Original | Odaily Planet Daily ( @OdailyChina )
Author: Golem ( @web3_golem )
The furthest distance in the world is when I stand in front of you and you insist on convincing me that Pi is a scam
On February 12, OKX, a global leading exchange, announced that it would open PI deposits and would open PI/USDT spot trading simultaneously when Pi Network launched its mainnet on February 20. This news triggered a series of butterfly effects. Not only did many exchanges subsequently announce their support for PI, Pi, which has been born for 6 years and has been repeatedly named as a pyramid scheme by regulators during its development and is often ridiculed by Crypto Natives, once again stood at the forefront of public opinion. Even Binance, the largest exchange in the universe, was affected and launched a 10-day Do you want PI to be listed on Binance? vote yesterday.
Old players who are familiar with the Web3 world are surprised that Pi, which has been criticized for stand-alone mining and no on-chain verification, actually has a mainnet. They sigh that OKX and other exchanges would support such a high-risk project for the sake of user growth. People who have participated in Pi believe that arrogant people in the crypto industry have never mined Pi and do not understand Pi at all. They only forward related memes and are full of prejudice against Pi - If you dont believe me, I dont have time to convince you.
So, what is the real Pi like? It is difficult for us who have not truly integrated into the Pi community to know. The founder of Pi Network posted his last tweet on the X platform on September 21, 2021. The only channels to understand Pis official activities are the official blog and the official X account . The core team and organization members are hidden in the fog. There are also rumors that after years of operation, there has been a major change.
The current OTC price of PI coin fluctuates between 2-5 USDT, and the “manual order” form appears from time to time in the WeChat group.
According to the official blog, Pi Network will officially launch the open mainnet on February 20, allowing Pi to interact with other networks and applications. However, PI coins previously mined through mobile devices must pass KYC and successfully migrate to the mainnet before they can be transferred or traded autonomously.
At this moment when the launch is approaching and facing authenticity verification, in order to let readers better understand the full picture of Pi, Odaily Planet Daily interviewed two senior Pi friends to understand how they joined and viewed Pi, their price expectations for PI and their next operational plans... and peek into a corner of the Pi story from the perspective of eyewitnesses.
(Note: All interviewees are pseudonyms. This article does not constitute investment advice.)
A Yao: The elderly are relatively persistent and less impetuous
A Yao has been mining PI coins for a total of 1,694 days (nearly 5 years) since 2019. He has promoted Pi to hundreds of people on the Internet. Later, he gave up because he was unable to cash out and find new opportunities. Now he continues to purchase PI coins off-market.
Odaily: Through what channel did you first come into contact with Pi?
A Yao: I came into contact with Pi while playing Pan. At that time, I learned about this project through promotional information in the WeChat group. I saw that the founder had a background in Stanford University and it was free to register and participate, so I decided to give it a try.
Odaily: Is the actual mining process and threshold of Pi high?
A Yao: Pi has a relatively low threshold. At the beginning, you don’t even need to be “scientific”. You can easily participate in mining by just clicking to sign in every day, but the mined coins cannot be withdrawn or traded. But starting from the closed mainnet stage (December 28, 2021), you can transfer after completing KYC and migrating to the mainnet. However, due to domestic policy reasons, KYC has always been difficult.
Odaily: Mining PI coins requires signing in every 24 hours. What keeps you mining PI coins for 5 years?
A Yao: First of all, I was optimistic about the blockchain and digital currency industry at that time, and believed that there were opportunities to get rich quickly at low cost; secondly, the background of Pi’s founder was well publicized at the time, and in 2019, cryptocurrency projects with a Stanford University background were very valuable; thirdly, mining PI coins is free, no capital investment is required, and it is very simple with just a few clicks every day; finally, because Pi has a promotion mechanism, the more people you invite, the faster the mining speed, so many people form a group, and everyone in the community brainwashes each other to form a certain deep consensus, which makes many people willing to invest in the long term.
Odaily: Is the promotion of Pi a pyramid scheme?
A Yao: Pis promotion model is not like a plate with a strict hierarchical structure. The motivation for promotion is more of a spontaneous desire to increase the mining speed. Many people promote it for the names of famous universities and well-known professors, and there is only a mining bonus for level 1 referral relationships. At the beginning, some communities translated English tutorials into Chinese for dissemination and promotion, but as everyone did not see any benefits, many groups gradually disbanded or were banned.
Odaily: Do you have any offline activities or gatherings?
A Yao: I personally prefer online promotion, so I haven’t participated in offline gatherings. But Pi still has offline activities. In the past, the promotion team liked to organize meetings for grandpas and aunts, probably because it is not easy to teach online.
Odaily: In your promotion process, is the proportion higher among young people or older people?
A Yao: Actually, there were more young people at the beginning, because all the documents were in English at the beginning, but young people are often more impetuous. If they cant see the benefits in the short term, they will easily lose patience and give up. Later, as the Chinese documents were improved and some disk organizations came in to promote Pi, the proportion of elderly people became higher, and the elderly are relatively persistent and not so impetuous. Even if some disks withdrew later, the confidence of elderly friends has not been shaken, and they spontaneously promote it to those around them.
Odaily: What do you think of the overwhelming negative reports about Pi?
A Yao: It depends on everyones cognition. Even though Bitcoin was strongly banned in China before, some people are still playing it. Pi itself is free to participate, and it was not circulated before, so the actual risk is not great. However, it is impossible to avoid doing evil. Fraud exists in every industry and project, but they are all individual cases. When we promoted it, we focused on free mining, not letting participants buy virtual currency.
Moreover, uncles and aunts usually promote their products through relatives and friends because they are familiar with each other and the probability of mutual deception is low.
Odaily: How do you feel after Pi was recognized by mainstream exchanges? What are your plans for the next step?
A Yao: I feel very excited and I also see many Pi friends carnival in the circle of friends. Although I havent participated deeply in it for a year, I am excited to see Pi coin gain mainstream recognition, especially on the OKX exchange.
Currently, only a small percentage of Pi users have passed KYC, and even fewer have migrated their coins to the mainnet. No one I know has completed this step yet. So in fact, most people don’t have coins, so I plan to buy a base warehouse first.
Odaily: What do you think the price of PI coin will be after it goes online?
A Yao: The price on OKX must be at least 9 USDT to be considered the first step to success. If not, I will basically judge that the project has failed.
Odaily: Do you think Pi will become second only to Bitcoin in the future?
A Yao: Pi has a grand vision, aiming to build a global payment system where users can directly use Pi coins to conduct transactions around the world without converting to other fiat currencies. But there is a lot of controversy about Pi online now. Although the performance of the Pi network is indeed not as good as Solana, if Pi succeeds, its price will definitely subvert everyones cognition. I think the probability of its success is more than 70%.
Deyou: Pi is essentially a zero-cost project, and its user base has surpassed many chains
Deyou has been involved in Pi network mining and promotion since 2019. It has been mining for nearly 2,000 consecutive days and promoted to more than a thousand people.
Odaily: Can you introduce Pi in one sentence?
Deyou: Pi is a revolution, or an innovation of Web3, which was initiated by a senior blockchain professor at Stanford in the United States.
Odaily: When did you first come into contact with Pi?
Deyou: I came into contact with Pi in August 2019, and I have been mining for nearly 2,000 consecutive days. But I have been involved in the cryptocurrency circle since 2015. I learned about Pi through WeChat group chats and Moments, and after in-depth research, I thought it was a good project, and then promoted it to more than 1,000 people.
Odaily: What is the reason why you insist on mining Pi and promoting it?
Deyou: The reason I promoted it is that it can speed up mining output, and because it is called Pi, I feel it is a good project, otherwise it would not be called pi. In addition, the project has been persisting for so many years, and I and my subordinates have not invested a penny, but just do promotion part-time, so why not persist?
Odaily: Do you have any offline activities or gatherings?
Deyou: I started doing offline promotion in 2020. The reason I didn’t promote it on the Internet was that I thought information was interoperable, and everyone who should register online had already registered, so I started with the people around me.
But my team has basically no offline gatherings, and I have not participated in large-scale offline activities, because the promotion is basically done by people around me and friends. However, there were many activities in Sichuan and Kunming before, but now that the main network is about to be launched, there are fewer meetings and activities.
Odaily: How does your promotion team operate?
Deyou: My team mainly relies on me for publicity and promotion. When I was working in other industries before, I had 10,700 direct subordinates, but not all of them were converted to mine Pi. The users who mined Pi were all promoted one by one by my friends, so there was no strong organization.
I have nearly 2,000 friends who are team leaders who mine Pi, but in fact, team leader is not a strict position setting. Anyone who has promotion ability and wants to mine more Pi coins can become a team leader. They don’t need to invest anything except time, and no one gives them additional financial incentives.
Odaily: What do you think of the overwhelming negative reports about Pi?
Deyou: I think the reports are not necessarily accurate. Bitcoin was also considered a Ponzi scheme at the beginning, but it is legal in many countries today. Pi is essentially a zero-cost project. The project owner has never required mandatory fees, but some people have induced fraud during the promotion process, which is absolutely illegal.
However, there are almost no people around me who have been defrauded, because they are all under my care and they do not come into contact with people from the outside world.
Odaily: How do you feel after Pi was recognized by mainstream exchanges?
Deyou: I am a Buddhist in mining. Even if it is not valuable, it is for my initial desire. If it is valuable, it is just a small fortune for me. But I think the launch of the mainnet is something worth celebrating. Five or six years of hard work has finally paid off. I will not transfer the mined coins to the exchange. I will follow the projects footsteps and move forward.
Odaily: Are there many people around you who have migrated to the mainnet?
Deyou: Most of my team members have passed KYC, but no more than 20% have migrated to the mainnet, and most of them have been locked for 1 or 3 years.
Odaily: Are more people looking for you to learn how to mine Pi? What age group are the new users in?
Deyou: First of all, there are definitely more people, but the new players brought by this popularity are mostly middle-aged people. If they are too old, they don’t know what is happening on the Internet.
Odaily: Are you organizing OTC trading? What is the price expectation for PI coins when they are listed on the exchange?
Deyou: If there is a need, I can help contact over-the-counter transactions, mainly through WeChat. The average transaction price may be around 50 yuan per coin.
The exchange is originally a place for speculation, and its price does not need to be cared about. According to the official will, the price of PI will not be lower than US$314,159 in the end, because the official will eventually support barter. If the price is too low, it cannot support the ecosystem.
Odaily: What are your future expectations for the Pi project?
Deyou: I think at least barter transactions should be supported. Pi has its own mall, which is full of spontaneous merchants. And I am one of the 28,000 merchants. In the future, I will sell the wine from my winery on it.
Odaily: Do you think Pi will become the second only to Bitcoin?
Deyou: Bitcoin is always the big brother. I have bought Bitcoin before, but I don’t know much about it as a whole. But Pi, as the younger brother, has its own unique potential and uses. Although it cannot replace Bitcoin, it has a good future prospect. The user base of Pi has surpassed many chains in the blockchain.
