Dogecoin digital currency takes on Bitcoin with a bit of meme flair

As far as digital currency goes, Bitcoin is the word on all interested parties' lips, but that could possibly (it pays to be optimistic) change in the coming months with the introduction of Dogecoin, a Bitcoin-esque digital offering that is based on, oddly enough, the Doge meme. There are some fundamental differences between Bitcoin and Dogecoin, not the least of which is that the latter's value mostly depends on how much someone is willing to give you for it.

Dogecoins are available in higher numbers than Bitcoins, which is one of the most notable aspects. While only 21 million Bitcoins are available for mining, Dogecoin keeps the game going longer by throwing 100 billion into the wild, so to speak. Furthermore, a Bitcoin block has an average time of about five minutes, give or take, while Dogecoin's is lower at about only 60 seconds.

Setting up specialized machines to do the mining isn't possible due to the use of Scrypt. The relevant question, then, is how much is Dogecoin worth? The answer isn't so simple, not the least of which being due to having only existed for a handful of days. Right now, the value is said by one to average about 0.046 BTC. That isn't so straight forward, however, since you'll have to find someone to pay that much.

There have been some publicly-viewable transactions, which span the range from worthless to quite lucrative. One person, for example, sold 10,000 Dogecoins, which are apparently being called DOGEs, for $1, giving someone an arguably worthless pile of digital entities. Another, however, offered up nearly a quarter of a bitcoin for a single DOGE, which amounts to a couple of Benjamins and a hefty going rate.

VIA: GeekoSystem

SOURCE: Dogecoin