I have looked at only one ICO so far and that was a new mining project with cheap electricity. I didn't bite in the end because I believe that mining in its current format is not sustainable and there is something wrong with our greatest economic leap having to burn that much energy to sustain itself. But enough about that. I have a dumb question.

I realise that an ICO is the way that the startup is funded, but is an ICO just the birth of a new cryptocurrency in other words ether was once an ICO?