As always, picking the year’s top stories is entirely a matter of opinion and perspective, so if you don’t see your personal favourite anecdote, development or incident listed below, start your own damn news site. Anyway, here’s our picks for the top North American gambling stories of 2015…

DAILY FANTASY SPORTS

Unquestionably, 2015’s top headline-grabber was the Icarus-like rise and fall of daily fantasy sports. After raising hundreds of millions in venture capital, DraftKings and FanDuel decided to spend nearly all of it inking an endless series of headline-grabbing marketing partnerships with pro sports leagues while buying up nearly all commercial time on US television during the month of September.

The almost comically inescapable exposure became a liability when a DraftKings staffer was accused of using insider data to win nearly $350k on FanDuel. Regardless of the validity of these accusations, the ensuing media brouhaha might have been nipped in the bud had the operators not attempted to write it off as much ado about nothing, with DraftKings CEO Jason Robins (pictured) earning the most criticism for his occasionally dismissive tone in media interviews.