Kanye West gets virtual currency named after him called CoinYe West

Online, digital payment currency, or cryptocurrency, has been in the news for much of 2013. Mostly associated with Silk Road and buying drugs, the Bitcoin rose from under $100 to almost $1,000 before the Chinese government effectively outlawed it, cutting its worth in half, according to Vice.

But Bitcoin isn't the only virtual currency floating around out there. According to the article, there are at least five other notable cryptocurrencies in existence: Ripple, Litecoin, Peercoin and Namecoin. There's also Dogecoin, which comes from the viral Internet meme of a Shiba Inu. And if a dog can rule a currency, then some believe Kanye West should, too.

A new cryptocurrency called CoinYe West will launch January 11 with the catchphrase, "WE AIN'T MININ', WE PICKIN'," and the people behind the coin promise "no premine, no screwed up fake 'flair' launches, shyster devs, muted channels, and f**ked up wallets." As Vice notes, the currency, like West, isn't messing around.

In a nod to West's illuminati conspiracy, the maximum number of coins that can ever be mined in the currency is 66,666,666,666.

West hasn't given his stamp of approval on the coin yet, but the CoinYe West founders hopes he will be cool with it. They even tweeted at him last week asking, "Kanye, have you ever invested in bitcoin or litecoin? What do you think of @CoinyeWest?"

Vice interviewed the currency's founders to ask how this all got started. The said their goal with CoinYe West is "to make it easier for people to use cryptocurrency. Right now, it's kind of a dark art for people to mine coins. We plan on releasing a front end to the "mining" programs called CoinyeMiner. It will make things a lot more simple and people will be able to make their own coins. We're working round-the-clock to get everything going as smoothly as possible."

On why they chose West instead of other rappers, they responded, "We chose to represent Kanye because he is and always has been a trendsetter, and he's always keeping things unique. I can picture a future where Coinye is used to buy concert tickets, with cryptographically verified virtual tickets, and other ideas I can't give away just yet."

You can read the full Q&A here. Let us know what you think of the idea in the comments section below!

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Kanye West