Every movement has its trendsetters, and celebrities often give them legitimacy by throwing their hat in with new, interesting ideas. In recent years, cryptocurrencies have become more popular and have attracted a few celebrity ambassadors. Here are three advocates who support cryptocurrency and the blockchain, without treating it like a fad.
Cryptocurrency Explained
If you don’t know, cryptocurrency was invented in 2009, with Bitcoin. A mysterious figure called Satoshi Nakamoto created it in response to the mortgage crisis of ’08, and quickly became the world’s first crypto celebrity as fans flocked to buy the digital coin. Bitcoin uses the blockchain to ensure there are a set amount of them, creating scarcity and value.
Since then, Bitcoin has led cryptocurrencies on its quest for acceptance. Bitcoin and other leading cryptos like Ether are widely accepted online, by businesses like Shopify and PayPal. To many, cryptocurrencies sound like digital casino chips, and some places use them for exactly that purpose. Many casinos and betting platforms allow crypto gambling, so you can wager and win with your chosen cryptocurrency instead of putting your national currency forward. In Nakamoto’s writing about Bitcoin, he hopes that cryptocurrency overtakes our dollars altogether, creating a digital currency that doesn’t rely on middlemen. We’re a long way from that, so many use cryptocurrency for investment or diversifying assets.
For most of the 2010s, crypto was ignored by the mainstream. During those early days, an early Bitcoin adopter paid 10,000 Bitcoin for a pizza delivery. Today, just one Bitcoin tracks over $70,000 (CA$95,600). The community affectionately celebrates spending nearly a billion dollars on lunch with ‘pizza day.’ Bitcoin has come a long way since, having become an official currency of El Salvador and becoming a national debate on the American election trail.
Celebrities Who Support Cryptocurrency
Many celebrities have paid lip service to cryptocurrency, but a celebrity endorsement doesn’t always mean their heart is in the game. However, there are very high-profile celebs who use their platform to push for the acceptance of not just crypto, but also the technology that makes crypto possible.
Snoop Dogg
Snoop Dogg arrived to the cryptocurrency scene much later than many other celebrities, during the 2021 NFT buzz. He has since pioneered his own projects featuring digital art, including an album distributed through NFT. NFTs aren’t just art, they can be any digital file, and Snoop figured that music would be a great fit and bypass the middlemen common in the music industry. Today, he is transitioning Death Row Records to become an NFT label. There have also been long-standing but unconfirmed theories that he is Cozomo de Medici, a prominent digital art collector.
Paris Hilton
Fans of Paris Hilton will know that she once quipped “I’m not a dumb blonde, I’m just very good at pretending to be one.” Her track record proves that, and today she’s more public about her many, many, many business ventures. Like any shrewd businesswoman, Hilton saw the potential of Bitcoin way back in 2016 when one coin was less than $1,000. She bought in and profited greatly, starting her crypto fascination. Since 2021, she has also been vocal for her support of the metaverse, another crypto-related tech that combines social media with e-commerce and, sometimes, virtual reality.
Ashton Kutcher (and Mark Cuban)
Mark Cuban’s business acumen doesn’t make his support of cryptocurrency much of a surprise. That said, he was once a critic before turning into a believer after Bitcoin took off. Now he’s working on his own crypto projects with an unlikely business partner, Ashton Kutcher. It may seem strange, but Kutcher has used his acting paychecks to invest in tech startups in the past, like Spotify and Skype. He’s no stranger to the tech scene and has shown a high level of understanding of how it works, celebrating crypto’s decentralised governance potential way back in 2013.