I've been gambling at various online sportsbooks and poker rooms for 15 years now and the part I've always hated has been the banking. Because I live in the U.S. I've lost count of the number of times I've had my Visa or Mastercard deposits declined. Payouts are even a bigger hassle. Last year I had to wait 4 months for Carbon Sports to send me a check. I've also lost plenty of money at poker sites like Lock Poker who shut-down and took all their players money. Because of all these headaches I finally bit the bullet and bought myself some bitcoin. I bought them at Coinbase using my credit card and then I sent them to the free Mycelium wallet I had set-up on my Samsung Galaxy. After that I sent the bitcoin to a couple of casino and betting sites. What has amazed me most is how fast the payouts are. Instead of waiting weeks or months for a bank wire or check to the US, I now have my money in a couple of hours. My mind is really BLOWN!!
I've lost a ton of money over the years too because I couldn't withdraw my dollars from dodgy online poker rooms. Those days are over thankfully. I rarely leave more that $50 in any of my bitcoin sportsbook or poker accounts.
i think gambling will be the killer app for bitcoin because it really does help to serve the underserved. my prediction is that in 3 years 50% of all withdrawals from off-shore sportsbooks will be done with bitcoin.
There is still a little bit of friction buying and selling bitcoin but I think in a few years most employees will be able to get paid a certain percentage of their wages every month in bitcoin. That's when it will become the currency of choice for online gambling.
Maybe I spoke too soon. Bovada refused to send me my second btc withdrawal because I did not provide them with a new address. Do this mean I can only use a bitcoin wallet once?
They just require a new address, which is different from a wallet. Typically when you receive a payment to your bitcoin wallet it will automatically refresh and give you a new bitcoin address. The old address will continue to work but for privacy reasons it's always better to use a new BTC address for each new payment.
i really can't wait for lightening network and micropayment channels to start operating. then your mind will be completely BLOWN
I also can't wait for TumbleBit and Mimblewimble to make transactions totally anonymous. Hopefully then we'll be able to send bitcoin directly from our sportbook account to exchanges like Circle and Coinbase without them noticing they've come from a betting site and closing our accounts.
They are not alt-coins. I think they are new tumbling services that increase the fungibility of bitcoin. Rather than having to trust a third-party to launder your btc and give it back, you can use these decentralised services which are much safer.
I don't think Mimblewimble is a tumbler service although it promises to fix some of the fungibility, scalability and privacy problems associated with bitcoin.
Some bitcoin sportsbooks now supports Litecoin also to cope with the increased demand for bitcoin transactions.
I hope fees don't keep rising. I recently paid $2 to make a deposit. That's still way cheaper than if I use my Visa but bitcon needs to scale.
It's looking likely that SegWit will get activated at the end of this month which will double the amount of transactions that bitcoin can process. That should help alleviate some of the strain the network has been under for the past year and keep fees low for the upcoming NFL and college football seasons.
As predicted, sending transactions with bitcoin has never been cheaper thanks to Lightning Network, batching and SegWit.
even though i've been using bitcoin for a number of years, i'm still kind of amazed every time i make a transaction and it's goes through in a few minutes. it really is magic internet money. anyone else still get a trill after all these years?
Here is a list of Lightning Network wallets for desktop, iPhone and Android that you might find useful. https://forum.bitcoingambling.io/th...twork-wallets-for-ios-android-pc-and-mac.380/