CoinYe West is the name of a new virtual currency slated to launch later this month, a recent Noisey article reports.

Based on the open source foundation offered by the popular industry leader Bitcoin, CoinYe West will utilize the same basic model of “mining for currency.”

“Our goal with Coinye West is to make it easier for people to use cryptocurrency,” the founders said. “Right now, it’s kind of a dark art for people to mine coins. We plan on releasing a front end to the ‘mining’ programs called CoinyeMiner. It will make things a lot more simple and people will be able to make their own coins. We’re working round-the-clock to get everything going as smoothly as possible.”

In their email interview with Noisey, the founders of CoinYe explain the general mining process that many cryptocurrencies are based on. “Basically, people’s computers try and figure out math problems,” they said. “Hundreds of them work together and when there’s a payout, about half a million coins get released from a block, and they get shared between everyone who helped open them. They then get paid out to a wallet, which is a software that people will keep on their computer. They can send or receive coins from there, sorta like Paypal.”

Bitcoins, the currency model on which CoinYe is based, are currently worth slightly more than $800 apiece as per the currency calculator

The CoinYe founders also pitched the mainstream appeal of their new currency, which is scheduled to launch on January 11. “Coinye West is a cryptocurrency for the masses,” they said. “Bitcoin is for hardcore money-hoarders, and Dogecoin was more for the internet-meme crowds.”

CoinYe West isn’t the first Bitcoin alternative, other examples include Namecoin, Litecoin, and PPCoin. Dogecoin, the currency descibed by the CoinYe founders, is a cryptocurrency referencing a popular Internet meme.

The CoinYe founders, who chose to remain anonymous in the Noisey interview, explained their rapper derived name. “We chose to represent Kanye because he is and always has been a trendsetter, and he’s always keeping things unique,” they said.

“We’re really not sure how Kanye is gonna react to this,” the currency’s creators added. “We hope he loves it, but if he doesn’t, he really isn’t someone we want to piss off.” The founders also invited the rapper to get involved with a promise of free currency. “We’re making an open invitation to Kanye,” they wrote, “get hold of us at and we’ll send you 100,000 COINYE on launch.”

The currency’s website features a countdown to launch and uses portions of West’s “Black Skinhead” video as a background.

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