Reddit co-founder to invest $100 million in social media on Solana

Quick Take

  • Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian spoke at the Solana-focused conference Breakpoint today.
  • He announced that he will be earmarking $100 million for building social media on Solana.

Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian will be investing in building out a form of decentralized social media using the Solana blockchain, according to an announcement today.

During a fireside chat with Solana co-founder Raj Gokal, Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian said, “One of the reason why i’m here is to announce — I have a venture fund called 776 — we’re earmarking $50 million to invest in the next wave of social, built on Solana."

During the chat, Ohanian added that $50 million wasn't enough so that the plan is to increase the initiative to $100 million.

This comes a day after FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried said that building social media on the blockchain could be "absolutely huge."

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During his talk, Bankman-Fried claimed that decentralized social media could solve a lot of pain points. He pointed to pre-existing social media sites, which have massive userbases, and stated that integrations with these sites could help to scale DeFi to millions more users.

Update: An earlier version of this story misattributed the increase in size to Gokal.

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Tim is the Editor-In-Chief of The Block. Prior to joining The Block, Tim was a news editor at Decrypt. He has earned a bachelor's degree in philosophy from the University of York and studied news journalism at Press Association Training. Follow him on X @Timccopeland.