Ever since the Filecoin mining machine set off a wave of "selling mining machines" in the last bull market, the Web3 world has been repeating the old routine of "economic incentives + scenario packaging". In the last round, GameFi hype was prevalent, and "getting tokens by playing games" and "getting tokens by running" once became the main line of the narrative. However, although these projects were popular for a while, they failed to find a truly sustainable commercialization path. GameFi ultimately failed to become a long-term track, with tokens soaring and plummeting, user loss, and ecological collapse.
In this round, the concept of DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks) has emerged, once again setting off a narrative climax in the Web3 circle. It is not just "you can mine by using", but also "everything can be DePIN": you can get tokens by charging, making calls, installing sockets, driving, watching ads, and even "drinking water".
This sounds more imaginative than GameFi - after all, compared to games in the virtual world, electricity, communications, transportation, and energy in real life seem to have more "real value". But when we look deeper into the actual implementation and economic models of these projects, we find that: in the current DePIN market, more than 60% of the equipment suppliers are from Huaqiangbei, Shenzhen. The price of these devices is often 30-50 times the wholesale price of Huaqiangbei, and almost all hardware investors have lost all their money. The DePIN Tokens purchased have almost no power to rebound, and can only watch their wallets shrink and wait for the "ecological landing" and "next round of airdrops" indefinitely. This is not an infrastructure innovation, but more like a "resurrection" of a hardware scam.
Project Inventory: The Blood and Tears Lessons of Those Who Stepped into the Pit
Helium: A machine is so hard to come by that no one is interested in it today
Helium was once a star project in the DePIN field. Its flagship Helium Hotspot device built a decentralized LoRaWAN network. Later, it teamed up with T-Mobile and Telefónica to launch mobile communication services, focusing on low-priced packages - for example, a $20 monthly package attracted 93,000 subscribers in just 5 months.
At first glance, it seems to be a great success, but the story of Helium equipment is a classic example of "harvesting leeks": the hot mining machine that once cost tens of dollars was hyped up to 2,500 dollars per unit (claiming to pay back the investment in three days), but the reality is: because the domestic nodes were blocked by the official blacklist, the Chinese region was completely wiped out, the mining machines were left in the hands, the price of the currency plummeted, and the miners lost all their money. The dream of "mining means wealth freedom" has now been shattered.
Hivemapper: Buying cameras for mining? The payback period is long
Hivemapper sells a $549 dashcam that allows users to upload geodata while driving and earn tokens. At first glance, this "drive to earn tokens" model seems easier to get started than mining. But the problem is:
- There is no strong token support behind the high price of hardware. The price of HONEY token has been sluggish for a long time, and the payback period is long.
- The quality and frequency of map data are worrying, and it has not yet been verified whether it is really possible to build a network comparable to Google Maps.
- Its map network mainly covers developed countries in Europe and the United States, and there are almost no landing scenarios for Huaqiangbei sellers and the Asian market.
In addition, Hivemapper generated more than $60 million in revenue from hardware sales, but this was more of a "device sales" income rather than a healthy performance of the DePIN economic model.
Jambo: The African legend of Web3 mobile phones, another attempt by Huaqiangbei to remove memory
Jambo has launched a combination of "DePIN + Web3 wallet" and has been selling well in the African market. The Jambo phone, which is priced at only US$99, has sold more than 400,000 units and activated more than 1.23 million wallet addresses. This is certainly not because investors have faith in this phone and project, but it is a blatant "scam" that takes advantage of the surge in APT tokens and the rapid development of the ecosystem to pre-install dApps on mobile phones. Users can earn JAMBO tokens, but the liquidity and value of the tokens remain a mystery. Can't the closed loop of data sales be achieved? Without real large data providers to pay, the ecosystem of mobile phones cannot support the long-term usage needs of a Web3 user.
Ordz Game: A Web3-modified version of a retro handheld game console
Ordz Game’s main product is “Play to Earn” + hardware handheld game console BitBoy. The pre-sale device priced at 0.01 BTC was sold out as soon as it went online, and more than 2,000 regular versions have been sold.
But essentially:
- The gaming experience is almost at the level of a retro handheld ROM, and is not very innovative;
- After the transformation of Token ORDG into GAMES token, it still lacks liquidity and real value;
- The essence is to replicate the GameFi mining model, but this time it uses a "handheld game console" skin.
The possibility of truly achieving long-term player retention and revenue returns is slim. The airdrops it promises are fake, but the big pie it cheats you out of is real!
Ton mobile phone: Bought an Android "senior phone"?
During the period when Telegram and TON were popular, TON mobile phone was also launched, with a price of nearly US$500 and a high sales volume. However, it was evaluated by users as "old-age phone texture" and "not as good as Xiaomi". It only has 6G memory, 128G storage, and Android 14 system. Although it comes with a mobile phone case and claims to have "airdrop expectations",:
- The quality of the airdrop is far inferior to the Solana phone;
- There is no differentiation in UI/UX, and the phone itself has no innovation;
- The payback period is long and ecological construction is still on paper.
What you buy is the "hope of future airdrops", but you can't see the fulcrum for the hope to land.
Starpower: $100 plug, incomprehensible scam
Starpower claims to be a smart power DePIN project under the Solana ecosystem, selling smart sockets, car chargers, batteries and other hardware. The project is supported by Alliance, Iota, etc. It is said that the token will be issued in Q2. A plug costs 100 US dollars, while the same model on Pinduoduo only costs 91
In addition, the project company is newly established, the technology is not transparent, and the ecological incentives are not yet clear, so it relies solely on "storytelling" to sell equipment.
Looking back at the history of Filecoin and Helium’s “mining machine futures scam” and then looking at Starpower’s roadmap, we cannot say that there is no connection, we can only say that they are exactly the same.
Glow, PowerLedger and other "energy DePINs" are far from market logic, and investors will eventually pay for it
These projects focus on highly idealistic models such as carbon credit trading and P2P energy distributed trading. Glow rewards the green power generation behavior of solar power stations through a dual token mechanism (GLW + GCC), but in actual operation:
- Who will buy the carbon credits?
- How to verify the actual power generation of a power station?
- Which token can help equipment recover its investment?
PowerLedger is trying to be a P2P trading platform in the electricity market, but the platform currency POW has almost returned to zero, and there is no verified case for the core business model. Although the ideal is beautiful, the gap between supervision and commercial implementation has not yet been bridged.
DePIN is essentially an attempt to extend the Web3 "economic incentive model" in the real physical world. In theory, it has unlimited possibilities:
It can decentralize real-world infrastructure (communication, electricity, maps, equipment), build large-scale user network effects, and achieve fair incentives and transparent governance through token design.
However, at the current stage, 99% of the DePIN projects that have actually landed rely on "selling hardware" to reap retail investors: token models with hardware attributes are generally a combination of "air + bubble", and the so-called "ecological empowerment" often relies on KOL packaging, drawing narratives, and airdrop expectations to fool new users. Most of the project parties are from Huaqiangbei, relying on "supply chain + profiteering pricing" to earn equipment income rather than actually building a network.
A truly successful DePIN requires a strong supply and demand model design, a transparent and continuous incentive mechanism, and a deep understanding of the hardware/infrastructure field. The biggest bubble in the current DePIN market is that most projects are not solving real problems at all, but packaging concepts to harvest users. When hardware becomes a hype tool in the form of "futures", when device tokens become worthless "digital coupons", and when all narratives revolve around airdrop expectations, DePIN is nothing more than another Ponzi cycle of Web3. I hope that in the near future, we can see some DePIN projects that survive not by selling hardware or telling stories, but by real use and real income.
