The only payments are the gas fees which are inherent in any ETH contract, the creators gain nothing from those fees. They DO get money from those who bought into the ICO but that's an investors decision. The cost to get the airdrop was negligible, and it was entirely optional, so pay and hope the tiny cluster fraction gains value, or don't and have no worries about your own money.
LOL....Okay....44 cents per contract call....for a 0.000002 cent stake! If that makes sense to you, go for it. Gas fees are used to execute a contract. In this case, the contract executed "mines" new token for the token creators and token ICO purchasers, but not the airdroppers....make sense?
EDIT: It's like the older boy who gave the younger boy 2 brand new pennies for his old worn out dime!