Online casinos of all stripes have been involved in the bonus industry for sometime now. It is perhaps not that surprising that this would be the case since bonuses and other promotions tend to be a very successful in getting new players to websites, but in the beginning the bonuses were actually quite a bit better than they are right now.
Back in the late 90's and early 21stt century, sign-up bonuses, were a lot more generous than today, being a relatively young industry with far fewer players and less competition around. However,where things were really different was in the actual bonus release requirements, many of which were quite a bit smaller than they are today. As you'd expect, it soon become fairly obvious that the bonuses meant a new player could go to a casino and stand a very good chance of walking away with a profit.
In some cases, you could actually wager a single digit multiple of just the bonus amount and still get permission to clear the bonus. This is something that would never happen today and it is for that reason that you will hear may online casino veteran players complain the bonuses now are not good as they used to be. Aside from which, with little or no legislation and regulation and being a new industry, players were obviously wary of who was taking their money. Therefore it was far more common for a player to stick with one casino they felt safe with it.
Bonus collecting players do bear the brunt of the responsibility for the changes that came about in the online casino promotional industries. As the industry expanded, more casinos came into the market, self-appointed regulatory bodies sprang up and the perceptions and visibility of the industry increased, more and more players entered the market and more casinos sprung up. This lead to greater opportunities for players to hop from casino to casino, taking the bonuses and leaving with the profit. It also increased the amount of "bonus abuse", fraudulent activity by players attempting to take more than the statutory one bonus from a casino via a variety of deceptive method.
When it became obvious to casinos through viewing the betting habits of their players that there were people taking advantage of the statistics of a bonus situation to basically guarantee themselves a profit through the situation. As today, the player was always required to undertake a certain amount of best before they could cash-out any winnings made from a bonus received. Sign-up bonuses remain common place but the wagering requirement has increased significantly, some would say horrifically and the choice of games is usually far more limited.
As the remedy of this problem, most of the casinos started raising their released requirements. From the average of 10 times the amount of the bonus of 20 times was their first major move. Now, the amount has been raised to 30 or even 40 times the amount of the bonus. The latest introduction on the part of the casinos is the sticky bonus which essentially cannot be withdrawn no matter what. It is a bonus that you can wager in the hopes of gaining more money, but it is not a true bonus in any real sense of term.