Did they tell your algorithms and if you were a trader?

to stoopid this, im oot

Sadly no you werent, because betfair wouldnt know either.

Now you know what I was and wasn't told and that (if I was) the guy was lying.


Didnt make any implications about anything. Escappee said volumes were down when bots were off the site, was looking for explaination.

You pasted Escapee's volume figures in response to a post that stated that liquidity would still be there without traders.

They do damage the site in some ways which is why we are having discussions about it and I don't like them because of their parasitic nature, but gambling is very a parasitic business, and I'm being a touch hypocritical because a lot of my bets are parasitic in some form.  I'd rather they weren't but it's just an inevitably of today' betting system.  Overall they are hugely important and fundamental, unfortunately.

Then how come my Account Manager knows how much I turned over, whether I'm a trader or a backer or a layer, know whether I won or lost, how much commission I paid and will notify me if I approach a Premium Charge threshold.

They know a lot more than you give them credit for, it's their job to know and report.

I suppose we could go back and forth with this argument about the positive and negative side of bots forever. The main issue though surely is whether betfair will do anything about it.

In fairness, they probably couldn't do much more to get rid of bot users than introducing a 60 percent tax, bar banning them altogether. Although as has been pointed out, this was hardly their intention anyway, more just to get some more money in their coffers.

When I get accused of whingeing and whining, it makes me laugh because this forum is overwhelmed with pc payers complaining along the lines of "oh how terrible it is that i'm only making 200k a year now, it used to be 350k, i'll have to give up that second holiday home in spain, and p.s. i'm off to Betquack"

Clearly this mass exodus to Betquack has never materialised, nor do I think it ever will, unless everyone decides to move over at the same time there will never be the liquidity to threaten betfair who will remain a monopoly within the industry. If anything I think Betquack will go under rather than get stronger.

When you are making large sums a year, even if somebody taxes you on those sums (and lets face, most of the working population gets taxed one way or another) you are left with a choice. Either quit what you are doing, and do something else or carry on. Clearly most are choosing the latter option, as the alternative of having an actual job is so unpalatable.

Until Betfair loses its monopoly status it will continue to do as it pleases. Clearly they quite cleverly calculated when they introduced premium charges in the first place, that they could either afford to lose those customers and or they wouldn't leave in any case.

I realise i'm swimming against the tide here by appearing to be against bots on a technological site which is based on the internet. I just wonder though where this is all heading. I have a friend who works in the city, and he says your average joe in the street might as well not bother to play the stockmarket, given you are up against companies and people with complicated algorithims and inside information.

clearly now long-term betfair winners can now be divided into the following categories:

1. bot users
2. those with inside information
3. courtside players/fast pic boys

everyone else has very little hope of winning on here long-term, which for me is a shame.

re: The £168k that would have been about £500k on the 16:30 at Haydock (not chester, my mistake ) if the API had been working.

I think people have wrongly jumped to the conclusion that this turnover would have been wholey atributed to "bots".

The "api" is used by all third party software such as the Geek's Toy, Bet Angel, etc etc.

So alot of the missing turnover due to the API failure would have come from users of these software products who were unable to place bets.

zipper I should have added "in no particular order"

mythical prince  thats ok with me
bit of fun  take inside info  my number 1
inside info  dont matter what the fast pic boys thing they see
inside info  the dreaded Bots  they can bet  or lay all they like
inside info will beat em BOTH out of sight .i rest my case mylord

Of course, but they are able to differentiate between the two.

I was speaking with a friend about this the other evening. The danger I see is that the entire world economy relies to a certain extent on stocks and shares being correctly priced.

For a real Luddite question, wd it be possible to discourage bot use by not turning the API on markets until say 10% of the money likely to be matched ultimately pre-race has been matched?

This wd mean price-finders up to 100k matched on good races get paid off w/out having to spread their custom.

Imo they wouldn't even need to rethink the queue if they hid the market movement and queue information.

The IR bots placing bets on 'oversold' positions based on momentum are not what most people are complaining about. To me, the prob. lies much more w/ bots taking markets to an equilibrium price w/out bets having been struck.

The only situation (barring spending the day drip-feeding or building your own bot) is to allow the market to develop at the wrong price.

Reasons for continuing with BF

1. TINA (There is no alternative.) If there is, you will use it. Bot operators may not have one, opinion players may have options but with different problems (eg staking)

2. Use BF for hedging (as insurance) & arbing (where more likely to win with books & lose on BF)

3. Have losses to mop up

4. Strategy doesn't incur PC

5. Margin insensitive (probable loser)

There may be more of course but this just about covers it I should think.

do you really think 5 percent is too much? and anyone else would charge less? I mean poker sites typically charge a five percent rake on pots for example, so that seems to be a universal level.

I fall into all of Sandown's first four categories, though they overlap i.e. the losses I have to mop up are arbing losses. Actually, try as I may, I'm continuing making them.

Imv it's important for a company to be liked by its customers. A cheap shop like Aldi is liked, as is a pricey shop that flatters its customers they're distinguished e.g. Waitrose. But it seems that bf is more and more tolerated by its liquidity suppliers as a fact of life, not as a company it's a pleasure to deal w/.

If I were the new bf CEO, I wd throw some money at trying to engineer a change of perception.

Imv it's important for a company to be liked by its customers

I'm not sure that this is the case.

Consider Ryanair, for instance. A lot of people I know constantly moan about the rather deceptive pricing structure, and how the company appears to treat its customers with contempt, but they still use Ryanair, because overall it is still the cheapest service.

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