Poker has been around for quite a few years, over 200 years. When the internet came around, it didn’t take long for poker to make its way online. Online poker has been around for over 20 years. Even though online poker has not been around for a very long time, it is still rich with history. It is interesting to see how quickly it caught on and expanded.

 When Did Online Poker Start?

The very first online poker match was hosted on the first of January in the year 1998. It was a great way to ring in the new year. Planet Poker was founded by the legendary poker player, Mike “Mad Genius” Caro and it was the first site to launch online poker. This website is still in use to this day. The first game that was played that use real money was Texas Hold’em. By the end of 1998, the online gambling business was able to generate over 800 million dollars in revenue.

 The First Horror Story Of Online Poker

To start out the new Millennium, the online poker industry had a huge year. In May of 2000, the poker professional, Dutch Boyd, launched his own website called Poker Spot. However, the Poker Spot was not nearly as successful as some of the previous online poker platforms. It was actually one of the first platforms that had some major issues and the horror stories of it are still told to this day. The website would take the players’ money and not give it back to them. There was no money on the website so no one was able to win anything. By the end of 2001, this website was closed down.

 What Other Sites Are There?

As poker99 online began to get more popular, more and more sites started to emerge. In 2000, UltimateBet was launched. By 2001, two more sites were able to be released. They were PokerStars and PartyPoker. In 2002, PartyPoker was named the biggest poker site. This is a large part because of WPT televised advertising and promotions.

 How Has It Changed?

Online poker was a huge portion of the internet during this time period. By 2004 it had grown so much that Yahoo and Google removed online gambling advertisements from their websites. In 2005, PartyPoker was listed on the London Stock Exchange. This was one of the first Internet gambling companies to go public.

It is estimated that 15 million real money poker player exists in the United States. The online gambling industry is worth nearly eight and a half-billion dollars. Over half of the money that goes into this industry comes from online gamblers from the United States.