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Esports betting just got a whole lot easier. Now what?
On May 14th, the United States Supreme Court eliminated a 26-year-old law prohibiting states from sponsoring sports gambling. Today, states are free to establish their own sports-betting laws, and a few governors are acting fast. New Jersey, the state at the heart of the Supreme Court decision, should have sportsbooks live any day now, while Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Delaware and Mississippi have already passed bills allowing gambling. A handful of other states have legislation in the pipeline, and meanwhile, the NFL, NBA, NHL and other national leagues are calling for some form of federal regulation in sports betting. "In the wake of the Supreme Court's decision, the volume of sports betting in the US is poised to explode -- and esports betting will inevitably follow suit," says Bryce Blum, attorney and founder of Electronic Sports and Gaming Law.
There's an easy way to bet on competitive video games
Competitive gaming is big enough now in the US that it's catching ESPN's attention, so it stands to reason that you'd want a way to bet on those virtual matches, doesn't it? Ex-Microsoft manager (and Engadget Expand panelist) Rahul Sood thinks so. He just launched Unikrn, a site that makes it easy to wager on eSports. If you live in a country where the company will accept bets (currently Australia), you can plunk down real cash and win jackpots, much like you would with conventional sports betting. You could make a tidy profit betting that a low-ranked League of Legends team will defy the odds, for instance. Even if you live in the US and other nations where real bets are illegal, you can still sign up and win prizes.
