Since the Filecoin mining machines sparked the "selling mining machines" craze in the last bull market, the Web3 world has been repeatedly following the old routine of "economic incentives + scenario packaging." The previous round saw the rise of GameFi, where "playing games earns tokens" and "running earns tokens" became the main narrative for breaking into the mainstream. However, although these projects were extremely popular for a time, they failed to carve out a truly sustainable commercialization path. GameFi ultimately did not become a long-term track, with token prices soaring and plummeting, user attrition, and ecosystem collapse.

In this round, the concept of DePIN (Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks) has emerged, once again igniting a narrative climax in the Web3 space. It's not just "you can mine by using," but rather "everything can be DePIN": earn tokens for charging, making calls, installing sockets, driving, watching ads, and even "drinking water."

This sounds even more imaginative than GameFi—after all, compared to virtual world games, the electricity, communication, transportation, and energy in real life seem to have more "real value." However, when we delve into the actual implementation and economic models of these projects, we find that over 60% of the device suppliers in the current DePIN market come from Huaqiangbei, Shenzhen. These devices are often sold at 30-50 times their wholesale price in Huaqiangbei, and almost all hardware investors have lost their investments. The purchased DePIN tokens have little chance of rebounding, leaving investors watching their wallets shrink while waiting indefinitely for "ecosystem implementation" and "the next round of airdrops." This is not infrastructure innovation; it resembles a rampant hardware scam that is "borrowing a corpse to resurrect the soul."

Project Review: The Blood and Tears Lessons of Those Who Fell into the Pit

Helium: From Scarcity to Being Ignored

Helium was once a star project in the DePIN field, with its Helium Hotspot devices building a decentralized LoRaWAN network. Later, it partnered with T-Mobile and Telefónica to launch mobile communication services, offering low-cost plans—such as a $20 monthly plan that attracted 93,000 subscribers in just five months.

At first glance, it seemed to be thriving, but the story of Helium devices is a classic case of "harvesting leeks": once priced at several dozen dollars, hotspot mining machines were speculated to $2,500 each (claiming a three-day payback), but the reality was that due to domestic nodes being blacklisted by the authorities, the entire Chinese market collapsed, leaving miners with worthless machines and plummeting token prices. The dream of "mining equals financial freedom" has long been shattered.

Hivemapper: Buy a Camera to "Mine"? Payback is a Long Way Off

Hivemapper sells a $549 dashcam that allows users to upload geographic data while driving to earn token rewards. At first glance, this "driving earns tokens" model seems easier to grasp than mining. But the problems are:

• Behind the high hardware price, there is no strong token support. The price of the HONEY token has been persistently low, with a long payback period.
• The quality and frequency of map data are concerning; it remains unverified whether it can truly build a network comparable to Google Maps.
• Its map network mainly covers developed countries in Europe and America, with almost no landing scenarios for Huaqiangbei sellers and the Asian market.

Additionally, Hivemapper has generated over $60 million in revenue from hardware sales, but this is more about "selling devices" than a healthy performance of the DePIN economic model.

Jambo: The African Myth of Web3 Phones, Another Memory from Huaqiangbei

Jambo combines "DePIN + Web3 wallet" and has seen great sales in the African market, with the $99 Jambo phone selling over 400,000 units and activating over 1.23 million wallet addresses. This is not due to investors' faith in the phone and project, but rather a blatant "scam" taking advantage of the soaring APT token and rapid ecosystem development, pre-installing dApps that allow users to earn JAMBO tokens. However, the liquidity and value of the tokens remain a mystery, and the data sales closed loop cannot be realized. Without large data buyers, the phone's ecosystem cannot support the long-term usage needs of a Web3 user.

Ordz Game: A Web3 Modified Version of Retro Handheld Consoles

Ordz Game promotes "Play to Earn" + the hardware handheld BitBoy, with pre-sale devices priced at 0.01 BTC selling out immediately, and over 2,000 units of the regular version sold.

But essentially:

• The gaming experience is almost at the level of retro handheld console ROMs, lacking innovation;
• The ORDG token, after transforming into the GAMES token, still lacks liquidity and real value;
• It essentially replicates the GameFi mining model, just with a "handheld" skin this time.

The possibility of achieving long-term retention and return on investment for players is minimal. The promised airdrops are fake, but the big pie taken from you is real!

Ton Phone: Did You Buy an Android "Senior Phone"?

During the boom of Telegram and TON, the TON phone was also launched, priced at nearly $500, and its sales were not low, leading users to describe it as having a "senior phone feel" and "not as good as Xiaomi," with only 6GB of RAM, 128GB of storage, and Android 14. Despite coming with a phone case and claiming to have "airdrop expectations,":

• The quality of the airdrop is far inferior to that of Solana phones;
• The UI/UX is undifferentiated, and the phone itself has no innovation;
• The payback period is long, and ecosystem construction remains on paper.

What you bought is "hope for future airdrops," but there is no visible support for that hope to materialize.

Starpower: A $100 Plug, An Incomprehensible Scam

Starpower claims to be a smart power DePIN project under the Solana ecosystem, selling smart plugs, car chargers, batteries, and other hardware, supported by Alliance, Iota, and others. It is said that a token will be issued in Q2, with each plug priced at $100, while the same model on Pinduoduo only costs $91.

Moreover, the project company is newly established, with opaque technology, unclear ecological incentives, and purely relying on "telling stories" to sell devices.

Looking back at the history of the "mining machine futures scam" of Filecoin and Helium, and then looking at Starpower's roadmap, it cannot be said to be unrelated; it can only be said to be identical.

Glow, PowerLedger, and other "energy-related DePIN" projects stray from market logic, ultimately leaving investors to foot the bill.

These projects focus on highly idealized models such as carbon credit trading and P2P distributed energy trading. Glow rewards green power generation from solar power plants through a dual-token mechanism (GLW + GCC), but in practice:

• Who will buy carbon credits?
• How to verify the actual power generation of the power plants?
• What tokens will support the payback of the devices?

PowerLedger attempts to create a P2P trading platform for electricity markets, but its platform token POW has nearly gone to zero, and there are no verified cases of its core business model. While the ideals are beautiful, the gap between regulation and commercial implementation has yet to be bridged.

DePIN is essentially an attempt to extend the Web3 "economic incentive model" into the real physical world. Theoretically, it has infinite possibilities:

It can decentralize real infrastructure (communication, electricity, maps, devices), build large-scale user network effects, and achieve fair incentives and transparent governance through token design.

However, at the current stage, 99% of the truly implemented DePIN projects rely on "selling hardware" to harvest retail investors: token models with hardware attributes are generally a combination of "air" and "bubble," and the so-called "ecological empowerment" often relies on KOL packaging, narrative drawings, and airdrop expectations to deceive new users. Most project parties come from Huaqiangbei, profiting from "supply chain + exorbitant pricing" rather than genuinely building networks.

A truly successful DePIN requires a strong supply-demand model design, transparent and sustainable incentive mechanisms, and a deep understanding of the hardware/infrastructure field. The biggest bubble in the current DePIN market lies in the fact that most projects are not solving real problems but are packaging concepts to harvest users. When hardware becomes a speculative tool in the form of "futures," when device tokens turn into worthless "digital coupons," and when all narratives revolve around airdrop expectations, DePIN is merely another Ponzi cycle in Web3. We hope to see some DePIN projects in the near future that survive not by selling hardware or telling stories, but by real usage and real income.

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