The cryptocurrency industry can claim another magnanimous accomplishment to its name: transforming a wholesome New York City dog contest into little more than an online pump and dump scheme. The Honorary NYC Dog Mayor Election of 2024 was designed to be a fun, local competition between pooches. Dog-owners enter their pets into the contest, and then people online are allowed to vote on which is the most qualified to be dog mayor of New York (as far as I can tell, the qualifications begin and end with cuteness).
Basically, its fantasy football—but with dogs. Unfortunately, the New York Times reported Wednesday that crypto bros had somehow caught wind of the competition and sunk their stupid, money-addled fangs into it. Indeed, it appears that one of the dogs, a Pomeranian named Bertram (or “Bertie,” as he’s better known), had a memecoin named after him.
The working theory is that crypto holders then began promoting Bertram in the hopes that the price of the coin would rise, should he win. One of the owners, an influencer named Olivia Caputo, said that she began to notice that the contest was being irregularly skewed after seeing the vote tallies increase exponentially in a short period of time: Caputo ultimately took her dog—a Shih Tzu named Enzo—out of the competition after it became apparent that the votes were being skewed. “I don’t want my name attached to any pump-and-dump scheme,” she told the paper.
“It sucked out all the fun and cheapened the whole t.
