Solana pulls ad after huge backlash
But was it an epic fail or more a case of “all press is good press”?
Well, Solana was having a moment… for a moment. Talks about including the token in the crypto national stockpile, the slew of spot solana ETFs filings, and its recent fifth birthday had the coin buzzing again. Then it posted what many describe as (at best) a very cringe and “idiotic” ad: “America is Back — Time to Accelerate.” An enormous backlash ensued, so it deleted the ad, though it took them a while to pull the plug.
Took them 9 hours to delete it.
— Adam Cochran (adamscochran.eth) (@adamscochran) March 18, 2025
Also all the major players in the Solana ecosystem suddenly delete their tweets promoting/supporting the ad and RT’d and liked takes about it being bad.
They approved this, supported it and celebrated it.
They rolled it back because it hurt… pic.twitter.com/kPMERDpTcn
The ad features a man named “America” in a therapy session after being diagnosed with “rational thinking syndrome.” Critics argue the 2-minute, 38-second ad is pro-Trump (notably, President Trump’s eponymous meme coin, $TRUMP, was launched on the solana blockchain), “anti-woke,” and makes fun of gender identity. A lot. The therapist says things like, “Why don’t we take this energy and channel it into doing something more productive, like coming up with a new gender.”
“I want to invent technologies, not genders,” the America character says to the therapist.
“Solana put out a politically divisive ad engaging in social identity issues around pronouns versus a focus on technology,” Two Prime Digital Assets CEO Alexander Blume said. “I think solana was aiming to be bold and align with tech-first values, but waded too deep into issues that distract from the offerings of their product.”
Others said that the ad was “brilliant marketing” as the “cringy rage bait” ad went viral. After all, as the saying goes, “all publicity is good publicity.”
Hot Take: This new @solana ad is actually brilliant marketing.
— Joshua Jake (@itzjoshuajake) March 17, 2025
Everyone crying that “crypto is supposed to be decentralized and apolitical” is missing the point entirely. The ad is designed to be cringy rage bait, and you’re all taking the bait—pushing its reach even further.… pic.twitter.com/9QKgoafuoD
“The solana ad felt out of the blue, given the nature of it punching down,” Alan Orwick, cofounder of Quai Network, said. “Solana is in the zeitgeist, so to kick other groups when it was uncalled for received clear backlash. It’s important to remember crypto is apolitical, and the networks behind the assets should be credibly neutral.”
The ad was meant to promote solana’s Accelerate “series of events” in May in New York City. The events are organized along two distinct conferences: “Scale or Die” and “Ship or Die.”
Solana is the sixth-largest crypto by market cap with $62.2 billion, but the price is down almost 40% since March 2024.
