FTP: End Era

The "official end of era announcement" was "Black Friday" on 4/15/2011 at around 2:00PM EST when the US Department of Justice indicted various owners of 3 online sites (PS, FTP, and UB/AP). (It's ironic it's "black friday" because the normal analogy is to Black Friday - when retailers make lots of money and "get in the black" on the day after Thanksgiving).

The FTP client software started offering a new download at 4:00AM EST on Friday night. Luckily, I had my computer/FTP software still on and was able to play for a couple days until an official "rebooting" of all the US IP addresses happened on 4/18 (Monday) at 3:00PM EST. After that point, only play money games are available.



FTP's Traffic during the "interim period"
1. Needless to say, traffic was gone 50-60% since it was mainly US players.
2. ~22 players at 50plo8/rush at 11:00PM on a Saturday (normally 100). Additionally, PLO8 ring games were almost non-existent.

Other thoughts about my "grace period" (after Black Friday until Monday afternoon).
1. I was fortunate to be able to play a couple extra days and complete a couple last promos (Silver Iron Man + Take 2 Promo).
2. My overall graph for PLO8 very recently officially made me a non-rakeback pro :) PLO/NLHE were still in the RB Pro status though.
3. I was attempting to change my playing habits to accomodate for the more European crowd (playing more in early afternoon-late afternoon as opposed to late nights). If FTP was still up, i was taking shots at the FTOPS PLO8 events (which would have started on Wed with a Rush event followed by a 6-max event the following Monday)...
4. Sadly, I wasn't able to enjoy those last couple days on FTP as much as I would have because of the large amount of social activities that were going on (figures...)
5. I hope that FTP does the honorable thing to convert and/or pay out for Take 2, Iron Man bonii, medals, FTP points, FT Academy, T$, and the other random "value items".

My concerns/thoughts after the closure:
1. Lack of Preparation for the WSOP. I didn't get a chance to play any PLO8 MTTs and now have almost no way of playing them.
2. Strong desire to play some FTOPS (PLO8)/mini-FTOPS (10 game multi-entry + other) events for the practice/experience. 
3. Continued "practice" for improving cash game play in NLHE and PLO!

Hopefully, some day, FTP (and PS) will come back into the market stronger or a strong US presence emerges. In the meantime, it looks like I'll be devoting lots of time to watching videos/reading strategy/posting in online poker forums.

Later posts:
1. reflections on PLO8 cash, PLO cash, and NLHE cash
2. reflections on Mini-FTOPS 10 game
3. live cash game sessions
4. thoughts about resuming online poker?
5. sifting through all the online poker training videos/literature