Original | Odaily Planet Daily ( @OdailyChina )
Author | Dingdang ( @XiaMiPP )
Last night, Wayfinder announced the launch of its native token $PROMPT and launched an airdrop event to reward community participants. This airdrop is for Yappers (content creators) registered on the Kaito platform. As long as they have posted tweets related to Wayfinder and meet the eligibility requirements, they can receive 5 million specially allocated $PROMPT tokens through the Kaito Dashboard. This move was originally intended to encourage community building and enhance user stickiness, but things went off track.
When users tried to claim the airdrop through the @KaitoAI platform, many found that the transaction failed or that their tokens were mysteriously snatched away, with some users claiming that the accident resulted in the loss of assets worth up to 120 ETH (about $200,000). Community sentiment quickly turned from excitement to dissatisfaction.
According to the X platform user, the source of the airdrop incident was pointed out to be a program problem of Wayfinders airdrop service provider TokenTable. Initially, there were rumors that TokenTables programmers used AI to write the airdrop code, which led to the contract vulnerability being attacked and finally the airdrop was taken away by hackers. However, subsequent clarifications showed that some project parties did try to write code with AI, and TokenTables smart contract did have a vulnerability that had not been discovered by the audit, but TokenTable did not use AI to write code. Although this clarification eliminated some misunderstandings, it could not cover up the impact the market suffered when the incident occurred.
According to the price data on OKX, $PROMPT reached a high of $0.26 after opening at 9 pm, showing the high enthusiasm in the early stage of the market. However, after 10 pm, the MEV front-running incident began to ferment, and many users expressed their anger at the airdrop mechanism loophole and MEV attack on the X platform. Market confidence collapsed, and the price of $PROMPT quickly fell to $0.1, a drop of more than 60%.
As for why the airdrop was snatched away, industry insiders pointed out that the culprit was the MEV robot. Airdrops are usually distributed through smart contracts, and users need to send the collection transaction to the Ethereum memory pool to wait for packaging. The MEV robot monitors the memory pool in real time. Once it finds that a user has submitted a transaction to receive $PROMPT, it will pay a higher gas fee and let the miners package their transactions before the user, so that they can receive the tokens first and quickly exchange them for ETH for profit. This attack method that exploits the manipulability of the blockchain transaction order exposes the vulnerability of the airdrop mechanism in high-traffic scenarios.
Fortunately, after the crisis, TokenTable took quick action, posting a message announcing the suspension of the airdrop collection process and launching a full investigation. At the same time, it promised that all users whose airdrops were snatched away by MEV due to transaction failures would be fully compensated, all allocated $PROMPT would be issued as expected, and the Gas fees of failed transactions would also be refunded in the form of ETH. Wayfinder and Kaitos official X account quickly forwarded the post in an attempt to stabilize the situation. This decisive response injected a glimmer of hope into the market. As of now, Kaitos airdrop collection channel has not yet been restored, waiting for the official follow-up measures to be implemented.
Thanks to the quick response of the party responsible for the accident, the price of $PROMPT token temporarily stopped falling. At around 1 a.m., Coinbase issued an announcement that its Base network would launch $PROMPT. This news further boosted market confidence, and the price of $PROMPT quickly rebounded to $0.2, and market sentiment gradually returned to stability.
Judging from the overall performance of Wayfinders airdrop, although Kaitos token distribution was unexpected, leading to a short-term crisis of trust, the timely response and proper handling of the project and partners basically eliminated doubts about the core value of the project. In terms of the distribution structure, although the airdrop ratio tends to be larger for $PRIME staking users, considering the high staking cost of $PRIME and the gradual release mechanism of rewards, this design aims to balance short-term market pressure and incentives for long-term holders.
In contrast, the real big winner of this airdrop is undoubtedly the Yapper players of the Kaito platform. The project allocated hundreds to thousands of $PROMPT tokens to these active content creators, and some KOLs directly posted the 6,322 $PROMPT tokens they received on the X platform, which aroused the envy of the community.
In addition, Wayfinders allocation of wallet tasks also demonstrates its community-friendly attitude: each qualified user is guaranteed to receive at least $30 worth of $PROMPT tokens, and a relaxed policy of no witch check (i.e., no restrictions on multiple accounts) is adopted, further lowering the threshold for participation and winning praise from many users. At the same time, Binance Alpha also announced that it will airdrop an additional 490 $PROMPT tokens to all users who have had transaction records on the Alpha platform before April 10.
Overall, Wayfinders series of airdrops are in stark contrast to those projects that have a strict restrictive attitude towards money-grabbing parties. Its community-friendly attitude and generous distribution strategy have won a lot of praise. Especially for Yapper users, Wayfinders special care allows users to see a new community incentive model.
This incident may provide a rare opportunity for money-grabbing parties. By registering a Kaito account and continuously cultivating content, participants can not only share the airdrop bonus, but also reap higher returns on investment in the long run. This cultivation is investment model may become a new trend in future crypto community participation, and it is worth more attention and attempts.
