Solana AI Hackathon "Golden Dog" continues, organizers urge developers to stop

Original Title: "Solana AI Hackathon and Token Launches --- Note to Builders and Investors"

Author: Yash Agarwal, Head of SendAI

Translation by: Azuma, Odaily Planet Daily

Editor’s Note: The Solana AI Hackathon hosted by SendAI has been underway for some time, but due to the ongoing hype around AI narratives, the community's enthusiasm for related projects shows no signs of waning.

On-chain analysis research firm Pine Analytics reported yesterday that there are now as many as 65 tokens created or directly associated with projects from this hackathon, with a total market capitalization of $482 million, an average market cap of $7.5 million, and a median market cap of $1.7 million; 13 tokens have a market cap exceeding $10 million, and 42 tokens have a market cap exceeding $1 million.

However, amidst such fervent community sentiment, SendAI founder Yash Agarwal today published a lengthy article criticizing the current hype and chaos—Yash emphasized that the hackathon homepage had only 40,000 visits in the past week, yet any random token could easily reach a market cap of $50 million… SendAI originally intended to build a platform to boost AI development in the Solana ecosystem, but it has now become a "casino for the fallen." In Yash's view, the current bubble will lead developers to become blind and short-sighted, which is detrimental to the long-term development of Solana AI. Therefore, it is necessary to point out some absurd situations; otherwise, the industry will soon witness a "great disaster."

Below is the full text by Yash, translated by Odaily Planet Daily.

When we launched this hackathon, I had a simple vision—to make Solana the AI blockchain and achieve 10x growth.

I believe hackathons are the best feasible way to achieve this goal, as we can gather everyone under one roof, and I can personally invest in promising Crypto x AI Agent projects.

In the past month, I can say that the Solana AI hackathon has not only established its brand but has completely changed the landscape of Solana's AI Agent ecosystem. Completing over 400 projects in 15 days is no easy feat, and my team and I are incredibly proud of our contribution to adding $500 million to $1 billion in market value to the Solana AI ecosystem.

Of course, when we launched this hackathon, we had a premonition that due to this strange Crypto x AI Agent model, there would be some related token issuances. If developers are using tokens as a means of capital accumulation with the goal of building excellent products, that is completely fine. We also carefully designed all 8 tracks (sponsors had no say in this) to encourage truly useful AI Agents.

But we did not expect it to turn into a "casino for the fallen." To give everyone a clearer picture of the numbers, the project homepage of the Solana AI hackathon had only over 40,000 visitors in the past week, yet now 2-3 hackathon-related tokens are easily reaching a market cap of $50 million daily, with the cumulative value of all related tokens exceeding $500 million. Unintentionally, the Solana AI hackathon has become a discovery platform for AI tokens.

Speculation Driven

The current situation is basically as follows:

• (Project teams) submit projects in the hackathon and appear in the Solana AI hackathon project directory;

• Use the reputation gained from Solana AI hackathon/SendAI;

• Release tokens → Attract whale and KOL sniping/promotion → Boom! Instantly complete a token issuance of $5 million to $50 million;

• In the eyes of gamblers, through early ape-in operations, they can potentially gain 100x returns from hackathon-related projects, making the hackathon a perfect investment venue.

This is not a new story; it is a typical power-law distribution-driven speculation.

While I am glad to see some developers launching tokens for necessary early capital accumulation, the problem is that the current bubble is too large.

Although this is closer to a fair issuance (similar to ICO), I believe this is not the best direction for us to move forward.

Developers are Becoming Blind

The extremely high pace of token issuance is making developers short-sighted and blind.

Currently, 90% of Crypto x AI projects are no different from meme tokens based on cat/dog concepts. Of course, if they are aware of this, that is completely fine… However, many projects will promote their tokens as "utility tokens," which is actually a bigger scam.

The current pace is detrimental to real developers (especially the weaker ones) in the long term, as they now have to consider short-term issues.

Most Agent/Infra projects have realized that tokens are the best way to gain attention: token issuance → Agent/Framework "viral" spread (but users are 0) → token pump → everyone is happy…

Many projects simply released some announcements or demos (even with a market cap of over $200 million) to please token holders, achieving a quick pump (stimulating the dopamine of holders), after which whales and conspiratorial groups start to hype "amazing technology" to offload to retail gamblers.

Many developers know their products cannot be promoted or operated in production, so they can only keep demonstrating or releasing some "X x Y" announcements. Please name some real-time, scalable, truly on-chain Agent products; I will be waiting in the comments.

Conspiratorial Groups/Whales/KOLs are Worse VCs, They Have No Reputation Burden

Conspiratorial groups and whales are making this game dirtier.

They snipe early supplies by fabricating lies (claiming "supported by xxx," but in reality, they just retweeted or casually praised) or persuading developers to allocate a certain share. They also incite people in their gambler groups and then continuously sell (or eventually will sell), harming the interests of retail investors and developers.

Remember, their tokens have no lock-up restrictions, as most tokens are issued through pump.fun.

Some Advice for Developers

• Please do not issue tokens just for the sake of issuing them, especially if you do not hold a significant proportion of the tokens. Trust me, if your token holding is less than 5%, once the price starts to drop, you will have no motivation to continue building.

• Yes, tokens may surge in the short term, and you will experience a quick dopamine rush from issuing tokens worth $50 million or $100 million. However, once the price corrects, you will lose the motivation to continue building. There will also be a bunch of lousy "shareholders" who want you to keep developing because they have heard a lot about "how amazing this project is" from conspiratorial groups/KOLs.

• Always remember, tokens are technically an asset, but emotionally they are also a huge burden. Launching a token is very easy; I have managed a token over the past 6 months and experienced all these low points. I can tell you that managing a token is not fun. A token itself is a large product that needs management.

• When the price drops, those communities, KOLs, or conspiratorial groups will not be of any help; you will have to fight alone. At most, they will just mock or criticize.

• Issuing tokens for the purpose of accumulating startup capital is not a problem, but if you are not prepared, do not rush to hop on the current bandwagon.

Look further ahead and ask yourself: "Even if the token's market cap falls below $500,000, would you still be willing to continue building this project for the next 6 months?" If the answer is yes, then go ahead and launch your token. If necessary, you should retain appropriate funds and team shares at the time of issuance— as a project developer, you have every right to become wealthy in the long run through your baby (the project).

For those hackathon developers who have already launched tokens, if they lack foresight, then I wish them happiness in managing their tokens; we can talk again in 6 months.

I will not name anyone specifically for criticism at this moment, but I can give a good example. My little brother Umang created Cleopetra in this hackathon, which is an AI Agent aimed at improving the DEX LP experience. They have no plans to launch a token yet, but they are being harassed daily by fake tokens and gamblers, with the community constantly urging them to announce a CA. Of course, he is very strong and has not launched a token yet. After the hackathon ends, I will personally help him.

If you are a weak developer without foresight and succumbed to the casino-like temptation to launch a token, to be honest, I do not respect you as a developer; you are a fraud. No matter if your token is worth $100 million or $500 million, I will criticize you.

If you have not launched a token, how should you respond?

Hang in there! Also, indicate in your X that "there is no token," never imply token issuance, and continue to build and develop. For those false token issuance behaviors, you are truly powerless; fighting against them is useless. If someone is still ape-ing in like a monkey without doing any research, they deserve it. Just ignore them or block them directly.

To KOLs and Gamblers

To Crypto x AI KOLs, we are all friends, but I hope you can be responsible for what you promote (especially tokens). Guide developers well and do not be misled by quick token allocations or influence. You also do not want to be seen as a fraud when prices drop.

As for gamblers, or simply all of us, do not buy things you do not understand or even want to understand just because your favorite KOL is shouting about them. Chasing short-term gains will ultimately leave you to foot the bill.

About the Results of the Hackathon

Many respected figures in the industry have approached me with requests, such as launching a token list or popular choices, revealing the end date of the hackathon, or even disclosing the results of the hackathon.

I have received at least over 50 private messages, some even offering bribes/token allocation schemes.

Sorry, we will not disclose the exact end date and final results to anyone (including the judge list, each judge has a separate form, and we will organize all of this) until officially announced.

Blood, Sweat, and Tears

When we decided to launch this hackathon, we had no funding or support; everything was built on blood, sweat, and tears, as well as our intrinsic passion for growing Solana AI by 10 times. SendAI is an umbrella organization established after the Solana AI hackathon. We placed this bet, and the results have been very good.

At this point, we hope to take our professional ethics seriously and strive for the best honesty in our thoughts. We truly do not care who you are.

To reduce speculation, we also made a difficult decision—to cancel the demo day and instead have the results of the hackathon announced directly by Solana or SendAI. Developers need not worry; we will have activities even more exciting than demo day afterward.

What’s Next?

Honestly, I still do not know what the best solution is for the token issuance issue in terms of capital structure. But I hope we can come up with some solutions; I will personally think about this in my spare time. Given that this is a recent issue (less than a month), we are still in the early stages and still have the opportunity to address it.

In summary, I am very optimistic about Crypto x AI Agent agents; this is definitely an industry worth over $100 billion.

SendAI, Solana AI hackathon, Solana Agent toolkit, all of these are completely spontaneous public products, and they were delivered within the past month. The market is not yet ready for our upcoming plans.

Although my brain tells me to wait for the results to come out before publishing this article, I followed my heart and published it now. From an industry perspective, we need to point out some absurdities; otherwise, we will soon witness a great disaster.

Remember, casinos always exist, and the house always wins.

These views are entirely my personal opinions and do not represent anyone else. Thank you for listening to my lengthy discourse; I will definitely write about my optimism for Crypto x AI Agents another day, but there will be no token recommendations.