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See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29716900 re:Axie Infinity and the “ saving the Philippines/Vietnam from poverty” bs

Had the same reaction. Seemed like such a silly thing to say. Does he know what the scale of Axie is and what the scale of national GDPs are? Seems so ridiculous.

But I also don't agree with your characterization of developing nation economies. You have your own blinders on. The degrees of freedom a developing country has are constrained ... but not mainly by outside market forces ... more their own internal institutional structures.

India was isolated from all Western banking for the main part for a long time. Also insulated from competition from Western companies. That was not a good time for India. Turns out your own institutions can fuck up pretty well on their own. Openness and liberalization of an economy also come with complications but these are not "slave labor" and "colonization". I feel you have been exposed to some ideologies but have not actually tried to manufacture something in a developing country and seen the friction that prevents local economies from leveling up ... its not the EU or America stopping Indian manufacturing from leveling up ... its India's own internal complexities.

If it was possible to do what you suggest, Taiwan, South Korea, and now Chinese advanced manufacturing would not exist. Countries just need to get their act together.

A lot of your response assumes I was talking about local manufacturing - but I was specifically talking about poverty and its relation to the globalised economy. Local manufacturing solves some things, not all things. But poverty is a result of innumerable things, of which manufacturing is only a small portion.

There is an inherent arbitrage performed by developed economies through outsourcing, and Axie Infinity demonstrates that wonderfully. Obviously the story would never be “GameFi solves poverty in the USA” because it pays well below minimum wage in developed economies.

Aside: There is no basis in humanity that foreign currencies are significantly lower in value than western currencies. It’s purely a result of historical economical forces resulting from colonisation.

> its India's own internal complexities

Many of the 'internal' problems in developing nations root in historical colonialism.

Axie Infinity and how it’s bringing entire nations out of poverty

Yup, that's quite a zinger there.

Seriously, what is with these people? Do they have any idea at all what they're actually saying?

Cringe.

The US was a colony to the UK. Singapore was some shanty island town that even Malaysia did NOT want to take in because how bad it was.

Just like you cannot have a fit body without exercising, you cannot become a prosperous nation without hard work and a predictable rule-of-law. There is no way around it and to blame "colonialism" is nothing but empty words that will help no one.

> The US was a colony to the UK.

Yes, and by that view, the USA is /still/ colonised by Europeans. The colonised Natives are not represented in any meaningful way.

> Singapore was some shanty island town that even Malaysia did NOT want to take in because how bad it was.

You can feel this way, but that does not justify the colonisation of Singapore by Europe. In fact, it begs the question as to why they would colonise such a “shanty town” if it wasn’t worth something to them.

> cannot become a prosperous nation without hard work

I’m not sure which fantasy you ascribe to that ignores how much hard manual labor the developing world’s people perform for the global economy. In fact, that is literally the basis of colonialism - to find able-bodied workers to enslave and resource-abundant regions to extract value from.

> and a predictable rule-of-law

I don’t know why you have such a negative impression of developing lands, to blame them for all their faults and claim they lack “rule of law” entirely. As if this is perfect in developed democracies, and the sole reason for their status.

> to blame "colonialism" is nothing but empty words that will help no one.

It is important to acknowledge history and not completely ignore it like you have. Regardless, you are right in that “blaming colonialism” helps no one - but that’s because colonisers don’t want to take the blame and fix things, but instead control the global playing field. This affects the poor classes of developing countries too, if you haven’t noticed.

Anyways, I get the feeling none of this will educate you, so probably not worth my time.

I completely agree with you. Crypto bros for some reasons think they are saving the world. The original claim is just pure ignorance. To get start with Axie or other so-called GameFI, players need to have money first. For people with small capitals, they need to participate in 'Guild' and borrow the money from the rich (be it in digital or physical world). So, it is just capitalism all over again. Spending all your time maximizing some games won't save a nation from poverty.