What is Dogecoin?
Dogecoin is an open-source, peer-2-peer cryptocurrency created by IBM software engineer Billy Markus and Adobe software engineer Jackson Palmer. They found the wild speculation of cryptocurrency absurd, so they decided to make Dogecoin, which was designed as a payment system, but initially as a ‘joke’. It was launched in December 2013 and is considered an altcoin. It is easy to identify with its meme Shiba Inu dog as their logo.
Dogecoin was intended as a joke, but behind the meme is a robust blockchain technology based on Litecoin. Dogecoin uses a scrypt algorithm with an unlimited supply of dogecoins. It started with a supply limit of 100 billion coins which once reached would then allow a further 5 billion coins to be mined each year.
How does Dogecoin work?
Dogecoin was designed from Litecoin’s foundations and uses a proof of work consensus algorithm known as Auxiliary proof of work. This consensus allows the simultaneous mining of coins. For example, if you are mining litecoin, you can also mine DOGE at the same time. Even more, you can do this at no extra cost.
Can it keep up?
Dogecoin processes 30 transactions per second which is higher than that seen in Bitcoin. Additionally, a new block is added to the blockchain every minute. Dogecoin fees are also much lower than those of Bitcoin or Ethereum. As this altcoin is seen more like a meme coin, competing with the OGs like Bitcoin and Ethereum will be difficult, but nothing is impossible.
Dogecoin foundation
One of Dogecoin’s real triumphs is their Doge Foundation who help raise money for different initiatives like the Winter Olympics and Doge4water. The initial fundraiser helped fund the Jamaican bobsled team to go to Sochi Winter Olympics (yes, there is already a film about this). The aim was to reach $50,000, and by the 2nd day, $36,000 had been raised. The Dogecoin community also helped fund a second athlete to go to Sochi. Secondly, Doge4water helped raise over $30,000 to build a well in the Tana river basin in Kenya.
