{
  "name": "ClubGG Club ID source verification study",
  "description": "A survey of nine public sources publishing ClubGG joining identifiers, recording how many Club IDs each publishes and whether any covers clubs the publisher does not operate.",
  "identifier": "deep-poker-clubgg-club-id-study-2026-08-31",
  "creator": "Deep Poker",
  "url": "https://deep.poker/learn/clubgg/club-ids",
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "licenseName": "CC BY 4.0",
  "dateSurveyed": "2026-08-31",
  "datePublished": "2026-09-01",
  "dateModified": "2026-09-06",
  "nextScheduledRun": "2027-03-01",
  "measurementTechnique": "Manual retrieval of each public source, extraction of published Club ID strings, and classification of each source by whether it publishes identifiers for clubs it does not itself operate.",
  "variableMeasured": [
    "Club IDs published per source",
    "Whether the source covers clubs it does not operate"
  ],
  "notInThisFile": {
    "identifierValues": "No Club ID, union identifier, referrer ID or referral code appears anywhere in this file. Printing a list of numbers the study has just finished showing cannot be verified would hand the reader exactly the thing the study warns about.",
    "sourceNames": "The sources are not named. Most of them are agents and directories competing with Deep Poker, and publishing a list of them here would amount to advertising them from our own site.",
    "howToReproduceWithoutThem": "Search for ClubGG club listings. For each source found, count the Club IDs it publishes and record whether any belongs to a club the publisher does not itself operate. That last column decides everything: a source listing only its own clubs cannot corroborate anybody else."
  },
  "totals": {
    "sourcesExamined": 9,
    "clubIdsPublished": 86
  },
  "sourceGroups": [
    {
      "kind": "Third-party directories",
      "sourcesExamined": 4,
      "clubIdsPublished": 80,
      "anySourceCoversClubsItDoesNotOperate": true,
      "soWhat": "Only one of the four publishes Club IDs at all. It carries almost every identifier in this survey, which makes it the sole broad source — and leaves nothing to check it against."
    },
    {
      "kind": "Agents publishing their own clubs",
      "sourcesExamined": 3,
      "clubIdsPublished": 5,
      "anySourceCoversClubsItDoesNotOperate": false,
      "soWhat": "One or two clubs each, all their own. Useful if you are joining that agent; no help at all in checking anybody else's number."
    },
    {
      "kind": "Unions' and clubs' own websites",
      "sourcesExamined": 2,
      "clubIdsPublished": 1,
      "anySourceCoversClubsItDoesNotOperate": false,
      "soWhat": "Only one of the two publishes its own Club ID. The other runs a full site — schedule, promotions, a store, a support address — with no joining identifier anywhere on it."
    }
  ],
  "findings": [
    {
      "headline": "Nine public sources. One that can check anybody else.",
      "detail": "Of the nine sources examined, exactly one publishes Club IDs for clubs it does not itself operate. Every other source either lists only its own one or two clubs, or publishes no identifier at all. A source that lists only its own inventory cannot corroborate anyone — so in practice there is no second opinion available on any Club ID.",
      "method": "For each source, count the Club IDs published and check whether any belongs to a club the publisher does not operate."
    },
    {
      "headline": "The broadest source cannot cross-check itself either.",
      "detail": "The single broad source publishes across two pages carrying 48 and 32 Club IDs. They have two identifiers in common. The inventories are effectively separate lists rather than one list published twice, so even reading everything it publishes does not give you a second reading of the same club.",
      "method": "Extract every Club ID from both pages and intersect the two sets."
    },
    {
      "headline": "Most clubs do not publish their own ID.",
      "detail": "Two unions in this survey have public sites of their own. One publishes its Club ID prominently. The other — a union routinely described as the largest on ClubGG — runs a full site with a schedule, promotions, a store and a support address, and publishes no joining identifier anywhere on it. If a club does not state its own ID, there is nothing authoritative to check any listing against.",
      "method": "Fetch each union's own site, where one exists, and search for a published Club ID."
    },
    {
      "headline": "Where an operator does publish one, it did not match the directory.",
      "detail": "For the single brand where both an operator's own site and a broad listing publish a Club ID, the two numbers differ. Both are labelled “Club ID”. Nothing on either side lets a reader reconcile them — and the explanation may well be innocent, since one could be a union-level identifier and the other a club inside it. That ambiguity is the problem: you cannot tell which kind of number you are holding.",
      "method": "Compare the identifier on the operator's own site against the one the directory publishes for the same brand."
    },
    {
      "headline": "The identifiers are not even formatted consistently.",
      "detail": "Referral identifiers appear in at least two different shapes — a hyphenated four-plus-four form and a plain seven-or-eight-digit form — on a single page. One Club ID appears twice on one page against two different club descriptions. Neither is necessarily an error, but both make it harder to tell what kind of number you are looking at.",
      "method": "Pattern-match referral identifiers across a single page and count distinct formats; count repeated Club IDs within one page."
    }
  ],
  "identifierKinds": [
    {
      "name": "Club ID",
      "what": "Identifies one club inside the ClubGG app. This is the number you type to find a club.",
      "whoIssues": "ClubGG, per club",
      "changesWhen": "A club is recreated, rebranded, or replaced — which happens without announcement."
    },
    {
      "name": "Union",
      "what": "A group of clubs sharing a player pool and a jackpot. You do not join a union directly; you join a club that belongs to one.",
      "whoIssues": "Not something you type in",
      "changesWhen": "A club joins or leaves a union, changing your pool without your ID changing."
    },
    {
      "name": "Referrer / Referral ID",
      "what": "Identifies the agent who introduced you, not the club. Two players in the same club can hold different referrer IDs and both be correct.",
      "whoIssues": "The agent",
      "changesWhen": "You change agent. It is not a property of the club at all."
    }
  ]
}