【Exposé】Side→Bitway (BTW): Rebrand and token change, airdrop migration left unfinished; Binance connections paved the way, while longtime holders still haven't received their tokens
@cz_binance @heyibinance, bosses, this isn't an attempt to pick a fight. I'm asking you to weigh in based on public information.
In November 2024, this project was still called Side Protocol. It launched the SIDE Genesis Drop airdrop, with registration open from 11/26 to 12/15. The promise was to distribute 100 million tokens to active BTC users, Cosmos stakers, and testnet participants. A bunch of people I know registered.
Let's go through the project's history, one issue at a time:
1. In December 2024, Side first raised funds through an LBP pool on Solana, then turned around and announced: “Issuance canceled, refunds issued, no token launch on Solana.” The Genesis Drop was changed to fully unlocked. What happened to the promised refunds for early buyers? The community still hasn't been given an answer.
2. In August 2025, it suddenly rebranded as Bitway and announced funding from YZi Labs (formerly Binance Labs). CEO Shane Qiu is a former core member of YZi/Binance Labs—that's the reason it was able to make a high-profile appearance in Binance Wallet Booster and ride Binance's traffic. Anyone with eyes can see that connections in Binance circles paved the way.
3. The biggest trap: SIDE had a total supply of 1 billion. After the rebrand, the total supply of BTW ballooned to 10 billion—a 10x increase. How many BTW can old SIDE holders actually exchange for? The project has never given a written commitment, only vaguely saying that “holders' shares won't be diluted.” Whales insist it's a 10x conversion, but has anyone seen that in writing?
4. The migration was left unfinished. The old side.one website and Genesis claim page have long been inaccessible. For people who registered at the end of 2024, the conversion details are still unclear even after the rebrand. Boxmining issued a direct warning: don't connect to fake “SIDE claim” pages or pay unlocking fees—which shows that phishing scams are already exploiting this unfinished mess to rip people off.
5. The valuation narrative is all over the place. Publicly reported funding totals only about $6 million, yet FDV estimates vary from tens of millions to over $4 billion, depending on the source. The seed-round price was about $0.0027; at the peak, that would mean paper gains of 150x or more. The top 10 addresses control 96% of the tokens, and the top 25 control 99%. On-chain liquidity has been rated “high risk,” and to date there has been no CertiK audit or bug bounty program.
A project that made a high-profile distribution through the Binance ecosystem has left its old airdrop users' tokens stuck in a “Schrödinger's migration.” Could listing and Alpha due diligence include checks on whether historical airdrops were delivered and whether the rights of longtime holders are guaranteed in writing? That's more relevant to retail investor trust than however many memecoins get listed.
(Sources: public reports and announcements from PANews, CoinGabbar, Boxmining, altFins, and SunCrypto. Not investment advice; DYOR.)
@cz_binance @heyibinance, bosses, this isn't an attempt to pick a fight. I'm asking you to weigh in based on public information.
In November 2024, this project was still called Side Protocol. It launched the SIDE Genesis Drop airdrop, with registration open from 11/26 to 12/15. The promise was to distribute 100 million tokens to active BTC users, Cosmos stakers, and testnet participants. A bunch of people I know registered.
Let's go through the project's history, one issue at a time:
1. In December 2024, Side first raised funds through an LBP pool on Solana, then turned around and announced: “Issuance canceled, refunds issued, no token launch on Solana.” The Genesis Drop was changed to fully unlocked. What happened to the promised refunds for early buyers? The community still hasn't been given an answer.
2. In August 2025, it suddenly rebranded as Bitway and announced funding from YZi Labs (formerly Binance Labs). CEO Shane Qiu is a former core member of YZi/Binance Labs—that's the reason it was able to make a high-profile appearance in Binance Wallet Booster and ride Binance's traffic. Anyone with eyes can see that connections in Binance circles paved the way.
3. The biggest trap: SIDE had a total supply of 1 billion. After the rebrand, the total supply of BTW ballooned to 10 billion—a 10x increase. How many BTW can old SIDE holders actually exchange for? The project has never given a written commitment, only vaguely saying that “holders' shares won't be diluted.” Whales insist it's a 10x conversion, but has anyone seen that in writing?
4. The migration was left unfinished. The old side.one website and Genesis claim page have long been inaccessible. For people who registered at the end of 2024, the conversion details are still unclear even after the rebrand. Boxmining issued a direct warning: don't connect to fake “SIDE claim” pages or pay unlocking fees—which shows that phishing scams are already exploiting this unfinished mess to rip people off.
5. The valuation narrative is all over the place. Publicly reported funding totals only about $6 million, yet FDV estimates vary from tens of millions to over $4 billion, depending on the source. The seed-round price was about $0.0027; at the peak, that would mean paper gains of 150x or more. The top 10 addresses control 96% of the tokens, and the top 25 control 99%. On-chain liquidity has been rated “high risk,” and to date there has been no CertiK audit or bug bounty program.
A project that made a high-profile distribution through the Binance ecosystem has left its old airdrop users' tokens stuck in a “Schrödinger's migration.” Could listing and Alpha due diligence include checks on whether historical airdrops were delivered and whether the rights of longtime holders are guaranteed in writing? That's more relevant to retail investor trust than however many memecoins get listed.
(Sources: public reports and announcements from PANews, CoinGabbar, Boxmining, altFins, and SunCrypto. Not investment advice; DYOR.)