Jamais Cascio describes on WorldChanging how the growth of massively-multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) and the real-world market that has arisen for virtual-world goods may take Chinese farmers on the cutting-edge of the global economy.

(Thank you Alex!)

….a remarkable example of the intersection of gaming culture, the Internet, and the globalized economy. The concept of developing world sweatshops filled with people playing video games to accumulate virtual items to sell to impatient players in richer nations would have sounded too surreal to be plausible a decade ago; a decade from now, it may be a topic for international trade regimes.