Doge (often DOHJ, DOHG) is an Internet meme
that became popular in 2013.
The meme typically consists of a picture of
a Shiba Inu dog accompanied by multicolored
text in Comic Sans font in the foreground.
The text, representing a kind of internal
monologue, is deliberately written in a form
of broken English.The meme is based on a 2010
photograph, and became popular in late 2013,
being named as Know Your Meme's "top meme"
of that year.
A cryptocurrency based on Doge, the Dogecoin,
was launched in December 2013, and the Shiba
Inu has been featured on Josh Wise's NASCAR
car as part of a sponsorship deal.
Doge has also been referenced by members of
the United States Congress, a safety video
for Delta Air Lines, a Google Easter egg,
and the video for the song "Word Crimes" by
"Weird Al" Yankovic.
== Structure ==
Doge uses two-word phrases in which the first
word is almost always one of five modifiers
("so", "such", "many", "much", and "very"),
and the departure from correct English is
to use the modifier with a word that it cannot
properly modify.
For example, "Much respect.
So noble."
uses the doge modifiers but is not "proper"
doge because the modifiers are used in a formally
correct fashion; the doge version would be
"Much noble, so respect."
In addition to these phrases, a doge utterance
often ends with a single word, most often
"wow" but with "amaze" and "excite" also being
used.
== Origin and pronunciation ==
Kabosu (Japanese: かぼす), the female Shiba
Inu featured in the original meme, was a pedigree
puppy who was sent to an animal shelter when
her puppy mill shut down.
She was adopted in 2008 by Japanese kindergarten
teacher Atsuko Satō, and named after the
citrus fruit kabosu because Sato thought she
had a round face like the fruit.
Another Shiba Inu featured in the meme is
Suki, a female belonging to photographer Jonathan
Fleming from San Francisco.
His wife had accidentally put a scarf in the
wash, making it shrink.
He took a photograph of Suki wearing the scarf
outside on a cold night in February 2010.Kabosu
was first pictured in a 2010 blog post by
Sato; afterwards, variations of the pictures
using overlaid Comic Sans text were posted
from a Tumblr blog, Shiba Confessions.
However, the use of the intentionally misspelled
"doge" dates back to June 2005, when it was
mentioned in an episode of Homestar Runner's
puppet series.The most common pronunciations
of "doge" are DOHJ and DOHG.
In non-English speaking countries, "doge"
is occasionally pronounced "dodge".
Those unfamiliar or unacquainted with the
meme also use the pronunciations "doggie",
DOG-ay, DOH-gay, or simply "dog".
== Spread ==
In August 2013, images of the meme were spammed
on Reddit's r/MURICA subreddit by 4chan's
random imageboard, /b/. Online searches for
the meme began to increase in July 2013.
Google later created a Doge Easter egg: when
doge meme was entered into the YouTube search
bar, all the site's text would be displayed
in colorful Comic Sans, similar to the kind
used by the meme.The meme was ranked at No.
12 on MTV's list of "50 Things Pop Culture
Had Us Giving Thanks For" in 2013.
Io9 compared the internal dialog of the Shiba
Inu dogs to lolspeak.
On December 13, Doge was named the "top meme"
of 2013 by Know Your Meme.In late December
2013, members of the U.S. Congress produced
material in the meme's style.
The Huffington Post commented that Doge was
"killed" because of the Congress members'
usage of the meme.In December 2013, the Dogecoin
was introduced as a new cryptocurrency, making
it the first cryptocurrency to be based on
an Internet meme; the viral phenomenon, along
with usage of the Comic Sans MS typeface,
gave it "the Internet density of a large star"
according to Medium writer Quinn Norton.
By early 2014, Doge's popularity was sustained
by internet communities on social media, accompanied
by the rapid growth and acceptance of Dogecoin.
In April 2014, Doge experienced a second major
media resurgence due to revelations of the
Dogecoin community's intent to sponsor Josh
Wise in NASCAR and place a picture of the
Shiba Inu on his vehicle.
The car features in downloadable content for
the video game NASCAR '14.
Media outlets have embraced the meme while
reporting on the cryptocurrency and the car,
with titles featuring phrases such as "so
wow" and "very vroom".In January 2014, Sydney-based
web developers Katia Eirin and Bennett Wong
created Doge Weather, a weather website and
mobile app incorporating the meme.
Doge Weather reports the temperature and weather
conditions based on the user's geographic
location.
In April 2014, Doge Weather became available
as a mobile app for iOS 7 costing 99¢.
In mid-2014, the advertisement agency DDB
Stockholm had Doge feature prominently in
an advertising campaign for the public transport
company SL in Stockholm, Sweden.
The advertisement concerned the company's
special summer tickets, and featured Doge
holding a public transport ticket in his mouth,
with phrases such as "many summer", "such
cheap" and "very buy".
Doge was also one of 25 Internet memes featured
in a Delta Air Lines safety video released
in May 2015.
In the video for "Weird Al" Yankovic's 2014
song "Word Crimes", a song about bad grammar,
a Doge tweet is used to illustrate the types
of bad grammar referenced in that part of
the song."Doge" was one of several additions
to Dictionary.com in November 2015.
The website defines it as not just the image
macro and its variants, but also the form
of "language" that it utilizes.The Japanese
perception is remarkably different; Satō
and Kabosu are rather known as a pet and owner
rather than a meme, and her blog is the fourth-most
popular pet-related blog in the country as
of December 2013.
Reacting to the meme, she explained, "To be
honest, some pictures are strange for me,
but it's still funny!
I’m very impressed with their skills and
taste.
Around me, nobody knows about the doge meme.
Maybe I don't understand memes very well,
because I'm living a such an analog life."
Satō has also expressed that she had learned
that "the risk of the internet is that anyone
in the world can see my life on my blog".
Fleming stated that in his experience, the
Shiba Inu breed has become more recognised
due to the meme.In the 2015 video game The
Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes, a reference
to the meme can be found in the North American
version only.
When examining one of the ancient bookshelves,
the text reads "Still, coming here has at
least afforded me the rare chance to explore
these ancient ruins.
So ancient.
Such ruin."
The reference was met with mixed views from
fans of the series.
== See also ==
List of Internet phenomena
== References ==
== 
External links ==
Original blog post featuring Kabosu
