FEATURE
THE POGG:
BUILDING THE UNION
ThePogg manager Duncan Garvie explains why it’s time to bring affiliates together to protect their
interests against the whims of powerful operators and questionable practices
iGB Affiliate: Why did you decide
to take this initiative?
Duncan Garvie: Recently Dave Sawyer
from OnlineCasinoReviewer.com (OCR)
looked to challenge Affiliate Edge in
the courts when it retroactively added a
minimum activity quota.
its support for an affiliate that chose to
take a stand. We could easily have raised
four times the target and had to turn down
many affiliates that were keen to contribute.
The fact that so many were willing to
open their own wallets in this way shows a
real desire for change. Affiliates are tired of
“Things are going to get a lot tougher in the next few years
for small- to mid-sized affiliates unless we start working
together to protect our own rights”
Unfortunately the court ruled that it
was not the appropriate body to manage
the issue owing to an arbitration clause in
the contract. The claim was stayed so we
don’t have a court’s view on the legality of
these changes. One of the consequences of
OCR’s case being stayed was that the site
was confronted with a sizeable legal bill.
An initiative was put together by
Casinomeister and ThePogg to try to
raise funds to help OCR meet these costs
without having to do anything drastic.
Both sites chipped in with financial
contributions, then we put the call out to all
affiliates to help OCR in its time of need.
I was absolutely floored by the response.
Within 24 hours all the remaining funds
had been covered by other affiliates angry
with Affiliate Edge, which wanted to show
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iGB Affiliate Issue 68 APR/MAY 2018
programs offering them a deal, accepting
their traffic, then changing the deal. If this
were a B2C rather than B2B transaction,
this type of change would be considered to
be false advertising. It is no more morally
sound in this arrangement.
How does the affiliate union
intend to tackle issues and broker
solutions with operators?
There will be two tiers of membership
– first tier and upper tier. The first tier is
for those affiliates that are agreeing to
co-operate in co-ordinated press releases
where programs make arbitrary changes
to contracts simply to short-change
their partners.
The second tier is for those affiliates
that are agreeing to jointly fund legal
action against programs that make these
types of unilateral changes.
Any member of the union can table
an issue for the union to consider. A brief
of the issue will then be prepared and
distributed to all members. The membership
will then be asked to vote on whether they
support the affiliate or not, with a majority
of 55% being required to take any action.
In the majority of cases, where support
for the affiliate is agreed, the union will
look to prepare a press release detailing
the union’s position on the actions of the
program. This press release will then be
distributed to all the members that supported
the action to provide a template for articles
they will publish on their own site.
A link structure would then be agreed
between the participating members to
ensure that all participating sites help
each other rank for relevant search terms.
Members that voted against the action will
not be expected to make any post.
In the most serious cases, where
significant detriment has been caused to an
affiliate’s business, an upper tier member
can request union support to pursue legal
action. If approved, the union would then
seek legal advice in the relevant jurisdiction
on behalf of the member. After this a
second vote would be held on whether or
not to pursue legal action.