What is bonus ball???
If Bonus Ball fails...
- Thread starter Roger Long
- Start date
Competition
First my opinion isn't if it will die, but when will it die. Second why does everyone complain if BB conflicts with other tournaments? Do you think Lowes hardware stores think we can't go into that town because there is a Home Depot? Competition makes everything better, and the strong will survive. If the tournaments are losing players to BB maybe they need to get off their asses, find more sponsors, and make it a tournament the players can't afford to miss.
This is business, seniority doesn't rule, what your product provides does.
First my opinion isn't if it will die, but when will it die. Second why does everyone complain if BB conflicts with other tournaments? Do you think Lowes hardware stores think we can't go into that town because there is a Home Depot? Competition makes everything better, and the strong will survive. If the tournaments are losing players to BB maybe they need to get off their asses, find more sponsors, and make it a tournament the players can't afford to miss.
This is business, seniority doesn't rule, what your product provides does.
Really? More money in their tournaments and the players will come? How about the contracts those same players signed to play in BB. Nice try but it doesn't float!
Sure would like to see your face when your best friend's G/F decides to schedule her wedding on the same day as yours. You scheduled yours a year in advance. What are you going to do? Promote a more expensive dinner? A better known band? Shoot your friend? Perhaps negotiate a date change?
Lyn
I'm going to come off like an a$$, but I'm really not trying to.
If a new buissness comes in to compete, and "does everything wrong" then it shouldn't be much of a problem. If it is a problem then it would seem one of two things are true.
Either they're not doing everything wrong.... Or
The other buissness are not doing nearly enough right.
I haven't really had an opinion on the whole BB thing. However, I see tons of post from people disscussing everything BB is doing "wrong."
When people state what they should do instead, they seem to describe the other ideas that have came and gone, or the act as if BB should imitate what's already going on.
If taking pool the direction of other popular American sports is the goal then doing the opposite of what people are doing now, and for the last 50 years seems like the best path to go.
I understand so many people we know can be hurt by this, but it doesn't mean it's the wrong thing to do for the game.
The pool hobby world is small. That's the problem. Not the solution. If the same "America promoters" keep doing what they're doing then nothing changes.
But it seems like these people think that their opinions are the right answer.
If your already a promoter, and you know the right course, then do it yourself.
You are correct sir. This is the first time I've ever seen people complain that their competition DOESN'T know how to run their company. Picture how pissed they'd be if they ran it right...
It does sound quite bizzarre and I've never thought of it that way, but I think what they're (the opponents to Bonus Ball) are trying to say is that while it's destined for failure it might take some time and leave a lot of damage in its wake. The argument goes that the status of pro pool in America is so tenuous that such a disruption could have a big overall impact damaging the industry as a whole. I'm not sure if I agree with that or not, but I think that's what they are saying.
Commercial space is $15 here. Warehouse is $10-12. Retail is $20-50. I was just shocked at that price, even if it is near the airport. Then again your gas is 25% of the price of ours and we're the 2nd largest oil producer. Economic differences are interesting.
The same things said about pool on this forum are said on those forums. It's become quite popular for news outlets to proclaim 'Everyone is leaving Facebook'. There have been several studies recently on the dangers of social networking and why quitting sites like Facebook and Twitter are advantageous.
Video gaming is a very special case to look at though. It is an industry that does collectively billions upon billions of dollars in revenue per year. Many economists have suggested the industry is recession proof. It continues to grow as generations have now grown up playing games, making it more acceptable for adults to be seen playing games. The average age of a gamer is now well into the mid 20's. On a micro scale, though, it is very different. Development studios get bought up, parted out, and disbanded on a nearly weekly basis. Numerous copyright protection schemes and distribution models have been attempted, often with disastrous results. Many financial models have been attempted. It was estimated in 2008 that only 4% of games that ever entered production would turn a profit. Most mobile developers never see a profit. Free app models have become dominant, yet users hate buying in app purchases (damned if you do, damned if you don't). Practically every user board for an individual game will have the following statements: "This game is dead". "The servers are empty". "Why does no one play this anymore."
The video game industry can be seen as an analogue for all entertainment options, everywhere: we spend an increasing amount of money on entertainment, and yet, the individual entities attempting to make money don't necessarily make any due to so many mouths eating the same pie. Go to practically any online community and you'll find a host of comments about people not participating in that activity. One game that gets compared to a lot on this board, in particular the professional side of it, is golf. Go to a golf community and you'll see rampant discussion about how golf is dying.
The point here is that it is all relative to how you look at it and to what scale you look at it. We spend a lot of time talking about how the game is dying, and yet never discussing how good it is doing despite all of these other entertainment options. We do that for the same reason people in other disciplines do it: we're scared. We like playing pool, and we need other people to play with and we're scared the population will dwindle and we won't have those people to play with any longer.
Well marketing is how you get new customers, clients, fans or what you are trying to attract. Example is I was at the VA Clinic today, as I came out there were two young ladies from a new restaurant in the parking lot passing out discount coupons. To try & get some new customers to the restaurant.
Very simple idea, that I am sure will work. As I have already tried the place, and will use my coupon in a week or so when I eat out again.
The restaurant is only about a 1/4 mile from were I was. They were marketing close to their location. Simple idea to draw new customers.
What has the Pool World, Local Pool Room Owner, Local Bar Owner with 5 or 6 Pool Table in their Bar done to get new players????/
I agree. I believe that's exactly what they're saying. They might even be correct.
None of my arguments have anything to do with my feeling towards bonus ball. I really don't have any. Whether it be BB, or something else entirely, something different should be tried.
Someone stated earlier that "American pool" for the most part has been in the hands of two promoters. People then make the arguement that American pool is already fractured, and that BB arriving with conficting dates may be the straw that breaks the camels back... So to speak. It might/will harm those promoters.
Now I understand the pool world is small. So the people who run some tourneys become beloved. That's fine, but personnel feelings shouldn't be confused with logic.
If pool is fractured, and its pretty much in the hands of a couple guys, that has to say something about those guys. They maybe quality people, but obviously their method isn't turning the results people claim to want.
Instead, people are telling players that to protect pool, they should not try to do everything possiable to help along a new league with substantial money, and effort behind it.
It may have a very small chance of success. But that chance very well may hold much more value then playing the same tourney, once a year just as they have been since they could hold a cue.
Sadly I believe I saw a post in which someone was disscussing banning BB players from future tourneys if they choose to not attend this year.
I believe a "loyalty" argument was used. That would change everything if its actually carried out.
A promoter claiming that he runs tourneys to help players, and the sport would then choose to ban players for essentially playing another tourney? That's not sticking by the sport. In fact it hurts your current "loyal" players by diminishing their future fields. It hurts the fans who want to see them. All those things their claiming BB is doing out of incompetence, you're thinking of doing out revenge?
I don't actually believe that. I think the idea is to scare players into coming to their event. Another thing I'd expect from a trusted friend. And if you actually want to know how scandalous that is, think about. A player could not attend the tourney because they want to stay at home and watch "I Love Lucy" reruns, and they could play the next year. God forbid a guy take a chance at making his profession bigger, and more lucritive. Something different, something new.
Now I understand that everything I said stands on the fact that BB has at least a slight chance of success.
I believe the arguement is that BB has "no chance" of success.
My only problem with believing these expert / fans opinions is that they seem to be coming from the people hoping that the "fractured sport" is able to remain exactly the same.
My last little note. I get that some people are just trying to do whatever they can to help protect their good friends. That's great, and I think it only speaks to having great character. I try to back up my friends when I can. But please don't confuse loyalty, with actually doing good.
You wouldn't be a great friend because you defend your drunk friend from the bartender trying to take his keys. Loyalty is more than following blindly. Sometimes letting your friends understand their weak points is the best form of loyalty.
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Like !
This is by far the best post concerning this issue I have read, My thoughts exactly and appropriately worded. I think this hit the nail on the head.
Gary
This is by far the best post concerning this issue I have read, My thoughts exactly and appropriately worded. I think this hit the nail on the head.
Gary
Leagues. That's the good and bad of how some leagues are designed is that they are built to attract new players.The details and merits have been discussed before, so no need to go into that aspect. But leagues and associated amateur tournaments, that sort of thing, that is the communal atmosphere that gets new players and keeps players playing.
In terms of getting people to the leagues, that's another aspect that is well discussed around here. We all are very much aware of how well pool advertises within the community versus how well it advertises across sectors. Leagues are great to attract players to more consistently play the game, but they obviously suffer in that they aren't advertised much outside of the existing community.
That's a good point, and opportunity is in some ways more significant than pure marketing. Soccer is an example we've looked at in some fashion before. It's growing in this country, and in the ages of 12-24 it is extremely popular in comparisons to our traditional sports. We're seeing serious investment in both television and professional leagues at this point. But where that started was 30 years ago when communities and municipalities began building more youth soccer complexes. Before there was more access, most youth players only had an opportunity through their education systems, and not many high school and colleges offered the sport. Now we have a generation that has grown up playing and watching the sport. There is more soccer broadcast now in the United States than in Great Brittain. TV saw an audience, and that means money. That's how TV works.
Pool obviously faces a big problem there. While there are places to play, the game is heavily subsidized by alcohol sales and that's a limiting factor obviously for youth. Many people got involved as children because they knew someone with a home table, but one of the consequences of all those electronic devices you mentioned above is the fact we're becoming increasingly isolated as a society because of them. We make far fewer real friends and far fewer real connections with one another because we're too busy checking our cellphone every 6.5 minutes. One of the points I don't see mentioned as much is that we focus so much on the financial aspects of the sport and so very little on how fun the game is to play. Like all of those other hobbies' boards mentioned above, we have a tendency to look down on more casual players. That guy that can't run three balls, but has fun doing it, however, is the one keeping the sport alive. There is a bit of a counter-culture angle to market here in that one can put down the phone for a minute and go have fun with real people, doing real things and that's something increasingly missing in our lives. What is old can indeed become new again.
It is not about beloved promoters, blind loyalty, personal feelings, or anyone hoping BB fails.
It is about promoters who have a proven track record, a viable product, and who are attempting to build an enduring structure for pool in the US and how all that is being potentially endangered by a new guy on the block who is scheduling on top of them, has no proven track record, and a product that *no one* can see as viable over the long term. The fact that pool has been frequently burned by promoters with questionable business models does not help.
Are Greg and Mark generally well-like? Yes. But that is not the central issue. And anyone who thinks so needs an eye test.
Lou Figueroa
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BB is creating a disturbance in an already tenuous industry due to the way have interacted with the existing entities. Some of those entities they have approached for help/guidance at one point or another over the years. If the project had any chance of actually succeeding and creating a great new future for pool that it proposes it would be much easier to accept that disturbance as growing pains and just live with it.
The problem is they have not shown anything that suggests they can do much besides spend money. So that means all this disturbance will have been for nothing when they finish blowing whatever money they have managed to accumulate.
This is why some people are annoyed they don't run it "right". It means all this trouble will have been for nothing. My opinion is at the end of the day its their chicken they can fvck it however they want to. Being this is the interwebz though no one should be surprised when lots of people suggest a better way of holding its head or saying "You have no idea what you are doing with that chicken do you?"
You only see it one way, your way. You assume your right and thats the end of it.
These promoters are just doing the same thing they've always done, host events. What they have failed to do is make pool any better. Of course the players keep attending their events casue thats all there is.
There events in my opinion are great, but that alone doesn't make pool better. Maybe they'll come up with some new ideas, or work with the new guys, or people like CJ who have a vision.
They're only doing it wrong if it fails. And if they do pool won't really be any worse off, just opportunities for others to succeed.
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You do not have to be an expert on anything to realize that when you pay out $50,000 every Monday and have zero money coming in that is an unsustainable model.
There are only so many possible ways to make money. It is not some secret formula. There are no magic bullets despite the mysterious claims of BB reps.
I think BB is paying their money so they can do whatever they want however they want. That doesnt mean everyone is going to just sit by and be all "YaaaaaYYYYY!! " as leave a big mess in their wake.
I find it interesting that so many people who have never actually done anything in this industry tell those that do what is and is not Bizzaro. So fascinating how that works,