Kaito AI quickly rose to prominence with its “Yap-to-Earn” model, attracting thousands of users who earned significant rewards through airdrop campaigns.
However, following the launch of its KAITO token, the project faced widespread criticism regarding the token’s real-world utility.
Kaito is now undergoing major structural changes to rebuild its ecosystem and restore community trust.
“Yap-to-Earn”: Turning Posts Into Real Money
Launched in December 2024, Kaito AI’s “Yap-to-Earn” program sparked a wave of engagement across Platform X. Users simply needed to share content related to partner projects on social media to accumulate Yap Points, which then made them eligible for airdrops from partners like Initia, Wayfinder, and others.
Kaito’s scoring system uses AI-driven analysis to evaluate content quality, user engagement, and network influence, ensuring that meaningful contributions are properly rewarded. Yap points rely on three key factors: how many posts you make, how much interaction you get (likes, comments, reposts), and how credible you are within the network.
Many users have reported substantial earnings through the program. One standout case is from the project Wayfinder (PROMPT), users who reached the “emerging yapper” tier (100+ posts) and shared relevant content were rewarded with 5,000–20,000 $PROMPT tokens, worth more than $1,500 USD.
“Thank you Kaito, thank you Wayfinder, thank you anonymous upper Korean,” one user humorously posted on X. They also revealed receiving 1,000 tokens from Initia simply for being an active yapper on Kaito, even without having interacted with its testnet.
Learn more: Initial Price Prediction
In the case of Morpheus (MOR), users who engaged with narrative threads and responded to community-driven prompts earned 3,000-8,000 MOR, depending on their engagement metrics. Other notable airdrop allocations for social contribution include Berachain and Story Protocol, which are considered the top Layer 1s in the crypto market.
Some early Yappers even reported receiving double-digit rewards across multiple campaigns, stacking tokens from different partner projects just by maintaining a strong on-chain presence and a consistent posting rhythm on X.
PROMPT price – Source: TradingView
Through simple “social allo” activities – sharing content on social media, users have gained access to high-quality airdrops from promising Web3 projects, highlighting the long-term potential of the Yap-to-Earn model.
Without requiring capital investment or complex interactions like traditional testnets, Kaito is creating a new entry point for everyday users to earn real value from the crypto space.
Kaito’s Return to Relevance
After the early success of its “Yap-to-Earn” program, the Kaito AI community placed high hopes on the KAITO launch in February 2025, believing it would complete the ecosystem. However, those hopes quickly gave way to a wave of criticism.
Many users who received the initial allocation offloaded their tokens quickly, citing unclear long-term value, low immediate utility, and a widening gap between the token’s role and the ecosystem’s most rewarding activities.
The issues stem not only from the low airdrop allocation (just 10% of total supply) but also from the lack of meaningful utility tied to the token. At the time of TGE, users primarily used KAITO for staking and governance participation through Kaito Connect — an activity many saw as internal and disconnected from more lucrative opportunities like airdrops and leaderboards that mostly rewarded Yappers.
This imbalance didn’t go unnoticed: while Yappers (users who actively post on X to accumulate Yap points) received tokens from projects like Initia, Morpheus, and Wayfinder, those who staked KAITO – arguably the most committed supporters, received no tangible benefits from simply holding the token.
“Yappers are making thousands from airdrops, but I’ve held since TGE and haven’t gotten anything,” one Discord user said.
In fact, the current system renders KAITO staking nearly pointless. If all it takes is spamming on X to qualify for airdrops, then why bother holding the token long-term?
The lack of utility and the unbalanced reward structure have made it difficult for KAITO’s price to gain sustained traction while also fueling growing skepticism around the platform’s future direction.
Read more: Kaito Introduces $KAITO Token to Revolutionize Attention Economy
This has prompted the Kaito team to accelerate a major update to Kaito Connect, shifting from traditional voting mechanics to a new “alignment signals” model, combining Yap points and sKAITO to rebalance incentives and restore fairness across the ecosystem.
Kaito Connect: Restructuring the Ecosystem
In response to community feedback, Kaito AI has announced a major overhaul of the Kaito Connect platform. The system will shift from a traditional voting model to an “alignment signals” mechanism, leveraging both Yap points and sKAITO (staked KAITO tokens).
This is good my only issues is with the kaito staking part (sKAITO) and the whole launchpad thing.
Unless they’re is a capped number of sKAITO to stake and earn incentive from a specific project it would just be a whales game giving people with limited liquid can only buy and… https://t.co/OywZmY8XAt
— Harrison! (@OfficialFlokiy) April 16, 2025
Specifically, users will be able to allocate Yap points and sKAITO to the projects they support, leading to:
- Increased visibility: Projects with more Yap points will rank higher on the Yapper leaderboard
- Reward sharing: Users who stake sKAITO on specific projects will receive corresponding rewards, such as allocations from launchpad campaigns
Additionally, owning a Kaito Genesis NFT will grant users a multiplier bonus on both Yap and sKAITO, amplifying benefits for active participants in the ecosystem.
To prepare for these changes, the current voting system will pause after April 16, 2025.
Conclusion
The restructuring of Kaito Connect marks a pivotal shift for the Kaito AI ecosystem – one that seeks to bridge the gap between its two core communities: the socially active Yappers and the long-term KAITO token holders.
By introducing a new alignment model that integrates both Yap points and sKAITO, Kaito is signaling its commitment to more equitable incentives and sustainable engagement. While early experiments with Yap-to-Earn showed that users can monetize attention and virality, the real challenge now is to deliver lasting value to token holders and strengthen KAITO’s utility.
