Remember the last airdrop season? A large number of participants received free tokens and were ecstatic. But what happened next? The tokens kept falling in value, and eventually, everyone lost their investment. This model of relying on project teams "spreading money" to sustain itself cannot go far. It not only drains community enthusiasm but also makes people start to ask: Is there a more practical and sustainable way to distribute value in Web3?

The answer is yes. The logic of top protocols is shifting—from "inflation subsidies" to "real profits" and "protocol-controlled value." Simply put: the protocol needs to be able to generate revenue itself and then distribute profits to builders, users, and holders.

Let's look at how a leading stablecoin protocol operates. Its revenue sources are very straightforward: first, stablecoin service fees, where users pay a fee each time they mint or redeem; second, liquidation premiums, where liquidators buy collateral at a discount when it hits the liquidation threshold, and the difference goes to the protocol.

All these real revenues flow into the protocol's community treasury. And the ownership of this money belongs to the token stakers. In other words, those who hold and stake tokens are the true beneficiaries.