Dialogue with Pump.Fun Lianchuang: I don’t think my products have killed the market cycle, Meme coins will continue to exist

Organize & compile: Shenchao TechFlow

Guest: Alon, co-founder of Pump.Fun

Podcast source: Bankless

Summary of key points

Alon, co-founder of Pump.Fun, joins us to discuss the rapid development of their token launch platform, the controversy and impact of Memecoins in the crypto space, and the vision of their latest product, PumpSwap.

This issue provides Alon with a fair opportunity to explain his views on Memecoins, while also not to ignore the central role of Pump.Fun, once one of the most controversial capital operations in the industry. From the initial harmless speculation to a structured and systematic capital plunder, ultimately concentrating wealth in the hands of a few people and resulting in large losses of capital.

Memecoins may essentially be similar to the public health impact of tobacco, with inevitable negative effects. I believe the Pump.Fun team may not agree with this because their interests are contrary to that. But we are still in the early stages of the crypto field, and also in the early stages of Memecoins' development. The future has not yet been determined. Memecoins could have a more positive future. Ultimately, Memecoins is just a natural result of crypto-enabled technology – empowering people with the ability to create financial assets without permission. So whether we like them or not, whether they are threats to the public interest or the first step towards a more equitable future, the outcome of this will be shaped by leaders in the Memecoins industry.

Wonderful view summary

• The essence of Memecoins is a “tradable unit of attention” whose value is closely related to the attention given by users.

• I strongly disagree with the statement that “Pump.Fun kills the market cycle”.

• I believe Memecoins will continue to exist in some form, because they do provide some value to the user, which takes time to prove.

• I hope Memecoins’ narrative can change so that people no longer think that trading these tokens on-chain is worthless or nihilistic. I never agree with the so-called "financial nihilism". This statement is just an excuse on Crypto Twitter to rationalize the current market situation.

• Twitter is not an ideal platform because its mechanisms tend to intensify emotions and conflicts among users. Therefore, many people often have a large deviation between their perception of other ecosystems and their actual situation.

• The cryptocurrency field essentially has strong social attributes, and this characteristic runs throughout the ecosystem.

• I don't want Pump.Fun to be a short-term product that only exists for a year or two.

• Pump.Fun’s success is mainly due to the advantages of our products. We always listen to user feedback, constantly iterate, and launch functions that truly meet user needs.

• The only goal I wake up every day is to think about how to make this product more sustainable and how to make users truly feel value when interacting with protocols or applications. This is what we always pursue.

• Direct conversation with users is a great way to get feedback on their market perceptions and help us build a deep understanding of the market conditions at that time.

• Many people devote too much time and energy to building infrastructure. But if no one uses these infrastructures, their existence does not make sense.

• I believe that anything of cultural significance, especially controversial content, is always exploring the boundary between acceptance and unacceptance. But we will make sure to draw a clear line and make sure no one crosses the line.

The founding of Pump.Fun

David:

Maybe you can briefly introduce your origins, your background, and your experience before Pump.Fun, and then start talking about the conception and creation of Pump.Fun.

Alon:

We have been in this field for a while about myself and my two co-founders. We all enter this field as retail traders, buying BTC, ETH, Doge, etc.

Over time, our interest in the industry has become increasingly strong and we have participated in several different projects. I personally have been deeply involved in a project called NFT perp, a futures exchange focused on NFT.

At that time, we were very active in DeFi and we saw that this market has its potential. Taking NFT perp as an example, we see the product market adaptability of collectible transactions. But after the events of Terra Luna and FTX, we realized that the market was falling and the prospects for NFT may not be as long as we thought.

So we want to try some new ideas. I quit that position and started experimenting with two of my co-founders on a variety of different ideas we have in this field. In fact, we are mainly developing on Ethereum and its L2s, which many people may not know. We came from the Ethereum ecosystem, started with NFT, and later developed something in SocialFi, almost from scratch and went through a difficult process.

I would say that we spent at least a year in a state of “glass gnawing.” One of my co-founders would even say that it might be longer, more than two years, just keep iterating, releasing MVPs (minimum viable products), working for what we think people will need. Honestly, when we started, we weren 't good at the work, we built things that we thought were cool, or trends that we thought the market would be, but weren't really built for today's users. We have not really had in-depth communication with our users, nor have we built products that can solve their current problems.

As we continue to iterate and try more things, our skills gradually improve. But the problem is that we do not understand the problem areas we construct. I think we were trying to build a creator fundraising market at the time, but we were not content creators. The reason we enter cryptocurrencies is on-chain transactions, NFT transactions, buying NFTs, and so on. Ultimately, when we saw people start trading Memecoins on Solana, we found it interesting. Honestly, we felt a little hesitant about turning to Solana because we had never used it before and we were developing it very well on Ethereum. I think our last project was before moving to Solana, and developing Solana was a pain at that time and we were not expecting it. But at that time, we were very eager to attract users, and users were indeed on Solana. So we decided to go there.

From my point of view, or from my co-founder's perspective, they would definitely say that if the user is on Cardano, we will also go to Cardano to build products and do everything possible to acquire users. We saw users on Solana and started experimenting with products there, and there was a lot of excitement in the market and we felt like we were at the beginning of a new trend. The transaction process is very smooth and fast. We enjoy using Phantom wallets, on-chain transactions, such as trading on Jupiter, etc. But we noticed some major problems with the market structure, the way people explore the currency, the way they create it, and ultimately what they trade. What was very popular at the time was that people pre-sale Memecoins. They will post wallet addresses on Twitter or elsewhere and people will send the funds there. We 've seen a lot of people send their SOLs to these pre-sales, and half the time, the currency hasn't been successfully launched, and it's a total farce. There is no standardization at all, and everyone doesn't know what to expect. Even if everything goes well, it is totally ridiculous that those who create these currencies will spend 50% of their funds on marketing. You don't have to spend millions of dollars promoting your Memecoins, it's all meaningless. At the same time, trading on AMMs or DEXs is very painful. Drawing liquidity from liquidity pools, buying honey pots, and buying the currency that will consume your entire wallet is a very cruel experience.

In the Ethereum ecosystem, I think there is more to explore behind this project, such as its final performance and whether there are management issues. But I really appreciate the idea that you can create a small token community without investing money in advance. By binding curves, liquidity can be initiated based on just one idea.

So the model we finally proposed is that you don 't need to invest money in advance to create currency. When enough people are involved, or the market indicates success, the liquidity pool will be created and destroyed. All permissions and related content of the created currency will be recovered from the currency creator. So once created, it is truly permissionless and tamper-free. When we released this model to the market, we quickly noticed its effectiveness. Although it took us a while to get it working, we are very optimistic about some of the product's prospects.

Pump.Fun's performance after release

David:

This reminds me of the times before Pump. Perhaps the most typical example is this Slurf, we have a Solana developer who publicly stated that he would pre-sale his Memecoins, but there was no Pump.Fun at the time. So he just sent the money to this trustworthy person, who managed it, and then launched Memecoins, adding SOL to the liquidity pool, which is how Memecoins was launched. Then, in this incident, he accidentally burned liquidity tokens because he didn't know what he was doing. And that famous tweet that reads: “Guys, I think I accidentally burned liquidity tokens, I’m sorry.”

I think this illustrates the chaotic status quo of the Memecoins market before Pump came out. Pump provides a commercialized platform that allows users to publish Memecoins in a more regulated environment. In this way, users no longer need to trust an influencer or individual, but can directly complete the issuance of tokens through the pump.fun platform.

How long did you spend in January 2024 attracting users? Will it take effect immediately? When did you realize, “Oh, we just created something amazing”? How long has this cognition been in the Pump ecosystem?

Alon:

I think we were confident in this project when we first conceived the idea, even before it was released. Unlike other products we developed before, this time we are truly integrated into the ecosystem. We know the importance of lowering the barrier to entry. Previously, a token required several thousand dollars of liquidity to be considered valuable. You can certainly see some liquidity pools that are only $50, but no one will buy it, right? So we were very confident in this idea from the beginning and quickly launched a Minimum Viable Product (MVP).

Honestly, the product at that time was very rough and clumsy. We just wanted to quickly verify whether this idea is worth continuing to develop. After the product was launched, although there were not many users, their response was very enthusiastic. This made us realize that the project has the potential to continue to grow, and it also received a lot of feedback to help us discover where the platform needs to improve. So, we began to iterate the product quickly.

At the same time, the problem we face is that Pump.Fun is a market that connects token creators and buyers. At that time, it was mainly concentrated on Memecoins, but other types of tokens were also supported. The cold start problem refers to how to attract early users, because most people were trading in other markets or exchanges at the time. It is a huge challenge to get them to move to our platform. We need to attract token creators and buyers at the same time. Buyers want to see a certain amount of transaction volume and activity, otherwise the platform will not be attractive to them.

In fact, we never paid any influencers and didn’t have enough funds to do these things. Our startup capital is only about $100,000, which is simply not enough to cover the promotional expenses. So we adopted a different strategy – talk directly to the user . I personally sent messages to more than 3,000 people introducing our ideas. It's not simply copying and pasting spam, but actually communicating with users, greeting them, and understanding their ideas. We have not overcomplicated this process. We talked directly to them and asked what they were trading and why they were doing this, which was a great way to get feedback on their perception of the market and helped us build a deep understanding of the market conditions at that time.

Eventually, after building a report like this, we could say, “Hey, I’m building this thing.” At first, I had only 200 followers, people thought I was a robot, but after a while, people started listening to us. Finally, after two months of iteration, we even launched a Pump.Fun on Ethereum L2, but it didn't work out. We tried a lot of things when it comes to product, but what we need in the end is to optimize the product to make it good enough while showing it to enough people.

About a year ago, we really realized that the product fits with the market demand. At the time, two micro-influencers released their own tokens on our platform. It is worth mentioning that we did not pay them and we did not know they would do so. They just thought the product was interesting and used it spontaneously. Since then, more and more people have begun to experience our platform.

It feels great and is probably one of the most exciting moments I’ve ever experienced in the past few years. Waking up every day and seeing the volume of trading continues to hit new highs, the feeling of this effort pays off is unparalleled. Even though Pump.Fun was a huge success later, the joy of finding a fit in the product market in the first place is still one of my most cherished memories.

The impact of Pump.Fun on Memecoins

David:

The trajectory of Pump.Fun is still impressive. By March 2025, the Memecoins field had a significant impact on the entire crypto industry. Overall, Memecoins has become a common phenomenon, similar to the Monkey craze in 2021. However, the reputation of cryptocurrencies may have fallen to its lowest point since the FTX crash in mainstream society, thanks to the launch of some large Memecoins. This structured and systematic interest extraction behavior seriously damages the industry's image and weakens people's seriousness and trust in the crypto industry.

Although Pump.Fun is not the creator of Memecoins, the emergence of Memecoins has existed long before it. For example, Dogecoin, it is the first Memecoins. However, Pump.Fun played a crucial role in driving the expansion of the Memecoins space, moving it from a cryptocurrency niche to a mainstream use case in today’s cryptocurrency. Can you talk about the role and influence of Pump.Fun in this cryptocurrency history stage?

Alon:

As you mentioned, the market for Memecoins has been around for a long time. I think Memecoins dates back over 10 years ago and evolved in many forms during this period. Many ICOs can actually be regarded as Memecoins, and the "food coins" in many DeFi projects also have similar characteristics to Memecoins. Even NFTs can be regarded as Memecoins in nature because they represent a transaction of cultural values ​​and people build communities around these ideas. This phenomenon not only exists in Ethereum, but also on other blockchains such as Binance Smart Chain and Solana.

I agree that Pump.Fun plays an important role in expanding the Memecoins ecosystem. It lowers the barrier to participation and provides the required underlying security. However, I don't think Memecoins itself is the main reason why cryptocurrencies can exist for more than 15 years. Many people think that the market is unattractive because it does not provide enough real value, not because people simply like to trade these "meaningless" Memecoins. This reflects the market demand for under-attractive use cases.

I strongly disagree with the statement that “Pump.Fun kills the market cycle” . If you created an L2 or L1 a few years ago but failed to get any user or product market fit and your tokens are worth $5 billion or $2 billion, you go to the conference and promise to build the future finance, obviously, when people lose a lot of money, they will be frustrated.

We should expect these things to happen, the crypto industry has been in development for 15 years, and it is time to see some substantial results. Those projects that ended up being successful are highly commendable. Hyperliquid is a good case, for example. They developed an excellent product that attracted a large number of users and the token allocation was very fair. People united to promote the project and eventually achieved great success, with the token price rising 10 times or even 15 times after its launch. This shows that the market has a huge demand for projects with practical application value, whether these use cases are speculative or non-speculative. However, such projects are still very few.

I think the root of the problem is that many people devote too much time and energy to building infrastructure. But if no one uses these infrastructures, their existence does not make sense. We need more application developers than infrastructure developers, probably 10 times or even more. I know this is a point that many thought leaders have been emphasizing for years, but Pump.Fun is a great example. It shows how to really test your infrastructure in practice by building a product that attracts users. Just like the significant improvements in Solana over the past year, this approach can drive the development of the entire ecosystem.

Make Memecoins more sustainable

David:

I think there is a recurring pattern in the development of cryptocurrencies, which can even be traced back to 2017. Why did the ICO (initial token issuance) craze emerge in 2017? This is because Ethereum's ICO was very successful, followed by Augur's ICO, both of which are legal and have real value. However, with the surge in the number of ICO projects, there are also some ridiculous, worthless virtual currency ICOs, or even just some Memes. This phenomenon is similar to the classic “euthanasia roller coaster” metaphor: a project with real value starts a cycle, such as DeFi’s launch of Compound governance tokens in the summer, which then triggers a chain reaction that eventually evolves into mining revenues that provide 10,000% APY. The NFT field has gone through a similar process. I think Memecoins is the same: initially launched some original and fair Memecoins, but it evolved into a highly speculative and interest extraction model.

I think the Memecoins boom is one of the most attractive phenomena in cryptocurrency history. If you can go back to the infancy of Pump.Fun, would you consider making some changes in design or construction to encourage more sustainable development? Or is this phenomenon completely beyond your control?

Alon:

There are a few points to talk about. I do think the market is a powerful existence. Ultimately, if that’s the essence of cryptocurrencies, then when market sentiment becomes fanatical, there’s actually very limited things you can do . These phenomena tend to occur repeatedly over time in similar patterns. But I do agree that there is still room for improvement in the mechanism. For example, we just launched PumpSwap yesterday to optimize the existing mechanism.

I think a major improvement point is the incentive alignment between token creators and holders, traders . Although creator revenue sharing has not been implemented on PumpSwap today, when it is implemented, creators will be allowed to earn from PumpSwap's transaction volume. This way, when their tokens succeed, they will have a strong incentive to maintain the value of the token instead of simply selling the token to cash out, but keeping their tokens relevant and active for as long as possible. I think this is a more sustainable model.

During the NFT boom, I had concerns about copyright fees. The copyright fees at that time were very high, even so high that users had to find ways to avoid them. But this model goes to another extreme and becomes a mechanism of overextraction. I think we need to find a balance point in the middle, which is one of the original intentions of creating PumpSwap. We hope to solve these problems through better mechanisms.

However, again, the nature of cryptocurrencies determines that it is often closely related to speculative behavior. Even tokens that initially appear in pure form may eventually go out of control because people constantly test their limits. For example, Libra is a classic example. Libra is a cryptocurrency project launched by Facebook, and while it is not really Memecoins, its failure reveals a problem: the fact that token issuance requires intermediary is ridiculous. If you just want to create some kind of token around a simple idea, you don't need to rely on these intermediaries at all.

This is also one of the original intentions that prompted us to create Pump.Fun. If Memecoins can open a new chapter and the mechanism can be improved accordingly for more sustainable development, we fully support this transformation. Because I don 't want Pump. Fun to be a short-term product that only exists for a year or two, and ultimately fail or disappear. Although we have achieved some success, if Pump.Fun cannot continue to exist in the next market cycle or in the next few years, it means failure. The only goal I wake up every day is to think about how to make this product more sustainable and how to make users truly feel value when interacting with protocols or applications. This is what we always pursue.

Pump.Fun's 4Chan Aesthetics

David:

My initial attitude toward Memecoins was resistant mainly because they exhibited a cold nature. They seem to convey an attitude: "We are not here to create any value. We are just here to participate in cartoon-like transactions, not to contribute to GDP growth, nor to try to build anything practical. We are just providing a meaningless, nihilistic speculative asset."

However, now my view has changed. While I am not fully accepting this nihilistic asset trading, I think there can be additional incentives in Memecoins to make them truly move in a more sustainable direction. I want to talk about this issue, especially the PumpSwap feature you recently announced. I think this feature may make Memecoins more productive and long-term.

A huge advantage of cryptocurrencies is that they allow ordinary people to access financial assets. Before Bitcoin was born, it was almost impossible for individuals to create financial assets. Bitcoin is the first asset created outside the national system. Since then, the development trend of cryptocurrencies has been to keep the threshold for asset creation lowered. I think Pump.Fun is a logical continuation of this trend, especially when you see it creates 9 million tokens in a year, which means 9 million financial assets.

My next question is, how do I transform these seemingly indifferent financial assets into sustainable business models ? How do we get them into economic growth? What is the cultural development trajectory of Pump.Fun? Back to the original design, Pump.Fun seems to have a 4Chan-style aesthetic and atmosphere. Why do you choose this design style?

Alon:

When we initially developed MVP (Minimum Viable Product), we chose this style for practical reasons because it is easier to implement. We just want to launch a product quickly. But on this basis, we continued to improve and decided to retain this style because we found it closely related to user behavior. Many of the initially successful Memecoins were launched on forums similar to 4Chan, and many users resonated deeply with these platforms. So we have continued this style since then. While there is still much to improve on the product in terms of user experience and other aspects, we believe that retaining this culture and paying tribute to its origins is an important difference between Pump.Fun and other projects that lack cultural connotations. Even if our goal is to expand our product to reach 10 million daily active users, we hope to continue to retain this culture. If you lose this, Pump.Fun becomes another soulless Web 2 product, which is not what we want.

David:

However, some may question whether 4Chan's culture is really considered a "rich culture." Although I am not an expert on 4Chan, in my understanding it is the "sewer" of the Internet, full of racism and other bad behaviors. Of course, I don't want to generalize, but it does seem like a "Wild West" unruly zone. In the cryptocurrency space in 2025, culture is often determined by the core leadership of these ecosystems. Ethereum’s culture is influenced by its leadership, so is Solana, and Pump.Fun is no exception. Therefore, I think some of the behaviors of Pump.Fun are determined by its design style and cultural choices.

If we hope Memecoins will open a new chapter that is more sustainable and fairer, I think 4Chan 's brand image may be a barrier. Do you agree with this view?

Alon:

Overall, I agree with this point, but I don’t think design styles will hinder our efforts to improve our culture. I think content regulation is extremely important. In the past, especially in the Ethereum ecosystem, many people found the Pump.Fun environment to be offensive, partly because of some of the events that occurred in November 2024. I want to make it clear that we have implemented content regulation from the very beginning. For example, in June 2024, we launched the live broadcast function, and many users started broadcasting their tokens live. This behavior is harmless and we think it would be interesting to support this function internally.

However, six months later, users began to question why we built these features, because the usage rate of live streaming features was very low at that time. But by October and November, as the market became hot, the live broadcast feature suddenly became very popular. I remember that in just a few days, the number of live broadcasts surged from 10 to thousands. Prior to this, Andrew Tate had traded tokens on live streams, and the entire market was experiencing volatility. When everything happens at the same time, the level of cryptocurrency is really incredible. I regret that we are not transparent enough in content regulation, which has led many people to mistakenly believe that we do not have regulatory standards. In fact, we have been enforcing content regulation but may not convey that very well.

As for the aesthetics of 4Chan, I don’t think it will hinder us from developing in a healthy way. I believe that anything of cultural significance, especially controversial content, is always exploring the boundary between acceptance and unacceptance. But we will make sure to draw a clear line and make sure no one crosses the line.

Content review of Pump.Fun

David:

Before, I had no idea that Pump.Fun had any form of content review. I always thought that 60,000 tokens were launched every day, and such a number was too large to be reviewed at all. Maybe you can briefly introduce how this audit system works? How did you conduct audits on such a large scale? I know not all 60,000 tokens have live broadcast functions, so can I share the specific process of the review system?

Alon:

Yes, it's really crazy that there are probably more than 60,000 tokens launched every day, close to 80,000. But here are a few points to be explained.

First, when a token is launched on the blockchain, its metadata is unchangeable. Most of this data interacts with users through front-end interfaces like Pump.Fun, or other similar websites. I'm not sure if other sites have reviewed, but Pump.Fun does attract a lot of traffic from users who want to interact with these tokens.

The challenge of content review is similar to that of social media platforms. It is indeed not easy to manage to have such a huge number of tokens online every day, but it is not impossible. Social media platforms generate a lot of content every second. Although this is different from text-based platforms such as Twitter, we have adopted a similar approach: combining an automated audit system and user reporting mechanism, and supplemented by manual auditing. A special challenge for Pump.Fun is that, especially in the Memecoins field, users are very keen to participate in the new token as early as possible. Therefore, many users like to view the tokens that have just been launched, which means we have little time to conduct a full review. Considering that tens of thousands of users are viewing new tokens in real time, we have to react in a few milliseconds. Therefore, we rely on an automated audit system and invest a lot of resources in manual auditing. Together, these two constitute the audit mechanism of the Pump.Fun front-end. Of course, this is not perfect, as users can also access to tokens through other front-end platforms. If those platforms do not conduct audits, it can lead to problems.

David:

I think Memecoins' mechanisms are interesting because they motivate user behavior, both good and bad. For example, the move to remove the live broadcast function is a good example. Some ridiculous things did happen when the live broadcast feature was launched, which were funny but also ridiculous. Later, it developed to a more extreme situation, such as a developer sucking fentanyl in a live broadcast and pretending to be dead, which may be the worst scenario. Eventually you decided to remove the live broadcast function, which effectively curbed these crazy behaviors. To me, this shows that Pump.Fun has the ability to guide user behavior through mechanism design. This ability comes from your traffic, users and brand influence.

Do you have other mechanisms or methods that can guide users to develop in a more sustainable direction?

Alon:

In a permissionless system, it is indeed difficult to completely suppress bad behavior. The behavior on the chain is open and unchangeable, which means anyone can access these systems and try to take advantage of them. However, in many cases, the role of the social strata is to motivate positive behavior. I think this can be done by directing users to focus on positive content and rewarding these behaviors. Ultimately, the essence of Memecoins is a “tradable unit of attention” whose value is closely related to the attention given by users. If we can guide users to focus on positive things, we can motivate more benign behaviors than negative behaviors. Of course, it is almost impossible to completely eliminate bad behavior in a permissionless system, but we can focus our attention in a more positive direction through mechanism design.

For example, many people have a negative view of AI-related tokens, believing that they are just chasing hot spots, but in fact, some projects are indeed building real products. For example, Griffain, which is a very interesting project, is developing an application similar to ChatGPT to interact with the Solana blockchain. When communicating with the founder, I found that his original intention was not to hype, but to attract attention by issuing tokens and promote the actual development of the project. If such tokens can successfully attract users' attention, people will start using this product, and the subsequent development will be natural.

Of course, most projects end up failing because they fail to find a market fit. But being able to quickly verify whether an idea is feasible through tokens is a great opportunity. We want to see more of this and will work to reward projects that attract attention by building actual products. My co-founder and I have also tried launching MVPs (Minimum Viable Products), so I understand this demand very well. This will greatly improve efficiency if the feasibility of the idea can be quickly tested by issuing a token.

However, many people are hesitant about this method because of reputation issues. I totally understand this. They do not want to be considered people who make money through tokens. This is also why we need to explore other monetization paths, such as through the design of platforms or protocols, so that project parties can make profits even without selling tokens. I think this is very critical. Therefore, this discussion returns to the question of how to inspire good behavior through the social level and how to optimize incentive mechanisms at the protocol level.

Pump.Fun's Success

David:

After Pump.Fun 's success, some similar token launch platforms have emerged on the market, but none of them can achieve the success of Pump.Fun or achieve virality like it does. Why do you think this is? What other platforms do Pump.Fun have key factors that cannot be replicated?

Alon:

I think this comes down to the fact that the switching cost of open systems is very low. Compared to Web 2 or traditional financial systems, the migration of users between these platforms is much simpler. Therefore, I think the success of Pump.Fun is mainly due to the advantages of our products. We always listen to user feedback, constantly iterate, and launch functions that truly meet user needs. We welcome competition because it is a good thing for users. At the same time, we also pay close attention to market trends. I think there are indeed some good competitors in the market and while they may not be as attractive as us at the moment, there are also some good creative and exciting trends emerging. Ultimately, users will choose the best product. So we believe that as long as we continue to improve and optimize, market feedback will eventually stand on our side.从过去一年的表现来看，市场已经证明了这一点。因此，我觉得答案其实很简单。

David：

每个团队如何使用他们的资金是自己的事情，但我想很多人都会期待我问这个问题。据估计，Pump.Fun 平台已经为团队、投资者或两者的组合积累了大约6 亿美元的资金，6 亿美元的盈利能力在加密项目中应该名列前茅，尤其是对于一个2024 年才推出的项目来说，这笔钱主要被用作什么用途？

Alon：

我们将所有资金都用于再投资，目的是打造更好的产品。比如，我们用这笔资金来扩大团队规模。 目前我们的团队大约有45 到50 人，而就在六个月前，这个数字还不到20 人 。当时团队以工程师为主，而现在我们还增加了数据科学家、机器学习工程师和安全专家。我们的团队还在持续扩张，目的是为用户提供最佳的使用体验。

David：

那你们会向投资者分配资金吗？我记得你们进行过一次种子轮融资，对吧？

Alon：

Pump.Fun 在早期确实接受过一些投资，但我们目前基本上是完全自我融资的。某种程度上，我也相信，努力工作的人应该享受自己劳动的果实。但正如我之前提到的，我们的目标始终是展望未来，打造一个能够经受住多次市场周期考验的产品。如果几年后回头发现这只是一个昙花一现的现象，那将是非常令人失望的。我认为那样会显得我们没有真正实现长期价值。

PumpSwap

David：

接下来我们聊聊你们的新产品之一，也就是PumpSwap。这是Pump.Fun 的本地DEX，也是你们推出的第二个产品。此前，Pump.Fun 的运行模式是，任何市值达到一定规模的Memecoins 都会迁移到Raydium。Raydium 是Solana 上的自动做市商(AMM)，可以说是Solana 上的“Uniswap”。一旦代币迁移到Raydium，它们就会成为Raydium 生态系统的一部分，而Raydium 也因此积累了大量手续费。由于Pump.Fun 的成功，Raydium 的交易量显著增加，其代币价格也表现出色。可以说，Pump.Fun 的成功不仅推动了Raydium 的增长，还提升了整个Solana 生态系统的活跃度，甚至包括Solana 本身的资产。比如，为什么会有像唐纳德·特朗普这样的名人在Solana 上推出Memecoins？这背后正是因为Pump.Fun 引领了Memecoins 的热潮。

而现在，你们推出了PumpSwap，作为Pump.Fun 的本地去中心化交易所。这意味着你们用自己的AMM 替代了Raydium，使Pump 生态系统更加垂直化，这是我对当前情况的理解。同时， 能否谈谈PumpSwap 的战略和愿景？

Alon：

你的理解完全正确。Pump Swap 是Pump.Fun 的本地去中心化交易所。我们推出Pump Swap 的主要原因有两个，这实际上为用户带来了巨大的价值。

首先，目前的交易流程仍然显得过于复杂。我们致力于打造一种简单的链上交易体验，让成千上万甚至数百万用户都能轻松参与。用户不需要了解迁移的具体过程、绑定曲线或AMM 的运作原理。 我们希望用户只需关注交易的核心问题：这是否有趣？这是否为我或他人创造了价值？

为了实现这一点，我们采取了一些措施来减少交易过程中的摩擦。例如，以前在迁移过程中，Pump.Fun 会从绑定曲线中提取大约6 个Solana，用于流动性池、支付小费等，而剩余部分则作为协议收入。现在，这部分费用已经完全取消，变为零。通过这种调整，我们希望让交易流程更加顺畅，同时与用户的利益保持一致。通过降低交易费用，我们能够在代币成功时获得稳定的收入，而不会因为高额费用影响用户体验。

因此，我们希望消除对这些复杂概念的需求。例如，以前在迁移过程中，Pump.Fun 会从绑定曲线中提取大约6 个Solana，用于流动性池、支付小费等，而剩余部分则作为协议收入。现在，这部分费用已经完全取消，变为零。通过这种调整，我们希望让交易流程更加顺畅，同时与用户的利益保持一致。通过降低交易费用，我们能够在代币成功时获得稳定的收入，而不会因为高额费用影响用户体验。

PumpSwap 的另一个方面，是对代币创造者和持有者进行对齐的概念。简而言之，我们的目标是激励更高质量的代币和内容，创建一个能够真正持久的产品。为了实现这一目标，你需要持续增长，增长的方式是吸引来自互联网其他领域的内容创造者。你需要让他们的参与变得简单和有回报。他们不一定需要投入资金，也无需担心声誉问题。创作者费用和收入分享在这一过程中起到了至关重要的作用。

另一个方面是我们想要市场的实验性，我们希望为用户提供其他类型的资产和代币进行交易。我们与大约15 到20 个合作伙伴合作，其中10 个合作伙伴首次将他们的代币从其他区块链桥接到Solana，并在这里创建流动性池。

我们希望通过这些尝试，让用户有机会探索更多类型的资产，而不仅仅局限于Memecoins。虽然这可能不会在短期内带来颠覆性的变化，但我相信这是一个值得期待的实验。

我们与许多用户保持了密切的交流。我认为，人们确实有探索更多事物的意愿，但很多用户并不是每天都在关注这些变化。对于加密社区(Crypto Twitter) 的核心成员来说，他们可能每天花16 小时泡在这个小圈子里，但实际上，许多使用Pump.Fun 的用户甚至不知道CT 是什么，甚至没有中心化交易所的账户，自然也就无法接触到这些新项目。因此，我们希望以一种简单便捷的方式，将这些资产带到他们面前。

虽然我不认为这会在短期内带来颠覆性的改变，但这是一个值得期待的实验。我相信，很多用户会对探索这些资产感兴趣，并借此机会深入了解加密世界，而不仅仅局限于Memecoins。这正是PumpSwap 的核心方向。

David：

目前我对PumpSwap 的理解是，它采用了类似Uniswap V2 的固定x*y=k 自动做市商(AMM) 模型。而Uniswap V3 则通过集中流动性模型带来了创新，但 你们选择了更基础的固定曲线模型，没有采用集中流动性。能否谈谈为什么会做出这样的设计选择？ 毕竟，当前AMM 设计领域有许多前沿的探索，而你们似乎更倾向于传统的方式。也请分享一下PumpSwap 在AMM 设计上的考量，以及未来可能的发展方向。

Alon：

我的观点是，如果某种模式已经证明有效，那就没有必要轻易改变。显然，Uniswap V2 的绑定曲线模型对于长尾资产（比如Memecoins）来说几乎是最优的。

当然，未来可能会有一些创新方式。当这些代币取得成功时，流动性会逐渐增加，人们可能会开始使用集中流动性AMM 模型，甚至在订单簿交易所中交易（主要是在链下，有时也在链上）。所以我认为这是未来可以探索的方向。

但就目前而言，我们已经看到Memecoins 在Uniswap V2 模型下取得了显著的成功。我认为没有必要在AMM 模型上过于实验化。相较于此，我们更愿意在激励机制上进行更多尝试，从而更好地对齐创作者和用户的利益，而不是对AMM 模型做出大幅调整。

创作者收入分享

David：

我想再谈谈你提到的创作者收入分享。我们之前已经讨论过这个话题，但我认为它非常重要，值得再次深入探讨。如果Memecoins 能开启新的篇章，我希望这个篇章能够围绕这种机制展开。

我在这里看到的是，创作者收入分享的核心是让代币创作者通过交易量获得收益，而不是依靠出售代币获利。在过去，Memecoins 的创作者通常通过出售代币来赚钱。然而，这种方式与后来购买代币的投资者利益是完全不一致的。因为早期的持有者通常有强烈的动机抛售代币，这往往会导致一些不负责任的创作者采取rug pull 的行为，即在价格高点突然抛售所有代币，或设计骗局骗取投资者资金。这些行为会直接导致代币价格暴跌，项目也随之终结，投资者只能另寻出路。

基于创作者收入分享的理念，理论上代币创作者甚至可以完全不持有任何代币。他们的主要收入来源是交易量产生的费用，而非依赖代币升值。当创作者通过交易量获得激励时，他们的利益与代币持有者的利益更加一致。因为当代币的价值上升时，交易量也会随之增加，从而提高创作者的收入。这种机制有助于将Memecoins 从单纯的金融资产转型为具备长期增长潜力的项目。

比如，一个创作者可以将自己发展为一个商业实体，即便只是通过互联网完成个人创作。我认为，这与我们在2021 年听到的“创作者经济”理念非常契合。尽管当时这一概念还停留在理论阶段，但现在我们看到它有机会成为现实。这种机制可能成为未来创作者实现商业化的新工具。当然，目前还没有类似的机制被真正证明有效，但我对此持乐观态度。你是否也同意这种看法？如果你有不同的观点，又会如何调整这种机制？

Alon：

我完全同意你的看法，你已经很好地总结了这一点。我认为我们仍然处于实验阶段，正在探索如何真正吸引内容创作者，或者说任何类型的创作者，进入加密领域，并以一种可持续的方式留住他们。这种机制不仅对创作者有利，同时也能为代币持有者、交易者和整个生态系统带来益处。

尽管这一机制尚需时间验证，但我对它充满期待。这是一种全新的尝试，也是一项令人兴奋的实验。让我们拭目以待，看看它能否为创作者和投资者带来双赢的结果。

Pump.Fun 与Raydium 的对比

David：

我想引用一位Raydium 贡献者的推文，他提到Pump.Fun 计划创建自己的AMM (自动做市商)，以取代Raydium，并构建一个完整的垂直生态系统。他在二月份发了两条推文，其中提到：“虽然Pump 平台本身令人印象深刻，但全新且未经测试的AMM 是否能带来显著的网络效应还有待观察。Raydium 将继续支持许多团队构建那些原本无法实现的协议。 我认为Pump.Fun 完全用自己的AMM 替代Raydium 是一种战略误判，低估了Raydium AMM 在其流动性启动功能中发挥的关键作用。”对此，作为Raydium 核心贡献者的你怎么看？

Alon：

我并不同意这种观点。如果Pump.Fun 想要建立自己的代币启动平台或其他功能，我们完全欢迎这种尝试。我们希望看到更多人能够尝试新的模型和功能。归根结底，我认为垂直化是其中的一个重要环节。那么，垂直化究竟能带来什么呢？它让我们能够在内部进行实验，而不必依赖第三方。

我每天都感到很高兴，因为我认为我们团队是这个领域中最优秀的团队之一。我们能够快速交付产品，并根据用户反馈迅速迭代。我注意到，许多其他团队在用户体验和产品交付上并没有同样的专注和效率。我们不希望依赖第三方，因为这样会让我们在交付产品时受到限制。通过PumpSwap，我们能够完全掌控自己的生态系统，同时也承担起相应的责任。当然，这也意味着如果我们失败了，人们会选择其他平台，这对我们来说将是致命的。但我认为我们愿意承担这样的风险。

David：

最近，Raydium 宣布他们将推出一个类似于Pump.Fun 的代币启动平台，我记得他们将其命名为Launch Lab。

Alon：

我已经听说了。我很期待看到他们会提出什么新想法。让我们拭目以待。但无论如何，我们并不害怕任何形式的竞争。

David：

这是否意味着Pump.Fun 和Raydium 之间的竞争将升级为一种“争端”？还是说你们有可能找到合作的方式？

Alon：

我不认为这是争端。我认为这只是企业努力为最终用户提供最佳产品的一部分。这不仅仅是Raydium，还有许多其他平台，无论它们叫什么名字。事实上，很多以太坊生态系统和其他领域的创新平台都借鉴了Pump.Fun 的一些想法，并在此基础上进行了迭代。

归根结底，我认为Pump.Fun 设计了一种非常巧妙的代币启动机制。但需要承认的是，很多这些想法实际上来源于现有的协议和项目。如果Memecoins 能开启一个新的篇章，我认为链上代币生成的潜力将会变得更加丰富。

未来还有许多事情可以做。我认为，多个不同的细分市场将不可避免地出现，而这些市场需要各自的机制来满足需求。 This is an inevitable trend in the development of the industry.作为一个协议，Pump.Fun 希望尽可能通用化，同时覆盖更多的细分市场。但我们也清楚，无法覆盖所有市场。因此，我很期待看到其他团队提出的新机制。如果其中任何一个取得了巨大的成功，我们也会乐于探索合作的可能性。

Pump.Fun 的社交元素

David：

加密货币领域本质上具有很强的社交属性，这种特性贯穿于整个生态系统。我们以“部落”的形式存在，聚集在Crypto Twitter 上，闲聊、讨论，甚至制造一些戏剧性事件。 几乎所有与加密货币相关的事物都包含某种社交元素。我注意到，Pump.Fun 的直播功能已经很好地体现了这一点，社交组件在加密领域的表现非常出色。那么，能否谈谈Pump.Fun 技术栈中即将加入的社交元素？你们计划如何在Pump.Fun 的未来发展中整合这些社交功能？

Alon：

我认为这正是Pump.Fun 从一开始就与众不同的地方。我们非常注重社交属性的设计，而不是简单地复制像Deck Screener 这样的金融化平台（一个以金融视角展示代币信息的平台），列出代币清单。从一开始，我们就认为项目的发展方向应该是创造一种社交体验，而不是单纯的金融工具。

社交之所以如此重要，是因为它不仅带来了娱乐性，还为用户提供了价值。我认为很多人对Memecoins 存在误解。如果你与用户交流，尤其是那些并非每天花16 小时泡在Crypto Twitter 上的普通用户，你会发现他们中的许多人并不是为了赚钱才参与进来的。他们更看重的是“这看起来很有趣，我想和朋友们一起尝试一下”。 It's that simple.我知道有些人可能不相信这一点，甚至会觉得不可思议，但如果你真正去了解用户，就会发现这种心态非常普遍。

因此， 我们希望进一步强化这一点，创造更好、更具娱乐性的体验。这正是我们称Pump.Fun 为“加密领域最大的社交网络”的原因。 我们相信，从一些基础的、简单的功能入手，如果能够持续专注于社交属性，就能将平台发展为一个伟大的项目，带来更多的可能性。

我还想强调一点，随着Pump.Fun 的用户规模不断增长，未来每天可能会有成千上万甚至数百万人使用它。这些用户一定会逐步探索更多功能，比如DeFi（去中心化金融）、深度交易功能、稳定币等。这是一个必然的趋势，也是我们培养未来“加密原住民”（指完全适应加密生态、将其作为主要经济活动的人群）的方式。

这也是为什么我们会继续关注创作者的需求，开发更多社交产品的原因。最近，我们推出了私信功能，并计划在此基础上不断迭代。虽然我们通常对未来的功能计划保持一定的保密性，但我可以说，Pump.Fun 的未来有很多值得期待的事情。

内容、注意力与市场

David：

我认为在内容市场、新闻和代币的垂直领域中存在一些有趣的交集。在某些情况下，市场和代币甚至可以合二为一。比如在Polymarket 上，你会看到新闻事件与市场之间的直接联系——新闻报道推动了相关市场的形成。在Polymarket 中，围绕许多潜在事件都有对应的市场，这种机制非常复杂，而我注意到Pump.Fun 似乎也在朝着这个方向发展。

不过，我认为这种结合的最终形态还没有完全呈现出来。在新闻事件、市场、内容和注意力之间，存在一些模糊但共享的价值联系。我觉得Pump.Fun 是目前最接近这种价值核心的平台之一。我想听听你的看法，当你观察新闻内容、注意力与市场结合时，你认为它的潜力在哪里？

Alon：

很高兴你提到了Polymarket。我认为Polymarket 是一个“寻求真相的市场”，通过市场机制预测或验证事件的真实性。而Pump.Fun 则更像是一个“寻求注意力的市场”，它是一个非常出色的注意力衡量工具。因为在这里，你第一次有了一个明确的指标，可以衡量某些话题的热度和趋势。

举个例子，当一个政治事件发生时，你不仅可以通过市场预测它发生的概率，还可以通过与该事件相关的代币交易量、市值和图表来直观地了解它的影响力和相关性。这是一种全新的视角，非常有趣。

Pump.Fun 的独特之处在于，每当发生重大新闻事件，总会有人基于这些事件创建代币。可以说，这些新闻几乎是“实时”在区块链上展开的。这种现象非常吸引人。虽然我无法完全预测它未来会如何发展，但我相信它具备很大的潜力。

需要注意的是，并非所有新闻事件或社交媒体内容都能转化为经济价值，毕竟全球范围内人们的注意力资源是有限的。但对于那些能够成功吸引大量注意力的事件，我们可以通过代币交易和市场表现来量化它们的价值。这种机制背后有很大的可能性，我认为这里面蕴藏着重要的机会。

Memecoins 的未来

David：

你希望Memecoins 的未来是什么样子？你对它有什么具体的期望？你觉得它的实际发展会是怎样的？

Alon：

这是个非常好的问题，我需要谨慎回答，避免过于理想化。我们一直以脚踏实地为目标，关注实际情况和可能发生的事情。

我希望Memecoins 的叙述能够发生转变，让人们不再认为链上交易这些代币是无价值或虚无主义的行为。我从来不认同所谓“金融虚无主义”。我认为，这种说法只是Crypto Twitter 上的一种借口，用来合理化市场现状。 归根结底，人们之所以交易和创造这些代币，显然是因为它们具有金融价值。但这种金融价值的存在，往往是因为它们在其他方面也具有价值，比如带来娱乐性，或者吸引人们关注某个新产品。我希望未来能看到更多这样的正面案例，同时减少那些让人们失望的负面事件，推动更负责任的行为。我认为，在这一点上，Pump.Fun 需要更加积极主动地发挥作用。

这实际上涉及到通过自上而下的方式塑造社区文化。我认为这是至关重要的。与此同时，我们也需要对平台上的内容进行适度的审核和引导，从而创造一种更可持续的用户体验，让人们愿意反复回归。或许这种体验不一定会像去年11 月或今年1 月那样令人狂热，但如果我们能够打造一个让大量用户每天都愿意登录并感到满足的产品，那就是成功。我认为，这正是我们在长期内努力实现的目标。

Memecoins 是邪恶的吗？

David：

目前，有些听众可能对Memecoins 的概念持有抵触甚至敌对的态度。尤其是在当前市场环境下，他们认为Memecoins 本质上无法创造价值，只是一个投机性的赌场。市场表现似乎也在支持这一观点。

根据Roadblock Changes 自2024 年1 月14 日以来的数据，Pump.Fun 已经推出了超过870 万个代币，累计收入达到了6 亿美元。目前，Pump.Fun 发布的所有代币中，只有四个代币的市值超过了1 亿美元。因此，我认为人们在看到Pump.Fun 的6 亿美元收入和所有Pump.Fun 代币的总市值（在4 亿到6 亿美元之间）时，感到存在差异。

如果有人认为Memecoins 本质上无价值，只是一个投机赌场，那么在当前市场阶段，这种观点似乎是有道理的。你如何回应这种看法？或者，你怎么看待那些认为Memecoins 只是短期投机工具的人？

Alon：

首先，当市场整体下跌超过50% 时，很多观点似乎就得到了验证。比如，Solana 的价格下跌了超过50%，以太坊和比特币的价格也从历史高点大幅回落。因此，无论是Memecoins、NFT、DeFi 还是其他山寨币，它们都属于风险资产。如果整个市场都在暴跌，那么Memecoins 也难以幸免。

但有趣的是，很少有人提到另一个事实：去年11 月，Pump.Fun 代币的累计市值约为80 亿美元，那时的市场环境与现在完全不同。显然，这种差异非常大。因为这些代币本身就是高风险资产，没有人否认这一点。但我认为，现在批评Memecoins 的人忽视了一个重要方面，那就是当前用户群体的行为和体验实际上是相当有粘性的。

如果你是今天的加密用户，你在Pump.Fun 上交易Memecoins 的可能性与几个月前是一样的。唯一的区别是，现在的加密用户数量减少了，但这些留下的用户仍然在重复几个月前的行为模式。我认为这种情况不会轻易改变。

这实际上是Memecoins 自然演变过程的一部分。Memecoins 必须不断演变以适应市场需求，我们希望能够参与这一演变过程。但最终，市场会给出答案。可能是Pump.Fun，也可能不是，但 我相信Memecoins 会以某种形式继续存在，因为它们确实为用户提供了某些价值。这一点需要时间来证明。

即使你看看NFT，虽然它们的价格与上一轮牛市相比大幅下跌，但许多NFT 收藏品仍然具有很高的价值，比如Pudgy Penguins 的市值仍然达到数亿甚至数十亿美元。因此，认为这些资产因为泡沫破裂就一文不值是不准确的。即便它们没有达到历史高点，但它们仍然为用户提供了实际价值。

即使你看看NFT，当然，它们与上个周期相比大幅下跌，但很多NFT 收藏品仍然非常有价值，市值仍然在数亿甚至数十亿美元。所以，认为它们因为泡沫破裂而变得一文不值并不一定成立。比如，Pudgy Penguins，难道不有价值吗？这将是疯狂的。再说，虽然它可能没有达到历史高点，但它仍然提供了很多价值。

所以，让我们拭目以待。我不确定Memecoins 是否能存在十年，但我希望听众思考一个问题：为什么在多年来用户行为一致的情况下，事情会突然发生变化？同时，我也想向所有尚未尝试Pump.Fun 的人，特别是以太坊社区的用户发出邀请。我建议你们花一个小时体验一下。我相信很多人会改变对它的看法。Crypto Twitter 的观点往往过于片面，现实情况远比他们描述的复杂得多。

Pump.Fun 的使命

David：

你认为Pump.Fun 的使命是什么？是推动更多代币的发行、增加交易量，还是帮助用户实现财富增长？你会如何定义这个使命？对于你们来说，核心的指导方向是什么？

Alon：

我认为这些目标实际上是紧密相连的。交易量显然是一个非常重要的指标，我认为它可以作为我们的核心指导方向，因为它直接反映了平台的活跃度和用户参与度。

与其他区块链类似，确定关注的核心指标确实不容易。但近年来，人们越来越关注收入（Rev），因为它代表了真正创造的经济价值。我认为，我们也应该关注用户在长期内为平台带来的经济价值，这可能是一个更具深远意义的指标。除此之外，我认为这些不同的目标之间是高度相关的。虽然很多人认为代币数量的增加是一件坏事，但我一直认为，更多的代币本质上是一件好事。

我们需要通过机制设计来激励用户产生高质量内容并遵守良性行为规范。我认为这是目前还比较缺失的一部分，而未来的一些功能会专注于解决这个问题。如果我们能降低市场的参与门槛，让更多人，尤其是那些目前还未进入生态系统的人，能够轻松参与，就能大幅提高积极的市场活动。例如，如果代币创建的成本从20 个Solana 降低到10 个Solana，这无疑会吸引更多的项目和用户。

我认为， 代币创建的便捷性和低成本是非常重要的。用户的财富增长同样至关重要。 根据数据，当市场最火热时，交易量达到峰值，用户的参与热情最高，大家对Memecoins 的评价也最为积极。

归根结底，Memecoins 是一个基于市场的系统，因此当风险资产价格下跌时，我们的能力有限。但我们可以专注于构建一个能够在长期内保持稳定并实现可持续增长的产品，确保它在未来的一到五年内都能为用户提供价值。

因此，我们不应过于纠结于每天发生的市场波动，而是需要放眼全局，通过观察用户行为，分析其核心习惯是否发生变化，并基于这些观察不断优化和迭代我们的产品。

为何选择Pump.Fun x Bankless

David：

Alon，我想可能大多数听众会想，“哇，Pump.Fun 和Bankless，这真是一个奇怪的组合。”能否分享一下你选择Bankless 的原因？

Alon：

首先，我个人已经有4 到6 个月没有做过Spaces，也很久没有做播客了，上一次还是去年夏天和Thread Guy 的对谈。这次，我希望以一种引人注目的方式回归，即使这可能会引发一些争议。

我认为这是一次不错的尝试，因为我希望大家能够听到我作为倡导者的声音，去支持链上社交体验、Memecoins 等等。同时，我也希望让以太坊生态系统中的一些最大批评者意识到，其实我们之间有许多共同点。很多时候， 我们会因为一些容易分散注意力的次要问题而产生误解。Twitter 并不是一个理想的平台，因为它的机制往往会激化用户之间的情绪和冲突。因此，很多人对其他生态系统（比如Solana 或Pump.Fun）的认知，常常与实际情况之间存在很大的偏差。