A lot of people understand cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology in general as a magical way to make money, easily and passively. A few sensational articles about average people who mined bitcoin in 2010 and became rich a few years later - instill in beginners' mind the wrong idea about the entire crypto space.
Proof of this claim is the presence of a large number of scam websites and projects aimed at attracting investors with marketing based on a new, "revolutionary" technology that enables unrealistic returns on investment. The marketing of such fraudsters always follows global trends, and these are currently cryptocurrencies and blockchain.
The reality is that the "formula" for creating a source of passive income has never changed. What has changed in this regard is the availability of this "formula", because, with the development of information technology and the widespread use of the Internet, all information is available to everyone regardless of social status, ethnic origin, nationality, religion, and wealth.

Blockchain and bitcoin entered our world "through the back door" almost imperceptibly after the 2008 financial crisis. The project was trusted by a handful of people, mostly cryptographers, programmers, and IT experts from cypherpunk circles. Only passion and the realization that they can make some significant change in the world (with a lot of hard work) led them to their current status - it was no accident.
I entered the crypto world in 2017 after earning a master's degree in economics and through those few years "full-time in crypto" learned and experienced the shaping of a new, fairer, more functional economy. Below I will write a few tips that I learned during that time so you may find some of them useful.

 1. Start without an initial investment - there are a lot of crypto projects where you can make money by working, participating in building a project, or even using the protocol itself. Entering blindly with money is equal to gambling.

 2. Education first - educate yourself about DLT( Distributed Ledger Technology), blockchain, and cryptocurrencies. Start reading the whitepaper of the project you are interested in (I would recommend Bitcoin whitepaper first), follow the forums, read articles, watch podcasts, follow industry specialized blogs, reports, posts, etc. First look at what you are dealing with so you will be able to build a better strategy.

 3. Create your due diligence framework - over time you develop an analytical approach when evaluating the fundamental values of a project. With a well-made framework with as many quantitative and qualitative factors as possible, you create a better filter when building a portfolio. It also helps you avoid scams and missed projects.

 4. Build your crypto ecosystem – create an online routine based on blockchain projects for the reason that they replace intermediary in any interaction with the consensus algorithms.
So for example Brave browser rewards users for watching promotional ads unlike Chroma or Opera, decentralized search engine Presearch pays the user 0.25 PRE tokens for each search while Google does not have such a practice, blogging platform Publish0x allows you to give content creator and yourself a tip for reading content, etc. Carefully choose the projects you intend to use and bring referrals to them. You don’t want to find yourself in a position to waste your time or lose credibility with a wrong recommendation.

 5. Participate in the consensus mechanism of various crypto protocols – learning by doing is the best approach to understand things "under the hood". Don't use cloud mining websites but rather invest in your hardware because in that case, you depend on yourself. I would recommend mining with graphics cards because you are more flexible in terms of market changes and do not require additional spatial conditions such as ASICs miners, and the GPU also has liquidation value as a component. Or you can participate in Proof-of-stake and earn a yield on your assets, provide liquidity in Defi protocols depend on your interests. 

 6. Actively participate in project forums – follow the saying – "if you are the smartest person in the room then you are in the wrong room". I learned the most by arguing on a forum with people who have more knowledge than me.

 7. Connect your profession and interests with the crypto area - so you will connect with the crypto community faster which will give you extra motivation. From my experience, I argue that serious projects reward your contribution.

I hope the above recommendations will help you find your way around this still-young industry, which has enormous potential to change the way we operate in online interactions.
My opinion is that a passive source of income creates knowledge, work, and persistence over a certain period with no shortcuts. What makes crypto space special is that you depend on yourself.