A Chinese Virtual Currency Challenges the Yuan: “Radon360 writes ‘A Wall Street Journal article reports that China’s fastest-rising currency isn’t the yuan.
It’s the QQ coin—”’online play money”’ created by marketers to sell such things as virtual flowers for instant-message buddies, cellphone ringtones and magical swords for online games. In recent weeks, the QQ coin’s ”’real-world value”’ has risen as much as 70%. It’s the most extreme case of a so-called virtual currency blurring the boundaries between the online and real worlds—and ”’challenging legal limits”’.
A Chinese Internet company called Tencent Holdings Ltd. designed the payment system in 2002 to allow its 233 million regular registered users to shop for treats in its virtual world. Virtual currencies are in use in many countries—but nowhere have they taken root more deeply than in China.’
(Via Slashdot.)
