Betcoin Poker Officially Shuts Down On Christmas Day

The cryptocurrency gambling site -Betcoin.ag- closed down its poker client this Christmas, and true to form, left a mess on its wake.

On December 18th, 2017, Betcoin announced it had been "acquired" by a, so far unnamed, third party and it would discontinue their poker client on Christmas day.

Despite having a great cryptocurrency hook, dishonest business practices has led the site to develop a bad reputation that it was never able to shake off.

Going into a full list of Betcoin's shady behavior and scandals would be a huge undertaking, but here are some of the greatest hits from just the year 2015:

• Unannounced rake increase.
  
• Taking money for a Bad Beat jackpot that didn't exist.
• Allowing proven colluding cheaters to play in their "anti-colluding 10 BTC Freeroll". 
• Paying for positive forum posts on BTCTalk
• Showing a shocking lack of concern for their player's security and game integrity in general.

It's worth noting though that while the site's management turned it into a dumpster fire, the crypto draw was enough to attract loyal customers, some of whom are sad to see it go. 

“This was a great poker site. Sad to see it go. I hope new worthy crypto poker sites emerge.”

Most of the comments also ask if they would be reimbursed for the portion of the Bad Beat Jackpot they contributed. 

“Are you planning to distribute the BBJ money ($800,000) to the players on a pro-rata basis based on how much they contributed? If not this seems like outright theft.”

Betcoin has remained quiet, which has been interpreted as an answer in and of itself.

Betcoin Poker was a Mess Run By Dishonest Pricks... But Can We Learn Something From It?

Betcoin should be remembered as a key part of poker history. 

As the cryptocurrency market grows in online poker, hopefully, future crypto poker sites will look back at these early experiments and realize that cryptocurrency doesn't mean lack of accountability towards your customers. 

Customers, for their part, need to realize that where there's smoke, there's fire. There shouldn't be so many stories of players trusting their money with sites that don't care about them, players need to be reminded that they have the power of choice. 

At the end of the day, the one thing pro and anti Betcoin poker players in the comments seem to agree on, is the hope for "new and worthy crypto poker sites" to emerge.

UPDATE December 28: Betcoin.Ag has since announced their plans to return the Bad Beat Jackpot money to the players.