# The Coinbase Commercial

By [Sal Paradise](https://paragraph.com/@sal-paradise) · 2022-02-14

---

I made a commitment to write and publish once per week and this week I put it off until Super Bowl Sunday. I was getting ready to write something on another subject when my attention was demanded by a contrarian commercial. For years, I have been adamant about the fact that commercials are generally terrible. Like the DMV, taxes, and the dentist, no one likes them. Why not try something different?

Apple’s “Think Different” commercial was a great example. That was an inspiring commercial, also debuted during the Super Bowl. Their 1984 commercial was undoubtedly more famous. I would not be surprised if Coinbase’s commercial this evening is remembered with a similar regard. We are in the early days of crypto, and arguably the most notable brand in the industry, coming off the year of its near $100 billion dollar IPO, just made a statement.

Just as they were unafraid to be the centralized exchange for the decentralized world and the trusted platform for a trustless technology, they have disregarded every norm of every commercial you have ever seen and just had a QR code with retro music bouncing around the screen. I pulled out my phone to try to catch it. I was far from the first one in the room. In fact, I was looking at my laptop focused on starting that other post when the reaction of others made me look up to see what was going on. By the time I looked down at my phone again, it was to check Coinbase. The site was down. Everybody was doing the same thing at the same time, exactly the thing any commercial wants people to do, something, anything, everything, to engage.

A commercial that makes people stop and do something is plenty good enough, much better than many others. This one was even better than that. It was remarkable, literally in the sense that it made me say out loud, “this is a great commercial”. Everyone agreed. That was well before I knew who was behind the commercial. When I made my instant evaluation, I didn’t know and I didn’t care. You can imagine how psyched I was when I found out it was Coinbase. The whole thing was kind of a blur and I look forward to watching it back again. It was just a QR code bouncing around like the screensaver that never seems to hit the corner, and when the company behind the creativity revealed itself, it was Coinbase. That was a drop.

---

*Originally published on [Sal Paradise](https://paragraph.com/@sal-paradise/the-coinbase-commercial)*