Celebrities Are Powering Meme Coin Surge From Bonk To Shiba Inu To Dogecoin (2024)

It almost seems like ancient history to think back to a time when Elon Musk was pumping Dogecoin DOGE ($DOGE) and Shiba Inu ($SHIB SHIB ) and Matt Damon was making high calibre TV ads for Crypto.com. Then again, it was only six months ago that Kim Kardashian was fined almost $1.3m for shilling EthereumMax ($EMAX) and failing to disclose her payment. Who can forget Justin Bieber and Eminem buying Bored Ape NFTs? High-profile individuals love to take risks - it’s often what got them to the top.

Since cryptocurrency started to receive mainstream media attention, back when its price surged in the bull run of 2021, countless celebrities have been trying to get in on the action. Some have done a fine job, while some jobs have got them fined. Now, at this precise moment in the bizarre and incredible story that is cryptocurrency, meme coins are playing the main character, enjoying their moment in the spotlight, while celebrities are once again getting involved.

Did Celebrities Accidentally Help Conceive Meme coins?

I’d like to pause for a moment to tell you where I stand on meme coins in general. I think they’re fun, exciting, and accessible, even if they’re a bit silly at times. I remember on the last bull run, someone said to me “Novelty precedes utility”, and that’s stuck with me. I’m convinced that if we leave meme coins to flourish, they’ll bring in millions of enthusiastic new adopters to the Web3 ecosystem, which will lead to more demand for innovation. Meme coins are an undeniable force, and those that really connect with investors often go on to do great things and develop real-world applications.

Dogecoin started as a joke, look at it now, it’s an accepted payment method for businesses around the world and boasts a market cap of over $26B. Of course, it had a lot of celebrity support along the way. In fact, without Elon Musk’s affection for the token, would it have made it this far? Even the founder of DOGE sold all his holdings because he had no faith in it.

One project that I’d like to use as an example is $BONK. It’s a Solana SOL meme coin based on the cartoon noise made when someone gets hit on the head. Like $DOGE and $SHIB, it’s characterized by the Shiba Inu dog breed. I first came across BONK when I read an article about the Solana Saga SAGA mobile phone, which was suffering from low sales until handset owners were promised a BONK airdrop. Suddenly, everyone wanted BONK and the Saga phone, which sent the price of both skyrocketing. The utility of BONK then became clear - it could be used to motivate a Web3 community.

Each new Saga phone was airdropped 30 million BONK, with a few thousand early handset owners claiming theirs. That airdrop was worth around $700 when the devices received them, before climbing to over $1,000. It’s still around $700 as I write this, and its value has held up well because utility followed novelty. “Bonk BONK boasts over 119 integrations across 10 separate chains, in categories ranging from DeFi, gaming, NFTs, social and wallets” the BONK website now claims. To reach this point, Bonk DAO (a group of 12 Solana power brokers) had to spend millions airdropping their own BONK holdings to Saga phone owners. They ended up giving away 50% of the total supply.

What has all this got to do with celebrities? Well, Solana has had its fair share of celebrity promotion over the years. In 2021, Jason Derulo tweeted “I betted on Solana in June. Wow, what a ride! #crypto”. Steve Harvey then got in on the action, promoting a Solana NFT NFT collection to raise funds for his charitable foundation. Then, back in early 2022, Mike Tyson claimed to be “all in” on Solana. These three guys combined have over 15 million Twitter followers and their sphere of influence extends well beyond that. The knock-on effect of crypto could be such that their posts in 2021 and 2022 contributed to the growth of Solana. This then contributed to the success of BONK, and that has spurred the meme coin frenzy. It’s a domino effect.

I feel that the crypto community gets drawn to meme coin projects because they represent digital excitement, the randomness and spontaneity of memes, and the power of crypto to make overnight millionaires. And I’m not the only one. Jennifer Booze leads Ecosystem Development & Growth for APhone, the world’s first decentralized smartphone that enables anyone to use high-performance, decentralized applications on any browser-capable smartphone.

“Memecoins are a great example of demystifying decentralization,” says Jennifer. “They are inherently fun, but they also have a powerful educational role; the first step in users’ journey to understanding what the decentralized web is and how it works. At APhone we see applications like memecoins and Web3 gaming as an incredibly compelling gateway to crypto, blockchain, and Web3 - one that can reach a huge potential without the ‘hard sell’ that’s put off so many potential users in the past. By gamifying the experience and, above all, by making it fun, we can teach people powerful lessons about everything from the changing nature of ownership to protecting your identity.”

Perfectly put. I would add that they are also a gateway to utility, with many memecoin projects using their platform to build genuine innovations. All of these considerations make memecoins quite likable in my book.

Misspelled Names

While I’ve made the point that celebrities can power the meme coin surge directly, sometimes they help ecosystem growth without doing anything at all. The celebrities might, however, be the butt of a joke.

A new meme coin trend has emerged using misspelled celebrity names to launch tokens. Some of the best Solana meme coin names that I’ve spotted so far are “Jeo Boden*,” “Danold Tromp,” “Xi Jongpeng,” and “Berik Obema.” Away from politics, I also saw “Mechael Seylor,” “Olen Mosk,” and “Androo Tete.” The idea behind this comes from another meme, Spoderman, which is just a poorly drawn and misspelled Spider-Man.

Sometimes, a meme’s creativity is in its simplicity.

*Jeo Boden reached a $49 million market cap, with its token price up around 12,000%, just 3 days after launching.

The Interplay Between Celebrity-Driven Endorsem*nts and Whimsical Memecoins

Whether celebrities are actively chasing crypto sponsors and endorsem*nts (FTX-connected celebrities look away now), or they are the victim of harmless fun from “meme lords”, there’s a role for the famous and influential to play.

Celebrities and meme coins have something significant in common - sometimes they make millions of dollars without having to do very much. While some people look on with envy, most of us are simply entertained. So, if a celebrity’s brand of entertainment aligns with the level of humor of a meme coin, why shouldn’t they collaborate? I just hope that some actual innovation comes out of it. That’s a tougher ask.

The “Number Go Up” Mentality

The charts are flying up and meme coins are pumping, which is bringing lots of new people to the space. This will help to solve any liquidity issues that these projects might be experiencing. Memecoin MEME whales know that selling off their holdings will affect the market, so for now many of them are just hodling. This means there is some incentive for projects to play a bit of a longer game and for investors to hope that utility does arrive (along with liquidity), not just substantial profits for a select few.

It’s easy to fixate on the financial numbers: the volumes and value. But that’s to ignore what’s genuinely exciting about meme coins (and what will, incidentally, drive long-term value). Coins are not just currencies; they are the basis for entire communities. Michael Rubinelli, Chief Gaming Officer at WAX — which along with Solana plays host to WUFFI, a cross-chain meme coin designed to incentivize third-party game developers — stresses the role of these coins as the foundation for user-controlled spaces where people can not only transact with each other but can build communities on their own terms.

“It’s crucial we never forget what the decentralization revolution is all about,” says Rubinelli. “It’s about taking power away from faceless, unaccountable, and often greedy centralized entities and giving it back to ordinary users. Of course, this requires token issuers to understand their users, to share the same values and to be prepared to foster democratic and independent communities. But where this does happen — and gaming is a great example — the results are incredible. People are far more loyal to platforms where they feel they have a stake in the community.”

We’ve seen with Dogecoin that what starts as a meme can have a lasting impact, and I think by leveraging celebrities and politicians, there may be a synchronicity that helps it happen. For now, though, another crypto meme — “number go up” — might be more accurate.