The PYTH airdrop was a huge surprise for me, as it came out of nowhere.

Here's how I qualified for it:

I interacted with 3 decentralised applications (DApps) that used Pyth oracles for price data:

1. Polynomial
2. Synthetix
3. Solend

And all I did was complete some Layer3 quests.

I did not use them frequently, but it was enough to get me a decent allocation of PYTH tokens.

It's not just PYTH that awarded users:

• Dymension and Celestia awarded their tokens to wallets based on their onchain activity on Ethereum L2s (Arbitrum, Optimism, Metis)
• Avail awarded rollup users (for EVM wallets, it is possible that you had to interact on all 4 networks used for the criteria: Arbitrum, Optimism, ZKsync, and Polygon zkEVM)
• ZKFair distributed the $ZKF token based on gas fees spent on other zk-rollups
• Optimism used your activity on different Superchain L2s to determine your allocation for OP airdrop #5
• PENGU was distributed to Ethereum and Solana OGs (no criteria was released, but it was likely based on your onchain activity)
• Initia awarded an allocation to the top 2,000 LayerZero users, IBC users, and milkTIA holders

You benefit from using other protocols too

Vampire attacks are common when smaller projects try to gain market share.

They award tokens to entice users of established Web3 DApps to try out their new platform.