The gambling industry has funneled a ton of cash into academic researchers producing papers that gave credence to the idea of "addictive personality," which in turn was massaged by PR experts into the notion that some people are just born addicts, and the gambling industry can't help it if they become addicted to gambling too. "Addictive personality" itself is on very shaky grounds statistically, and the derived PR messaging certainly is false. The gambling industry is likely more culpable in this mess than even a typical, generally well-informed person might be aware.
In case of Kakao Taxi vs Uber, it was Uber's unwillingness to work with existing taxi operators that killed any chance Uber had in the Korean market. Kakao (at least until they became dominant) acted more like an agent that sends additional customers to existing independent taxi drivers while Uber kept trying to find legal loopholes to bypass the taxi licensing system. S Korea is a civil law country, and its courts have no patience for actors whose entire legal strategy is to subvert the intent of the laws, and that was the end for Uber there.
I find it strange these types of articles never mention UAE's Barakah nuclear power plant (which did not source reactors from a nation unfriendly to the U.S.) and experienced only 4 year delay from the originally projected commercial operation start date and relatively limited cost overruns.