DashDASH
Evan Duffield's 2014 code fork of Bitcoin, launched as XCoin, renamed Darkcoin, then Dash; masternodes, X11 and an on-chain treasury.
Vlad admitted on air that Dash was always “sort of a mystery” to him, then gave Joël Valenzuela nearly five hours to explain why it became his everyday money.[3][4]
Launch and names
Evan Duffield opened the Bitcointalk announcement thread on 18 January 2014 for a coin then called XCoin; the thread's surviving titles show its later names, Darkcoin (DRK) and Dash[1]. Wikipedia, citing Fortune, dates the rebrand to Dash, a portmanteau of "digital cash", to March 2015[2].
Design
Dash uses the X11 hashing algorithm and adds a second-layer network of masternodes that provide InstantSend, PrivateSend and a governance and budgeting system that funds work from the block reward[1]. The announcement describes a launch with no premine[1], while Wikipedia records criticism that an early distribution mishap concentrated coins among early adopters[2].
On the podcast
Joël Valenzuela told Bitcoin Takeover S17 E33 how Dash became his primary money a year before the Bitcoin Cash split[3].
References
- primaryeduffield, “[ANN][DASH] Dash” (opened as XCoin, 18 Jan 2014), Bitcointalk topic 421615 [archived]
- secondaryWikipedia, “Dash (cryptocurrency)” — rebrand to Dash in March 2015 (cites Fortune, 26 Jun 2017) [archived]
- episodeS17 E33: Joël Valenzuela — how Dash became his primary money▶ listen at 46:26timestamp transcript-derived, pending a listen [archived]
- primaryBitcoin Takeover podcast RSS feed, bitcoin-takeover.com/audio/feed.xml (read 13 Nov 2026) [archived]