It's hot because there is demand and a massive driving force. I myself have been buying up as much as I can get my hands on because it seems like a good sustainable coin.
The devs didn't even mine much themselves the first few days. It really is a community driven coin. The community is hilarious, it's got the most active IRC chat I've ever seen for an altcoin, including LTC...
Not even a week in and we have a market cap of around $880,000 for it. I predict that by mid-January you'll see a $4 million market cap and it will be listed on Cryptsy and Bter.
But it price is overvalued now(Considering to its big amount)