The Broken Promise of Fair Launches
When you hear “fair launch” in crypto today, I think we all know it doesn’t mean what it used to. The term once represented something pure—equal access for everyone, no special treatment, no hidden advantages. But looking at the current landscape, it’s become more of a marketing catchphrase than a genuine principle.
I remember when Bitcoin was held up as the gold standard of fair launches. No venture capital rounds, no foundation treasury, no presale. But when you really examine it, the story gets complicated. For that first year, Satoshi controlled most of the network—some estimates say around 70%. Early mining was essentially a premine by another name.
The DeFi Summer Illusion
Fast forward to 2020’s DeFi Summer, and fair launch became fashionable again. Projects like Yearn Finance claimed fair distribution, but providing liquidity wasn’t something everyone could do—it required capital and technical knowledge. These launches became vulnerable to vampire attacks, where forks would promise better yields and reward the same insiders repeatedly.
What struck me was how “fair” came to mean little more than “we didn’t do an ICO.” The system kept rewarding early participants while creating barriers for newcomers. Each new fork claimed to be fairer than the last, but the pattern remained the same.
The Presale Standard Takes Over
Now we’ve shifted to what I’d call the presale standard. Ethereum’s ICO in 2015 set the pattern—raising millions before any blocks were mined. Solana, Aptos, Sui—they all followed the same playbook. Hundreds of millions raised, huge allocations to insiders.
What bothers me is how we’ve normalized this. Five percent insider allocation is now considered “fair enough.” But whether it’s 5% or 35%, the principle is compromised. Users aren’t buying into a network—they’re buying out early backers.
What Fair Launch Really Means
I think we’ve lost sight of what fair launch was supposed to be about. It wasn’t about percentages on a spreadsheet. It was about whether the smallest contribution to a network gets equal treatment, whether you join on day one or year ten.
The real test is simple: does the network treat all contributors as equals forever? Are insider allocations zero at the network layer? Is on-chain inflation inclusive and auditable?
By that standard, almost every project today fails. Presales and foundation treasuries create deferred inflation that users have to absorb. Liquidity mining restricts participation to those with capital. Unlock schedules build in exit liquidity for insiders.
For a true fair launch, the protocol needs to stand on its own utility, independent of token prices. Founders should earn from building services people want, not from token appreciation. When a protocol’s survival depends on token demand, fairness is already compromised.
Perhaps the most frustrating part is that fair launch remains the only foundation for durable crypto networks. Networks that privilege insiders will always fracture because someone can always fork the code and promise a better deal. But when fairness is absolute and product value drives growth, there’s nothing left to fork against.
Communities stay because they’re treated as equals, not because of speculative incentives. Fair launch should be crypto’s social contract—a commitment that no matter when you arrive, you stand on equal ground with everyone else. But right now, that promise feels broken.
