Doge

2013

Date: 2013 (viral peak November) · Place: Tumblr, then Reddit, then everywhere · Figures: Atsuko Sato, kindergarten teacher and Kabosu's owner, Sakura City, Japan · Kabosu, the Shiba Inu (b. 2 November 2005, d. 24 May 2024) · Tags: Doge, Comic Sans 01. Wow. Such Shiba. Atsuko Sato adopts Kabosu, an abandoned Shiba Inu, from a puppy mill in November 2008. She posts photos to her personal blog. In February 2010 one specific photo — Kabosu sitting on a couch, eyebrows raised, looking sideways at the camera with a slight smile — gets reposted to Tumblr. Three years later, in late 2013, someone adds wow. such doge. in Comic Sans, multicolored. The internal-monologue-of-the-dog format crystallizes. Within weeks, Comic Sans captions overlaid on Kabosu with the structure wow. such X. very Y. so Z. are everywhere. The genre rewards bad grammar specifically. It is, structurally, an anti-image-macro: not Impact font, not white outline, not declarative. Doge is the meme's first explicit anti-aesthetic to Impact-font macros. 02. Doge Becomes Dogecoin On 6 December 2013, software engineers Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer launch Dogecoin, a cryptocurrency parody using the Doge meme as its branding. They intend it as a joke about Bitcoin speculation. By January 2018, Dogecoin's market cap briefly exceeds $2 billion. By May 2021, after Elon Musk's repeated promotion, it briefly exceeds $90 billion. Kabosu the actual dog dies on 24 May 2024 at age 18. Atsuko Sato runs an Instagram (@kabosumama) until the end. The dog never knew it was the cover image of a $90 billion financial asset. Wow. such market. very cap. so meme. Sources • Atsuko Sato, Kabosu-mama blog (2010-2024) • Know Your Meme, Doge entry • Dogecoin whitepaper / launch announcements, December 2013