Introduction: When "Mobile Mining" Becomes a Reality
"February 20, 2025 at 4:00 PM, this time will be written into the history of encryption - either the crowning moment of Pi Network's ascent to the 'people's blockchain', or the starting point of the biggest air coin bubble burst in history."
6 years ago, Stanford PhD Nicolas Kokkalis launched a social experiment with a mobile App: users could "mine" by tapping a button once a day, without professional mining rigs, power consumption, or cost. Now, this experiment is coming to an end - Pi Network has announced that the Open Network will officially go live at 4:00 PM Beijing time on February 20, 2025, when Pi coins will be interconnected with external systems for the first time.
The data tells a tale of two extremes:
- Passionate supporters: 50 million global users, over 18 million KYC-verified, with Taiwanese merchants even using Pi coins to buy bubble tea and pay rent;
- Skeptics: 6-year mainnet delay, tokens unable to be traded, and the "IOU futures" listed on exchanges are accused of hype.
In this controversial vortex, is Pi Network a technological revolution or a meticulously designed capital game? This article will unpack its value logic and potential risks based on the latest data and ecosystem progress.
I. Positive Outlook: Three Breakthroughs of the Democratized Blockchain
1. User Base: The "Traffic Nuke" that Crushes Traditional Public Chains
Pi Network has created the largest user network in crypto history:
- 50 million registered users, far exceeding Ethereum (less than 5 million active users out of 120 million addresses);
- 18 million KYC-verified users, with over 8 million already migrated to the closed mainnet, expected to surpass 10 million migration target before February 20;
- Asian dominance: 1.34 million users in South Korea exceed Binance's local user count, with Vietnam and the Philippines ranking among the top 3 globally in community activity.
This user scale gives it natural ecosystem incubation capabilities - even if only 1% of users participate in development, it can spawn 50,000 DApps (currently only 80 mainnet applications).
2. Technical Democratization: The Fusion of Mobile Mining and Stellar Consensus
Pi Network aims to lower the blockchain barrier with two major innovations:
- Stellar Consensus Protocol (SCP): Abandoning Bitcoin's energy-intensive PoW, it achieves energy-efficient consensus through the Federated Byzantine Agreement (FBA), allowing mobile participation in verification;
- Hierarchical Role System: From "Pioneers" (daily sign-in mining) to "Nodes" (running full nodes), users earn tokens based on their contributions, forming a bottom-up governance structure.
This design brings blockchain to non-technical groups - housewives, students, and retirees can participate, breaking the "geek-exclusive" industry barrier.
3. Real-world Applications: From Taiwanese Bubble Tea Shops to Cross-border Payments
Although the mainnet is not yet open, Pi Network has explored unique offline scenarios:
- Taiwan Business District Experiment: Over 200 merchants accept Pi coin payments, from catering to property rentals, 1 Pi ≈ 25-30 New Taiwan Dollars (about $0.8-1);
- Cross-border Remittance Test: Filipino workers transfer funds to their home country through the Pi wallet, with fees only 1/10 of traditional banks;
- Developer Incentives: 80 mainnet applications cover education, healthcare, logistics, such as "Pi Health" using anonymous medical data to train AI diagnostic models.
If the Open Network runs smoothly, these scenarios may upgrade from peripheral experiments to a global inclusive financial infrastructure.
II. Negative Controversies: Trust Deficit and Valuation Bubble
1. Six-year Delay History: The Crisis of Trust of "The Wolf Comes"
Pi Network's mainnet timeline is a textbook case of procrastination.
Pi Network was launched in 2019, initially supporting cryptocurrency mining via smartphones, and has gone through multiple stages, including Testnet, Node Program, and Closed Mainnet. Currently, the project is in the transition to the Open Network, expected to migrate the mainnet in early 2025.
· March 14, 2019: Official Launch - Pi Network was officially launched on "Pi Day" (March 14), named after the mathematical constant π (3.14). The initial mobile app version allowed users (called "Pioneers") to directly mine Pi cryptocurrency through their smartphones.
· March 14, 2020: Testnet Stage Launched - On the first anniversary of Pi Network, the project entered the Testnet stage, marking an important step towards decentralization. This stage supported the deployment of globally distributed nodes, allowing community developers to test the blockchain and create applications using Test-Pi.
· Late 2020: Node Program Introduced - Pi Network launched the Node Program, allowing users to run network nodes on personal computers. This increased Pioneers' contributions to network security and transaction verification, driving decentralization.
· December 2021: Closed Mainnet Launched - Pi Network entered the Closed Mainnet stage, with the mainnet officially going live but still under firewall protection, blocking external connections. During this period, users could complete KYC (identity verification) and migrate Pi to the live mainnet, while the community built applications and utility tools within the closed network.
· October 2023: Roadmap Released - The Pi core team published a milestone-based roadmap, detailing past achievements, current projects, and future plans. This roadmap increased transparency and outlined the key steps towards the Open Mainnet.
· December 2024: Open Network Update - The Pi Network team announced that the originally planned Open Mainnet launch at the end of 2024 would be postponed to the first quarter of 2025. This decision aims to allow more users to complete KYC and migrate their tokens to the mainnet, ensuring a more inclusive and secure ecosystem.
· January 2025: Mainnet Migration Progress - As of January 2025, Pi Network has over 18 million KYC-verified users, with more than 8 million having migrated their tokens to the mainnet. The team extended the KYC and mainnet migration grace period to January 31 to further support the transition.
Although the team attributes the delays to KYC review and ecosystem building, the community questions if they are deliberately delaying to maintain token scarcity.
2. Trillion-dollar Valuation Doubts: The Fatal Trap of Full Dilution
Calculated at a maximum supply of 100 billion, if Pi coin reaches $1, its fully diluted valuation (FDV) would reach $100 billion - over a third of Ethereum's current market cap ($315 billion). But this faces two paradoxes:
- Circulation Black Hole: Currently, only 2 billion Pi have migrated to the mainnet, with the remaining 98 billion needing to be gradually released through mining. If the team controls the unlocking pace, it may trigger panic selling;
- Lack of Application Scenarios: The existing 80 DApps are mostly utility-based, lacking value capture scenarios like DeFi and NFTs, casting doubt on the ecosystem's self-sustaining ability.
3. Regulation and Privacy: The Double-edged Sword of Compliance
Pi Network's compliance strategy harbors risks:
- Excessive KYC Data Collection: Users need to submit ID cards, facial recognition, and proof of residence, far exceeding standard project requirements, posing data breach risks;
- Regulatory Crackdown Risk: If the SEC deems Pi coin a security (similar to the XRP lawsuit), its US ecosystem could collapse instantly.
III. Open Network Launch: Four Key Verification Indicators
February 20, 2025 is not only a technical milestone, but also the touchstone of Pi Network's value. The following four indicators will determine its success or failure:
1. Exchange Liquidity Test
- Real Trading Volume: If major exchanges like HTX and Binance open Pi coin spot trading, it needs to be observed whether there is an "immediate crash" upon listing;
- Price anchoring: The current Taiwan P2P price (around $1) is vastly different from the IOU futures price ($48.3), and the convergence of the price spread indicates market confidence.
2. Degree of node decentralization
- Distribution of validator nodes: If the top 10 nodes control more than 50% of the computing power, it will violate the original intention of the "people's blockchain";
- Anti-censorship capability: Whether the open network can withstand government-level firewall blockades, especially in sensitive regions like Southeast Asia.
3. Developer migration tide
- DApp explosion speed: Whether the mainnet applications can break through 500 in the next 3 months, and whether at least one phenomenal application will emerge;
- Cross-chain interoperability: The progress of asset bridges with Ethereum and Solana will determine whether it can integrate into the mainstream ecosystem.
4. Token economic model
- Inflation control: Whether the mining release speed will lead to hyperinflation, referring to the market capitalization collapse of Helium due to token oversupply;
- Burning mechanism: The proportion of in-app fee burning will determine whether Pi Coin can enter a deflationary cycle.
IV. Future Projection: Three Possible Scenarios
Scenario 1: Utopia Realized (Probability 30%)
- Key assumptions: Zero mainnet failures, daily exchange trading volume exceeds $1 billion, and the emergence of DApps with millions of users;
- Price forecast: Pi Coin stabilizes at $5, with an FDV of $500 billion, ranking among the top five in crypto market capitalization;
- Social impact: Becoming the inclusive financial infrastructure for developing countries, shaking the SWIFT hegemony.
Scenario 2: Moderate Growth (Probability 50%)
- Key assumptions: Stable technology but mediocre applications, with an annual inflation rate controlled within 15%;
- Price forecast: Pi Coin fluctuates between $0.5-$2, with a market capitalization comparable to Dogecoin (around $30 billion);
- Social impact: Maintaining a regional payment tool status, similar to Vietnam's MoMo e-wallet.
Scenario 3: Bubble Burst (Probability 20%)
- Key assumptions: Mainnet downtime, regulatory crackdown, and team token dumping;
- Price forecast: Pi Coin plummets to below $0.1, leading to large-scale community protests;
- Social impact: Triggering a global crisis of trust in the "zero-cost mining" model.
V. Conclusion: A Social Experiment on Blockchain Beliefs
The essence of Pi Network is a social collaboration experiment - it attracts a massive user base with simple interactions, builds community consensus through delayed gratification, and challenges elitism with a populist narrative. Its success or failure not only concerns token prices but will also validate two ultimate propositions:
1. Whether blockchain requires a technical threshold? If 50 million novice users can shape a thriving ecosystem, the large-scale adoption of Web3 will no longer be distant;
2. Whether value must come from scarcity? If the zero-cost mined Pi Coin gains market recognition, the "digital gold" narrative of Bitcoin may face challenges.
Personal opinion:
The launch of the Pi Network mainnet is the most suspenseful crypto event in 2025. Its massive user base and real-world application scenarios have disruptive potential, but its six-year delay history and valuation bubble are also like the Sword of Damocles. In the short term, the release of liquidity after mainnet launch may lead to price fluctuations; in the long run, its fate depends on whether it can evolve from a "social viral tool" into a "value creation engine". If the team can curb greed and focus on the ecosystem, Pi Coin may indeed become the "people's currency" in the crypto world; if it repeats the fate of a Ponzi scheme, this experiment will become the most expensive lesson in the history of blockchain.
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