Hello and welcome to my first Medium article as a member of Coq.Media!
You might know me from my infographics and twitter threads, but I also enjoy writing long-form. It’s refreshing to break free from the character limits of X!
My goal here is celebrate Coq Inu Avax — the #1 meme coin on Avalanche and one of the top meme coins in all of crypto! Hereon-out, I plan to publish a new Medium article on the 1st of every month. With all that’s happening within the Coq Inu ecosystem, it should be quite easy to do!
For my debut article, I’ve chosen to explore the rapid growth of culture within the Coq Inu community, something that is both intriguing to me and a fascinating topic overall.
To quote Pope John Paul II:
“Man creates culture, and through culture, creates himself.”
Behind every strong group, there is often an identifiable culture, established both by both meticulous planning, a pre-determined idea of what kind of culture you want to try and cultivate, and sheer chance — a blessing from the gods, if you will — having the right pieces fall into place at the right time.
From the beginning, the founders of Coq Inu have aimed to create a strong culture of community. Through early initiatives like launching a hackathon, and organizing meme and art competitions, they’ve intentionally worked to bring us together and help each of us each find our role in building within our community.
It is what has kept us connected and engaged in Coq irregardless of token price. As the great Wojak once said:
“Price up, we bull post. Price down, we bull post more.”
So without further ado, let’s dive in! I present to you, the Five F’s of Coq Inu Culture!
1. Flags 🇺🇸
Flags symbolize countries, groups, or celebrations, and play a crucial role in establishing cultural identity. In the Coq Inu community, two emblems stand out above the rest.
The first is the OG genesis $COQ token symbol (pictured left below) created by the world renowned Gravy Dream. This token was many people’s first impression of Coq, solidified by the slogan “In Coq We Trust,” fostering a deep sense of faith and loyalty from within the community.
The second emblem is the King Coq mascot (pictured right below) which was chosen by the community. This mascot has inspired thousands of memes from professional digital artists and enthusiastic community members alike. King Coq GIFs are now integrated across all major social media platforms, making the Coq Inu brand truly mainstream. As more sticker content becomes available, this trend will only accelerate!
These two symbols make our brand extremely recognizable, something that is important in helping people identify and associate with our culture.
I’m a Nike guy. I’m an Apple guy. Yes, I’m a Coq guy.
2. Famous People 🤩
Famous people advocate for their culture and bring awareness to their ideals. The Coq community is no exception, boasting bona fide celebrities and emerging talents.
First, we have Wojak Satoshi and Gribbly Fire, the founders of Coq Inu Avax.
Wojak, a meme historian, works tirelessly to put Coq on the map. If you’ve ever met Wojak in real life, you know that this guy is a giga-brain chad, full stop. In addition to his big brains, he’s also incredibly generous. To date, he’s given out two sets of rare gold coins. The first, celebrating Chikn NFT in 2023, and the second, celebrating Coq in 2024.
Gribbly, a code connoisseur, is known as “the dev who devs better than most devs although he isn’t even really a dev.” Gribbly is a mountain of a man, standing 6'3" with biceps that would make even Stache blush. Some of Gribbly’s successful Web3 projects before Coq Inu include EGGZ on Avax and Coq Terminal, a data explorer for the Chikn community.
If you are lucky enough to have met Wojak or Gribbly in realy life, then would have likely received one of their Coq Cards!
Then there’s Clint of The Bokcast, the best Spaces host in the industry. His presence leaves people star-struck, and his value to our community is immeasurable. When I first met Clint at the Avalanche Summit II in Barcelona, Spain, May 2023, I couldn’t help but to follow Clint around like a… well… like a chikn! His personality just draws people in.
We also have World Wide Wex, the beloved host of Wex After Dark. His hot takes and enthusiasm for Coq are both hilarious and contagious, making him a tremendous asset to our Coq community. He’s also the mastermind behind Coq.Media, and a mentor to us youngins in the space.
Another true legend in the community is Grenville Riley. Grenville, in addition to being a stalwart on The Bokcast, a regular at IRL events, a blur on X and in Discord, also published a 16 chapter article here on Medium: The Ramblings of a Humble Chikn Farmer. If you ever get a chance to meet Grenville IRL, buy this man an IPA!
Additionally, we must mention Onethird Nerd, Adrian Martinez, and Luke 152. Onethird, also a regular on The Bokcast and an OG in the Chikn NFT community, hosted the first annual CoqFest in Troy, New York. Adrian and Luke co-hosted the COQsensus event in Austin, Texas, and run the 2Six Podcast, which is mightily Coq-aligned. Huge props to these three guys as well!
Finally, I would be behooved to mention Jon Ray, who has worked tirelessly behind the scenes running NFTreasure, a Coq-aligned cutting edge phygital merch enterprise. More on that later!
So many other legends in the Coq community as well, including Sam the Carpet Man, Crypto Quine, and all the others that I’ll leave you, the reader, to discover!
3. Festivals 🥳
Festivals are a core factor in establishing cultural identity, and the Coq community loves to get together! Meeting face-to-face with our online friends makes our coqmunity feel even more special!
As a matter of fact, Coq Inu was born out of the Chikn communities first ever meet-up in Barcelona, Spain at the Avalanche Summit II.
Since then, we had our first official rendezvous as the Coq community at the NFT NYC event, followed by three different CoqFest events hosted on 4/20 — not only the aforementioned CoqFest: Troy, New York, hosted by Onethird Nerd, but also CoqFest: London, United Kingdom, hosted by Mason, and CoqFest: Woodlands, Texas, hosted by Steven Gates of GoGoPool. And, of course, COQsensus which was hosted at Consensus 2024 in Austin, Texas.
There will be no shortage of festivals in the coming years as well! Next up is BitCOQ ’24, happening at The Bitcoin Conference in Nashville, Tennessee from July 24–27. After that, the Avalanche Summit III in Buenos Aires, Argentina from October 16–18, which will see a HUGE community presence. Towards the end of the year, we’ll likely throw a 1st birthday party for Coq, with the location to be determined. There have also been whispers of renting a castle for CoqFest ’25. 👀 🏴 🏰
If you haven’t attended a Coq meet-up event, I highly recommend attending one in the future! These gatherings are perfect for sharing ideas, networking, and just partying hard!
4. Fashion 🧥
At any Coq festival, you’ll notice the amazing merch from NFTreasure. Jon Ray, the community lead, has empowered creators to develop their own lines of merch. This has led to a plethora of creative and eye-catching Coq-themed clothing!
Some items are limited edition and many come embedded with NFC (Near Field Communication) technology. This allows garments to be authenticated and creators to reward their community with tokens, NFTs, or other prizes.
It is truly cutting edge what Jon and NFTreasure have created. As a content creator, or in this case, a fashion designer, we get a kickback on all the sales of our merch. This further incentivizes us to come up with fresh Coq designs! I personally plan to launch quarterly merch drops, with Season 1 already live in my Dano’s Threads store on the NFTreasure website.
Wearing our Coq merch, not only helps us to establish our culture and identify with our brand, but it also helps bring massive attention to Coq.
When we are at crypto conferences, meeting up with friends, or just simply out in the real world, it’s hard to see someone wearing a “Got Coq?” tee-shirt and not be curious!
5. Food 🥪
While chikn (sic) might seem like the obvious food of the Coq community, the pastrami sandwich has surprisingly become culturally significant.
As the story goes, after a long night of drinking in New York City, including a powerful 4.8 magnitude earthquake, Clint could only finish half of his brunch, a pastrami sandwich from Katz, NYC’s oldest deli. This gave rise to the legend of the pastrami sandwich.
If you ever find yourself in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, make the pilgrimage to Katz Deli to see if you can finish the challenging task of eating a whole sandwich!
As for chikn, our tendyman, chikn_kfc, devours drumsticks by the bucket, which was evidenced by his appetite at the TOKEN2049 Conference in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
When it comes to Coqtails, nothing beats a Long Island Iced Tea — or a Short Island Iced Tea if you can’t finish the full version.
Also, White Claw has become the unofficial drink sponsor of the Coq community — simply because they are really good!
And there you have it, folks! With a blend of flags, famous people, festivals, fashion, and food, Coq has established a strong, inclusive, recognizable culture. We support each other, enjoy spending time together, and genuinely care for one another.
As our community grows, it becomes more diverse, drawing in people with different strengths and abilities. This diversity strengthens our foundation, helps us find unique perspectives, and leads to a stronger, more vibrant community.
As we continue to absolutely crush the fine culture of art, music, and memes, our culture as a whole is coming together quite strong!
To finish the article, I’ll leave you with this — a comparison of the five F’s of American culture compared with the five F’s of Coq culture.
Something great and truly long-lasting is being built right under our beaks!
#bokbok ❤️🐓
