Jacob, here, your trusty webmaster. I've decided to throw some personal material in here, to sort of journal my experience with online gambling. This post is here to explain the early days of my online casino experience; how I got started playing at Web-based gambling venues.
I've only been out of college for four years - I earned a Bachelor's and a Master's degree at the same time, meaning I spent a little more time in school than most people my age. Obviously, my time in college didn't allow for a lot of gambling - unless you consider eating three-week-old pizza a gamble. My first experiences with gambling came after I graduated and got a job and suddenly realized that I had a little expendable cash. 
My First Casino Experience
Only a few months after I got hired at my current position, my company sent everyone to an industry conference in Atlantic City. Wanting to impress my bosses, I saved up a little extra cash and decided to do some research - you know, show up and look like a master at blackjack. I had a $1,000 bankroll, three or four blackjack strategy cards memorized, and a strong desire to show off at the tables.
I didn't lose that original $1,000 stake - but I didn't win much, either. It turned out that the real-world casino game was nothing like the charts and graphs I'd memorized. The casino was distracting, and trying to show off to my older co-workers kept me off my game.
Finding Online Gambling Sites
What's a guy to do when he has a few hundred bucks, a head full of blackjack know-how, and is apparently too shy or too inexperienced to play at live casinos? I'd heard of online poker rooms and casino sites - I'd even written some basic casino game software as part of an undergrad project. The next logical step was to take my bankroll and send it to an Internet betting site and try my luck online.
I was hooked - here, I could be myself, in the comfort of my own home. With few distractions, I found myself able to apply my blackjack learning and, to put it bluntly, win more often. Once I put two and two together, hooking my computer up to my giant LED television, I had a game I loved in a beautiful (and much larger) format - and a game I was good at, to boot.
From My Computer to My TV
Finding the best-looking online blackjack game led me to try out live dealer roulette, and (I'll admit) I've played a few slot machines in my day. My new hobby gives me hours of inexpensive entertainment - and thanks to my analytical mind, I know how to identify sucker bets. I may not have made millions playing Internet blackjack on my TV, but I've made enough to upgrade my set a few times.
That's the long and short of it. How I grew from an unsure college kid with a head full of numbers and a stack of bills into a regular online gambler. Connecting my live dealer online game to my giant TV makes online casino play just enough like the real thing to keep it entertaining, but not so realistic that I freak out like I did in my first real casino.