Dogecoin launched as a joke cryptocurrency

On December 6, 2013, software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer launched Dogecoin, a Litecoin fork built around the Shiba Inu "Doge" meme, explicitly as a parody of the crypto industry's self-seriousness. The joke aged into a multibillion-dollar asset and the template for every memecoin that followed, which is either a triumph of internet culture or a cautionary tale, depending on whom you ask.