator I want to see regulation. Most of us are from the states and grew up playing poker from our dining room tables, especially around the holidays. My parents taught me poker as a matter of fact. Let’s allow our country to flourish and reap the benefits taxation can afford to all of us.
Tags: Corporate, Executive, Online Poker
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Thursday, December 4, 2008 - CMO
In order to fully comply with the Franklin County (Kentucky) Circuit Court’s recent orders, Ultimate Bet is restricting access to Kentucky state residents.
In complying with the Court’s orders, UB has agreed to implement an IP Block on UltimateBet websites (both .net and .com), plus utlimatebet.tv. The Block will prevent players with IP addresses originating inside the Commonwealth of Kentucky from playing using UB software, logging in or registering a new account, making deposits to the cashier, and transferring or receiving funds from other players. The IP Block will allow players with IP addresses originating in Kentucky to make withdrawals of existing account funds, but these players will not be able to make any new deposits or transfers.
This action has taken place in order to ensure that the vast number of UB customers, who do not reside in Kentucky, continue to have access and to enjoy playing online poker without disruption or inconvenience.
Tags: CMO, Corporate, Kentucky
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Thursday, November 27, 2008 - COO
Roughly eight months ago our company was contacted by 60 Minutes. They were working together with the Washington Post to develop a story about online poker.
The show’s producers asked us a lot of questions off camera, and initially we provided them with a lot of information and tried to answer most of their questions. We soon learned that the story was to be only about our company and the cheating scandal that occurred on our site.
We continued to cooperate with them in hopes of getting the truth out about what really happened. We provided the Washington Post with on-the-record responses to over 150 questions. I personally gave an off-the-record interview with Gil Gaul from the Washington Post and met with Ira Rosen, a producer from 60 Minutes. I had numerous calls with them over those eight months and tried to answer their questions the best I could. Over the many months they were developing their story, I struggled with the decision as to whether to grant them with an on-camera interview. At first, I was very hesitant to grant the interview because this was by far the highest profile media I have ever dealt with in my life. But after talking at length with the two gentlemen, it became very obvious to me that they had no interest in telling a fair story. They were only interested in getting me on camera to try and make me and my company look bad. Basically, it came down to them wanting to produce a sexy story about the “dark underbelly” of online poker and embellish it with details of the cheating scandal. Knowing this, I decided not to grant the on-camera interview and instead just provide them with a written statement.
According to the CBS News website, the show that they have been developing for 8 months (man, our investigation didn’t take that long), will finally air this Sunday, November 30th.
Since taking over as COO at the beginning of this year, I have given many interviews and worked with the media, specifically about the cheating scandal. I have done interviews with www.twoplustwo.com, www.pocketfives.com, Cigar Aficionado, numerous poker blogs, many poker news sites, and dealt with a variety of high profile investigative journalists.
Every interviewer I worked with treated me fairly, asked tough questions, and gave our company a fair shake based on facts and not just people’s opinions. After dealing with 60 Minutes and the WP for many months, everything inside me was screaming they were going to try and crucify us. Although they assured me during certain times that I would be completely off the record, it later turned out that I wasn’t. They were very friendly towards me until I said I wasn’t sure I would agree to an on-camera interview. Just after the words left my mouth, they immediately became very hostile. They said that unless I granted the interview, they would do their best to make me and my company look horrible. At that moment, I realized that their goal was just that to begin with. There was little I could do to improve the spin they were going to take. I firmly decided to not grant an interview and was comfortable with my decision.
After viewing the two video clips on their website yesterday www.cbsnews.com/video/60minutes my worst fears seem to be coming true. By the looks of the first video, it seems that they will paint online poker as an illegal industry with no oversight. Then they will go on and make blatantly incorrect statements about our company and the incidents of cheating. The player whom they interviewed explained the cheating well, but everything else seemed either inaccurate or inflammatory. In the second video, which is an interview with Kroft, it seems that he is reading cards and hardly knows the details of what happened. Unfortunately, I think the story will not be fair to our company and will not add anything to what everyone already knows in the poker industry.
What would you guys have done if you were in my position? Would you have granted the interview or not? I am very interested to hear your thoughts.
Anyways, let me know what you think…If we had agreed to go on camera, here are some points that I would have wanted to get across:
• Our business is not illegal. Joseph Norton has the aboriginal right to operate a gaming business, as a Mohawk of Kahnawake, and he provides online poker services to players from around the world.
• AbsolutePoker’s and UltimateBet’s cheating scandals were awful and we will never forget them. But we have put a tremendous amount of effort into refunding all affected players, being transparent, and ensuring this can never happen again.
• Our company never benefited from cheating. In fact, it was damaged severely by the scandals as players lost trust in us, while the media condemned us.
• However horrible this incident was, I believe that we are a better company because of it.
• In the AbsolutePoker scandal, false statements were released by the company, but once upper management discovered what happened we immediately took decisive and corrective action to ensure the problems were addressed completely.
• In the UltimateBet scandal, we inherited the cheating from the previous ownership. We fought for the better part of a year to investigate and understand everything that happened. We won a settlement from the previous owners in court and quickly completed all of the outstanding refunds, although the total damage to us was far in excess to the amount we settled for.
• Our company has been transformed in 2008. Security, transparency and compliance with the strictest regulations and standards are our priority. I believe that we are now the most open, approachable and personable poker business on the net.
Regardless of how the 60 Minutes producers choose to skew their show, I know that we have acted with diligence and transparency in addressing these crises, and we will continue to do so. We have told the story of how the cheating occurred in an open and honest way.
You can view an interview with me on youtube or on our corporate website www.tokwiro.com.
I also know that for me, Monday morning means I’ll breathe a little easier. At least then we’ll know exactly what punches the 60 Minutes program has thrown at us, and in the bright light of day, I believe we’ll be well equipped to counter the attack.
Tags: 60 minutes, cheating, COO, Corporate, scandal
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