WeakTight.com Interview with PokerSoftware

WeakTight.com is a site growing in popularity every single day with online poker players. Its main attraction is the universal hand history converter that takes hands from any Hold'em or Omaha game and posts them to an online database that users can share with each other. PokerSoftware.com recently caught up with the Vince, the site's owner and operator, and asked him about his personal history as well as what is in store for the future of WeakTight.com.

PokerSoftware.com: How did WeakTight.com get started and how long did it take to get to its present state?

Vince: My friends used to tease me about my "weak-tight" play. Hence, I grabbed the domain WeakTight.com, which was surprisingly available, and started the site. The motto just came to me: "Fold when you know you're beat," which comes from the mind of a weak-tight player. The irony is, of course, if you're a weak-tight player, you're usually going to think you're beat.

Originally, WeakTight.com started as an online poker stock. I sold shares of myself to my friends in order to create a poker bankroll. This was mostly just for fun, as I already had an online poker bankroll. I thought it would be interesting to have people buy and sell stocks of a poker player while being tracked online.

It wasn't long before the site ended up being full of tracking features. It was essentially an online version of PokerTracker, following my play so that everyone could see the stock's value.

In 2007, I thought it would be awesome if everyone could take advantage of the site I created. I then started to focus on building the site you see now. I started on it in March of 2007 and launched it in October of 2007.

PokerSoftware.com: What is it about WeakTight.com that makes it a necessity for poker players to use?

Vince: Simply put, it's the best of its kind. In today's games, it is becoming increasingly important to review, analyze, and discuss previously played hands. WeakTight.com is the best way of doing so. The goal of the site has been to make it simple, fluid, and quick to post hands. In addition, we wanted to be better than the existing hand posting and converting sites. Omaha players especially find the "Show Equity," or Sklansky Bucks, feature very useful.

PokerSoftware.com: For a new online player who might have just set up Holdem Manager, how can your site help them in their poker endeavors?

Vince: When getting started playing poker online, it's very important not to hide in a hole. You must accept the fact that you're going to be making a lot of mistakes. The best way to learn is by sharing your hands with other experienced players and getting their feedback. WeakTight.com is a useful tool when you have a hand that you want to share or discuss with someone quickly. Whether it's a bad beat, a big win, or a difficult spot, you can post the hand on WeakTight.com to be shared. From the site, it can be converted and pasted into your favorite forum for further discussion.

WeakTight.com fully supports Holdem Manager. You can take hands directly from Holdem Manager and post them onto WeakTight.com. That way, you can share your hands with friends easily and quickly.

PokerSoftware.com: Your site appears to have the only functional Omaha tournament hand converter in the entire world. How did that happen?

Vince: Luckily, when I started the project, a number of my friends were playing Omaha. I had to support the game from the start, so it's always been a big part of our feature set.

PokerSoftware.com: What features will we see in the coming months?

Vince: There are a number of features in the pipeline for WeakTight.com, much of it driven by its users. People are always suggesting new features and ways to improve it and I'm thankful for that.

Without giving too much away, the next set of features will aid the growing WeakTight.com community. I'll be adding to our feature set enabling users to take advantage of the community. I will also be looking to enable support for any forum, rather than the finite set of conversions that I currently support.

PokerSoftware.com: You have a really slick feature that allows someone to connect their PostgreSQL database from PokerTracker 2 or Holdem Manager to your site so that villain stats can be displayed. How did you pull that off and are people using that feature?

Vince: When I originally wrote WeakTight.com as a stock tracker of my online poker play, it was pulling everything directly from my PokerTracker 2 database. So, this was a natural step in its progression. I was very excited about this feature, but it's not for everyone. If you don't know how your router works, how to forward a port, or how to setup a firewall, you're likely to get lost in it. It is being taken advantage of by savvy computer users.

PokerSoftware.com: Just to put a story behind the name, what's your online poker background?

Vince: I started playing poker in 2003. I began with Limit Hold'em cash games. The mathematics and game of poker hooked me quickly. In 2006, I followed the trend and made the switch to No Limit Hold'em cash games. I play poker online actively. Currently, I'm trying to break into the mid-stakes levels as the games seem to get harder and harder each day.

PokerSoftware.com: Are there plans to support other games like Stud or Badugi in the future?

I'm always looking for ways to put WeakTight.com ahead of the others. These will get done, but there are bigger features that will happen before them. As far as requests go, there haven't been many to have these games supported.