Musk Casually Overturns the Rice Bowl of Crypto KOLs

Original | Odaily (@OdailyChina)

Author｜Golem (@web3_golem)

Crypto KOLs active on the X platform are collectively up in arms.

The reason is that on March 1st, the X platform updated its Paid Partnerships Policy, which includes two core changes. First, the disclosure requirement for posts published by KOLs as paid partnerships has changed from mandatory inclusion of the "#ad" hashtag to mandatory activation of the "Paid Partnership" disclosure label. Second, for non-compliant paid partnership posts, the reporting channel has changed from sending an email to anonymous submission of a reporting form.

Besides these two core changes, the X platform also made a blunder in this policy update. In the new list of prohibited industries for paid partnership promotions, the community was shocked to find "Cryptocurrency" included. Just as crypto KOLs were preparing to collectively criticize X for intentionally marginalizing the crypto industry, X's Head of Product, Nikita Bier, stated that this change was an operational error and that categories like "financial products, cryptocurrency" had already been removed from the prohibited promotion list (promotions are still not allowed in Australia, the EU, and the UK).

Subsequently, Nikita Bier clarified that the "Paid Partnership" label is not targeting the crypto industry or prediction markets specifically, but is intended to strengthen the disclosure mechanism for commercial content. While the X platform encourages creators to engage in commercial collaborations with third-party brands, undisclosed paid promotions can still harm product integrity and erode user trust in content. The new feature helps fans clearly distinguish between commercial partnerships and organic content.

Although the misunderstanding has been resolved, the two core changes in X's new paid partnership rules still apply to the crypto industry. The impact of these changes is just beginning to surface, causing anxiety among crypto KOLs...

The End of the Era of Hidden Crypto KOL Promotions

How much can a crypto KOL earn for posting one piece of content for a project? This topic often sparks discussion within the community, primarily because it's a highly opaque income model with significant individual variation. There is no public standard for crypto KOL pricing. Project teams typically price based on factors such as the KOL's follower count, niche relevance, content influence, and price-driving ability. Sometimes, a project might pay a KOL simply because the boss likes them.

According to Odaily, Binance offered a well-known crypto KOL with over 30,000 followers $5,000 per month. The agreement required the KOL to post a full quota of promotional content for Binance each month and included an exclusivity clause, prohibiting them from posting content promoting other exchanges.

It's not only KOLs with tens of thousands of followers who receive sponsorship from exchanges. A crypto KOL with 5,000 followers revealed that OKX pays them $600 per month in advertising fees, requiring at least 4 promotional posts for OKX per month, with OKX elements mandatory in their personal bio and background.

Besides long-term contracts with exchanges, crypto KOLs frequently receive single-post advertisements from projects, typically for event promotions, research analysis posts, or direct shilling posts. Pricing for these varies even more widely among different KOLs. For instance, during bullish markets, "local tycoons" behind Meme projects, to get KOLs with "price influence" to shill their tokens, might offer thousands of dollars in advertising fees and directly send tokens to the KOL's private wallet.

The substantial profits from these diverse collaboration methods once made becoming a KOL a career goal for many in the crypto space, but all this might now vanish. With the changes to X's paid partnership policy, the golden era for crypto KOLs is ending.

X's new paid partnership rules explicitly require that all paid promotional posts by crypto KOLs must carry the "Paid Partnership" label. This means the hidden ads that previously flooded crypto users' timelines will no longer exist. As Nikita Bier stated, creators clearly disclosing paid promotions is responsible to their fans. In short video and other content industries, creators inserting "overt ads" into their content is perfectly normal.

However, in the crypto industry, a KOL explicitly stating they were paid to promote a project is a major taboo.

First, the paying project teams themselves often cannot accept "overt ads." If readers can clearly see a post is a paid "puff piece," the project's actual strength will be questioned regardless of the content's objectivity. Therefore, KOLs promoting a token/project are usually required to adopt a style suggesting "personal research, personal看好 (bullishness)."

Imagine, in the future, to comply with X's rules, KOLs add the "Paid Partnership" label to all paid promotion posts. "Research-based hidden ads" become "recommendation-based overt ads." Will fans still blindly follow and buy?

Second, KOLs themselves are often reluctant to take on "overt ads." The crypto industry is one where money is closest at hand. Crypto users' research and information acquisition directly and immediately feed into trading decisions. Seeing a KOL shill a project and then buying in, profits are credited to the KOL, while losses are quickly blamed on their misleading advice. This emotional reversal has become the norm.

If fans buy in after seeing a KOL's "Paid Partnership" post with a project, it will likely be seen as evidence of the KOL colluding with the project to "rug pull" retail investors. At best, the KOL's reputation is ruined; at worst, fans seek维权 (redress). KOLs cannot take this risk.

What if a KOL thinks: just disguise the project promotion post as their own research as usual and don't add the "Paid Partnership" label—will it be discovered? The second core change in X's paid partnership policy, changing the reporting channel from email to anonymous form submission, is precisely about leveraging the power of the crowd to catch those who slip through the net.

The Cornered KOLs

Users only need to go to the online reporting form, enter the crypto KOL's username and the corresponding post, and submit to complete the report. The entire process takes less than a minute. According to X's latest rules, if a reported KOL's violation is confirmed, tiered penalties will be applied.

For a first or minor violation, the visibility of the违规 (violating) post will be restricted, removed from search results and recommendations, and interactions like likes, replies, and quote retweets will be limited. The KOL will also be required to delete the违规 post. For repeated violations, the KOL's account may be set to read-only mode, restricting functions like posting, retweeting, and commenting, and KYC verification may be required. If the platform deems the violation severe, the account may be直接封禁 (directly suspended).

Several crypto KOLs have already been affected. On March 2nd, crypto KOL Eva 树姐 (X: @EvaCmore) posted that her account was suspended for violating X's new paid partnership terms. Fortunately, her account was restored to normal after being required to delete the post. She later stated that due to the risk of being reported, she might no longer share projects for free in the future.

X's new rules aren't just targeting the Chinese crypto community. On March 1st, overseas crypto KOL Ashley (X: @AshleyDCan) with 190k followers also had her X account suspended. The X platform required her to delete a post from February 27th promoting OKX without the "Paid Partnership" disclosure. Currently, Ashley's bio clearly discloses her paid partnerships with OKX and Polymarket.

X required Ashley to delete the post promoting OKX

According to X's new Paid Promotion Partnership Policy, paid promotions mainly include the following four scenarios:

• The product or service was gifted by the brand or a brand representative;
• The creator receives compensation (cash payment or in-kind donation) for promoting these products or services;
• The product or service generates commissions for the creator through sales (e.g., via affiliate links or discount codes);
• The creator has a commercial agreement with these products or services, such as serving as a brand ambassador.

However, these definitions remain somewhat principle-based. Specifically for the crypto industry, what kind of content will lead to suspension if posted without the "Paid Partnership" label? Where is the boundary between organic research content and paid partnership posts? These questions remain unclear. After being reported, outcomes depend more on X's backend AI review or direct human judgment. Worse, the reporting mechanism has an asymmetry of rights and responsibilities, objectively amplifying the risk of abuse.

The crypto industry is already a dark forest. When the cost of reporting becomes low and reporters bear no risk, crypto KOLs become naked targets, open to狙击 (sniping).

Even before this, there were instances in the industry where malicious actors artificially inflated a KOL's follower count and engagement, then reported them, leading to account suspension. Now, anyone who followed investment advice and suffered losses could mass-report the (previously) posted content by crypto KOLs that sits in a gray area between paid and unpaid. If enough accounts report simultaneously, it could increase the probability of platform penalties. Even without malicious intent,误杀 (friendly fire) by users is possible.

The force of the new rules will ultimately be reflected in crypto KOLs' income. The various软广 (soft advertisement) collaborations KOLs had with projects are no longer viable. Some major KOLs are collectively memeing, using the "Paid Partnership" label on abstract content as a form of protest against X's new paid content policy.

Crypto KOLs' "Abstract Protest"

However, some argue that crypto KOLs should "fight poison with poison" and label *all* future posts as "Paid Partnership," so users eventually become desensitized to it.

Will Crypto KOLs Migrate Again?

Incentive mechanisms are core to social platforms retaining high-quality content creators. In 2025, X continued to expand its revenue-sharing scale for platform content creators. According to an official announcement, 2025 payout amounts reached the highest record since the monetization program launched. Furthermore, 2026 will see increased shared revenue规模 (scale), with 2026 dubbed the "Year of the Creator."

Some crypto KOLs often share their monthly "salary" from Musk in their accounts, ranging from tens to thousands of dollars. However, after X's new paid partnership advertising rules were released, the importance of this revenue stream has diminished, as crypto KOLs may lose a much larger income source.

Crypto folks never sit idle. From 2021-2022, due to regulatory changes in China, Weibo大规模封禁 (massively suspended) crypto accounts and禁止发布 (banned) crypto-related content. Subsequently, crypto KOLs chose Twitter (now X) as their new crypto base and, over the following years, built a project marketing/promotion model around Twitter involving the "project team-agency-KOL"链路 (chain).

Now, when X's content policy changes compress the生存空间 (living space) of crypto KOLs, where can they migrate to? The answer might be exchange-based social platforms like Binance Square. (Sincere disclosure: This is not a paid advertisement.)

In 2025, leveraging Binance exchange's continued growth, along with引流 (traffic guidance) from CZ and He Yi, and content mining mechanisms, Binance Square's daily active users and user count saw significant growth. Although its main task remains poaching crypto creators from X, it has already cultivated a group of loyal users.

Previously, when Farcaster announced its pivot to wallet services (Farcaster has been acquired by Neynar), I pointed out that exchanges have inherent advantages in building crypto social products—trading naturally催生出 (gives rise to) scenarios and desires for交流 (communication). In that article, I also asserted that inclusivity towards crypto users is the core competitiveness of exchange-based social products against X. When X implements policies unfavorable to crypto content creators, the大规模迁移 (large-scale migration) of crypto KOLs from five years ago might happen again. Building a new project team-KOL promotion system around exchange social products is only a matter of time. (Related reading: Farcaster Pivots, 'Binance Square' and Others Take Over Crypto Social)

If crypto KOLs真的逃离 (truly flee) X, X won't lose much, or rather, the X platform won't do much more to retain the crypto crowd. Looking at the entire internet, the crypto圈 (circle) is a very small information茧房 (silo); its collapse wouldn't significantly negatively impact the platform.

X's latest paid partnership policy update isn't specifically targeting crypto KOLs either; it's just that the unique attributes of the crypto industry正好撞到了枪口 (happened to be in the line of fire).