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Token2049's top KOL revealed to have bought followers and comments, turning into a farce

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KOL "Professor Crypto" recently announced that he won the Best Content Creator Award for KOL at the Token2049 summit, which immediately sparked widespread skepticism in the crypto community, as almost no one has heard of this KOL. Veteran players in the industry also found that none of their Twitter followers pay attention to this KOL, and the content produced by the KOL is filled with phenomena of buying followers and bot comments.

Professor Crypto Awarded Token2049's Best Content KOL

Professor Crypto @profcryptotalks recently announced winning the Token2049 award, sparking widespread community criticism questioning who this person really is.

Twitter user NewsyJohnson pointed out that despite following over 1,100 Twitter accounts and having nearly 20,000 followers, no one followed Professor Crypto back. NewsyJohnson believes that Professor Crypto's large following was likely acquired through buying followers to engage with project teams for tokens.

Professor Crypto's award-winning tweet was later marked by community notes, stating that this KOL's content often creates a false sense of fan engagement, such as using a large number of bots to comment to make posts appear popular. Users are advised to be cautious when viewing related content, as the number of likes on a tweet may not necessarily indicate genuine interest from the crypto community.

Professor Crypto has blocked many critical users and deleted the award-winning tweet.

Community notes marking the tweet

Crypto Detective Also Blocked

Many, including ZachXBT, have reported being blocked, with ZachXBT urging Professor Crypto to stop using bot comments to feign influence.

With 132,000 Twitter followers, and a YouTube subscription of 1.34 million, it is evident upon viewing Professor Crypto's tweets that there are numerous bot comments.

In reality, Professor Crypto's actions may soon be in violation of the law, as the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has officially passed new regulations targeting fake reviews and false interactions on social media, explicitly prohibiting the buying or selling of "fake social media influence indicators," including artificially inflating followers, views, and other data using bots or hijacked accounts, which could be enforced as early as October.

KOLs Beware of Fake Followers and Likes! U.S. FTC to Crack Down on Fake Traffic, $50,000 Fine per Offense

Bot comments

Marketing More Important than Technology in Crypto Industry

CoinDesk also reported on this incident, mentioning that in Polkadot's financial report released in July, approximately $37 million was spent on marketing activities in the first half of the year, including advertising, sponsorships, events, and KOL promotions, indicating that the crypto industry places more emphasis on marketing than on technological breakthroughs.

The Professor Crypto incident reveals that much of the content posted by crypto Twitter KOLs is essentially "advertising" rather than conveying researched information, and even many airdrop tutorial articles are set up for the upcoming Token Generation Event (TGE) of crypto projects.

Professor Crypto's Twitter account has since been restored after a brief closure, with many criticisms from the crypto community, and still with a significant number of bot comments. It remains unclear why Professor Crypto was able to win the award, as TOKEN2049 has not provided any response to this event.