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Dabloons

From WikiRecord, the encyclopedia of everything

Not to be confused with doubloon.
An image of a cat with an outstretched paw with the superimposed caption "4 dabloons", which became a viral TikTok meme that spawned the Dabloons trend

Dabloons is a collaborative online role-playing game and Internet meme that became popular on TikTok in November 2022.[1] Within the game, participants collect and spend an imaginary currency called "dabloons" via "encounters" with videos featuring cats as merchants or other characters.[2] Its name comes from doubloon, a Spanish gold coin.[3]

The Internet trend started from an image of a cat with an outstretched paw, which was posted to Instagram in April 2021 with the caption "4 dabloons".[1] Players kept track of their own dabloons balances, and TikTok's recommendation algorithm also supplied personalized encounters to players.[1] Users also collaboratively added thieves, lotteries, government agencies, and rival factions to the game.[1]

Large dabloons giveaways led to fictional hyperinflation, rising prices, and debt.[2] The fictional economy of dabloons was analyzed in a 2026 study in the journal Convergence.[4]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Weatherbed, Jess (24 November 2022). "Hello traveler…have ye heard about TikTok Dabloons?". The Verge.
  2. 1 2 Waite, Thom (25 November 2022). "What are dabloons? A guide to TikTok's new favourite meme currency". Dazed.
  3. ↑ Boseley, Matilda (25 November 2022). "What are dabloons?: Tiktok's new imaginary economy explained". The Guardian.
  4. ↑ Kerche, Francisco W.; Venturini, Tommaso (2026). "Dabloons, autopsy of a TikTok meme: Self-excitation and self-destruction in social media cultures". Convergence. 32 (4): 1234–1257. doi:10.1177/13548565261417919.