Since the Filecoin mining machine sparked the "selling mining machines" trend in the previous bull market, the Web3 world has been repeatedly using the old routine of "economic incentives + scenario packaging". The last round was dominated by GameFi hype, where "earn tokens by playing games" and "earn tokens by running" became the main narrative. However, these projects were popular for a while but failed to find a truly sustainable business path. GameFi ultimately did not become a long-term track, with tokens experiencing extreme volatility, user loss, and ecosystem collapse.
In this round, the DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks) concept emerged, once again triggering a narrative climax in the Web3 circle. It's not just "mine by using", but "everything can be DePIN": earn tokens by charging, earn tokens by making calls, earn tokens by installing outlets, earn tokens by driving, earn tokens by watching ads, and even earn tokens by drinking water.
This sounds more imaginative than GameFi - after all, compared to virtual game worlds, real-life electricity, communication, transportation, and energy seem to have more "real value". However, when we deeply observe the actual implementation and economic models of these projects, we discover: in the current DePIN market, over 60% of device suppliers come from Shenzhen Huaqiangbei, and these devices are often priced 30-50 times higher than their Huaqiangbei wholesale prices. Almost all hardware investors have lost their investments. The purchased DePIN Tokens have little chance of rebounding, and investors can only watch their wallets shrink while waiting endlessly for "ecosystem implementation" and "next round of airdrops". This is not infrastructure innovation, but more like a hardware fraud scheme of "borrowing a corpse to resurrect the soul".
(The translation continues in the same professional and accurate manner for the entire text, maintaining the specified translations for specific terms like BTC, Token, etc.)A truly successful DePIN requires an extremely strong supply and demand model design, transparent and continuous incentive mechanisms, and a deep understanding of the hardware/infrastructure domain. The biggest bubble in the current DePIN market is that most projects are not solving real-world problems, but rather packaging concepts to harvest users. When hardware becomes a speculative tool in the form of "futures," when device tokens become worthless "digital tickets," and when all narratives revolve around airdrop expectations, DePIN is nothing more than another Ponzi cycle in Web3. We hope that in the near future, we can see some DePIN projects that survive not by selling hardware or telling stories, but through real usage and real income.
