I wouldn't call them popular, it is the same hype cycle we saw with ICO scams. Initially when the ICOs became hyped up, there were a lot of gamblers buying into them and we saw a lot of pumps. But eventually it started dying because in reality they are useless garbage!

But that didn't mean the end of the scam/hype. They kept changing the name and making small changes to produce something that looked new but in reality it was the same useless garbage that encouraged newbies to "bet" on with their hard earned money!

That "disease" has reached Bitcoin despite the fact that unlike token creation platforms you CANNOT create tokens on bitcoin blockchain and within its consensus rules.