Author: 137Labs

On February 13, 2026, Pump.fun, one of the most controversial and high-profile projects in the Solana ecosystem, announced a new mechanism that, while seemingly a "small feature," could potentially impact its growth logic: users can distribute "creator fees" to any GitHub account through the Pump.fun mobile app . The official announcement also hinted at further "social" features to be introduced in the future.

To the untrained eye, this seems like "another way to tip"; for Pump.fun, it's more like an upgrade to the fee distribution system : moving from a fixed or limited revenue-sharing model to a more targeted and flexible fund flow configuration. It's not just about changing the UI, but about changing the incentive structure.

1) What is Pump.fun: It lowers the barrier to entry for issuing tokens to "as low as posting a message on social media".

Pump.fun, often simply called Pump, is a cryptocurrency issuance and trading platform running on Solana. Users require almost no technical background; simply uploading an image, filling in a name and ticker, allows them to quickly create tokens and trade them immediately. Once tokens meet certain conditions, they can "graduate" and continue circulating on decentralized exchanges. The platform launched on January 19, 2024, and was founded by Noah Tweedale, Alon Cohen, Dylan Kerler, and others.

This product model directly led to the fact that the vast majority of tokens lacked functionality and were mostly classified as meme coins . While issuing them was "as easy as posting on a forum," the supply of new coins exploded; media reports indicated that by January 2025, the platform had issued millions of meme coins, describing it as one of the fastest-growing cases in the crypto application world.

But the other side is also quite straightforward: the failure rate of new coins is extremely high, and most projects cannot gain sustained trading interest, let alone enter more mature DeFi scenarios. This is the fundamental contradiction of Pump.fun— the extremely low barrier to entry brings a huge supply, but also a huge amount of noise and a high attrition rate .

2) Controversy and Costs: When "Cryptocurrency Issuance + Live Streaming" Becomes a Battle for Attention

One of the most frequently discussed periods in Pump.fun's history is the "attention arms race" that ensued after it introduced live streaming in 2024: project teams would go to great lengths to attract attention and create hype in order to make their tokens stand out among a sea of new coins. As a result, the platform faced a lot of criticism for a period of time due to content content and risk issues, and the live streaming function subsequently experienced repeated suspensions and relaunches.

At the same time, regulatory pressure has become increasingly apparent. For example, the platform has imposed restrictions on UK users following warnings from UK financial regulators; and there has been long-standing debate regarding whether it is involved in unregistered securities trading and whether investor protection is adequate.

In other words, Pump.fun was never just a "tool" from the beginning; it was more like a "issuance and trading factory" that mixed financial speculation, social dissemination, and anonymity. This explains why every adjustment it made to "fees," "incentives," and "social structure" was amplified and interpreted by the market.

3) What's changing in this new feature: Linking creator fees to GitHub identity.

The core of this update can be summarized in one sentence:

Users can now direct creator fees to any GitHub account (via the Pump.fun mobile app).

Its significance lies not in "whether it can distribute," but in "who it distributes to": when the distribution target expands from "on-chain wallets/project roles" to GitHub accounts , Pump.fun is essentially integrating a set of "the most commonly used identity systems in the developer world" into its incentive chain.

This will bring about three potential changes:

Productizing actions that support developers : Many people are willing to tip open-source authors, but lack an easy way to do so; Pump.fun has put the "give money to developers" button into high-frequency trading and token issuance scenarios.

External contributors can be included in the incentive program : they don't necessarily have to be members of the project team; anyone who contributes to the tools, scripts, or community content can be "named" and receive a share of the revenue.

A stronger communication narrative : By linking the attention of meme coin to open-source developers, it is at least easier to package the narrative from "pure speculation" to "supporting builders".

The official statement mentioning that "more social features will be added" also suggests that Pump.fun is shifting its focus from a "coin issuance and trading platform" to a more "content/community platform".

4) Why do it now: From "cost design experiments" to "more market-oriented allocation"

The reason this update has attracted attention is that it is not an isolated action, but rather a continuation and modification of Pump.fun's fee structure experiment over the past period.

In Pump.fun's growth flywheel, "fees" have always been a key variable: the platform generates revenue through transaction commissions and "graduation" mechanisms, and then returns a portion of that revenue to the ecosystem in various forms to drive more issuance and trading. There has been much discussion in the community about solutions such as "Dynamic Fees" and "Project Ascend," all of which essentially address the same problem— how to make the incentives for trading and issuance more sustainable, rather than just a burst of popularity .

This move to open the revenue-sharing channel on GitHub can be interpreted as "supporting developers," but it can also be seen as a more realistic strategy: to tap into the heart of the developer community and see if it can bring in new users, narratives, and funding.

5) Potential impact: What does this mean for the "cash flow" of the platform and tokens?

From a business and financial perspective, the biggest variable in this function is whether creator fees will "spill over" from the original closed loop .

If this mechanism primarily brings "new users, new projects, and new transaction volume," then the platform's overall fee pool may expand, the flywheel will be stronger, and Pump.fun can package it as a positive feedback loop of "builder economy."

However, if it focuses more on "redistributing existing costs" and splitting away the revenue that was originally kept in the system, then the internal return flow of the platform may be weakened, and the final effect may not be as optimistic as the narrative suggests.

Of course, the short-term market usually favors "story": using GitHub as the receiving end strengthens the association between Pump.fun and "developers" and "open source," giving it an extra advantage in the narrative competition among similar distribution platforms.

6) Risks and controversies will not disappear automatically: Greater social interaction ≠ Lower risk

It is important to emphasize that giving money to GitHub does not automatically equate to a healthier ecosystem .

Pump.fun's core problem remains on the supply side: too many new coins, too short lifecycles, and fierce competition for attention. These mechanisms easily induce phenomena such as "soft rugs," "pump and dump," and "short-term sentiment trading." The platform can provide more information to aid judgment, but it cannot fundamentally eliminate speculative behavior.

If Pump.fun continues to push for "more social features," it may become closer to a hybrid of "content platform + financial asset"—this would increase user stickiness, but it would also mean that content governance, risk warnings, and compliance pressures would become more complex.

7) Conclusion: A pipe leading to GitHub, behind which lies the next stage of Pump.fun's narrative.

Distributing creator fees to GitHub accounts may seem like a "minor update," but it reflects a clear trend at Pump.fun: moving from a simple "token issuance and trading infrastructure" to a product form with more social attributes and a greater emphasis on identity and relationship chains.

The question it wants to answer is actually quite simple: In the cycle of meme coin frenzy and exhaustion, how can Pump.fun transform itself from a "traffic factory" into a "continuously operating ecosystem machine"?

GitHub, as a conduit for "identity and developer assets," may be a bet by the company in an attempt to redefine its own boundaries.

The "Strategy counterparty" has opened new long positions in PUMP, bringing the total position size to $157 million.

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