Everyone knows about Bitcoin, Ethereum and other serious cryptocurrencies, but there are some coins out there that pretty much nobody knows anything about. Many of them are outright bizarre and, while most sprung into existence as a joke, some of them ended up becoming popular. Let’s take a look at a few examples.
PotCoin (POT)
This project was developed for lovers of plants that trigger states of altered consciousness – connoisseurs of cannabis in other words. It came into existence in 2014 as a result of a Litecoin fork. POT was created in order to make transactions in the legal cannabis sector more convenient and secure, and its goal is to become the industry’s standard payment method.
The token supply of PotCoin has been capped at 420 million coins.
Petro (PTR)
This project was proposed by the Venezuelan government in 2017 and launched in 2018. The idea of creating a new cryptocurrency came to the country’s president immediately after witnessing rapid growth in the price of Bitcoin and Ethereum. He expected that the financial community would view PTR as an investment opportunity and provide cash flows that were sorely needed at a time when the country was experiencing crippling hyperinflation, thereby helping to revive Venezuela's collapsing economy.
The coin, which is backed by the country’s vast oil reserves, launched to great fanfare but ended up falling short of its creators’ ambitions.
The government took the decision to mine Petro itself, meaning that the coin is centralized and PTR ultimately did not become the first government-issued cryptocurrency.
TrumpCoin (TRUMP)
No prizes for guessing who this coin is named after. It was released in February 2016 by supporters of Donald Trump as a way to help him in his presidential election bid. Trump himself has nothing to do with this coin, and his son Eric has even publicly refused to support the initiative, insisting that the Trump family is not associated with the coin and even suggesting that its creators are fraudsters.
The total issuance was set at 18 million coins and, though they are now of little interest to anybody, there are still platforms where they can be purchased.
PUTinCoin (PUT)
Another political crypto project, in this case in honour of Russia’s leader. According to the developers of this coin, “PUTinCoin was created to pay tribute to the people, the economic success and the president of one of the largest and greatest countries in the world: Russia!”
The project was created with the mission of aiding the economic development of the Russian Federation and helping to make payments in Russia more convenient.
Today the idea looks rather utopian, given the negative attitude of the Russian government even towards large and world-famous crypto projects such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.
At the time of writing, you can become a PUTinCoin owner for $0.0007.
Cthulhu Offerings (OFF)
The creators of this coin were inspired by H. P. Lovecraft’s The Call of Cthulhu. The adherents of this mysterious movement – that’s probably the best word to describe it – refer to Cthulhu Offerings as “blessings”, mining as “sacrifice”, and themselves as “cultists”. This, however, is where OFF’s distinctive elements end. In all other respects, it’s a bog standard, cheap, and obviously useless cryptocurrency.
VeganCoin
If you’re a vegan, then this is “your” coin. Targeting the vegan community, the developers of the project describe VeganCoin as a cruelty-free cryptocurrency.
Owners of this “ethical” cryptocurrency can use it as a payment method on the VeganPoint meal-sharing platform and the VeganNation online store.
The project was launched at the beginning of 2018.
BitCoen (BEN)
This cryptocurrency claims to be the “first kosher crypto”. It wasn’t launched in Israel however – entrepreneur Vyacheslav Semenchuk founded the project in Russia. Anyone can buy and sell BitCoen, and 10% of the profits are redirected as interest-free loans to members of the Jewish community. There are only a few places where BEN is traded, however, and it seems Jewish investors prefer to put their funds in other projects.
The best of the rest
We could continue expanding this list pretty much indefinitely. If you can believe it, there are religious coins like Jesus Coin and ConfessionCoin. The former invites people to purchase its native coin to secure entry to heaven, while the latter asks users to confess by writing their sins onto the blockchain.
At the other end of the spectrum, there are cryptocurrencies that don’t bear speaking about in polite society. Sexcoin, for example, was designed to become an alternative payment system in the porn industry, while FUCK Token (which is almost impossible to find, has unclear origins and now appears to have disappeared) outlines in its whitepaper that users can send a couple of tokens to their friend to show that they “give a fuck”.
Finally, there is one project which, without any hesitation, admits that its native token is completely useless. It’s called Useless Ethereum Token.
That’s all for now!