Pay to Earn is the new trick in this airdrop where you pay to receive ZRO

Author: Deep Tide TechFlow

Good news, the ZRO airdrop is available for claiming.

Bad news, it requires a fee to claim.

Previously, there were doubts in the market about the small quantity of Layerzero airdrops, with many expressing that despite their hard work interacting, the amount seemed insufficient; the feeling of "insulting airdrop" arose.

And this insult seems to have come twice.

On the evening of June 20, Layerzero officially announced that the ZRO airdrop could be claimed, but this claim is not free:

Users must donate $0.10 in USDC, USDT, or native ETH for each ZRO to claim the ZRO tokens.

LayerZero calls this a new claiming mechanism named Proof-of-Donation, which will donate up to $18.5 million to the collective funding mechanism Protocol Guild for Ethereum developers.

Regardless of the transparency and purpose of the donation, from the user's perspective, this rule simply means:

If you want to claim the airdrop, you have to pay first.

This is the first time such a practice has appeared in the crypto market's airdrop playbook.

You've seen various scams that secretly pull the rug, have hollow white papers, or say "sorry, we failed," but openly collecting a portion of your airdrop as a donation is indeed unheard of.

Thus, Airdrop to Earn has turned into Pay to Earn.

Forced Donations, Strong Contrast

What is even more emotionally stirring is a "historical review" section displayed on the Layerzero official page before claiming ZRO.

Before claiming ZERO, the page provides a review similar to the annual recap often used by domestic internet companies, prominently stating "You first used omnichain on X date," "You interacted X times," and other warm reflections, seemingly reminding you of the hard times spent interacting in hopes of good outcomes.

This review itself is fine, but when compared to the donation requirement on the final claiming page, it becomes somewhat disheartening.

It seems to suggest that all your previous efforts in interaction have only increased your financial burden when it comes to making a donation at the time of claiming.

Batch farming? Creating premium accounts? Multiple chains together?

No problem, the clown is actually you.

Until the last moment, you never know what the restrictions on the claiming page are; and thinking according to industry norms, you might only feel that the distribution rules of the airdrop quantity might be a bit unfair, after all, it's hard to please everyone.

But the design of paying to claim an airdrop is something you wouldn't have thought of until the end. However, the project team might have designed it long ago, just not revealing it at the beginning, placing it at the last step merely to increase your sunk cost.

Here, the claiming rules set by the smart contract have become a thorn in the eyes of many farmers. Sorry, there's no way to change it; the contract is already written, and if you want to claim, you have to donate.

It's not that donations are bad, nor that everyone lacks kindness; it's just that this design appears somewhat forcibly malicious, easily leading to comparisons and disparities, thus making "donation" feel like "robbery."

Airdrop Tax, Robbing the Rich to Give to the Poor

If we abstract this donation button further, it can actually be understood as a kind of "airdrop tax."

The project team rewards you for your interaction, but how much reward you receive is actually determined by the project team. Moreover, there is no law stating that the project team cannot take a portion of the reward as a tax for other uses.

You are the fish on the chopping block, and it's already quite nice to give you an airdrop; what's wrong with collecting a tax?

From the project team's perspective, this seems reasonable, even a bit greedy; but from the perspective of the vast majority of users, it seems the project is taking itself too seriously.

For large holders and batch farmers, if each ZRO requires a donation, then large holders obviously have to pay much more. But small holders are not spared either; under the design of $0.10 each, all are equal, robbing the rich to give to the poor.

Some netizens even expressed on Twitter that the donation tax they were charged did not strictly follow the $0.10 per unit design, and in reality, they had to pay more, clearly a money grab.

Additionally, with the soaring gas fees during the airdrop period, small holders may feel like they earned something but not completely, even feeling tricked.

In the future, will you still unhesitatingly farm multiple accounts? And those studio-level airdrop hunters will need to calculate their input-output ratio carefully, trying to minimize their costs; after all, no one can predict what the tax rate on this donation will be.

Farming has transitioned from the golden age of high profits to a state of internal competition.

Users are competing; as more and more people come, if you don't interact, there are plenty of others who will. Projects are competing; ultimately, what you receive is getting less and less, and now there's even a tax design.

There's a saying that goes well: the future has arrived, but it's unevenly distributed.

Layerzero's pay-to-claim ZRO is the first, but it certainly won't be the last.

Future project teams may use gentler tax rates, more convoluted excuses, and grander narratives to take a portion from the airdrops you have already received. As a participant in the market and an acceptor of the rules, you may have no other choice.

Want to collectively resist this behavior without interacting? In a decentralized and motivation-diverse crypto forest, this is even more difficult.

Lower your expectations, spend within your means; there are no free lunches in the world, and perhaps there will be no free airdrops in the future either.