In the ever-evolving narrative of cryptocurrency, ghosts from the past often hold more influence than present-day leaders. This week, the Shiba Inu community was reminded of this as a poignant message from its mysterious and long-absent founder, Ryoshi, resurfaced on social media, four years after he vanished from the public eye.
The message was shared by “@Shibizens,” a prominent X account focused on updates for the Shibarium network. Paired with a link to a Shibarium-based application, the post featured a powerful quote from Ryoshi’s original blog posts: “I am nobody. I have said from the beginning, I am a nobody, I am not important.”
This statement is more than just a display of humility; it’s the foundational pillar of the Shiba Inu project. In an industry where founders are often treated as celebrities, Ryoshi’s philosophy was one of radical decentralization. His vision was for SHIB to be an experiment in spontaneous community building, owned by everyone and no one simultaneously.
Ryoshi’s departure on May 30, 2021, was as enigmatic as his identity. In a move mirroring that of Bitcoin’s creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, he scrubbed his entire digital footprint, deleting all blog and social media posts. He had warned the community this day would come, and true to his word, he disappeared. The market’s reaction was telling: the SHIB price saw a negligible dip of just 6%, a testament, perhaps, to the community’s acceptance of his core principle that the project was bigger than any single individual.
Since then, the project’s stewardship has been in the hands of another pseudonymous figure, Shytoshi Kusama, who has guided its evolution from a simple meme coin into a broader ecosystem, most notably with the launch of the Shibarium layer-2 network. The fact that Ryoshi’s message was used to promote a Shibarium app shows how his founding vision continues to be a guiding light for the project’s current development.
From a market perspective, Shiba Inu’s journey has been a volatile one. After hitting a historic peak of $0,00008845 on October 28, 2021, the token currently trades at approximately $0,00001346, a steep 84,77% decline from its all-time high. Yet, for the dedicated “SHIB Army,” the project’s value isn’t solely dictated by price charts. The recirculation of Ryoshi’s words serves as a powerful reminder of the project’s decentralized soul, a rallying cry that prioritizes community and vision over fleeting market highs. In the world of SHIB, the founder may be gone, but his philosophy remains the central code.
