Pepecash 101: How a frog meme became a cryptocurrency for fun and prophetWith pepetrading there are several things coming together as an extra: Memepower, Curiosity, Human nature of collecting all sorts of stuff, Hope for profit, Community, Interest in Blockchain Technology and above all — the lust to make fun about everything and everybody,” Bates wrote. “It’s the mix of it all.So how do we begin…Pepe the Frog began as a web comic by artist Matt Furie:Soon 4chan adopted him and like all esoteric and quirky Internet stuffs, that is where Pepe grew from a comic tadpole into a full blown frog meme.Celebs like Katy Perry and Nicki Minaj got in on the action:We may have reached peak Pepe during the ’16 Election when the altright movement tried to adopt him as one of their own, Hilary denounced Pepe, and the Donald even retweeted a Pepe selfie:That’s the beauty of a good meme. Like a newborn baby, it cries and crawls in ways you can’t predict.Pepe art would continue to evolve as enthusiasts began to ironically to declare their Pepe creations as “rare”, knowing that as gif and jpg and png files, copying was instant and free and unstoppable.This is the birth of Rare Pepes.But Pepe wasn’t done yet. His frog eggs would soon spawn a quasi religion, complete with a deity named Kek inspired by an ancient Egyptian frog being.It only gets weirder. So now we have Rare Pepes — rare digital art which isn’t rare — and Kekism — a religion with an amphibian godhead and truly dank slogans like Feels Good Man and Stay Alpha.But then something happened to put them together into a magical combination:PEPECASH.Just what is Pepecash? It is one of the most interesting behaviors to arise from blockchain world as others have already mentioned. Sure investing in bitcoin and ether has made early adopters lots of cash money, and there are some early and interesting use cases for cryptocurrency and digital tokens, but there is still more hype than substance, more hope than sustainable value prop.But Rare Pepes and Pepecash are one canary in a very intriguing coal mine. The Pepe community took the idea of Rare Pepes and actually made them rare. They used the Counterparty protocol which sits on the Bitcoin blockchain.So now when an artist creates a Rare Pepe card like so……the creator can determine exactly how many copies there will be (in this case, 132 Melancholia Pepes and I own one of them :). And this is provable and showable on the Bitcoin blockchain.Yes, while you can just copy-and-paste Melancholia Pepe a million times and send it to your friends and so on, only 132 people can own a Melancholia Pepe card which is certified and digitally signed by the artist. Feels good man.And that’s just the beginning. Because more and more creative stuff is on the way. One designer tied a t-shirt to his Pepe card so if you own one of the cards you get a free t-shirt. Another Pepe card gifts you exclusive digital music. And so on.And Pepecash is the fuel that powers the Rare Pepe economy. The creators gave away 700M Pepecash moneys to everyone in the community who held a few of the early rare cards. And thus was born the most fun and most popular currency to trade and buy and own memes. Dogecoin began as a meme coin which has blossomed into a $100M blockchain and community. Pepecash has the potential to be much more.So now you have this positive loop:Artists design and sell exclusive Rare Pepes for Pepecash (technically they accept other moneys like XCP and BTC but Pepecash is the lingua pepe-ca)Collectors buy and trade and shill for Rare PepesSpeculators buy and sell Pepecash on exchanges including TuxExchange and Zaif and the Counterparty DEXEveryone profits (and prophets, long live Kek)What makes a card rare? Well, certified Rare Pepe cards are officially reviewed and approved by Pepe scientists and any artist can submit their own creations.These magnificent works of art are then released in the Rare Pepe Directory and come in groups of say 20 or 40 cards. Each group is a Series and Series 1 was the first. We’re on Series 20 now so there are already more than 1000 sweet Rares like LIAMPEPE:Only 150 of the above and I own a Liampepe too.So if you haven’t already grasped the beatific magnificence of Kekism and Pepe-ism let me give some more reasons why this movement is so special:For the first time in the history of humanity we have RARE DIGITAL ART which is on the blockchain and is powered by its OWN CURRENCYThe whole thing grew by itself: designers create cards, people spend real Pepecash to buy, and the market is small but growing and growing and growing. The community is dedicated and everyone loves PepeA thriving community of believers hang out on Telegram trading and shilling and running card auctionsIt’s an international movement. Currently trading volumes and exchange prices are 20–30% higher on the Japanese exchange Zaif than the USD exchange Tux (see Coinmarketcap)It’s plain simple fun, unlike most of the stuff I research and do in blockchain worldThere’s even a Pepecash theme songHow can you not like such works of Pepe art?Hop aboard the hype train and join us for the ride:Memes are pure intellectual property. A good meme is ownerless, permissionless, and truly global. It can change minds and hearts. Pepe is one of the world’s most popular memes and the Rare Pepe movement is the sharp tip of the spear in learning how we quantify and monetize a meme. The memeconomy is worth millions or possibly billions of dollars in attention and influence. The holy grail is figuring out how to create a sustainable and scalable business model. Pepecash just might have an answer, like Bitcoin does for a stateless currency, and Ethereum for a decentralized computerThe Pepecash and Rare Pepe movement is not only attacking monetizable memes, but also the collectibles market which some analysts estimate at 50–100M collectors worldwide and many billions of dollars. Most of these items are physical (eg, coin collectors), but software is eating the world and the market for digital collectibles will be hugeRemember Dogecoin? Never underestimate a joke coin worth $120M dollars. The two things Doge has going for it: the staying power of a good meme, and a truly nice community with a tipping culture. Pepecash has both features, and much moreRare Pepe is for the lulz but there’s real innovation: An online wallet. A mobile wallet to buy and sell cards and show collections. Weekly card auctions. Designers. Collectors. A theme song. Cards have traded for thousands of dollars including MYLITTLEPEPE and LORDKEKThere is a fixed supply of only 700M Pepecash; that’s it. What’s more the supply is shrinking: Pepecash must be paid by artists to submit to the Rare Pepe Directory, and with each approved card more Pepecash is burned in praise of Lord KekGames are beginning to integrate Rare Pepes for fun and prophet: for example the trading card game Rare Pepe Party and Sarutobi.Someone recently ran some numbers and showed there are like 2K holders of Pepecash. By comparison more than 1 MILLION addresses hold >1 dogecoin. So, early days folksWord of kek-caution: This is NOT investment advice and whatever you collect or buy or ignore is at your own risk.But just look how cool these are:SO HOW DO YOU GET STARTED?ONE: Praise Kek.TWO: Do some readingHere are good articles on all things Rare Pepe and Pepe-conomy:https://www.dailydot.com/unclick/rare-pepe-frog-meme-economy/https://cointelegraph.com/news/rare-pepe-cards-become-tradeable-counterparty-asset-now-has-valuehttps://medium.com/@coin_and_peace/rarepepe-is-the-most-innovative-project-in-the-crypto-space-seriously-6d6b74749687https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/4chans-frog-meme-went-mainstream-so-they-tried-to-kill-itHere is where Pepecash formed out of the primordial coin launch soup: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1617264.0Here are all the legit certified Rare Pepes by the pepe scientists: http://rarepepedirectory.com/?page_id=1405Here is Pepecash moneys, now more than $4M worth of true blue inflatable US dollars: https://coinmarketcap.com/assets/pepe-cash/Here is a gallery of some dank rares: http://rarepepe.galleryTHREE: Join the Rare Pepe Telegram group and say hello: https://t.me/rarepepegradergroupFOUR: Create a wallet on rarepepewallet.com. Write down and store your password phrase (aka private key or secret key) somewhere safeFIVE: Buy pepecash moneys. You need Bitcoin first or the Counterparty token XCPSIX: Collect Rare Pepes on rarepepewallet.com or the sweet mobile app Book of Orbs7. Email or message me your wallet ID and I will hook you up with some Pepemoney or Rares8. Go much much deeper into Kekism and our frog overlords. Believe for fun and prophet.If you enjoyed (or didn’t) this essay, you can send amphibious gifts here: 1JCzEZKejMPC7EHRyuns5Zg1WRCH3vMAJpThanks goes to my friends Phil and Derek and Koji and Rare Pepe News and the Rare Pepe Telegram group. Stay alpha.