Facts:
1. Pseudo random numbers will produce hole cards, flops turns and rivers which over a reasonable sample size will show the expected distribution. I would bet 10BTC against the idea that analysis of enough data from hands at seals would show abnormal distribution. If someone is interested in this I will detail ,y terms.
2. SWC stands to make shittons of money even charging as reasonable a rake as they do. It is in their best interest to provide the fairest environment possible to their regulars and recreational players. Nothing is really more important than trust for them. The client etc all come in second at best.
3. There are surely many many thousands of dollars (possible understatement) being held in wallets by seals. If they wanted an unethical payday they would disappear with that money. They have not done this.
As a player at seals for well over a year, I can vouch for the quality of the people running it. They have earned my trust. And as I said... To my analysis the distribution of cards is absolutely normal.
I fully agree.
Actually, one thing that worries me, (after what happened to Slush and bitcoin-central), is that even very reliable site could get hacked. Of course, I trust your capabilities and I assume you have done very good job minimising the risk and possible losses. Actualy, I feel quite safe regarding seals. Slush and BC minimized ther losses and I believe you do as good job as they did.
However, I would feel safest, if I could send the BTC to the site before starting to play and then send my wallet back after I stop. I think it is almost impossibe to make it completely work like that, transactions should be immediate to make it happen.
I assume you make manual transactions as a final step to prevent cheaters from withdrawaling the chips and possibly preventing some unwanted accidents. That's good. But how about adding some kind of credit to the system? Let's say, a player has a roll of 2k. He has 2k on the site and makes a 'conditional withdrawal' for that. That request is manually accepted just like normal withdrawal. However, after that, a player has a 'credit' for 2k, so before session, he can send the 2k back to the site, then play and afterwards make *immediate* withdrawal for max 2k. That would make possible to keep roll on player's own wallet instead of the site.
Actually, initial 'credit' could be the deposit amount.
i can imagine one way of abusing it; if player loses all his roll and after that gets the same amount of chips by cheating. Then he could withdrawal the cheated chips without manual intervention.
When I was thinking about how slush and BC was hacked, another idea came to my mind; some kind of emergency transaction, which, when triggered, would send the hot wallet to an offline wallet. So when the site is rebooted unintentionally, or something otherwise weird happens (you know better what could be suspicious), the online wallet would be immediately emptied to an offline wallet, leaving the thief empty handed. Of course, the best would be to have no online wallet (I think it would be possible, if very carefully designed).
Btw, do you have a 'dead mans switch', which would send all player's money to their withdrawal addresses if FBI knocks on your door ;-) ?