Super Bowl LVI viewers are mostly in agreement about the worst commercial of the night after an “annoying” ad for cryptocurrency showed just a bouncing QR code.
During Sunday’s game between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals, viewers were disappointed to see one ad that showed nothing but a colour-changing QR code slowly moving around an otherwise black screen.
When the QR code was scanned, which many viewers said they had no intention of doing, it brought people to the Coinbase website, which urged visitors to do “less talk, more Bitcoin”.
“Get $15 in free Bitcoin for signing up,” Coinbase’s website states.
However, on social media, many sports fans were annoyed by the simple ad, with many claiming that it was the “most annoying” commercial of the night.
“I WILL NOT SCAN THAT QR CODE NO MATTER HOW LONG IT BOUNCES AROUND MY TV,” one person tweeted.
Another said: “No f**king way am I going to scan some Super Bowl commercial QR code.”
“QR code bouncing around my TV screen for a 30 second Coinbase commercial is THE most annoying so far,” someone else tweeted.
Others joked that they would never actually scan the QR code, but would rather just log on to Twitter to see what the commercial was advertising.
“Imagine scanning that QR code instead of just going to Twitter to find out what it was,” another viewer wrote.
While most people were not fans of the unique advertisement, not everyone was annoyed by the commercial, as one viewer suggested that it was the “most effective ad” aired so far during Super Bowl 56.
“Probably the most effective ad so far during the Super Bowl!” they wrote. “Was it just me or did you also open up the camera on your phone and scan the QR code?”
Despite the divisive nature of the commercial, one viewer acknowledged that the “floating QR code ad for 60 seconds” was “certainly interesting”.
As for how much Coinbase paid for the ad, NBC Sports previously reported that 30-second ads were sold for roughly $6.5m during the big game.
