Daily Racing Form Classifieds?

[Maxspa]

All,
Has anyone tried any of Michael De Pasquale Jr.'s systems advertised in DRF? His advertisement has been on the DRF's classified ad list for several months. He claims to have sold 5,000 copies? Is this another buyer beware or does it have value?
Thanks in advance for your input!
Maxspa

[midnight]

Save your money.

There are two possibilities here.

If the systems are bad and don't work, then it's obviously a waste of money to buy them and a bigger waste of money to make bets with them.

If the systems are valid, then the author has told you that they're no longer profitable. He claims that over 5,000 people have bought them. If so, then they're being bet down into underlay status and won't make money anymore.

Either way, they're not worth buying, imho.

[Overlay]

I would tend to agree with that assessment, although I'm not familiar with the items in question. The one possibility that occurs to me that would still allow the material to be profitable even with that number sold would be if it somehow allowed for the generation of reasonably accurate fair-odds lines for race fields or individual horses, so that you could lay off horses that had been bet down too far.

[Maxspa]

Midnight+Overlay,
Thank you for responding with some thoughful opinions!
Perhaps the 5,000 copies sold is an exaggeration. I know many software developers would be overjoyed to get that kind of response. I just don't know if there are many would be handicappers who would be willing to put up the money to buy a system. However, Daily Racing Form has credibility and perhaps people will buy this product because it is being offered on their web-site.
Maxspa

[Overlay]

I usually accept Daily Racing Form's information uncritically when it comes to past-performance and track-statistic data (although I may be a bit too trusting in that regard, since I got hooked on the game back in the Stone Age when the hard-copy Form was the only source of its kind). But from some of the ads for handicapping information that I've seen in the Form over the years, it would seem clear to me that the mere appearance of a particular seller's pitch does not constitute or imply any kind of screening, endorsement, or warranty by the Form. The main driver there is advertising revenue. As in most cases (not just with handicapping information), the sensible policy is, "Let the buyer beware", and evaluate products on an item-by-item, seller-by-seller basis.

[hurrikane]

Originally posted by Maxspa
However, Daily Racing Form has credibility


really?

[midnight]

The DRF doesn't care what anybody advertises, as long as it isn't expressly illegal. Their motto seems to be "Caveat Emptor" ("Let the buyer beware").

[Maxspa]

Hurricane,
My response was general one. If you asked a cross section of handicappers whether they were familiar with certain racing publications, I believe many of them would designate the Daily Racing Form as one of their choices. That in itself will give the publication some credibility. Now if we are talking about quality that maybe another issue based upon one's specific dealings with the company.
Maxspa

[JackS]

Most of us would be more trusting of ads that run in the DRF.
Isn't it possible or probable that these ads are at the very least "real business's?
This wouldn't absolutly guarantee quality but, it would guarantee a degree of legitamacy.

[Overlay]

Jack:

I would agree that the outfits advertising in the Form are most likely real, legitimate entities, and that if you responded to an ad, you could expect to receive the product that was advertised for the price stated. I was just expressing my personal view (which you apparently share) that the mere appearance of the ad in the Form doesn't constitute a warranty or guarantee on the part of the Form of the performance or quality of the item being offered. That would be between the buyer and the seller.

[kitts]

I can say from personal experience that ads in the DRF cost enough to give one pause. If DiPasquale is selling stuff just using the classifieds, good for him. The ads not in the PPs cost more and ads in the PPs are the most costly. At least, they were. It would appear that basic economics would apply here although 5000 copies of any horseplaying product strains my credulity. In other words, I don't believe that number at all.

[dav4463]

DePasquale also has an ad in American Turf Monthly. His ads have ran for a long time, so he must be selling a few.

[ranchwest]

Originally posted by Maxspa
Hurricane,
My response was general one. If you asked a cross section of handicappers whether they were familiar with certain racing publications, I believe many of them would designate the Daily Racing Form as one of their choices. That in itself will give the publication some credibility. Now if we are talking about quality that maybe another issue based upon one's specific dealings with the company.
Maxspa

Wow!

Grocery store tabloids have name recognition. I hardly think that equates to credibility.

[Pace Cap'n]

The surest way to tell if a product is selling is the continuity of the advertising campaign. No one is going to repeatedly spend dollars on costly advertising if the results are not favorable.

[Bill Cullen]

Look at it this way, if 5000 jackasses did buy the system, that's 5000 more yokels you get to bet against.

Bill C

[Overlay]

To me, the willingness to spend money on long-term advertising might be a function of both the resources of the seller (whether connected to the actual revenue produced by the product or not) and the cumulative effect of repeated exposure on the advertising's readership. It might be accepted by the seller as just part of the "up-front" cost of doing business in getting his name and product before the public in those media (such as the Form and American Turf Monthly) that most directly appeal to potential customers, and getting customers so used to seeing the advertising that after a while a saturation point is reached where the product starts to register on the potential customer's "radar screen", and motivates the undecided into giving the product a try. (Of course, it would then be up to the product itself to offer sufficient merit or value to persuade the customer to keep it. But if the item is worth the money, and if the seller deals with customers in a responsible and responsive manner, word-of-mouth should take over at that point.)

[freeneasy]

couple of weeks ago and it was basically the same old shpeal. just a lot of gunky info on why his system woksand why you should buy it. bla bla, yada yada.
and as a personal project some while back, i called all these handicapping services advertised in the rform and put my opinions on the board. all were straight up scams from the word go. one srevice was bringing an entire stable into calder and had privy information to this stable and for a 5-$10,000 fee i too could be privy to all this info.
another guy "DUKE" was just an outright mongoloid. nasty, foul, indignant, intimidating. he even had his own daughter working his scams, scumbag hairball that he is.
drf does nothing, absolutely nothing to check these guys out. they just take their money and say hey 'our customers are your customers so have at em boys"
and please marc @drf if your going to get on here and say " wha wha, what would you have us to do?" then your just as limp-nosed as they are. cause your customers are entitled to the best service and care that you can provide. and by not offering any form of protection from these gangters just means that "their bed is your bed"