Trusting a project solely on the fact that the founders have titles from Standford is the same as trusting a politician because he has a Harvard title.
Mining requires solving a complex mathematical problem, that is why it's so computationally expensive and therefore requiring a high power consumption. Why do you think people have 12 SLI GPU builds to mine bitcoin if that could be done on a mobile phone? Easy, a "mining app" that works on your mobile phone and does not use power is not mining.
Cryptocurrency transactions rely on solving that specific complex mathematical problem. Therefore if there is no problem solving, there won't be any transaction in the close future.
Also, please note the pyramidal scheme they are building. The more "references" you have the higher the rate you "mine" that leads to people sharing their "invite codes" to keep building the pyramidal scheme. You can state that it's not a pyramidal scheme as you're not lending them any money.
And there is where the "click the mining button every 24hs" trick enter
Haven't you thought why on earth they are enforcing that? easy: the ads. If you weren't forced to open the app every 24hs, they wouldn't' be able to show you ads.
Every time you open the app to "mine" and an advert pops up, the Standford geniuses are getting a few cents.
Therefore, This Pi Network project is a (pretty damn smart I gotta say) scam to show you ads.
It also should be suspicious for you to you that there is literally no appearance of this "revolutionary cryptocurrency geniuses" giving explanations, more than a "White Paper" in the app that has been drafter March 2019 but hasn't been published in any recognised scientific journal yet.