Blockchain boosters have long touted cross-border remittances as a market that’s practically begging to be disrupted by their technology of choice, the public ledgers that underpin cryptocurrencies. But what if early blockchain proselytizers weren’t quite right? What if the biggest impact blockchains will have isn’t enabling overseas workers to send money back home cheaply and quickly (and thereby circumventing the steep fees levied by services such as Western Union’s)? What if the real innovation lay, instead, in people’s ability to earn a living wage…while working from home…playing video games?
That’s the dream offered by Axie Infinity, a video game developed by Sky Mavis, a Singapore-based development studio. The game recently blew up, attracting more than 1 million daily players in August, up from less than 500 in July of 2020. (Yes, that’s a 200,000% increase in usage, approximately.)
Fortune
