illustrations by StorysetI am probably in the twilight of my web3 journey, so I do not care much about the space. However, events happen, and I can't help but talk about them. Today I just want to rant about the zkSync airdrop.
From my understanding, airdrops are used as a marketing strategy to create hype and onboard new users into an ecosystem. Unfortunately, it has become a means to enrich a few, e.g., developers, founders, and grifters who pose as whales. It is unfortunate because those who do not fall under this category are used to create hype around these projects or blockchains.
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Understandably, if you are coming into a project with little to no liquidity, you are not expecting to make a huge gain from your endeavor, whether it be your time or even financial investment, because there are people with inside knowledge and bags bigger than whatever you can dream of playing the same game.
However, most people who do not have funds or insider knowledge are not expecting much. Most of them are fine being rewarded in proportion to the contribution they bring to the change. For instance, Notcoin did an airdrop that shook the web3. Millions of newbies got the token, most sold, nevertheless, no one questioned the distribution because it was fair.
Unfortunately, most projects do not understand the concept of fairness. They assume that those who bring the most (in terms of capital) deserve the most, but that is far from reality because this category does not do much for the project or chain aside from rent-seeking, and we saw that today with the zkSync airdrop. Most 'sybilers' went home with millions of tokens, which they will dump indiscriminately shortly, while organic users got nothing.
It is barely 24 hours since the zkSync announcement, and every project in their ecosystem is on the decline in terms of price. They've received the worst PR I have seen in a while. Does it make sense that a project of that community will go downhill all because of some poor distribution? Yes! Because distribution is everything. When your token is not properly distributed among those who support and use your chain, product, or service, then your project is destined to die.
Now the counter-argument would be that most newbies just dump their tokens. Personally, I do not think it is the place of the founder/developer to police how people use their tokens. Also, if most people dump your token as soon as they receive it, that says more about your token than anything else. A coin like Notcoin airdrops millions into wallets and never policed their community on how they choose to use it. Their focus is on creating products and services that make their token more valuable.
The bottom line is most founders are greedy and short-sighted. They choose to ignore meaningful feedback, and when things go south, they try to do damage control, but by then it is far too late because their community has moved on.
Also, Web3 can be unforgiving. You do not have many chances to get things right, and the competition is tough. So founders should guard their core community jealously (and I am not talking about whales). A whale is not going to tweet about your project or run campaigns. They only have their bags to offer. Your community members are your soldiers, those on the field willing to go the extra mile for your project. Once you have enough of them, the whales will come because they are attracted by value, hype, and utility. That is how to play the long game.
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