There is a symbiotic relationship between airdrop farmers and network owners/insiders. The heightened network activity due to airdrop speculation leads to more TVL, more users, more dapps and the ability to raise at higher and higher valuations. Of course, it also leads to more tx revenue, but that's peanuts compared to driving up the private equity and token valuations due to the perception of more adoption. They're not strictly for users, those users are also providing a service of adding increased perception of economic activity and network adoption.
My slightly pessimistic perspective:
There is a symbiotic relationship between airdrop farmers and network owners/insiders. The heightened network activity due to airdrop speculation leads to more TVL, more users, more dapps and the ability to raise at higher and higher valuations. Of course, it also leads to more tx revenue, but that's peanuts compared to driving up the private equity and token valuations due to the perception of more adoption. They're not strictly for users, those users are also providing a service of adding increased perception of economic activity and network adoption.
The business case is legal risk mitigation relating to securities not user acquisition.