Dogecoin cryptocurrency: introduction
Dogecoin: this name may still not be familiar to you, but certainly, it will soon be. Dogecoin is a first generation cryptocurrency (i.e. it appeared in the first years, just after Bitcoin was released) that only very recently gained prominence on the market. Why?
Some will say that the recent support of celebrities (like Snoop Dogg and Gene Simons from Kiss) and the eccentric billionaire, Elon Musk, helped to push the coin. Others may tell you that the coin has attracted attention because it offers a casual and relaxed proposal, which is different from others on market.
The truth is that there is no right answer for what has been happening to this virtual currency. But, to keep you up-to-date we have prepared this text with all known about the coin.
In the next line you will understand how it was created, how its mining works, you will learn about its historical performance on the market and also the last news that made Dogecoin get all the attention recently.
How has Dogecoin appeared?
Dogecoin was already on market long before it got the attention of celebrities and the CEO of SpaceX. The cryptocurrency was created 8 years ago, by two programmers who did not have much ambition for the project. However, despite their low ambition, Dogecoin has conquered the market.
Launched originally on December the 6th of 2013, Dogecoin was created by two software engineers: Billy Markus, who at the time worked at IBM, and Jackson Palmer, an Adobe employee.
The two creators did not know each other before the project and they met through the coin’s website, created by Palmer as a joke about the creation of a cryptocurrency that had, as logo, a Shiba Inu dog, a popular breed and internet meme in 2013.
The logo, featuring the dog’s face, appeared on the Dogecoin.com internet domain, bought by Palmer as part of the joke. The software engineer even used Comic Sans font as a way to show its main objective: to entertain.
When Markus found the website, he thought it was an interesting idea and reached out to Palmer with the proposition of actually developing the cryptocurrency. It was Markus that built the coin’s network from the Bitcoin code in, he said, only 3 hours.
Due to the Dogecoin’s resemblances with other cryptocurrencies, the time is not impressive. Markus and Palmer used as a base the code of other digital assets already launched on the market.
The most important alterations made were the time that takes for a new block to be added to the blockchain (it takes 1 minute on Dogecoin while 10 minutes on Bitcoin) and the fact that the Dogecoin does not have a ceiling on the number of coins to be produced. Moreover, unlike Bitcoin, which uses SHA-256 encryption, Dogecoin uses a password based encryption technology, similar to the used by Litecoin.
However, the strength Dogecoin has today did not come from changes made in the technology; most of its popularity came actually from the casual and relaxed spirit that the founders (who are not part of the community anymore) could provide to the coin.
It has also gained prominence because of its use as a tipping currency. Members of the Reddit community, supporters of Dogecoin, use the cryptocurrency to thank other users for comments and contributions in posts.
Kabosu, dogecoin’s face
It is not any Shiba Inu dog that is the logo of the Dogecoin, it is Kabosu, a Japanese dog. Kabosu was 8 years old at the time it became famous because its owner, a kindergarten teacher, Atsuko Sato, created a blog for the animal, where he used to post pictures of his dog standing in funny ways.
It did not take long and the images went viral. Kabosu then became an internet meme with jokes about the most diverse subjects, with a very simple font written on the pictures. Inspired by these memes Jackson Palmer created a coin that had the dog’s face, initially as a joke.
Dogecoin’s early years: the impulse on reddit
To understand Dogecoin’s popularity, we have to analyze its performance in its beginning. With a casual proposal, soon after it was created, Dogecoin’s website got millions of visits and attracted the attention of a small community on Reddit, in which tips about cryptocurrencies were exchanged.
Less than 20 days after its official launch, on December 19, 2013, Dogecoin experienced its first moment as a star: the coin appreciated 300% in just three days. But the spike did not last, and on the fourth day the coin lost part of the value gained on previous days.
Some days later, Dogewallet, the coin’s native wallet, was hacked and, consequently, thousands of users lost their assets. It was found that the hacker modified the page’s exchange settings, making the coins to be sent to a static IP address.
However, what could have been a disaster for other projects was seen as an opportunity for Dogecoin. Still part of the project at the time, its founders used the occurrence to start a campaign called “SaveDogemas”, with the objective of recovering lost sums for investors.
The campaign not only managed to recover all sums, but also made Dogecoin well known. From this experience, the currency decided then to carry on with its donation projects and started other charity campaigns to raise money for different causes, such as to finance the Jamaican bobsled team or to provide drinking water to communities in Kenya.
2021: the year when Dogecoin really went viral.
As we have already told, Dogecoin has emerged more as an internet meme than as a new investment idea or value decentralization, like Bitcoin and other altcoins. So, what really has produced the coin’s growth and to be frequently in the news?
Reddit has certainly an important role in the process. In many opportunities the platform users, the redditors, encouraged the purchase of the cryptocurrency as a way to increase its market value. In mid-2020, a campaign on Tik Tok went viral encouraging Americans to buy Dogecoin so the coin would reach the value of $1 U.S dollar.
However, it was an interview with Elon Musk, the eccentric billionaire founder of Tesla and SpaceX, that reshaped things. Musk spoke about the cryptocurrency appreciation and its future potential, producing a buzz on the market. And it was not the only mention of Dogecoin that the billionaire made: Musk occasionally tweets about the currency, impacting on its value on the market every time he does it.
In 2021, the cryptocurrency soared again, once more as a result of the movement and stir made by Reddit users. In this opportunity, it was related to the GameStop shares, a videogame retailer.
In the intense week of confrontation between small investors supported by Reddit and big investment funds, Dogecoin registered a rise of 600%, showing that a project that appeared as a joke really became a serious business.
How to buy Dogecoin
Dogecoin (DOGE-USD) started to be traded at very insignificant values and, for many years, its price was below $0.01 (one U.S dollar cent).
It was only in January 2021 that the coin could surpass that mark.
It is still too early to know when and if Dogecoin will reach the value of $1 (one U.S dollar), but its low price and the buzz it causes on the market makes it an interesting option for those who want to diversify the cryptocurrency portfolio.
Dogecoin can be acquired on some of the major foreign exchanges, such as Coinbase, Kraken and Bitfinex. The cryptocurrency’s official website – check it here – has a guide for those who want to start investing in Dogecoin and are not yet very familiar with the market of crypto assets.
In exchange companies, the coin can be obtained with a credit card that is activated for international purchases. An interesting fact is that Dogecoin started to be commercialized in ATMs in the United States by Coinflip, a company that aims to popularize the access to cryptocurrencies.
While this option is still not available in all countries, it is important to research very well before choosing your cryptocurrency exchange. You can check out some tips in this link.
Dogecoin cryptocurrency: conclusion
The cryptocurrency that was originally an internet meme has certainly shown an interesting journey since it was launched and has brought something really innovative to a market saturated of new cryptocurrencies. Even though future predictions are difficult to make, if we take as reference the first month of Dogecoin in 2021, and if Elon Musk continues to support the currency, we can expect to see more breakouts in the future.
Did you like the article? Follow our ECC blog to know everything about the market of crypto assets.
