Open source software powers most of the internet. The browsers you use, the apps on your phone, the systems running behind the scenes at your favorite websites; a huge portion of it was built by developers who contributed their work for free.

That’s the problem. Most open source contributions happen without any pay. Developers fix bugs, write features, and improve code out of passion or goodwill. Some companies benefit enormously from open source without giving anything back. It’s a system that works, but it’s unfair to the people doing the actual work.

Gittensor is changing this. As Subnet 74 on Bittensor, it pays developers directly for meaningful contributions to open source projects. Every time you improve code in a supported repository, you can be incentivised. Real work gets real money.

How Gittensor Actually Works

The process is surprisingly simple. You connect your GitHub account to Gittensor, which is the platform where most developers already host and share their code. Then you look at the list of open source projects Gittensor supports and find something you can improve.

Maybe there’s a bug you can fix. Maybe you see a missing feature. Maybe you can make the code run faster or cleaner. You write the improvement, submit it as a “pull request” (the standard way developers propose changes to code), and that’s your contribution.

From there, AI validators evaluate your work. They look at things like how much impact your change has, how original your solution is, the quality of your code, and whether it actually helps the project. This scoring system ensures that higher-quality code earns a larger share of the daily incentives.

The whole setup takes about 10-15 minutes to get started. You don’t need advanced expertise, as basic coding knowledge and a GitHub account are enough to begin contributing and earning.

Payments are drawn from a monthly reward pool currently estimated at around $125,258 in TAO tokens. Because this system is performance-based, you aren’t limited by a fixed hourly rate. Your score determines your slice of the daily emissions, which are paid out in liquid TAO tokens. This means you can earn immediate market value for your work, with the option to hold the tokens, trade them for other cryptocurrencies, or convert them to cash on an exchange.

What Makes This Different From How Open Source Used To Work

Before Gittensor, if you wanted to contribute to open source, you did it for free. GitHub is full of talented developers who spent hundreds of hours improving projects and got nothing but a “thank you” in the code comments.

Some platforms tried to fix this. Gitcoin ran grant programs where the community could fund developers. Bounty platforms like Bountysource let companies post paid tasks. But these systems were clunky, centralized, and often inconsistent about who got paid and how much.

Gittensor works differently because the rewards are automatic and tied directly to the quality of your work. AI validators score every contribution based on objective criteria. No manager decides whether you did a good job. No company decides which contributions matter. The system evaluates the work itself and pays accordingly.

This is essentially “Uber for coding”, where developers show up, do good work, and get paid based on what they produce. This matters because open source already has millions of developers contributing. Gittensor doesn’t need to convince people to start coding. It just needs to make their contributions worth something. 

Why Anyone Would Invest in SN74

The SN74 alpha token currently trades around ~$1.56 with a market cap of about $4-5 million. That’s small, which means either it’s overlooked or it’s too early to have proven itself.

The bull case is straightforward. Open source software is worth trillions of dollars to the global economy. If Gittensor captures even a tiny fraction of that value by properly compensating contributors, the token has massive room to grow. Monthly reward pools are already around $125,258, and contributions are growing fast, from 60 pull requests in 10 days to 131 in 13 days.

As Bittensor grows and more capital flows into the ecosystem, successful subnets like Gittensor benefit from increased emissions and attention. The halving that cut TAO supply in half makes quality subnets more valuable because there’s less new TAO to go around.

The bear case is that Gittensor is early and unproven at scale. A small market cap means high volatility. Not all subnets succeed. Developer adoption could stall if the rewards don’t feel worth the effort compared to just contributing for free or getting paid by a company directly.

Like all crypto, only invest money you can completely afford to lose. But for people who believe open source deserves better funding and that Bittensor will grow, SN74 offers early exposure to an interesting thesis.

How Normal People Can Actually Use This

There are three main ways to participate in Gittensor, and two of them don’t require advanced technical skills.

As a developer, you can become a miner and start earning directly. Connect your GitHub account to Gittensor using a personal access token (that’s just a password-like code GitHub gives you to link your account). Browse the supported repositories, find something you can improve, submit your pull request, and earn TAO when your contribution gets scored. If you already code and already use GitHub, this adds almost no extra work to your routine. You’re just doing what you’d normally do, but now you get paid for it.

As an investor, you can buy SN74 alpha tokens on decentralized exchanges and hold them, hoping they appreciate in value. You can also stake TAO on the subnet to earn a share of its emissions. This is purely financial, so you don’t need to write any code. You’re just betting that the subnet succeeds and the token goes up.

As a validator, you can run a node that helps evaluate miners’ contributions. This is more technical and requires some computing resources, but you earn TAO for helping maintain the quality of the network. It’s basically being a judge for code contributions, using AI tools to score submissions.

Where This Goes From Here

Gittensor has entered a new era following its strategic acquisition by Ventura Labs in late 2025. This ownership change marks a pivotal shift from a simple contribution platform to a permissionless software marketplace. While the subnet has already produced over 200,000 lines of production code, its current contribution numbers, though growing, remain modest compared to the massive scale of global open source development.

The next phase is attracting more developers and more repositories. Right now, only a curated list of projects is supported. As the subnet proves itself, that list should expand. More projects mean more opportunities for developers to earn, which means more developers joining, which means more value for the subnet.

There’s also the question of AI integration. Gittensor currently rewards human contributions, but the line between human and AI-assisted coding is blurring fast. Tools like GitHub Copilot already help developers write code. How Gittensor handles AI-assisted contributions will shape its future.

The bigger picture is whether paying developers for open source contributions at scale actually works as a sustainable model. It’s a genuinely important question for the software industry. If Gittensor figures this out, it could change how open source gets funded forever, not just on Bittensor, but as a model that inspires other platforms.

Right now, it’s a small subnet with big potential. Worth watching, and if you’re a developer who already contributes to open source, absolutely worth trying.

Website: gittensor.io

Check out their GitHub at entrius/gittensor

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