Are Airdrops Just Web3’s Version of Pump-and-Dump Schemes?

Uniswap conducted its legendary airdrop in early 2021, so users discovered unexpected tokens inside their wallets.

These tokens brought transformative wealth to certain individuals. For others, a siren call into the chaos of Web3. The original purpose of airdrops was to provide compensation to initial users who helped decentralize platform control.

The token distribution trend expanded to Arbitrum alongside Optimism and StarkNet, which conducted their own distribution programs. When recipients sell their received tokens soon after receipt, it causes prices to drop dramatically, thus reducing long-term value potential.

The critics draw parallels between airdrops and present-day pump-and-dumps by showing that the scheme starts with publicity to boost prices, followed by cash-outs from insiders, which leaves initial investors empty-handed.

The majority of bot and whale operators successfully acquire most of the available tokens while real users remain sidelined.

NCOG Earth Chain, Gitcoin, along with other projects, has transformed airdrops by making them dependent on real user participation and reputation accumulation and sustainable actions.

Users can only access earned rewards because free handouts are a thing of the past.

The question is: Will airdrop technology remain an equitable distribution tool or has it evolved into a mere binary marketing scheme in the Web3 world?