It’s been yet another intense day of workshops and mentorship sessions at XFounders Bootcamp in Bali and our man-on-the-ground, CEO Steve Wood has sent us his latest dispatch (catch up on the last one here). As you know, the bootcamp is powered by the Starknet Foundation and is a transformative 30-day residency designed to catapult ambitious Web3 projects (like Earnscape!) beyond traditional obstacles through world-class mentorship and real-world application. This time around, we’re talking about digital capitalism and gaming.

Today’s session featured a powerhouse presentation from Animoca Brands, one of the true pioneers of Web3 gaming. According to Steve, Animoca’s vision for the open metaverse, digital property rights, and why gaming companies are positioned perfectly for the future really resonated.

“We’re not just building streaming technology,” Steve noted. “We’re laying groundwork for an entirely new type of economy.”

The XFounders Deep Dive: Understanding True Tokenization

Animoca spent considerable time dissecting what went right and wrong during the explosive Web3 growth periods from 2017 to 2022. The XFounders curriculum emphasizes learning from both successes and failures, and their analysis exemplified this approach perfectly.

According to Steve’s notes, many projects failed because they fundamentally misunderstood what tokens actually represent. The common mistake was treating tokenization as exit liquidity or “surprising forms of money.” but really:

…tokenization is actually a proxy for owning network effects and the store of value those networks create.

This was illustrated with a compelling example of the attention economy, a massive $1.1 trillion market dominated by Apple, Facebook, and Google. Currently, companies are essentially renting space on their networks. Tokenization, Steve tells us, gives entrepreneurs the ability to own and extend these network types themselves.

One of the most striking examples involved the US dollar itself. Stablecoins have tokenized the dollar, giving it broader reach than ever before. Hundreds of millions of people in Africa and Southeast Asia who lack traditional banking can now hold dollars, expanding the currency’s network capacity exponentially.

For gaming companies, this insight is ground breaking. Tokenization accelerates value creation at internet speed, just as the internet expanded knowledge access. Gaming assets and content like play-streams that previously had no transferable value now possess significant worth, simply through tokenization. This breakthrough created a multi-billion dollar industry in five years from literally zero.

Digital Capitalism and Gaming as the Ultimate Financial Literacy Gateway

The XFounders curriculum emphasizes identifying a platform’s natural advantages, and the mentors’ insights validated gaming’s unique position. According to Steve,

gaming offers the most naturally designed interface for converting people to cryptocurrency. Gaming concepts prove far more intuitive than abstract financial instruments.

However, many early Web3 gaming made the mistake of simply extending existing concepts like skins and virtual currency into tokens without recognizing the fundamental shift from closed ecosystems to open markets. This approach created significant problems that many projects still struggle with today.

Success in this space requires founders to marry Wall Street financial knowledge with product expertise. Companies must focus on sustainable income streams, proper treasury management, and crucially, avoiding selling directly into their communities.

The XFounders mentors consistently emphasize that those who don’t understand money in this new construct will continue launching failed tokens. Understanding financial fundamentals becomes essential for any entrepreneur building in this space.

Digital Identity: The Most Valuable Asset You Can Build

Steve reported that the portion of talks addressing digital identity and property rights resonated most strongly with the bootcamp cohort. When we use platforms like X or Instagram, we’re borrowing space that others own. These platforms control our digital identities and can delete users at will.

This is an historical pattern. People have always gained identity and property rights by moving beyond being property themselves, like serfs. Digital property rights represent the modern extension of natural property rights.

The most valuable digital asset anyone can build is reputation. As social creatures, reputation drives wealth, social status, and capital formation. Today’s platforms like Amazon or Uber build rating systems not for users’ benefit, but to enable safer transactions within their closed ecosystems.

The Animoca vision centers on building portable reputation stacks. Why should seller ratings or gaming achievements be exclusively owned by Steam or YouTube? If users own their identity and reputation, they can transport them everywhere. See how that connects with streaming content creators?

This ownership enables powerful financial outcomes. When someone’s solid reputation connects to their job, opportunities, and relationships, lenders can provide unsecured credit based on that reputation score. Using blockchain concepts like zero-knowledge proof, people can own their data and reputation while granting permissioned access, solving privacy regulation challenges like GDPR.

The Revolutionary Vision: True Digital Capitalism

According to Steve’s notes, there was another compelling vision that left the entire cohort energized. Web3 and blockchain will do for financial literacy what the internet did for digital literacy. Because tokenization transforms nearly everything into capital assets including attention, virtual goods, and intellectual property, we’re introducing true digital capitalism.

Look at Axie Infinity, where millions of Filipinos without bank accounts suddenly earned money, gained crypto wallets, and became financially literate. The entire world is becoming more capitalist, and entrepreneurs should embrace this transformation rather than resist it.

Another striking statistic:

…globally, fewer than 10% of people understand money well enough to maintain investment portfolios. We live in a “capitalist world,” but most people aren’t actually living as capitalists. Blockchain technology is addressing this fundamental disconnect.

XFounders Application: Building for the Financial Future

The XFounders curriculum emphasizes translating insights into actionable strategies, and that framework validates several key approaches for gaming platforms. Steve noted that focusing on rewarding users for their time and attention aligns perfectly with onboarding millions into financially literate ecosystems.

The mobile gaming market represents over 60% of global gaming, yet traditional streaming platforms ignore these users due to technical barriers. By solving the immediate monetization problem that prevents 99% of aspiring streamers from earning sustainable income, gaming platforms can serve as gateways to financial empowerment.

That vision feels incredibly optimistic, especially when discussed among founders building on similar principles while refining their approaches for demo day presentations. Gaming isn’t just entertainment anymore. It’s becoming the gateway to financial empowerment and digital ownership for billions of people worldwide.

Key Takeaways for Web3 Entrepreneurs

Steve’s dispatch highlighted several crucial insights from Animoca’s presentation that apply across the Web3 gaming sector:

• Build Genuine Value First: Successful Web3 gaming companies will combine strong product development with sound financial principles, creating sustainable businesses that benefit users rather than exploiting them.
• Master the Balance: Success requires understanding both traditional business fundamentals and the unique opportunities blockchain technology enables. Companies that master this balance will drive the next wave of innovation.
• Focus on Empowerment: The future belongs to platforms that empower users to own their digital content, build portable reputations, and participate directly in the value they create.

According to Steve, hearing these concepts discussed among world-class entrepreneurs while working on real implementations creates tremendous energy around what’s possible. The infrastructure being built today will enable tomorrow’s digital economy, and gaming companies are perfectly positioned to lead this transformation.

For those of us who couldn’t be at the bootcamp, check out this YouTube interview with Animoca’s co-founder, Yat Sui.

Steve Wood is CEO and founder of Earnscape, the mobile-first gaming platform transforming aspiring streamers into successful content creators. 

About the XFounder Insider Series

These reports provide an inside look at the world-class mentorship and learning happening at XFounders Bootcamp. Each post shares actionable insights from leading entrepreneurs and investors, applied directly to building next-generation gaming and streaming platforms. For more information about Xfounders, visit x-founders.com.