Chill Guy is a personified dog character created by artist Phillip Banks on October 4, 2023. The character wears a gray sweater, blue jeans, and red sneakers, with hands in the pockets and a calm smile on the face. When Banks first released Chill Guy on Instagram, he described him as ‘a laid-back guy who doesn’t care about anything’. This relaxed and go-with-the-flow image quickly resonated, especially on social media, where users combined Chill Guy’s zen attitude with their daily lives to create a variety of humorous and creative content, further promoting the popularity of Chill Guy.
The popularity of Chill Guy is not limited to social media, but also extends to the cryptocurrency field. The meme coin based on this character, ‘CHILLGUY’, is in Solana Issued on the blockchain, with a market value soaring from $10 million to $580 million in a short period of time, attracting a lot of attention from investors. YouTube star MrBeast called Chill Guy ‘the biggest meme of our lives.’ His statement on November 26, 2024, greatly boosted the credibility of the CHILLGUY token and sparked even greater interest from traders and investors.
However, the original author Phillip Banks subsequently stated that he did not authorize the use of his work for cryptocurrency projects and has applied for copyright for Chill Guy, planning to take legal action against unauthorized commercial use. This event has sparked widespread discussions about the relationship between meme culture and copyright protection, reminding creators how to protect their rights while adapting to internet culture in the digital age.
According to the market data of Gate.io, CHILLGUY, a meme coin on the Solana chain, is currently priced at $0.0306, with a 24-hour increase of 1.38%. The current market cap of CHILLGUY is $30.6 million, ranking 700th in the entire market. CHILLGUY was deployed on the Solana chain on October 6, 2024, and then fell all the way after hitting a historical high of $0.768 at the end of November last year. It has now fallen by more than 95% compared to the historical high.
The rapid rise of Chill Guy token (CHILLGUY) reflects the unique combination of meme culture and the cryptocurrency market. Its market value soared from $10 million to $580 million in a short period of time, demonstrating the market’s high interest and speculative enthusiasm for meme coins. However, the subsequent Price trend, it also reflects that the meme market is actually an attention market. Meme coins usually rely on market sentiment and hype. If the Chill Guy token can maintain its topic heat, it may attract more speculative capital inflows.