The Real Deal – Musk Did Talk About Stepping Back from “DOGE” Starting May 2025

But he meant the Department of Government Efficiency – A cost-slashing project he helped with for the Trump administration.

Here's the real deal – Musk did talk about stepping back from "DOGE" starting May 2025. But he meant the Department of Government Efficiency – A cost-slashing project he helped with for the Trump administration. He announced this during a Tesla earnings call, saying he needed more bandwidth for his car company after some rough financial waters. He wasn’t talking about the Shiba Inu coin we all know.

Just to hammer it home, Musk himself poured cold water on the crypto connection back in April 2025, at a town hall, saying the government isn't using Dogecoin. Apparently, the department name was a bit of a joke, having been chosen over something blander like "Government Efficiency Commission," and someone slapped the Doge mascot on the department’s site for a hot minute (February 2025), causing a quick DOGE price jump. But that was fluff, not policy.

This whole mess perfectly captures crypto's wild side – How a misunderstanding, especially one tied to a figure like Musk and a shared nickname, can snowball into market-moving FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) before anyone checks the facts.

From punchline to powerhouse – Dogecoin's odd journey

Now, to rewind a bit. Remember how Dogecoin even began? Well, in 2013, Billy Markus and Jackson Palmer were making a new coin. But they weren't aiming to disrupt banks or anything serious like that. They saw the early crypto scene as too grim and wanted something fun, using the internet-famous Shiba Inu meme (RIP Kabosu, the original Doge, who passed in May 2024). It was about making crypto less intimidating.

And it exploded. Reddit users flocked to it, and they used it for tipping on the web, which is still huge today. It even outpaced Bitcoin in daily transactions early on! Sure, there were bumps, like a major wallet hack in 2014. But the community's "SaveDogemas" response, raising funds to cover the losses, showed its unique spirit.

Tech-wise, DOGE isn't groundbreaking. It's derived from Litecoin (which itself is based on Bitcoin), using Proof-of-Work mining. What is different is its inflationary supply. No hard cap like Bitcoin's 21 million. Instead, new coins get minted with every block, forever. This was baked in from the start to keep people spending and tipping, not just holding – a design choice Musk later acknowledged.

Even after the founders stepped back relatively early, the community kept the flame burning, funding things like the Jamaican bobsled team's Olympic trip and a NASCAR sponsorship. That spirit eventually led to rebooting the Dogecoin Foundation in 2021, aiming to give the project more structure and direction. It's a wild case study in how pure community energy and a killer meme can sometimes count for more than cutting-edge code.

The Musk Factor – Rocket fuel and kryptonite

Oh, and then there's Elon. His involvement went from casual mentions in 2019 to becoming the unofficial "Doge Father." His SNL gig in May 2021 was peak chaos – Hyping DOGE one minute, saying it's a "hustle" the next, and triggering a massive price dump from its all-time high.

He didn't just talk; he acted. Tesla now accepts DOGE for merch. SpaceX announced a DOGE-funded moon mission (still pending, by the way). And his tweets, even silly ones, could send the price soaring 40% or more in minutes. This brought insane visibility and pulled tons of retail investors in, pushing DOGE's market cap into the stratosphere ($85 billion+ at its peak!)

But, it was always a dangerous dance. That massive influence meant massive volatility. Every Musk utterance held DOGE hostage. It also brought headaches, like a huge $258 billion lawsuit claiming market manipulation (which got tossed out in August 2024, the judge calling his hype "puffery").

Elon's shadow both legitimized DOGE for many and made it dangerously dependent. His meme-lord persona and DOGE's meme origins fed off each other perfectly.

Dogecoin – Still barking, but what's new?

So, where's DOGE today? It's still a top dog by market cap. People still use it for tipping and small payments. Big names like Tesla and others accept it. Charities keep doing fundraising drives with it.

But let's be real: development hasn't exactly been blazing fast. Since around 2015, major tech upgrades have been few and far between. The network runs smoothly enough, thanks to ongoing maintenance and piggybacking on Litecoin's mining security, but don't expect the complex DeFi or smart contract action you see elsewhere. The re