Between August 8 and October 3, 2025, Ethos published weekly updates on its XP distribution, each one adjusting who earned XP and how much. Over those eight weeks, Ethos penalized low scores, made farming less effective, capped rewards at the top 2,500 contributors and, by October, required a vouch to earn anything at all.
This is a record of how XP worked on Ethos at the time.
August 8: score penalties and a sigmoid on farming
On Friday, August 8, 2025, Ethos distributed 15,500,000 XP for the week and listed three changes:
- An enforced penalty on scores below 1400
- Improved bonuses for scores above 1800
- A sigmoid function applied to activities that had been additive, to reduce the effectiveness of explicit farming. Ethos credited @erosAgent for this change.
The sigmoid change targeted activities where every extra action had added more XP, which made repeating them an easy way to farm. Ethos described the change as reducing the effectiveness of that kind of farming.
Ethos also sent out 3,836 invites. Replying to @erosAgent, Ethos said it felt more confident turning invites back on because of changes to the score, the weighting of the score and its ability to prevent further spam. It added that it was still actively monitoring the new invites.
August 15: “farmers depleted”
On August 15, Ethos announced that the week’s XP was out with a short summary: farmers depleted, and validators, believers, developers and the community rewarded. There were no invites that week.
August 29: top 2,500 only
On August 29, Ethos distributed 14 million XP with these changes:
- Only the top 2,500 contributors of that week received XP
- Validator owners who used their validator as their profile picture on X received larger rewards
- Other adjustments
The post also said Ethos had “nerfed anyone with the word ‘farmer’ in their X handle.” Ethos followed up shortly after to say that line was a joke.
Ethos said the following week would be a double XP week, with 28 million XP available. The posts collected here don’t record how that week turned out.
The weekly leaders were:
- @dragossden: 270k
- @eskacie: 249k
- @0xJohannes_: 244k
- @porkbus: 148.5k
- @0xGeeGee: 122k
- @quadwitch: 90k
- @peceka: 90k
- @stellarobject1: 69.8k
- @yukokosaka: 66.8k
- @0xak_: 64.7k
Ethos also distributed 3,390 invites to accounts that had been active in the previous 24 hours and had no invite available to give to someone else. Ethos expected some spam to follow but said it thought it could handle it. A bug briefly hid some of these invites from users; Ethos looked into it and reported soon after that invites were showing up properly.
September 12: halfway through the season
On September 12, Ethos said week 13 had brought 14,000,000 XP to contributors. Again, only the top 2,500 weekly active users by XP received any. Ethos said the algorithm had been adjusted, sharing the details in an image, and noted the season was halfway done.
It also granted around 3 invites to anyone who had been active in the previous 24 hours and had no invites to give.
September 19: XP is zero sum
On September 19, Ethos distributed 14m XP and reminded users that XP is zero sum and that rewards would go down over time. It added, tongue in cheek: “Good thing it’s completely useless, right?”
The top earners that week were:
- @dragossden: 316k
- @eskacie: 187k
- @quadwitch: 139k
- @0xJohannes_: 134k
- @porkbus: 92k
- @0xCragHack: 90k
- @0xGeeGee: 89k
- @MutantMatt0x: 89k
- @0xak_: 84k
- @MrNeverPullsOut: 82k
- @irmelvin: 79k
- @stellarobject1: 76k
- @mrseven_1: 72k
September 26: hard going below 1400
On September 26, week 15 distributed 14m XP. Only the top 2,500 of about 10,000 weekly active contributors were rewarded. Ethos warned users to be careful not to grab the “thorny rose,” adding that season 2 was full of them.
Ethos also gave a direct heads-up: accounts with scores under 1400 were likely to find it very difficult to earn XP, and that was working as intended.
October 3: no vouch, no XP
On October 3, Ethos rewarded 13.8m XP to 2,500 contributors, with a new condition: XP went only to those who had vouched for someone or been vouched for by someone else. Ethos summed it up as “skin in the game.”
Ethos said only 84m XP remained in the season, with 10 weeks to go. It also distributed 1 invite to any user who had no invites to give and had been active in the previous 5 days.
The pattern across the eight weeks
- Weekly XP held around 14 million, starting at 15.5 million and dipping to 13.8 million
- Rewards narrowed to the top 2,500 contributors each week
- Low scores were penalized, with accounts under 1400 told they would struggle to earn XP
- Anti-farming changes, including the sigmoid function, reduced the value of repetitive activity
- Vouching became a requirement to earn XP
- Invites returned in batches, aimed at recently active users with none left to give
This story first appeared on X.
