The year was 2017 and I can't help but think about FreeBitco and few others where it's been proven that many people lost their Bitcoin to them.
I am pretty sure that many people on this forum lost their Bitcoin this way too, I can't help but think that if we are to ask ourselves who the first whales are in this crypto space I will have to point to the likes of FreeBitco and others.
Nope, they cannot be the first whales, what about the types of Lazlo who used 10k BTC to buy pizza? They're no where close to the early people who mined BTC and got lots of it for free and some of them still holding. They may have gathered some good quantity to be considered whales, but I'll classify them as 3rd generation whales after those that mined free and those that bought when it had little or no value.
Back then many people doubled their Bitcoin this way and many lost theirs, where are all those Bitcoin today? Freebitco is still working till date, they must have big bags of Bitcoin now.
Online Gambling and faucets platform like Freebitco is one of those whales today, I am sure many people have more platforms in mind, especially gambling platforms, aren't we just enriching these people? This is why I hate using Bitcoin to gamble today, it's a waste of valuable asset.
That's gambling for you, it's a cycle of robbing Peter to pay Paul or robbing both to pay nobody. Some people were luckier than others and that's fate. It's quite unfortunate you fell on the losing side. Gambling with Bitcoin isn't different from gambling with Fiat for me since you've mapped out such funds for gambling, unless you didn't gamble responsibly, then you may have spent more Bitcoin than intended, hence your regret.