Author: Golem
Original Title: White House Ignites, BSC Spreads: A Meme Frenzy That Bids Farewell to the 'Imperial Decree Model'
The meme market today witnessed another "golden dog" legend.
At 11:10 on January 21, the White House official account posted on X platform mentioning "victory, eviction action, and memes". One minute later, a meme coin named memes quickly emerged on the Solana chain; 20 minutes later, the BSC chain version was born. A meme race between the two chains officially began.
According to empiricism, the Solana version should have the advantage—not only is the ecosystem active, but it also aligns with the consensus of "first is first". However, the result was unexpected: the BSC chain version of memes surpassed in market capitalization. According to GMGN data, the BSC version reached a peak market cap of $28 million, with 7,300 holding addresses; while the Solana version peaked at only $3.6 million, with 3,900 holding addresses.
The new feature of GMGN also revealed where players' attention was: three hours after the token was born, the number of simultaneous online users for the Solana version remained below 1,000, while the BSC version once approached 3,000.
Although some questioned whether the BSC version's market cap was due to "pump and dump schemes aimed at harvesting", the real market attention does not lie—this time, BSC indeed won.
Previously, the community often joked that BSC's meme model was "Shandong-style learning in the crypto circle", where only projects related to CZ and He Yi had a way out, raising concerns about the sustainability of the ecosystem. However, BSC's victory in this meme race not only sparked a wave of "slapping thighs" regrets over missing out but also prompted the community to rethink the evolution of its meme model. As Haze, founder of GMGN, stated: "The BSC 3.0 era has arrived." (Odaily Note: Haze holds 1.93% of BSC chain memes, ranking second on the holdings list.)
CZ and He Yi Publicly State They Do Not Support 'Word-Picking Memes'
I once expressed my thoughts on BSC's meme model at an Odaily editorial tea party, believing that CZ and He Yi were actually "held hostage" by the community. The current meme model of BSC, which relies on "imperial decrees" for cold starts, deceptive continuous interactions, and finally "pouring" onto Binance Alpha, is actually a consensus of the BSC community. Although this model started with CZ's unintentional actions in early 2025, they actually do not like it. However, as it has developed now, CZ and He Yi are powerless to reverse the situation.
When I published this view, it was merely a conjecture, but recent public statements from CZ and He Yi have proven it to be true. On January 13, CZ posted that although he likes meme coins, if players blindly follow and buy meme coins "picked" from his tweets, they are almost certain to lose money.
To prevent everyone from blindly chasing these "word-picking memes", CZ's tweets have become cautious. Yesterday, CZ reposted a plush toy created by a user based on his image, which was an ordinary matter, but CZ still specifically noted: If you create or buy meme coins based on my tweets, please note that I may not mention the same words again for a long time, or even never. I do not recommend you do this. He even added at the end
