PayPal Puts a Stop to Bitcoin-Inspired Ad Parody PayPal Puts a Stop to Bitcoin-Inspired Ad Parody:
‘New Money’ campaign gets an imitator after the Super Bowl.
PayPal Holdings Inc. this week blocked a parody of its “New Money” Super Bowl ad that swapped in “bitcoin” as the future of money.
PayPal, which lets users and businesses pay digitally in a variety of ways, was one of a few financial upstarts to spend big money on a spot during last Sunday’s Super Bowl 50 football game.
The commercial that was published online earlier this month and ran during the game touts PayPal as “New Money” against “Old Money” like paper cash and banks that close at 5 p.m.
But the message apparently riled some backers of bitcoin, who consider the digital currency “the new money.”
Shiloh Silverman, who runs a video production firm called Silver Park Studio, created a version of the ad that swapped in images of people using bitcoin and substituted “PayPal” to proclaim “Bitcoin is newer money.”
PayPal redefines the meaning of new money, in this Super Bowl ad. After Mr. Silverman posted the video to YouTube and others shared it, PayPal responded by asking websites to remove the video. As of Monday, the parody ad had been blocked.
“Our vision of New Money includes Bitcoin,” a PayPal spokeswoman said in an email on Wednesday. “But to avoid customer confusion, we asked them for the video to be removed.”
PayPal primarily helps people transfer money in traditional currencies, but it also works with bitcoin. It has partnered with companies such as digital wallet provider CoinBase to accept bitcoin payment via PayPal’s Braintree platform. Braintree powers online payments for companies such as Uber Technologies Inc.
“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” the PayPal spokeswoman said in the email. "I think this demonstrates just how excited customers are about the concept behind PayPal’s ’New Money’ campaign.”
A new version of the video posted by Mr. Silverman this week that hasn’t been taken down also changed the ad’s music. “Newer money is decentralized. Older money is fiat,” the new parody says.
“I’m not a bitcoin fanatic, I just love the whole world of it,” Mr. Silverman said in an interview.
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