As a seasoned crypto investor with several years of experience in the industry, I’ve seen my fair share of airdrops and their impact on the community. The ongoing controversy surrounding EigenLayer’s restrictive airdrop qualifications is just the latest chapter in this saga.
As a researcher studying the cryptocurrency scene, I’ve been following the ongoing debate surrounding EigenLayer’s much-publicized airdrop on Ethereum. This event has sparked significant controversy due to its stringent eligibility requirements for receiving rewards. Various project founders and crypto community members from far and wide have joined the conversation in response.
According to Leandro Schlottchauer, the founder and CEO of Kuyen Labs, a smart contract development company, it’s increasingly unlikely that we’ll see significant, transformative airdrops again. He emphasized this point in a statement, explaining that no incentive, including airdrops, can fully meet the expectations of every community member.
“Community members have been divided on the core team’s plans, including the amount to be airdropped to early contributors and the limited number of jurisdictions from which users will be able to claim.”
Mohak Agarwal, the CEO and founder of liquid-staking protocol Claystack, expressed his disagreement with EigenLayer’s surprise airdrop announcement. In his opinion, such an unpredictable approach is not viable for the future. He explained that while the unexpected nature of the event may generate initial enthusiasm, it can ultimately result in disappointment. Agarwal noted that this trend indicates a propensity among projects to release a limited airdrop supply first, expecting users to be disappointed, and then distributing additional tokens as a remedy – a temporary solution that is not sustainable over the long term.
On April 29, in an unexpected announcement for its blog audience, EigenLayer, the second-largest DeFi protocol with a total value locked of $15.67 billion, revealed its airdrop strategy. Approximately 5% of the initial token supply would be assigned to early participants in Season One. The remaining tokens would be distributed among users during subsequent “seasons.” However, residents from about thirty countries, including the United States, Canada, China, and Russia, were unable to receive EIGEN tokens.
The community strongly criticized the announcement, with one social media user on platform X expressing their disappointment by stating, “It’s unfair not to acknowledge the investment from those countries and not provide any rewards for the risk they took.” In response to the feedback received, EigenLayer developers made a statement on May 3rd, announcing that they would distribute an extra 28 million EIGEN tokens to approximately 280,000 wallets as an airdrop.
Although cryptocurrency growth has been robust lately, many recent airdrops have struggled to maintain the interest they generated at first.
On April 4, Wormhole, a cross-chain messaging platform, transferred approximately $800 million in W tokens to selected users. Following this airdrop, Wormhole’s valuation soared to an impressive $22 billion based on fully diluted market capitalization. Unfortunately, since then, the value of the W token has dropped by over 50%, and it is currently trading at $0.6457 as of publication.
Like Starknet’s native token, STRK, there has been a 43% price decrease since its distribution during the February airdrop. Reportedly, approximately 701,544 wallets were managed by airdrop farmers who acquired STRK tokens by establishing duplicate developer accounts on GitHub at that time.
From my perspective as an analyst, I’ve noticed that airdrops have gained significant popularity in the crypto space. However, this popularity comes with its own set of challenges. Airdrops have become prime targets for farm and Sybil accounts, which often result in a large number of tokens being allocated to unqualified recipients instead of genuine ecosystem users.
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2024-05-06 22:52