Hence, to say that gambling is more popular in our time than it has been in the past is wrong since there is no standardized method of comparison as far as I know. Of course, with the prevalence of the Internet, gambling has become much more accessible to the general public.
It was also accessible to the public before Internet, the difference was that preInternet gambling was more about small companies of small society groups, like neighbors or friends.
Internet just made it all worldwide and give access to the games which was not popular in your local region (and sometimes was not even known)