iShowSpeed Faces Backlash for Promoting Questionable Cryptocurrency Game
iShowSpeed found himself in hot water with his YouTube fans after they called him out for promoting The Paradox Metaverse, an action-adventure game that allows players to earn Paradox Coins, a form of cryptocurrency, by completing missions. However, there’s a catch – players must purchase the company’s NFTs.
The game’s branding was heavily featured on his stream, appearing as banners, hoodies, and t-shirts. In fact, one of the t-shirts directly encouraged fans to invest in the cryptocurrency. As a promotional stunt, iShowSpeed even gave away signed PS5 consoles during the stream.
Unfortunately, iShowSpeed’s YouTube audience did not react positively to this promotion.
They bombarded him with messages via donations and chat, accusing him of attempting to scam them with a ‘pump and dump scheme,’ which involves inflating the price of a cryptocurrency, in this case, the Paradox Coin.
Fed up with the comments, iShowSpeed responded defensively, expressing frustration towards his audience. He stated, “Mods, do something! Because I’m really getting pissed off, bro… Chill the fuck out, bro. Seriously, dog… Because y’all really getting on my nerves, bro! The fact that y’all would ever even think of me like that. I don’t even know if y’all are trolls or not, but the fact that you guys would ever think of me like that is kind of fucked up. It’s kind of making my feelings hurt.”
Clips of this incident, which have since been removed from social media, along with a shortened VOD that excluded chat, generated further outrage online.
Fans expressed their confusion, wondering why iShowSpeed would scam his audience when he makes around $250,000 a month. Others criticized the promotion as unethical, targeting low-income individuals who aspire to pursue gaming as a career.
The situation took an even stranger turn when iShowSpeed brought on a Cristiano Ronaldo look-alike to help promote the game on his stream. For a while, he referred to the imposter as if he were the real Cristiano Ronaldo before revealing the truth to his fans.
This controversy arose shortly after Sky deleted several of iShowSpeed’s videos due to his past misogynistic comments.