Bitcoin appeared on the Las Vegas Sphere—an enormous, globe-like screen that can be seen from vast distances—on Monday thanks to an advertisement from prominent centralized crypto exchange Crypto.com.
As a video shared by the exchange late Monday shows, an enormous Bitcoin logo covers the towering presence on the Las Vegas Strip, then transitions to scads of golden digital Bitcoins adorning the screen. Of course, the Crypto.com logo also appears.
Bitcoin is the largest crypto asset by market cap and the O.G. coin that spawned the broader crypto industry. But backers of another, more recent crypto token had raised funds to try and beat Bitcoin to the punch: Back in March, the Dogwifhat (WIF) meme coin community raised over $700,000 to get their dog on the Sphere.
With no apparent movement on getting the meme dog on the landmark, critics of the “Sphere Wif Hat” fundraiser have speculated that the Las Vegas arena would not ultimately offer advertising space to crypto projects. But with Bitcoin now appearing on the Sphere, some in the WIF community believe that the door is open for them.
One of the organizers of the fundraiser, prominent pseudonymous meme coin trader Ansem, reposted the video while adding a simple text smile. By and large, the community reaction to Crypto.com’s ad is that WIF’s advertising campaign must be on the horizon, given the apparent ability for cryptocurrency projects to make the cut.
“This must be an AI-generated deepfake, as I have been repeatedly told by [Crypto Twitter] that the Sphere doesn’t want to have anything to do with crypto,” pseudonymous Dogwifhat investor Free sarcastically posted on Twitter.
But not everyone is happy about the lack of concrete status updates around the “Sphere Wif Hat” campaign, or Ansem’s scattered replies. The Dogwifhat Telegram channel set up an automatic response for anyone who asks, given the frequency of the inquiries, and that’s remained in use for more than a month now.
“Everyone will be given notice here once a concrete date is set,” the automatic response reads. “We are exploring partnership angles for the sphere and trying to maximize the effect! We are getting closer to a date set!”
Mihir and Quasi, two of the campaign organizers, did not immediately respond to Decrypt’s request for comment.
The price of WIF is down 7% over the past 24 hours to a current price of $2.56. Bitcoin, meanwhile, has taken much less of a hit with a roughly 2% drop during the same span.
Edited by Andrew Hayward