When I was younger and had a lot of dare, so many years ago that I can hardly remember these times, gambling was so much easier. You either got in your car or on an airplane, and went where people were playing casino games for real money, or you asked around and found out where the floating games were for that night. I guess when I was starting out, the illegal kind was always more exciting until you got to know everyone then it was down to a routine. After that, going to a real casino had the edge.

You have to protect yourself. Except you do not know who the company is behind the online casino.

But because the overheads for running an online casino are significantly less than the real world equivalents (paying salaries to all those countless people is not required), the online payout schedules are more generous. Online operators can afford to return more of the stake money to the players and still make a good profit. I suppose some of the motivation for regulation is the sense that online gaming is not regulated. Go into any real world casino, and you should always be “safe” except from your own gambling habit, of course. There are security cameras everywhere making sure no-one is going to cheat you. Regulators check the slots to make sure they are all working properly. Once you are online, there are no external eyes looking after you.

So does that mean online gaming is a “good thing”? There you are at home or sitting in a hot spot with your wifi laptop and there is no-one to tap you on the shoulder to warn you that you are riding a losing streak into bankruptcy. But, so long as you have your gambling under control, you say when, where and how long you play. What can be better than that?