We had what we call a "material" scoring error yesterday with L. Berkman. He was scored 0 pts in the fantasy contests, but should have had 10 pts it appears. Please be patient while we research this, and determine why this happened and if any other fantasy scores were effected. When we get the bottom of this, we will determine if any contest results need to be adjusted, and credit user accounts as required.
For material scoring errors we are allowed to adjust contest results after completion. We hate to pull funds out of an account due to our own error, so it is doubtful we will do this if this is the case. We will simply credit the accounts of those that were negatively effected by the scoring issue.
We do not correct for scoring issues related to updates to box scores after the initial, official box score is delivered to us. However, this does not appear to be the issue with L. Berkman on Friday.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Another Rainout
The weatherman does not seem to like us right now. We had another rain out today. Most contests today will remain running through the night, and be settled in the morning as a result. We need a few days, to automate the process of closing contests with rain outs, by picking up the correct information from our live stat feed. We were hoping we would not have a repeat of yesterday while we worked this out, but no such luck.
Our policy on rain outs, postponements, and cancellations is that we do not score the players in the cancelled or rained out game (see Rules). We legally can't cancel a contest that has 2 or more entries, because we would be removing the guaranteed prizes we are required by law to offer. So we can't cancel the contest, and must let it run. If nobody factored in the weather, overtime rain outs would not make a difference to your results. Some times you would lose points, other times your opponents would lose points. So this would be a wash long-term. Please consider this before getting too upset about zero points for rained out games. We do recommend that players consider the chances of a rain out, when making there fantasy team selections. Dome games are always safe.
Our policy on rain outs, postponements, and cancellations is that we do not score the players in the cancelled or rained out game (see Rules). We legally can't cancel a contest that has 2 or more entries, because we would be removing the guaranteed prizes we are required by law to offer. So we can't cancel the contest, and must let it run. If nobody factored in the weather, overtime rain outs would not make a difference to your results. Some times you would lose points, other times your opponents would lose points. So this would be a wash long-term. Please consider this before getting too upset about zero points for rained out games. We do recommend that players consider the chances of a rain out, when making there fantasy team selections. Dome games are always safe.
Wednesday Contests Still Running
There was a game cancellation yesterday that effected several contests. The contests were not paid out, because the software was waiting for the box score from the cancelled game. Per our rules, there will be no fantasy points awarded for players in a cancelled or postponed game or event. We are resolving this manually and the contests will be closed, and settled shortly. Our rules state that we are allowed to settle contests the following day if required, and this will be the first time we have had to do so since the launch. We will automate the process of closing out cancelled games going forward so this does not happen again. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Pardon Our Dust
There were a couple of items that were not put in place in time for last Friday's launch due to last minute negotiations with our lawyers and banking partners. These include acceptance of Canadian customers, and acceptance of Amex and Discover credit cards. All of this is fully approved and is being implemented this week in our software. Sorry for the inconvenience this has caused for our friends up north. I expect all three items to be functioning by the weekend. We currently only accept credit cards drawn from US banks, and do not accept debit cards. This policy will not be changed with the addition of Canadian customers. Canadian customers will be able to use PayPal, a US credit card, or any credit card or checking account tied to their PayPal account as a deposit method.
Contest Offering
We will be expanding our contest offerings as our customer base builds, which is happening rapidly. Currently our mix of contests is weighted heavily towards the lower cost contests, and the number of contest structures currently offered is very small. The number of structures offered will increase and the mix of contests will evolve very fast. Our goal is for most of our contests to offer at least 90% of the entry fees returned in prizes. This is already true and will remain true for all "Heads-Up" contests, and all contests with entry fees of $20 or greater. We will also be increasing the payout percentage for some of the smaller fee contests shortly, as they fill up with more consistency. If you would like to try out an inexpensive contest with a great payout, you can't go wrong with our "Launch Specials". These $1 contests payout 100% minimum of the contest fees in prizes. We plan on offering these for the next few months at least on a daily basis. They are our personal version of a freeroll contest.
Thanks to all the new users and affiliates who have made our first week in operation a huge success!
Contest Offering
We will be expanding our contest offerings as our customer base builds, which is happening rapidly. Currently our mix of contests is weighted heavily towards the lower cost contests, and the number of contest structures currently offered is very small. The number of structures offered will increase and the mix of contests will evolve very fast. Our goal is for most of our contests to offer at least 90% of the entry fees returned in prizes. This is already true and will remain true for all "Heads-Up" contests, and all contests with entry fees of $20 or greater. We will also be increasing the payout percentage for some of the smaller fee contests shortly, as they fill up with more consistency. If you would like to try out an inexpensive contest with a great payout, you can't go wrong with our "Launch Specials". These $1 contests payout 100% minimum of the contest fees in prizes. We plan on offering these for the next few months at least on a daily basis. They are our personal version of a freeroll contest.
Thanks to all the new users and affiliates who have made our first week in operation a huge success!
Monday, June 25, 2007
The Importance of Pitching
When your home team really needs a win what do you do? You send your ace to the mound. Having the best possible starting pitcher on the mound gives any team their best chance of winning an important game. This is just as true for fantasy baseball as for real baseball. Pitching is the key. If your selected starting pitcher does not get the win, you will not get the 10 points that other winning pitchers will get. You need to select a pitcher that will at a minimum get the win, or it will be next to impossible to win your fantasy contest. With pitchers unique ability to put up huge positive and huge negative fantasy scores, their performance is key for your fantasy team. Pick the best starting pitcher possible every time, and don't worry about salary. Salary cap money towards a winning pitcher is always money well spent.
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Calling All Quotes
We are looking for some fresh, honest quotes about the website to put up on the main page. Provide an honest quote about us in the comments, and if we use it not only will your words be immortalized where millions of people will see them, but we will also drop $20 in your FSL account for helping out. Deadline is one week. Be sure to identify your FSL nickname if you want credit.
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Joe Speaker and Hans Moleman Big Winners on Launch Day
Joe Speaker commented the other day that he thought the games were "soft" on this website. He might be right as he took down his second 10-player promotional contest in three days. This one was a blogger filled field including StB, oossuuu754, Daddy, Smokkee, and myself. 52 fantasy points would be enough for Joe's win. StB took second, and oossuuu754 third for the other cash prizes.
The big winner of the day, and setting a new individual prize record on FSL was hans moleman. Hans entered the $10, 10-Player contest which would go off with just 5 entries and a whopping $40 overlay. He would put up a solid fantasy baseball score of 67 and earned the $50 first place price. Nice job on the win hans!
The big winner of the day, and setting a new individual prize record on FSL was hans moleman. Hans entered the $10, 10-Player contest which would go off with just 5 entries and a whopping $40 overlay. He would put up a solid fantasy baseball score of 67 and earned the $50 first place price. Nice job on the win hans!
Friday, June 22, 2007
First FSL Strategy Post
OK, now for the good stuff. This one is pretty simple. A great way to start making profits on FantasySportsLive.com is to look for situations like this.
See that $10 contest at the top? That's got $50 in entry fees, and will pay the top 3 a total of $90. This is called an overlay. If you were to jump in for $10, there would still be a 50% overlay. You would need to be pretty bad at this to lose long-term in contests with this much free money. You can also see ID=26 running with just two entries. In that one both players automatically won, and were just fighting it out for the 1st place prize. A third player would have made things a bit more interesting.
As we ramp this site up, you will probably see lots of this over the next few weeks. Check back ten or so minutes before the start of contests, and grab yourself some free money!
LAUNCHED!
We are off to a great start today with our "official" launch. This is real exciting times for us, as we can finally show the world what we have been working on. Thanks to Pauly, Iggy, Joe Speaker, and UpForSports for getting the pimpage off to a great start. And thanks to all of the new affiliates who signed up today. Together we will take this website all the way to the top!
Thursday, June 21, 2007
MRB and Joe Speaker Big Winners On Opening Night
FantasySportsLive.com launched yesterday with some promo contests for those in the know. Friday the word officially goes out. Joe Speaker took down the 1st 10-player contest run on the site. It was a $1 promo contest so it was just a $6 win, but Joe is not very good at fantasy sports so I am sure he is pumped.
The big winner of the night was MRB who entered a $10 6-player contest. Only three would enter, so there would be a whopping $30 overlay, and all entries would be guaranteed a prize. MRB took it down and won a $30 1st place prize. The $30 is the current record win on the site, but I expect that to be shattered on Friday when we start running a full slate of contests.
Thanks to everyone who made our first day in operation a success!
The big winner of the night was MRB who entered a $10 6-player contest. Only three would enter, so there would be a whopping $30 overlay, and all entries would be guaranteed a prize. MRB took it down and won a $30 1st place prize. The $30 is the current record win on the site, but I expect that to be shattered on Friday when we start running a full slate of contests.
Thanks to everyone who made our first day in operation a success!
Monday, June 18, 2007
Rewriting the Rules of Fantasy Sports
That post title is worth trademarking, so we did it. It sums up what we are all about at FantasySportsLive.com
When the UIGEA of 2006 passed, it signaled a major turning point in online gaming regulation. It was very bad news for the offshore online poker rooms, sports books, and casinos. These all fall under the category of gaming in the UIGEA. Bill Frist snuck this bill into the port security act that was sure to get it passed, and got it through with little debate or review. In its attempt to identify what was "gaming", it was forced to carve out what would not be considered "betting or wagering" (i.e. gaming) in the USA. The obvious carve outs were made for insurance, options trading... Some less obvious carve outs were made for things like online state lotteries, online horse race betting, and online fantasy sports. All of these carve outs are for things that could be interpreted as gaming, but the lobbies for interstate lotteries and horse racing are just too strong, and that's how politics work. Also, such a high percentage of voters play fantasy sports that touching that would be political suicide.
So we looked at what was done specifically on Fantasy Sports in the legislation. It turns out that fantasy sports had been operating in a legal gray area up until the passage of the UIGEA. Big fortune 500 companies like Yahoo, Disney, and CBS were taking chances by hosting fee based fantasy contests with cash prizes, but the contests were so profitable for those companies, and they were paying taxes on their profits, so they felt much safer than say an offshore sports book. So they continued to operate in a legal gray area, and chose to litigate as required against their customers, and faced zero pressure from the government. There are some major cases still pending against the big boys for running gaming-type operations prior to the UIGEA.
So now fantasy sports are perfectly legal to operate online, and in the U.S. will not be considered "betting or wagering" provided that you meet all the requirements outlined by the UIGEA. It is here that we get you Bill Frist. It's the politicking that made the bill be written the way it was, and this is and will always be your weakness. Money. So we use the framework that Bill Frist provided to revolutionize fantasy sports. We decided to rewrite the rules of fantasy sports!
So what did we do?
First of all, we realized that the big companies were holding back due to the legal uncertainties, and sticking with their cash cow traditional fantasy offerings. It would take a start-up like us to shake things up. We decided to find a way to make fantasy contests as exciting and action packed as possible, while fully complying with the requirements of the UIGEA. We realized that we could offer contests that lasted as little as three hours, just the length of a single game or event, as long as other games started and finished in the same time frame. We could take the early football games on Sunday for example and create fantasy teams using just the players from those games. We could form contests up in real time, like a sit and go, collect entry fees, and pay cash prizes however we like as long as we guarantee the prizes before taking the entries. With the latest live scoring update technology, we could score the individual contests real-time so that you could have your laptop next to the TV as you watch the games, and view the real-time results of your contests.
To do this right, we would need to abandon a fundamental business model in fantasy sports. We would have to give our contestants a realistic chance at winning, if they were truly more skillful then their opponents. The problem with the season long contests is the service keeps almost all the money, and pays just a handful of big prizes. No matter how good you are, your chances of actually winning the advertised big prize in your lifetime is almost zero.
We thought it would be better if we paid out almost all of the entry fees back in prizes. Typically 90% minimum is paid back. We also keep the contests small. Currently 2, 6, and 10 player contests paying the winner, top 2, and top 3 respectively. In these types of contests, the skill factor can play a huge roll long-term and you can beat these contests for a profit. Without that, we have something pretty cool and a nice alternative to season long fantasy sports. With the ability to use your skill level to profit from the contests, we bring a revolution to fantasy sports.
Are you on board?
When the UIGEA of 2006 passed, it signaled a major turning point in online gaming regulation. It was very bad news for the offshore online poker rooms, sports books, and casinos. These all fall under the category of gaming in the UIGEA. Bill Frist snuck this bill into the port security act that was sure to get it passed, and got it through with little debate or review. In its attempt to identify what was "gaming", it was forced to carve out what would not be considered "betting or wagering" (i.e. gaming) in the USA. The obvious carve outs were made for insurance, options trading... Some less obvious carve outs were made for things like online state lotteries, online horse race betting, and online fantasy sports. All of these carve outs are for things that could be interpreted as gaming, but the lobbies for interstate lotteries and horse racing are just too strong, and that's how politics work. Also, such a high percentage of voters play fantasy sports that touching that would be political suicide.
So we looked at what was done specifically on Fantasy Sports in the legislation. It turns out that fantasy sports had been operating in a legal gray area up until the passage of the UIGEA. Big fortune 500 companies like Yahoo, Disney, and CBS were taking chances by hosting fee based fantasy contests with cash prizes, but the contests were so profitable for those companies, and they were paying taxes on their profits, so they felt much safer than say an offshore sports book. So they continued to operate in a legal gray area, and chose to litigate as required against their customers, and faced zero pressure from the government. There are some major cases still pending against the big boys for running gaming-type operations prior to the UIGEA.
So now fantasy sports are perfectly legal to operate online, and in the U.S. will not be considered "betting or wagering" provided that you meet all the requirements outlined by the UIGEA. It is here that we get you Bill Frist. It's the politicking that made the bill be written the way it was, and this is and will always be your weakness. Money. So we use the framework that Bill Frist provided to revolutionize fantasy sports. We decided to rewrite the rules of fantasy sports!
So what did we do?
First of all, we realized that the big companies were holding back due to the legal uncertainties, and sticking with their cash cow traditional fantasy offerings. It would take a start-up like us to shake things up. We decided to find a way to make fantasy contests as exciting and action packed as possible, while fully complying with the requirements of the UIGEA. We realized that we could offer contests that lasted as little as three hours, just the length of a single game or event, as long as other games started and finished in the same time frame. We could take the early football games on Sunday for example and create fantasy teams using just the players from those games. We could form contests up in real time, like a sit and go, collect entry fees, and pay cash prizes however we like as long as we guarantee the prizes before taking the entries. With the latest live scoring update technology, we could score the individual contests real-time so that you could have your laptop next to the TV as you watch the games, and view the real-time results of your contests.
To do this right, we would need to abandon a fundamental business model in fantasy sports. We would have to give our contestants a realistic chance at winning, if they were truly more skillful then their opponents. The problem with the season long contests is the service keeps almost all the money, and pays just a handful of big prizes. No matter how good you are, your chances of actually winning the advertised big prize in your lifetime is almost zero.
We thought it would be better if we paid out almost all of the entry fees back in prizes. Typically 90% minimum is paid back. We also keep the contests small. Currently 2, 6, and 10 player contests paying the winner, top 2, and top 3 respectively. In these types of contests, the skill factor can play a huge roll long-term and you can beat these contests for a profit. Without that, we have something pretty cool and a nice alternative to season long fantasy sports. With the ability to use your skill level to profit from the contests, we bring a revolution to fantasy sports.
Are you on board?
Saturday, June 16, 2007
Official Launch Date Set, Friday June 22nd 2007
The date is set. No need to pencil it in. FantasySportsLive.com goes live on Friday June 22nd. For readers of this blog, we invite you to a special preview starting Tuesday night June 19th. We will be accepting PayPal for initial deposits, and will be running micro-stakes fantasy baseball contests with overlays on Wednesday and Thursday, as well as a small assortment of regular full stakes contests. It will be a great way for you to be one of the first to check out our daily version of Fantasy Sports that will change the industry. Use Bonus Code "Blinders" for a $10 free instant bonus on a $50 initial deposit, $20 on a $100 initial deposit, or $30 on a $200 initial deposit. Use the bonus money to try our contests out for free. We know you will like them. Good luck!
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