Dogcoin is an open-source, peer-to-peer cryptocurrency that was made as a parody of the crypto market following the establishment of Bitcoin. It was originally created as a light-hearted joke for crypto enthusiasts, but it quickly exploded to be one of the leading cryptocurrencies in use today.
Dogcoin’s brand logo is based on a popular meme of that time that featured a Shibu Inu dog. It was created in December 2013 and was based on the same basic technology of other cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Litecoin.
However, Dogcoin introduced some improvements, which included faster access speeds and more affordable transactions. Also, it counts the support of a robust community around the DOGE popularly known as the “Doge Army.” In 2021, Dogcoin is the ninth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.
Dogcoin uses a simplified variant of the hashing algorithm, Scrypt. It also uses the “proof-of-work” protocol, enabling it to receive work from other Scrypt based networks. Dogcoin mining is less power-intensive than Bitcoin algorithm SHA-256.
History of the Dogcoin
Dogcoin was created in late 2013 by two software engineers, Bill Marcus and Jackson Palmer, who were working at IBM and Adobe Systems, respectively. It was created using the open-source code from Litecoin, which itself was a fork of the Bitcoin blockchain. The main purpose of its creation was to raise public awareness of blockchain technology capabilities.
Through the support of a large online community, which included Elon Musk, Mark Cuban, and Snoop Dogg, the volatile crypto has risen more than 4,000% in 2021 alone, with some analysts forecasting the price to reach $1 before the end of the year.
The online community has also been influential in newsworthy headlines, which included various fundraising events, such as the $50,000 fundraiser to send the Jamaican Bobsled Team to the 2014 Winter Olympics after the team qualified but could not afford to attend. They also sponsored a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver, Josh Wise, with about $55,000 in 2014.
Such publicity stunts raised Dogcoin to almost cult status by 2021. It gained influence on Redditt’s WallStreetBets message boards and Twitter, where its value responded to popular Elon Musk tweets, such as propelling its value “to the moon,” “fav cryptocurrency,” and “people’s crypto.”
The price of DOGE remained relatively flat since inception but began increasing rapidly in April 2021. The all-time highest price reached was $0.7376 and an all-time low of $0.00008547. The ROI for early investors is about 89,841% as of 15 September 2021.
