How Sports Betting Changed Through History

Since ten centuries ago, there were Chinese songs talking about people placing a bet on certain things in life. People were placing bets on rooster fights, betting on who will come out of a fight as a survivor. Since the dawn of human history, people would bet on basically anything they could. For example, they would bet on if a horse will survive or not, if kids would finish school or not, if cars would break down or not. Basically on as many things as you can imagine.

Sports Betting – First Bookmaker

And then sports emerged and people soon started betting on horse races and so on. But back then, to place a bet you need someone to accept the bet and if there was nobody willing to accept the bet you are making, you’re out of luck. You couldn’t place any bets. Some people saw an opportunity in this and started accepting bets from anyone betting on anything. They would obviously keep a small profit in the whole process but they were able to take any bets people were willing to bet. This happened in England. One man started accepting bets from everyone and he is the origin of the bookmakers.

From England, betting and bookmakers spread throughout the world and they could be found in the most popular of places. In the second half of 20th century, when all this was taking place, you could only bet on dog races and horse races. This changed and bookmakers started accepting bets on any sport. Most popular sports were adapted first and all other sports followed soon after. This made a bookmaker’s life even more profitable than before. After sports, betting on stuff like music contests or political outcome was possible. Most of the cultural elements of society were exposed to betting and became available.

History of Sports Betting Cannot be Told Without the Mention of the World Wide Web

Although the first casino website started out once the technology was good enough in 1994, sports betting websites were being built at a massive scale. Modern operators started offering their bookmakers services to the public worldwide. They were only limited by the laws and regulators in the country they are operating. Sports betting has been on the rise ever since and it is rising at the pace that is measured in tens of percents every year.

It is hard to put so much history in a single article. Someone should really write a whole book about this subject. I would like such a book to contain interviews with all the major people who have influenced the sports betting in the second half of the 20th century and let them tell the story from their own perspective.

As the competition is rising and markets are becoming more saturated, there is an increased number of people who are enjoying sports betting regularly. It is hard to say much about the future of the sports betting considering that only it looks bright. There are many bookmakers and their strategies are changing as new waves of bookmakers start operating. Someone will come up with a new way of betting that the whole industry will follow, it’s only a matter of time.