The Philippines Kicks Off its First National Web3 Festival

Showcasing the future of web3 and GameFi, the Philippine Web3 Festival will kick off starting November 14 to 18, 2022. The event will include web3 industry leaders from across the globe such as Axie Infinity co-founders, Animoca Brands Chairman, and many more. Will the Philippines become the “blockchain capital of the world”?

After years of being at the forefront of Web3 and Blockchain, Philippine web3 founders hold their first Web3 festival at the Marquis Events Place in BGC, Taguig City. The event started with a bang on its first day on November 14, 2022, continuing until November 18, 2022.

The Web3 festival was put into motion by famous local Web3 leaders such as Yield Guild Games(YGG) and BlockchainSpace(BSPC). Over the past years, the southeast Asian country has been one of the most vibrant crypto communities in the world, especially with regard to its GameFi users.

The event features established Web3 industry leaders as speakers such as Jeffery Zirlin, co-founder of Axie Infinity, Yat Siu chairman of Animoca Brands, and Sebastian Borget co-founder of The Sandbox. Armed with a stellar roster of speakers, the local web3 scene plans to take the world by storm, establishing itself as a formidable hubspot within the web3 industry.

The romance between web3 and the Filipino, like many other third-world countries, started during the onset of the COVID-19 Pandemic. National health policy forbade most people from going outside, leading many locals to try out unorthodox means of earning income. This led to the influx of many Axie Infinity players from the Philippines.

GameFi was the catalyst that introduced many Filipinos into the world of crypto. From Axie, they were open to investing in DeFi (Decentralized Finance) and CeFi, widening their horizons of what web3 is capable of.

Companies that are in a suitable position to shape web3’s future are partnered with the festival event. Mobile wallet GCash will be joining the event, partnering with its vision for making financial products more accessible for Filipinos. Globe Telecom, one of the leading internet services in the country, and Binance are also major players in making the event possible. Moreover, the Philippine Government represented by the Department of Information and Communications Technology(DICT) will also be presenting a speech during the event.

Addressing the elephant in the room, the event will still be pushed through despite the recent FTX issue and the ripples of FUD it has sent all over the crypto markets. Moreover, this is also in congruence with Bitcoin reaching it’s two-year low and within an ongoing global recession.

Despite current fear and pessimism, web3 leaders see potential in the country, often calling it the “Blockchain capital of the word“. The Philippines was also the “texting capital of the world” and “BPO capital” which means, the aforementioned title coupled with its massive user base means that the Philippines being crowned as the blockchain capital might not be so far-fetched after all.

This also might be the ripe opportunity to appropriately address the industry’s negative reputation that’s being associated with scams and hacks. All in all, the web3 festival might prove to be the catalyst for further community building and partnerships that can propel the country into the spotlight regarding all things web3.

Edmond is a passionate writer for Video games, GameFi and Web3. He has worked for top GameFi companies and video game/crypto news websites.