Will Caldera become yet another ghost town, just like Story or Magic Newton?

The ERA allocation is heavily skewed towards yapping, with some getting 16k+ tokens.

While the highest allocation I’ve seen so far for pure onchain usage is 1.6k ERA:

Has InfoFi ruined airdrops for good, with onchain metrics no longer being relevant?

Here’s my take on the current meta and how it’ll eventually evolve:

It’s likely that you qualified for a ‘decent’ allocation if your wallet has a strong onchain footprint.

Multiple criteria were listed, including

• Usage of Caldera-powered chains

• Top L2 usage (Arbitrum, Optimism, ZKsync, and Base)

But the snapshot was taken on 5 March 2025 (lol).

This was what I expected from an infra project, where they would do a PYTH-style airdrop by rewarding active usage of their partners.

But it seems like being a Yapper was way more lucrative (once again):

Do you remember any of the ads that you watch on YouTube?

I highly doubt you would, unless you view an ad from the same company again.

Ads are great for awareness, but they’re only effective as long as the company keeps paying for them.

Yapper leaderboards have now become a paid ads platform, where projects pay anyone to talk about them.

Based on the mindshare the account captures, they’re paid accordingly with an airdrop allocation.

But paid ads have a major problem:

Once projects stop paying (or offering incentives), no one will talk about them.

Who’s yapping about Newton or Story now?

Or maybe it’s because I’ve muted all of them.

If engagement and views are the only metrics that are being rewarded, then projects are essentially adopting a pay-per-view model.

(A mini rant) I talked about Caldera before they introduced their Yapper leaderboard and received zero Yapper allocation.

But it is what it is, maybe I should have posted gmera more.

One thing I loved was how accounts said that L2s were bearish (because it was cool to diss them).

But once Caldera launched their Yapper leaderboard, they suddenly changed their tone and said how L2s are the endgame.

It’ll be interesting to see how many of the top-ranked Yappers actually use the product.

Because the InfoFi will be shifting away from this current meta:

InfoFi’s problem is what kind of content it incentivises: engagement farming and slop.

Many feel like giving up on onchain activities and going all into yapping.

Since it’s all part of the game, and I’m likely an idiot for not going down that route.

But I’m confident that the algo will change.

Most of the InfoFi-related content is just noise with no added value to the project.

Just by looking at the leaderboard, we can tell what type of content the project is rewarding.

And they will realise it doesn’t make sense to pay so much money for low-quality ads that don’t convert.

Sooner or later, projects will choose to prioritise conversion instead of raw metrics.

While others will reward high-quality content:

The current state of low-quality ads will evolve into one that encourages thoughtful discussion and high-value content.

But I believe that social metrics alone will no longer be enough:

The meta is shifting towards long-term alignment, as projects are struggling with the retention problem.

Which is why I see @JumperExchange’s Time-Weighted Loyalty Scoring as the most ideal model.

Of course, I’m a huge beneficiary of this, so I’m biased.

But projects will shift towards rewarding long-term users, including long-term yappers.

This prevents gaming where any account with a significant following can jump in at the last moment to outrank everyone.

We’ll need both strong onchain and social metrics to get a good allocation.

Say what you want about Galxe, but their Starboard platform already does this:

And it makes the most sense to reward protocol users that share what they did on Twitter.

Ultimately, we could see projects choosing to use yapping as a multiplier on top of their onchain allocation.

In this way, it incentivises accounts to use the project first before talking about it.

So it’s time for a rethink if we’re relying too heavily on either side:

I’m leaving so much money on the table because I’m not ranking on any of the Yapper leaderboards.

But it all depends on what game you want to play:

• Short-term game: Extract as much profit with whatever social capital you have

• Long-term game: Choose to build a sustainable brand based on trust and value

Your brand is the most valuable asset that can stand the test of time (even if InfoFi falls).

So if you’re playing the long-term game:

Choose to build a strong brand that reflects your authentic self.

Following the similar playbook that currently works will eventually kill off your brand (since it decreases trust with your audience).

The ultimate skill to have right now is to yap about a project without it looking like a paid ad.

And that’s how we maintain trust with our audience while still qualifying for InfoFi airdrops along the way.

But there are multiple ways to monetise beyond just InfoFi airdrops too.

Ultimately, projects get to decide how they want to allocate their airdrop.

So what if Caldera chooses to reward yappers more than those who are active onchain?

Interacting with Caldera-powered rollups gave us X-in-1 stacking opportunities by gaining exposure to other tokenless infra.

There are other RaaS projects (like Conduit) that are still tokenless and will likely follow a similar onchain criteria as Caldera and Pyth.

I shared my entire strategy below:

The smartest airdrop hunters are stacking modular airdrops instead of chasing points.

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