There has been a surge of memecoins being launched on Solana lately, with nearly 500,000 created in May 2024 alone.
A Solana memecoin developer named Mikol accidentally set himself on fire in a live-streamed stunt to promote the $DARE memecoin.
Mikol suffered third-degree burns on 30% of his body and is currently hospitalized.
Despite the stunt, the "Trust or Dare" memecoin price dropped significantly over the last 24 hours.
Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin isn’t too impressed by the current memecoin craze, and advocates for responsible marketing.
Memecoins generally rely on hype for their price action, rallying by several hundred percent in a matter of weeks or even days, based on real-world events.
Back in the early days, we had memecoins like Dogecoin and Shiba Inu rallying by thousands of percentage points, Dogecoin on hype from Elon Musk’s “doge father” hype, and Shiba Inu on residual hype from Dogecoin, as well as the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020/2021 to some degree.
This time around, we have hundreds of memecoins being deployed and hyped every day, mostly on the Solana network.
In fact, recent insights from Binance show that nearly 500,000 new cryptocurrencies were launched on Solana in May alone.
In the story below, however, one of the Solana memecoin developers took things a little too far, when he doused himself in fire accelerant, and “accidentally” set himself on fire—on a live stream!
Here’s how crazy things have become so far, and what is going on in the memecoin industry.
The developer in question is named Mikol, and is one of the people on the development team of a Solana-based memecoin called "Trust or Dare".
In an attempt to drive the hype (and the price) of the "Trust or Dare," ($DARE) memecoin, Mikol soaked himself in isopropyl alcohol, more commonly known as "rubbing alcohol".
But he didn’t stop there.
The developer went ahead and ignited fireworks directed towards him by friends, and things quickly escalated from there.
Mikol and friends attempted to use water bottles to put out the fire and resorted to calling emergency services when nothing seemed to be working.
Mikol was soon taken to a trauma centre, where doctors reported that about thirty per cent of his body had third-degree burns.
Mikol says that he remains committed to his project, despite the memecoin failing to garner the attention he had hoped for.
According to data from DexScreener, this memecoin, despite the publicity stunt, hasn’t garnered as much attention as Mikol had hoped.
DexScreener data shows that the “Trust or Dare” memecoin is down by 64% over the last 24 hours, indicating that hype doesn’t always work on memecoins.
$DARE is down
Just like we saw in the Ethereum craze between 2017 and 2022, the memecoin craze in this cycle has found its way onto the Solana blockchain, with nearly half a million of these new cryptocurrencies being launched last month alone, according to Binance.
Last week alone, we had memecoin issues between an alleged memecoin scammer and celebrities like Rich the Kid, Caitlyn Jenner, Iggy Azalea and even Nigeria’s Davido.
However, this track record of pump-and-dump schemes and even celebrity-endorsed cryptocurrencies with no real-world value has been bashed by Ethereum co-founder, Vitalik Buterin.
Buterin clarified that the Stoner Cats project by Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis was a lot more sensible than anything that has come out of the 2024 celebrity memecoin craze. "At least Stoner Cats funded a real show, while the memecoins are meaningless and unimportant," he remarked.
In sum, Buterin advocates for a balance between responsibility and innovation, as well as the importance of drawing a fine line between creative marketing and self-destructive behaviour.
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