The glory of online opportunities: everything from the best in college courses to the best in entertainment. College students have a rich and varied 'virtual' life these days.

But, as superheroes know, with great power comes great responsibility. And sometimes, that's hard to remember.

Case in point: online gambling. The franchise, especially its poker element, has become enormously popular in the last few years, especially among college students. With students always looking for extra cash, why not have fun at the same time you're earning the big bucks?

Of course, what happens when you lose big bucks instead? That's a dilemma more and more college students are encountering.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports:Twenty-six percent of college men gamble in online card games at least once a month and 4 percent once a week or more, up from 1 percent a year earlier, according to a 2005 survey by Penn's Annenberg Public Policy Center. The vast majority are betting on poker.

At any given moment, the rooms are filled with thousands of players seated up to 10 per table and known to one another only by handles such as ElDonkerino and Chiptaker32.

All it takes to get in the game is a computer and a credit card. And what college student doesn't have those?

Meanwhile, the poker sites market themselves relentlessly to the college demographic, hiring "student representatives" to promote the game and sponsoring "Win Your Tuition" tournaments.

Kent, a third-year Drexel student, has played 17,190 hands of online poker in the last three months. The count would have been higher a year ago, he said, but his GPA was taking a battering from the 13- to 15-hour daily sessions.

"I didn't go to any classes," he said.

His old [roommate], Kent said, let an online gambling addiction spin out of control. He lost his Drexel scholarship, dropped out, and moved out.Obviously, online poker companies are targeting college students. What do you think is the best way to avoid falling into a gambling addiction and squandered funds? Have you or a friend experienced the lure of online gambling?