Australia a strong market for online gambling

An article in the Sydney Morning Herald, penned by Nicky Phillips, has reported that there is about to be an explosion in online gambling.

A recent survey on the online gambling habits of Australians, looked at around 6,500 people and of those polled, 50% admitted to taking up some form of online gambling in the last 6 years.

Sally Gainsbury, who was the chief researcher said that, “Australia is one of the strongest international markets for online gambling, particularly online sports betting, on which an estimated $600 million is spent annually.

Anti-gambling Senator Nick Xenophone is worried that online gambling will open up a whole new generation of people with gambling addictions.

The survey found that many people combined land based gambling with internet gambling, and that the participants were more likely to be men in full time employment or students.  Most were married or lived with a partner and enjoyed a higher standard of living than land based gamblers.

Most online gamblers used the computer for sports and race betting as well as various casino games such as bingo, and poker (a favourite with students).

A big surge in new technology, such as iPads, smartphones and tablet computers has made internet betting a 24 hour activity for some punters.

However, some caution must be exercised as a small percentage of the  gamblers surveyed said that online gambling is more addictive than its land based counterpart, mainly because it is so easy to access, and by using payments other than cash some people did not worry about how much they were spending.

The other main concern regarding the easy access to online gambling is that it may be too tempting for teenagers and young people in general.