The Dilemma and Reconstruction of the Web3 Airdrop Ecosystem

Recently, the airdrop strategy in the cryptocurrency field has gradually evolved from the "get-rich-quick myth" into a controversial battleground. The trust crisis between project parties and users, the imbalance in distribution mechanisms, the proliferation of witch attacks, and the survival dilemmas of participants together constitute the complex picture of the current airdrop ecosystem. This article will explore the roots of distribution imbalance in the Web3 airdrop ecosystem, the chain reaction of user responses, and the deep-seated contradictions behind the collapse of trust through multiple cases.

1. Imbalance in Project Distribution: Users Transitioning from "Harvesting" to "Being Harvested"

1. Capital-led distribution logic

Taking the recent controversial airdrop of a certain project as an example, the total amount of the airdrop accounted for 15.8% of the initial supply, but testnet users only received 1.65%, while NFT holders accounted for 6.9%. Six major NFT holders divided $306 million worth of tokens through a scarce series of NFTs, with the highest single address earning up to $55.77 million. A similar phenomenon is also evident in another project: 1.3% of addresses received 23.9% of the token share, with the minimum and maximum rewards differing by 100 times. This "wealth disparity" exposes two major issues with the airdrop mechanism:

• Resources tilt towards capital: NFT holders are mostly early-stage investors with substantial funds, while users of the testnet who contribute to on-chain activity become "low-income households".
• Rule black-boxing: Some projects have not disclosed the airdrop algorithm dashboard, while others are questioned for allocating tokens to NFT holders who did not participate in the ecosystem, leading to disputes over the ambiguity of the rules.

2. Systematic Devaluation of Interactive Value

Traditional airdrops focus on trading frequency, cross-chain interactions, and other engagement behaviors, but some projects have shifted to "fund retention time" and "risk asset allocation" as core metrics: providing liquidity to decentralized exchanges can earn double bonuses, and users holding high-risk tokens or NFTs enjoy multiplier rewards. This shift, while suppressing witch attacks, has led to the failure of incentives for ordinary users, creating a vicious cycle where "the higher the capital threshold, the greater the returns."

2. Users from "Airdrop Frenzy" to "Trust Collapse"

1. Expectations Miss and Liquidity Trap

• Yield Inversion: Participants of a certain project invested millions into a testnet address but only received a thousand tokens (valued at around $10,000), while users who made pre-deposits were forced to lock their funds for three months, with a 2% loss incurred for early redemption, which has been ridiculed as "anti-harvest".
• Sell-off wave spreads: Only 19.3% of the tokens are still held in the airdrop address of a certain project, and 80% sold off, causing the mainnet activity to plummet; the cross-chain trading volume of another ecological project decreased sharply by 75% after the airdrop, highlighting that airdrops have become a "one-time traffic tool".

2. The Spread of Trust Gaps

• Double standard in rules: Early users of a certain project are deprived of qualifications for not participating in the interaction of the new version, while partners receive a large amount of tokens, far exceeding their public financing amount.
• The bankruptcy of technological idealism: Despite projects launching innovative mechanisms and dual-token models, allocation disputes reveal that if the economic model deviates from fairness, technological innovation becomes a "fig leaf" for centralized control.

3. The "collateral damage" cost of anti-witch measures

A certain project banned over 1 million addresses through community reports, but misjudged a large number of real users; the reputation system attempts to balance security and fairness, but biometric verification and KYC have sparked privacy controversies, falling into the "trilemma of decentralized identity."

3. The Survival Dilemma of Participants

As the Web3 airdrop ecosystem evolves, users participating in multiple project airdrops to earn token rewards are facing an increasingly harsh survival environment. The once low-cost, high-return strategy is gradually becoming ineffective, replaced by high costs, complex rules, and opaque operations from project parties.

1. "Small capital high-frequency interaction" becomes "high-cost game"

Early participants maximized Airdrop profits by creating addresses in bulk and engaging in low-cost interactions. However, as project teams adjusted Airdrop rules, individual addresses required significant funds to be held for extended periods, with costs far exceeding profits. Taking one project as an example, it set "fund retention time" and "risk asset allocation" as core indicators, requiring users to hold substantial funds long-term or provide liquidity. This significantly increased the costs for individual addresses, while the returns may not necessarily cover the investment.

2. Devaluation of interactive value

The weight of traditional high-frequency interactive behaviors (such as trading and cross-chain) in Airdrops has decreased, making it difficult for ordinary users to achieve considerable gains through low-cost operations. In contrast, users with substantial capital have received higher rewards by holding high-risk assets or NFTs, leaving ordinary users with diminishing profit opportunities.

4. The Way to Break the Impasse: Restructuring the Consensus of Fairness

Currently, airdrops seem to be caught in a dilemma. The traditional model is often simplistic and crude, using only the number of addresses or the amount of tokens held as the sole criteria, ignoring the users' genuine contributions and long-term value to the project. This "money-spraying" type of airdrop not only fails to attract target users but also fosters speculative behavior, deviating from the original intention of project development.

To reconstruct fairness consensus, a more scientific and reasonable airdrop mechanism needs to be established:

1. From "Quantity" to "Quality": Incorporate users' contributions to the project into the Airdrop criteria, encouraging users to engage deeply in the project ecosystem, rather than simply pursuing the number of addresses.

2. From "one-time" to "continuous": Combine airdrops with the long-term development goals of the project, for example, by providing dynamic rewards based on user holding time, participation in governance, etc., to incentivize users to grow together with the project.

3. From "Centralization" to "Decentralization": Utilizing blockchain technology to establish a transparent and open airdrop mechanism, for example, by automatically executing airdrop rules through smart contracts to avoid human manipulation and enhance user trust.

The project party needs to be transparent and collaborate with community users, for example:

• Algorithm Audit: Public Airdrop parameters, introducing third-party audit to verify the rationality of the rules.
• Community Governance: Publicly disclose anti-witch standards in advance and open community discussions, introducing a voting mechanism to allow users to participate in rule design.
• Gradient distribution: Dynamically adjust rewards based on staking duration and contribution, limiting whale monopolization; increase weight for small high-frequency users and lower the asset threshold ratio.
• Long-term value binding: Link airdrops to governance rights, requiring users to continuously participate in voting to unlock benefits and suppress short-term selling.
• Technological empowerment for fair verification: By utilizing social accounts, on-chain behaviors, and other multidimensional identity verification, we increase the cost of witch attacks; exploring zero-knowledge proof technology to verify real identities while protecting privacy.

Airdrop is not a panacea and cannot guarantee the success of a project. However, by reconstructing the consensus of fairness, airdrop can become a bridge connecting project parties and users, attracting users who truly recognize the value of the project, and jointly promoting the prosperous development of the on-chain ecosystem.

Conclusion

Airdrops should not merely be a game of wealth transfer. Recent controversies have revealed the core contradictions in the Web3 airdrop mechanism: project teams pursue cold start efficiency, users yearn for fair returns, while capital waits to arbitrage. When airdrops become a channel for exit or bait for traffic, the collapse of trust and user exodus will become inevitable. In the future, only through transparent rules, community governance, and technological iteration can airdrops return to the essence of "contributors first," thus reshaping the trust foundation of the Web3 ecosystem. Allowing value creators to share in the value is the ultimate answer to the spirit of decentralization.