The next time someone remarks casually that cryptocurrencies are not “real money” because nobody would use real money to buy digital goods, ask them if they’ve ever played the highly addictive mobile game Clash of Clans or any one of the other hugely popular mobile gaming titles available. In Clash of Clans, prices start as low as US$2.60 for 500 gemsbut can go much crazier from there. Yet not only are players happy to fork out real cash for virtual goods, at least in the case of Clash of Clans, they’re forking it out to the tune of a cool US$1.5 million a day, making the Helsinki-based company enormously rich. What are the developers going to spend all that real gold on anyway? A better ice house? Nowhere is the addictive nature of gaming more apparent than in China — the world’s largest biggest video game market. But just as the Chinese have been plonking down some hard-earned yuan for some virtual armor, the Chinese government has been coming down hard to limit what it has determined to be a highly malicious influence on Chinese society.
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