Q&A: Meet the early adopter with deep ties to Dogecoin

DOGE’s surge this year has blown Bitcoin and Ethereum out of the water. It’s crazy to think that, just a few short months ago, even a price of $0.01 seemed elusive.

Here, we talk to WaykiChain founder Wayki Sun about his involvement in Dogecoin from the early days, and how this has inspired him to develop new blockchain projects.

1. Hi! Why is your name so associated with Dogecoin?

My relationship with Dogecoin dates back to late 2013. Back then, there was a big number of early DOGE users.

Despite on-chain addresses and transfers being exceedingly high — not to mention Reddit discussions and global offline events — the cryptocurrency’s market cap wasn’t that big. I thought it was massively undervalued.

2. One of DOGE’s founders, Billy Markus, ended up abandoning the project. Why did you then make the effort to promote it?

Well, we know that Billy Markus created Dogecoin as a joke cryptocurrency that poked fun at Bitcoin — riding high on the shiba inu meme.

Perhaps they didn’t see the true meaning of blockchain. I imagine he was very surprised by the way DOGE captured the community’s imagination back then.

The whole industry was in a big decline at the time, and so was Dogecoin. There were a lot of DOGE investors (especially those with big positions) who felt trapped.

Back then, like many communities today, Dogecoin’s community praised the project when prices rose… and attacked the founders when they went down.

Markus must have still firmly believed that DOGE was a “dumb” crypto that should remain stupid. But many in the community disagreed with his ideas and attacked him. He’s said himself that this drove him away from DOGE.

3. How do you judge the popularity of a project?

I evaluate various indicators to judge the quality of a project.

At the time, DOGE had very good data in all aspects — broad public support, an active community, a lot of blockchain addresses and plenty of attention on Reddit.

The founder’s actions didn’t affect my judgement, even if it did shake the community’s confidence.

We saw DOGE’s popularity in Western communities bottom out, so I led a team to rebuild support for this altcoin.

My team established the Dogecoin Association in Hong Kong and the Dogecoin Foundation — holding offline events, adding traffic, assisting in listing on major exchanges, even protection for secondary market investors when exchanges shut down — doing whatever we could to keep the spirit of DOGE users up. I personally organized a burn of more than 50 million DOGE.

4. DOGE has now hit the big time, thanks to grassroots support from early adopters like you… and big endorsements from Elon Musk. How can this be applied to other blockchain projects?

Those who have the heart of retail investors have the world. Whether you can dominate retail investors and whether they can trust you and reach a consensus is the key to success or failure of a project.

As long as I find something valuable, I will promote its development. I believe that others will eventually see its value, too. After all, as long as gold continues to shine, all it takes is more time.

Back in the days when Bitcoin fell to $900, I was still only buying Dogecoin without selling. History has proved that my choice, persistence, and vision were right. The current popularity and development of DOGE has really exceeded my expectations.

5. Are you planning to apply your experiences to WaykiChain?

I’m not going to copy it… but upgrade it.

Blockchain projects have been developing rapidly — and you can learn some valuable lessons by examining their progress. Just look at Ethereum and Vitalik Buterin.

The success of Dogecoin mainly dwells on viral marketing or pop culture marketing. It has won the heart of every ordinary user. The success of Ethereum and other top public chains comes from very inspiring and cohesive founders who attract other capable communities and resources.

I have used some of my experiences with DOGE when it comes to marketing WaykiChain — prompting content on major social media platforms and holding online meetups around the world before the pandemic.

We are currently planning to first restore them in China. Our offline conferences kicked off in March. We’ve successively held them in seven cities so far and communicate with local supporters up close.

Offline meetups are more efficient when they convey the value, technology and advantages of the project. Although during the epidemic all participants must wear masks, as the number of host cities increases, the enthusiasm of supporters is getting higher.

Once COVID-19 is less of a threat, we’ll be holding offline events globally.

We’ll be promoting WaykiChain for as long as it takes. If 30 offline conferences aren’t enough, we’ll do 100. If 100 aren’t enough, we’ll do 1,000 more. I believe that we’ll eventually achieve our goals through perseverance.

6. Do you think WaykiChain has what it takes to be as popular as Dogecoin?

Definitely.

The positioning of WaykiChain and DOGE are different — but the overall blockchain concepts, decentralization and listening to the community, remain the same.

I would say WaykiChain has more mature technology, a more sophisticated vision, and a greater suite of products.

For me, the future is in decentralization. I believe in borderless digital currencies and in the positive effect of blockchain improving the efficiency of social operations.

7. What’s next for DOGE?

I think the Dogecoin community has lost some of the spirit that made it so magical in the first place — especially with the crazy hype that recently surrounded this altcoin.

For a blockchain project to thrive, a community needs to keep its spirit, come together to accomplish great things, and remain united.