Proof of Work - 2009.
ICO - 2014.
Airdrops - 2020.

Now, web3 is beginning to enter a new era - Progressive Ownership (revenue sharing).

What will change?

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A few months ago, I read an article from Variant (a VC with $500M AUM, investments in Uniswap, ZkSync, Aptos, etc.)

Progressive Ownership: A Model for Application Tokens.

Ideas from this article are already starting to be implemented.

ICO, Airdrops - turned out to be not quite effective for motivating organic users.

Creating long-term network growth is a priority for projects.

People, however, are interested in profit in the moment, not in the further development of the network.

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What is the essence of Progressive Ownership?

Revenue sharing - all this stimulates growth, strengthens loyalty.

Under this model, users receive a share of the revenue (for example, ETH or stablecoins).

If desired, they can convert it into the project's token.

Interest is formed, dedicated supporters appear, wishing for the long-term success of the network.

Case with Uniswap. Recently, the project proposed to distribute protocol fees among $UNI holders.

As a result - the growth of $UNI token by 75% in the moment, $DYDX - 33%, $COMP - 25%.

Users are interested in the model, the narrative has already been launched.

Other projects are starting to move in this direction.

The founder of BLUR considers the concept of revenue distribution (growth of $BLUR by ~25%).

Emergence of projects implementing revenue sharing (Mode Network, Superfluid, Blackbird)

Thanks to this model, users are more economically interested.

A bright example is Zora. A portion of the revenues is allocated to creators and developers. Around ~2280 ETH has already been distributed among users.

Revenue sharing is a powerful lure with an obvious scaling effect.

We continue to adopt the experience of web2, not only in terms of UX/UI but also the basic tenets.

YouTube, Twitter, Substack, OnlyFans - all these projects share their revenue.

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Now, global changes are beginning to emerge.

The trend of sharing revenue will live on.

I advise paying attention to projects somehow related to Uniswap.

To observe the development of projects in which Variant is an investor.

It's possible that Variant prompted Uniswap to such decisions (invested in series A, B).
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TL;DR - Progressive Ownership

• Creating products that meet user needs.

• Distributing revenues on-chain to ensure growth, retention.

• Providing the opportunity to increase ownership level (exchanging revenue for tokens).