There are few other events and happenings in the world of poker that evoke reactions of strong general discontent aside from what has been dubbed as Black Friday. On April 15, 2011, online poker rooms PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker stopped providing real money online poker options to players from the United States. The occurrences that preceded the two brands (as well as several others) being banished from the US as well as the effects this produced within the poker community were countless.
One particular online poker brand was seriously hit as a result to Black Friday. In September 2011, Full Tilt officials were accused of defrauding players of over $300 million. The poker room quite expectedly saw a certain decline in the number of active players over the next years and it actually never recovered from the negative effects its involvement in numerous related court cases had.
Professional poker player Howard Lederer, who co-funded Tiltware, LLC, the company behind what has once been one of the largest online poker rooms, was among those to be believed responsible for Full Tilt’s slow and painful demise. And it took Lederer more than five years to admit his guilt.
On Thursday, the player and poker entrepreneur posted an apology statement, in which he commented on his involvement in the events prior to Black Friday and after that. Lederer used Daniel Negreanu’s blog on Full Contact Poker to say his sorrys.
Lederer’s apology came only two days after Full Tilt’s migration to PokerStars was completed. The online poker room’s co-founder said that he was taking full responsibility for the brand’s “failure to protect player deposits leading up to Black Friday.” He admitted that at the time of the happenings in question he was not the one to oversee what was going on within Full Tilt but was the one that had to make sure that there were reliable “responsible others” to oversee operations and money transactions, in particular.
Being a professional poker player with two WSOP gold bracelets and two WPT titles, Lederer was not only Full Tilt’s co-founder but also turned into the brand’s face to promote it within the poker community, a fact he himself admitted to in his statement. In short words, he pointed out in his apology letter that a lot of trust was put in him and five years later, he eventually acknowledged that he failed that trust.
Daniel Negreanu, who is known for not being shy to speak his mind, commented on Lederer’s confession/apology by saying that it was a belated but necessary one. The full text of the Full Tilt founder’s statement and Negreanu’s comments could be read here.
