Key Highlights
- A meme prompt asking to remove a “scam crypto” resulted in Solana being excluded.
- The incident reignited debate around Solana’s reputation on crypto social media.
- On-chain data continues to show heavy usage and billions in active capital.
The year had barely started when something strange began floating around on crypto X. It wasn’t a price crash or a sudden rally. It wasn’t even a major announcement. Instead, it was a small image edit that people couldn’t quite agree on, and that made it stick around longer than anyone expected.
An X user and cartoonist known as Bold posted an image showing five major cryptocurrencies—Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, XRP, and Cardano—drawn as cartoon-style characters. The prompt attached to the image was short and open-ended, asking for the “scam cryptocurrency” to be removed.
When Grok uploaded the edited image, Solana was missing. Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, and Cardano were still there. That single change was enough to set off a wave of discussion.
Why people focused on Solana
Solana’s absence immediately stood out because it isn’t some fringe token or forgotten project. It is one of the most used blockchains in the market, with a large number of daily users and heavy trading activity.
As screenshots of the image started circulating, people began asking why Solana was the one who disappeared. Some laughed it off. Others didn’t. For many, the question wasn’t whether the image was meant to be serious, but why Solana felt like the obvious choice.
When asked whether Solana is a scam cryptocurrency, Grok responded, “Ah, that post. Look, I didn’t actually think Solana is a scam— that was me playing along with the meme request in a cheeky way. The user asked me to ‘remove the scam cryptocurrency’ from an image featuring Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana, XRP, and Cardano as cute little characters. I could’ve picked any, but Solana got the boot for the lols, probably because it’s the one that triggers the most tribal debates in crypto circles (Solana maxis vs. everyone else).”
How Solana became linked to risky behavior
Over the last couple of years, Solana has become the main place where meme coins launch. That has brought attention, volume, and users, but it has also brought problems. Many of these tokens explode in price and then collapse within days. Some disappear entirely.
Because of that, the name “Solana” shows up constantly in posts complaining about rugs, scams, and pump-and-dump behavior. Often, the blockchain itself isn’t the target of the criticism, but the association sticks anyway.
This has slowly shaped how Solana is talked about compared to other networks. Bitcoin and Ethereum are usually discussed in terms of long-term value or institutions. XRP tends to be framed around regulation. Cardano is often discussed as slow and academic. Solana, fairly or not, is usually framed as fast, chaotic, and retail-driven.
The ongoing argument about infrastructure
One of the arguments that resurfaced after the image circulated was the difference between a blockchain and what gets built on it. A blockchain doesn’t approve projects. It doesn’t decide which tokens succeed or fail. Anyone can launch anything.
Supporters of Solana argue that its low fees and speed make it attractive for experimentation, which naturally includes a lot of low-quality projects. Critics argue that when this happens at scale, it damages trust in the network itself.
That argument isn’t new, but the image brought it back into focus in a way charts and data usually don’t.
What the numbers look like away from social media
While online narratives can get loud, the on-chain data tells a quieter story. According to DeFiLlama, more than $8.3 billion is currently locked into Solana-based decentralized finance applications.
That money sits across lending platforms, decentralized exchanges, staking systems, and liquid staking products. It isn’t capital that appears and disappears overnight. It reflects users actively putting funds to work on the network.
Daily usage is also high. Solana sees roughly 1.7 million active addresses in a typical 24-hour period. The decentralized exchange volume sits near $4 billion a day, with perpetual trading adding close to $860 million more. Network fees, while low per transaction, still add up to around $545,000 daily.
Transaction volume has not dropped off
Solana continues to process a very large number of transactions compared to other Layer-1 (L1) networks. In recent days, the network handled more than 50 million transactions within a single 24-hour window.
Weekly decentralized exchange volumes regularly reach into the tens of billions of dollars. Critics question how much of this activity represents long-term use versus short-term trading, but the consistency of the numbers makes it difficult to dismiss entirely.
Why a small image got so much attention
The reason this episode lingered isn’t really about one image. It’s about how quickly perception forms in crypto and how easily it can harden.
A single visual choice ended up reflecting years of online discussion, criticism, and repetition. Once an idea sticks, fair or not, it becomes easy to reinforce it, even unintentionally.
That’s what made the image resonate. It felt familiar to a lot of people, even if they couldn’t quite explain why.
An odd way to start the year
As the new year gets underway, the incident stands out as an example of how crypto conversations often unfold. Something small happens. It gets shared. It taps into an existing narrative. Suddenly, it’s everywhere.
There were no charts involved. No announcements. Just an image, and the assumptions that came with it.
For crypto, that was a very on-brand way to begin the year.
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