Solana Foundation Deletes Controversial Ad After Crypto Community Backlash

The Solana Foundation has removed an advertisement from its official X account following criticism over its political messaging on gender identity.

The ad, posted on March 17 to promote the Solana Accelerate conference, attracted negative commentary from the crypto community for its references to gender and pronouns.

Solana Co-founder Disapproves of the Campaign

The video in question depicted a man, referred to as “America,” speaking with a therapist about his thoughts on innovation and crypto. However, the professional dismissed his concerns and suggested he focus on coming up with a new gender and on pronouns instead.

As the conversation continued, the man delivered a monologue set to patriotic music, declaring his intention to build on-chain, reclaim innovation, and invent technologies rather than genders.

Solana co-founder Anatoly Yakovenko, who recently disagreed with the foundation’s Executive Director Lily Liu over the now-rejected SIMD-228 proposal, has since distanced himself from the campaign. He stated that a previous marketing effort, the “Maren ad,” had been better. While the original post has been deleted, multiple users have reposted it on the platform.

Community Backlash

Several industry figures criticized the initiative for its handling of gender identity and its political tone. Cinneamhain Ventures partner Adam Cochran pointed out that it took Solana nine hours to delete the post. He also noted that major figures in its ecosystem initially supported the ad before removing their tweets and engagement with it.

“They approved this, supported it and celebrated it,” he said. “They rolled it back because it hurt their business, not because they thought it was wrong.”

Blocknative operating chief Sean O’Connor called the initiative “tone-deaf,” especially following recent policy changes in the U.S. President Donald Trump revoked executive orders from Joe Biden aimed at preventing discrimination based on gender and sexual orientation.

Tyler Bench, CRO of on-chain governance platform Tally.xyz, described the campaign as highly problematic and likened it to previous Coinbase advertisements but with a more extreme tone. Anneri van der Merwe, product lead at Base, criticized it as offensive and pandering, stating that it contradicted Solana’s previous messaging about inclusivity.

Nicolas Pennie, co-founder of Solana development platform Helius, argued that virtue signaling in marketing efforts would always be ineffective, regardless of political ideology. On his part, DoubleZero operating chief David McIntyre questioned why the platform did not take a more positive approach instead of mocking social issues.

Some observers believe the intention was to attract people by causing controversy. Reka, CEO of DEX protocol Avnu.Fi suggested that the marketing was designed purely for attention, stating that it prioritized controversy over creativity.