Kabosu is a Shiba Inu whose stunning face helped launch one of the most iconic memes of the past decade and inspired a cryptocurrency DogecoinDied on Friday. He was 18 years old.
She “crossed the rainbow bridge” on Friday, her owner Atsuko Sato Expressed on social mediaHe added that she did not suffer any pain when she died and that Ms Sato was still touching her.
Kabosu’s sudden rise from ordinary dog to global icon can only be described as “amazing” in the Animal Hall of Fame. After her breeder went bankrupt, she was sent to an animal shelter along with a group of other Shiba Inus, and was adopted by kindergarten teacher Ms. Sato in 2008. Ms. Sato began posting photos of Kabosu enjoying life and playing at home. On her blog.
but A special photo In 2010, Kabosu had her breakthrough: eyebrows raised, an expression that could be interpreted as intellectual, mischievous or amusing, like a Rorschach test. Her rounded head quickly became Doge Emoticons.
Fans online initially captioned photos of her face with cartoonishly wordless and grammatically incorrect two-word phrases that became their own language: a way to express a reaction to nearly any situation. (Very awake! Very scared! Wow!)
Images of Kabosu and other Shiba Inus have been cut up and remixed to produce jokes ranging from the relatable to the nonsensical, and have sparked their own Derivative memes. Nicolas Cage’s face Photoshopped onto her body. A loaf of bread. even Legislator (Another Shiba Inu, Suki, is also often the source of Doge emoticons because there is a photo of her wearing a shrunken scarf and staring into the distance with her mouth wide open. According to The Verge’s historical definition of meme.
Her image then made its way to the cryptocurrency space and was later used as the logo for Dogecoin. Cryptocurrency A token launched as a joke in 2013. This meme token made some investors millionaires overnight After the stratospheric rise in 2021it can disappear.
Whether she realizes she’s popular or not, Kabosu doesn’t seem to mind the attention. She has an unusually laid-back temperament for a Shiba Inu, Ms. Sato said.
“She was very gentle and calm; she loved being photographed,” she told The Verge in 2013. A volunteer, drawn to her round face, named her after the Japanese citrus fruit of the same name. “I thought the name was perfect, so I kept it,” she said.
The Shiba Inu has been plagued by illness in recent years, and Ms. Sato said in 2022 that it was diagnosed with chronic lymphoma leukemia (a type of cancer) and acute cholangiohepatitis (a disease that inflames the liver and surrounding areas).
Her life has attracted the attention of more than 500,000 fans online, and she lives with three other cats. Her birthday, November 2, is celebrated by many people and is known as “Doge Day.”
“She didn’t get love as a child, so as a member of the family, I wanted to give her plenty of love,” Ms. Sato told The Verge in 2013. farewell party It will be held on Sunday in Narita for Kabosu.
“I’m convinced that Kabosu is the happiest dog in the world,” she wrote on Friday.
