CoinMarketCap and Hello Labs are trying to captivate the Web3 scene with “Killer Whales,” their version of a crypto Shark Tank TV show.
It’s the funniest, most cringe thing to happen to crypto since FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried promised he was an “everyday man” and then lost his users billions of dollars.
First off, you don’t get funding for your project on this show — you get mentorship!
Second, the mentorship isn’t from seasoned financial vets — most of it is from YouTubers with big crypto followings and a few venture capitalists like Anthony Scaramucci who missed on Tesla and Uber.
“This has got to be a parody,” — Brandon Ewing, streamer
If this show were a parody, it would be amazing.
But because it isn’t, it makes Angel Investing — angel ‘mentorship?’— in Web3 looks like a job at Enron.
Here are the many lowlights:
Crypto Shark Tank Pitch #1: Ticketmaster But Crypto
Shark Tank famously has to dumb down its talks, shorten the length of the pitches, and make it accessible, but this show takes that to a new level.
It often NEVER explains anything about the project.
Take the first pitch to the crypto sharks in episode two, “Entertainment”
The panel of investors, including Scaramucci, Aaron Arnold of Altcoin Daily fame, and Gracy Chen — who replaced Crypto YouTubr Wendy O — was for a crypto Ticketmaster called Celebrates.
In five minutes, Celebratix’s CEO flirted with the female shark (or it was edited that way; either way), used a day-in-the-life TikTok as his pitch, and didn’t talk about his product at all.
He was a model for Dolce and Gabbana – that was the pitch.
“I’m worried that you’re too much of a pretty boy and you’re going to get distracted,” said Scaramucci. “How do you maintain focus?”
Web3 entrepreneurs are expected to pitch their projects to the panel. If three of the five panel members greenlight the idea—choosing “swim” over “sink”—the project gets mentorship.
Here lies theproblem.
Why would you care if you aren’t investing your money into a project? There’s no risk.
The only mentorship worth a damn is from the very top of your profession, not from YouTubers who talk about shitcoins.
Aaron of Altcoin Daily won the gold medal of cringe in episode two for funding a project without a business plan, saying, “Satoshi Nakamoto started with nothing, so I’m willing to take a chance on you.”
Crypto Shark Tank Pitch #2: Spotify But Crypto and Opaque Sports Thingy
As was one of the common problems with episode one of Crypto Shark Tank, the panel asks, “Why do I need this with crypto,” the entrepreneur stumbles — and they ‘fund’ them anyway.
“Fund” because no actual funding happens.
The next two projects on episode two were a crypto Spotify called Newm and a Sports Commentary app called Fx1.
Newm was sharply criticized for having 8,700 followers on Twitter and 7,000 people on its website over the past six months.
Where do they even find these projects? Maybe it is a parody?
The last proposal, FX1.io, was barely the sole project to get a green light.
Fx1.io only gets around 20 users daily — and the founders have been doing this for four years. But someone’s gotta get some money, we mean mentorship, right?
Reflections on Killer Whales
The show’s only redeeming feature is being a scam detector for any dubious altcoin and shitcoin bets you shouldn’t be making. At least you get to see the CEO, the pitch, the project: it’s a crash course in whether you should’ve hit Vegas instead.
Shows like this make it easy to dunk on— and has rightfully earned its reputation with retail traders as a scam with pretentious content like this.
‘Killer Whales’ cements the crypoto bro stereotype. It’s the ‘Plan 9 From Outer Space’ of terribly made tv.
