Lets have an explanation

[ColdEyeMe]

Yesterday I posted two responses in the Bodog Slow payouts thread.

One was a detailed explanation about cheque processing, Ponzi schemes, and the role of forums in hiding information from bettors in exchange for ad revenue.

the second was a response to a post by Xavierinthenati in which he released quite a few details about a bounced cheque from Bodog. It revealed the results into an investigation into the factual basis given.

Both of those posts have disappeared. They haven't been switched over to the BetUS and Bodog thread, as is SBR's usual tactic, but disappeared entirely.

I have been unable to get an explanation from SBR John as to what has happened.

If anyone by any chance happened to save the content of those posts, particularly the explanation of cheque processing, please PM me. It will save me writing and posting it again.

Thanks

[ColdEyeMe]

sorry, apologies to SBR John. He did reply. I just missed it.

He says he doesn't moderate. He says that one of the moderators removed it, but doesn't say which one. Probably doesn't know.

But we should all know one thing. Whoever that moderator is is taking money from Bodog. It would be a fabulous thing for all on these forums to have the identity of that moderator, and review all his or her posts where Bodog is the subject.

Let's have a name please, SBR. And then lets have the posts back up so that everyone can make their own decisions about what possible reason there could be to censor such factual and relevant contributions.

[BigBollocks]

I'll be curious to go back and find your posts ColdEye. Sometimes it's hard to decipher information when you have shills such as Michael Cash blindly supporting Bodog on one side, but also when you have personal agendas that don't pertain to the business of things on the other.

I've said before and will say again that Bodog being even an A- is the only thing that I think takes away from SBR's validity in the slightest. I have no doubt that SBR has some incentive in allowing bodog's lack of customer care and lack of expressed concern for prompt customer withdrawals go unpunished. Bodog has some extremely beatable props from time to time (granted with small limits), but I refuse to play anywhere that does not make customer withdrawals a priority for whatever the reason may be. Almost SBR's entire slate of A- books focus a substantially greater interest on customer withdrawals...

[BigBollocks]

My personal opinion is that we'll see bodog disappear one day. I can't tell you how much I hope I'm wrong as bodog has the market on small time American punters covered, and even what they are doing to everyone now is putting such a sour taste in folks' mouths that they will be hesitant to return.

I've seen too many previously rated A and B books on here collapse that all started in similar fashions with a drop in standards and a higher degree of carelessness noticeably displayed...

[shake zula]

My personal opinion is that we'll see bodog disappear one day. I can't tell you how much I hope I'm wrong as bodog has the market on small time American punters covered, and even what they are doing to everyone now is putting such a sour taste in folks' mouths that they will be hesitant to return.

I've seen too many previously rated A and B books on here collapse that all started in similar fashions with a drop in standards and a higher degree of carelessness noticeably displayed...

I really disagree. Bodog has so much invested in the MMA market (which is HUGE in the U.S.) and all their other side ventures that I don't see how they can just disappear, especially w.out paying. I think that the laws in the U.S. will change maybe not in the next few years but they will, the ppl in power won't be in power forever and when younger generations move into these positions of power you'll see more liberalization.

[BigBollocks]

I really disagree. Bodog has so much invested in the MMA market (which is HUGE in the U.S.) and all their other side ventures that I don't see how they can just disappear, especially w.out paying. I think that the laws in the U.S. will change maybe not in the next few years but they will, the ppl in power won't be in power forever and when younger generations move into these positions of power you'll see more liberalization.

Shake you're talking about two separate issues---Americans trust in the gaming system pre-legalization and potentially post-legalization. Of course folks (many of whom have yet to even touch the offshore market) would pump in record amounts of money to harrahs.com, etc.

What does Bodog being a paid sponsor to MMA events have to do with disappearing at any time they so desired? They pay for billboards at events and the website, but could pull that at any time they so choose. I guess I don't get your train of thought at all. Many fly by night books have been paid sponsors at a lot of places. If you're talking about Bodogfight it is based out of Costa Rica and attempts to profit off of PPV events. I really don't see where you're going, but if you put your blind faith in them for whatever reason you are of course more than entitled to do so with everyone's well wishes....

[BigBollocks]

I've spoken or had interactions with most book owners/GMs in the A/B range here at SBR, and there's few I would trust less than Calvin Ayre based on history alone. That said he's a very personable guy no doubt about it, but once a con always a con. To use a counterexample I would say Tony Williams of 5Dimes is probably the biggest jerk and has the worst disposition of all the A range books owners on here, but I also believe he'd do what it takes to see people get paid....

[shake zula]

Shake you're talking about two separate issues---Americans trust in the gaming system pre-legalization and potentially post-legalization. Of course folks (many of whom have yet to even touch the offshore market) would pump in record amounts of money to harrahs.com, etc.

What does Bodog being a paid sponsor to MMA events have to do with disappearing at any time they so desired? They pay for billboards at events and the website, but could pull that at any time they so choose. I guess I don't get your train of thought at all. Many fly by night books have been paid sponsors at a lot of places. If you're talking about Bodogfight it is based out of Costa Rica and attempts to profit off of PPV events. I really don't see where you're going, but if you put your blind faith in them for whatever reason you are of course more than entitled to do so with everyone's well wishes....

I don't feel like it's blind faith, I just doubt that a company would go through all the trouble that bodog goes through to pimp their name and then just up and disappear stealing a bit of chump change. It would be extremely short sighted.

[ColdEyeMe]

I don't feel like it's blind faith, I just doubt that a company would go through all the trouble that bodog goes through to pimp their name and then just up and disappear stealing a bit of chump change. It would be extremely short sighted.

Calvin Ayre has dissapeared from every other failed venture he has been associated with prior to Bodog. Every single one of them has failed, people have lost a lot of money, and Calvin Ayre appears in this third, fourth, whatever reincarnation.

Ask yourself this, has a single person who lost money in ventures with Calvin Ayre behind them ever heard from the billionaire with offers to reimburse them for their losses due to him in the past?

Let's say bodog did disappear with your money. Try and put your figure on a single entity you could sue, could take to court, could try and get anything back from. Nada.

Bodog Fight. Bodog Music. Pffff. They aren't going to pay anybody out, but you can bet they were started with your money and are being kept alive with your money, while you're being given stories about problems with "cheque processors". How problematic can processing a cheque be if the money is there. You can do thousands a day.

[shake zula]

Calvin Ayre has dissapeared from every other failed venture he has been associated with prior to Bodog. Every single one of them has failed, people have lost a lot of money, and Calvin Ayre appears in this third, fourth, whatever reincarnation.

Ask yourself this, has a single person who lost money in ventures with Calvin Ayre behind them ever heard from the billionaire with offers to reimburse them for their losses due to him in the past?

Let's say bodog did disappear with your money. Try and put your figure on a single entity you could sue, could take to court, could try and get anything back from. Nada.

Bodog Fight. Bodog Music. Pffff. They aren't going to pay anybody out, but you can bet they were started with your money and are being kept alive with your money, while you're being given stories about problems with "cheque processors". How problematic can processing a cheque be if the money is there. You can do thousands a day.

No one. I agree, but that is the risk we take. The thing is why???
I just don't see the reason, unless he thinks that internet gaming is done in the U.S. forever. Which IF he did think this would be really short sighted.

[ColdEyeMe]

You have asked a very good question and I don't think it has a simple answer.

Bodog has spent an enormous amount of money attempting to make Calvin Ayre a celebrity. If Ayre had shareholders, they would be hitting the roof over that. They would be pointing out that a huge amount of the company's money is being spent for purposes that do not increase its profits. Good software, better return to bettors, assurances that the games are fair, a much better unique selling proposition than a bloated ego spouting slogans from a poor MBA course, all of those things would have brought about a return on investment for the money spent.

Calvin was aware that he appeared to be a super narcissist run wild. He tried to counter that with the story that he was following some Hugh Hefner type of game plan in which he allowed himself to be used as a "lifestyle' model that had something to do with "branding". It included the extraordinarily paradoxical scenes in which he, a man as gay as Christmas, was always surrounded by bevies of what appeared to be, for lack of a better word, prostitutes.

The ultimate failure of this strategy was that there was nothing about Calvin Ayre that merited celebrity. He was a man with considerable ego and psychosexual problems that had a past that would have caused him to be shunned by the real celebrities he so desperately wanted to be seen and photographed with.

What I did through the Cold Eye was destroy any hope of Calvin ever realizing his "celebrity" and briliant business mind illusion. Why did I do that? I did it for retribution, for a family broken apart and in memory of a dead brother falsely and malisciously accused by Calvin Ayre of despicable crimes that he never committed. If you don't understand that, you don't understand the Irish and the price there is to be paid for doing what Calvin Ayre did.

The tactic I used was to simply tell the truth about Calvin. On the internet, to journalists, and to people who needed to be warned about who they were associating with. It happens to be information that is also very important to people on forums such as this, so sometimes vengeance is very useful to others.

I can explain to you why Calvin would pay for all this primping and then let it go. He sees the writing on the wall re online gaming and he sees the writing on the wall for himself if he keeps it up. So he has been siphoning off large amounts of money to start up Bodog Fight and Bodog music.

Yes, he does intend to leave online gaming. His run in this industry is over. All that is left is to keep the charade going for a few more months and then end it. But what will survive is the money you and thousands of others aren't going to be paid, the money he has already siphoned off which results in him now having to give you these 30 day and cheque processor problem stories. And Bodog Music and Bodog Fight will survive, with your cash, because they don't make any of their own, and they won't be illegal businesses. And Calvin will go through life trying to avoid setting foot in any country that might extradite him to the US. He won't worry for a moment about any of his gaming employees who might start getting picked off at airports for conspiracy to violate US law. He may worry about his properties he has in Canada being picked off by proceeds of crime people, but he will think he has that buried. he doesn't. For a man that once wanted to be the world's top money launderer, he has done a pretty amateurish job of that.

Ultimately, I think that the point that comes out of all this is that far from being banned and bringing about all the problems that drug prohibition has, online gaming should be regulated, with strict vetting of people associated with such businesses, and rigorous financial solvency standards put in place.

Maybe then, in a perverse way, Calvin Ayre can say he accomplished something good for someone other than himself.

[shake zula]

Coldeye everything you bring to the table seems possible and the fact that you are honest about why are doing this does add some validity, but I disagree with your dissection of what one man, in this case Arye can do. There are high powered people who work w/ him, who may want to stay in the industry even if he is on his way out. Where are the whistleblowers?

[ColdEyeMe]

Coldeye everything you bring to the table seems possible and the fact that you are honest about why are doing this does add some validity, but I disagree with your dissection of what one man, in this case Arye can do. There are high powered people who work w/ him, who may want to stay in the industry even if he is on his way out. Where are the whistleblowers?

That's exactly my point. I didn't say he could do anything positive. He did bring a lot of attention on the industry with his Forbes thing and that was a major, if not the major, factor in the DOJ cracking down.

I think Calvin is pretty well a one man show, with some flunkeys and some quite talented people working with him. Other operators will be glad to have the good people, the bad ones will become Michael Cash clones over at theRX or shilling on here and elsewhere for some other operator.

Bodog is not a situation that occasions "whistleblowers" Calvin has blown his own whistle louder and shriller than anyone else could. I saw it said on another forum that he is the kind of man that will back you until your nose bleeds and then run. He led the online gaming industry into a public fight with the US government through the Forbes thing, and now he's on the run, leaving all of us writing stuff on forums.

[ColdEyeMe]

Man, it's a miracle this thread has stayed up this long.

but we still don't have the identity of the moderator who cut the other two posts.

Lets have the Bodog plant's name.

[WHERE'SMYMONEY?]

How about some of my money back, Cal?

My name is Dave Loudon. I have known Calvin Ayre for almost thirty years. Recently, I was made aware of this forum. I had previously known of Calvin's high profile through various news articles up here in Canada, and I was aware of his Forbes Nagazine appearance. Not too sure how to say this, but I trusted Calvin with money once. A lot of money, One Hundred Thousand Dollars, to be precise. It was in 92, or 93, I forget. He had come to me with a deal to buy some stock in a heart-valve company, he said it was called Bicer Medical. I was skeptical, because I knew Calvin through my sons, who were the same age, and I knew his father had recently been released from prison. I also knew that Calvin had brought his Dad into the drug-smuggling scheme which ended in the arrests of Cal's father and several other men. The last thing I wanted to do was buy stock from him, but he persisted, and he persisted. He was almost begging me, and on the verge of tears. He claimed Bicer was being promoted by some well-connected German guy, and it was a sure thing. I had recently sold a mobile home park in the BC Interior, and had some money to play with. Calvin had been hanging around my sons a lot at the time, and I had been friends with his Dad, so I finally said, OK. But not before I got his personal guarantee that if things started going south, he would alert me and I would be able to sell my stock. I know what you may be thinking, no guarantees in the stock market. But we had also structured the agreement, to protect myself, that he was personally liable for any losses incurred by me. I made it clear to him that I considered the money more as a loan than as an investment. He told me we had to proceed quickly, as the money had to be paid immediately to some stock-brokers who had been hired to promote Bicer. Long story short, that was the last I ever saw of that money, and that SOB knew, he knew, that I would suffer financial hardship if I didn't get that money back. For the first few months, he kept giving me excuses, and promises of a pending payment. Then he started telling me the money had been put into a different venture, Gazootek or something. I begged him, Calvin, I need that money, you promised me, our families are friends; all the while my sons were telling me he was living high on the hog, buying two penthouses and having them made into one, partying with prostitutes and drug dealers and the Howe St. stock market crowd. I tracked him down, finally, at an office on Burrard St. I pretty much started crying to the guy, how my wife was going to leave me, my kids needed help, I had given him the money to help him keep his business going, on and on. He said, Dave, I'm late for a meeting, I'll have a cheque for you tomorrow, for 100.000, and another one for 25 grand, and I'm really sorry it took so long. He said it was the banks fault, not his. I was so happy. The next morning, I practically flew down the seawall to meet Cal and get my money. You cannot begin to understand the anger and shame I felt when the secretary informed me that Calvin had left for Costa Rica the night before. After several months, I located a phone number for him in Costa Rica. Every time I phoned, some secretary would inform me that Calvin was in Thailand, or Cambodia, or Russia, or the Phillipines, or Saskatchewan. She always said, yes, I'll be sure to give Mr Ayre your message. I could talk all night about the excuses I got, but to this day have never seen a penny of the money I put up. I had pretty well put it in the back of my mind until one of the Roberts boys contacted me to say a reporter was tracking down people who had invested in Bicer Medical, and wanted me to tell my story. I thought, no, I don't feel the need to share my shame with the whole province, so I said no. Now I wish I had. But I have been following Cal's recent troubles on this forum that a friend put me onto, and I see history repeating itself. Calvin living high on the hog, other people footing the bill, him blaming the processors and the govt. for people not being paid. Now I hear he is living in Antigua, a place he has boasted to mutual friends about where he is untouchable. I still keep in touch with some of his family, and hear they are doing real well. His Dad lives on 160 acre farm 30 minutes from downtown Vancouver, gotta be worth mega-millions. I heard from his Mom's hair-dresser in Vernon that Cal bought her a five million dollar house not far away. I wasn't going to write in, but then I read the article by ColdEyeMe as to how Calvin brags about being well on his way to becoming a billionaire twice over, and yet he knows where I live and I have heard nothing from him. Frankly, folks, I;ve never gotten over the loss of that 100 grand, and my wife did leave me, and my liver is pretty well pickled, and I'm a bit of a laughing-stock for being the guy who helped get Cal to where he is, and haven't seen a dime back. Good luck to Bodog bettors. ****, I'm stupid. I don't have a mean bone in my body, but I think Calvin should be in prison, at least til he learns a bit of decency, and humility. Thanks for reading this. Dave.

[MrX]

Interesting story, but it would've been better with paragraphs.

[SBR_John]

And the beat goes on...

As I mentioned before Coldeye lost some type of custody suit to Calvin's sister and now has become his stalker.

This forum is not here to give folks a platform for stalking... for anyone..sorry. I'd suggest opening your own forum.