A suggestion, for what it might be worth.
First, run a poll in which each member can vote for 5 things. If the forum's poll system is not capable of doing this (that is, only 1 vote allowed), then it would be safe to ignore the rest of this post.
This Poll would be for the top 5 categories of importance in approving a Casino. (Again, each member can have up to X votes.)
- Purchasing systems
- Withdrawal systems
- Customer Service systems
- Accreditations & Certifications
- Promotions
- Games - Download system
- Games - No-download system
- Transparency
- Business History
- Terms & Conditions
and any other general categories that others might think of.
The top 5 (or 4, or 6) categories would each then proceed to Round 2. Here again there would be a multiple-vote poll, with each category having a list of applicable elements for that category.
I just re-read what I wrote, and I thought to myself "Shit, I think each one of these categories is important."
Maybe the list of categories could be:
- Business Systems
- Accreditations & Certifications
- Promotions
- Games
- Business History
- Other
Business Systems could then cover Purchasing, Withdrawals and Customer Service. Accreditations & Certifications could also include Transparency.
And like that.
In this way, individual observations and suggestions could then be placed in the appropriate category and sub-category. It strikes me, in reading the posts in this thread, that without this type of structure I wouldn't know where to put some of these things (many of these things).
Issues also frequently arise in the various other areas of the forum - most are discreet, finite things, small snapshots in the grand vista of online gambling. But, however small, many of them are important things to know and keep track of, whether they relate to a single Casino, a group of Casinos, a software provider, or to online Casinos in general. It again comes down to "Where do you put this specific item?"
As I said in my earlier post (in which I also said that I would not post again
), it is not just the data, it is the structure of the data (and the rules that define that structure) that is equally important. This structure, if properly defined, allows each item and issue, regardless of relative size or importance, to be placed in a proper spot.
It's kind of like painting a room in your house - most of the work is up-front prep (what I call the "shit work"). Once all of the various parts of the prep have been done, the actual painting is easy. And the final quality of the job is more often determined by the time spent on the "shit work" than the time spent in painting.
One thing that I think is important - I think that the opinions and impressions of some of the less-experienced players are as important, and in some areas more important, than the opinions of the seasoned veterans.
Seasoned veterans "know the ropes", they have the map through the maze, they know what to watch out for to avoid harm. It has become second nature - in some areas it's a fair guess that they aren't even aware of what they are automatically checking and scanning.
There is no "fault" here - this is just basic human nature. I'm sure that those seasoned veterans paid, and perhaps paid dearly, for those road maps.
However, theirs may not be the most valuable perspective for rating a Casino's "ease of use" for the "recreational gambler". (As an extreme, I'll paraphrase words which have been printed in this forum: "If they don't know what they are doing, then they deserve to lose.")
Terms & Conditions, Game Rules, even navigating the Casino and/or playing a game, should not require advanced degrees. If I tried to explain a Bonus T&C, with wager requirements, percent contribution by game, post-WR purchase requirements and all the rest of it to the somewhat elderly clerk at my local drug store, she'd hit eye-glaze pretty quickly.
This last item is one about which I am completely biased.
Based on my personal history, but based also on several other criteria, I also think that dealing in some way with the Sportsbook Casinos, which to a great extent seem to fly under the radar, would prove to be of value to the Players. The Sportsbook forums barely touch them, but many of them are really excellent (and many of them are really terrible). They're Casinos, and they deserve to be brought out of the "gray zone" in which they currently exist and discussed in a forum which has the knowledge and experience to address them properly.
Chris