Who in the world thought this was a good idea?
Over the weekend, we got our first viral star of college football season when the ESPN cameras zoomed in on Ole Miss fan Sara Smith during the team’s matchup with Louisville on Sunday night in Nashville.
The image of the blonde fan watching anxiously as her Rebels battled it out with the Cardinals immediately took over the internet:
Well after her viral moment, Smith took to TikTok to reveal some of the absolutely unhinged DMs she had received, from one that said “Let’s make babies” to a guy who wrote her an entire dissertation on how beautiful she is. Pretty creepy stuff.
But as weird as that is, none of it is as creepy as this ad from an online sportsbook.
BetUS was apparently eager to capitalize on the viral moment, and created an AI-generated ad featuring Smith that falsely depicted her winking at the camera before pulling her shirt down to distract the Louisville defense. Honestly, it’s so outrageous that I’m not even going to embed it here, but it’s somehow still up on their X account if you want to see it for yourself.
Well luckily it seems that even the folks on Twitter realized how absolutely insane this is, and immediately began calling the company out for the disgusting ad:
“This feels like a lawsuit?”
“Is there a bet I can place for this lawsuit about to happen?”
“Amazing how anyone with half a brain thought this was a good idea”
“How do I bet my life savings on the lawsuit”
“May God have mercy on your souls, and may that woman bankrupt your company…. financially. We can see it’s already morally bankrupt.”
“You don’t hate betting companies enough”
“I would sue them into oblivion. What is wrong with people? This is disgusting and shameful.”
“A real company posting a sexualized deepfake of a fan based on footage from a TV broadcast. We can’t let this be the future. Shun this behavior with all your might.”
“This is what people were warning us about with AI.”
And this one from the community note on the post:
“Also, this is absolutely insane.”
Of course sports gambling companies are always putting out edgy content, but this goes far beyond anything that we’d see from most of the mainstream sportsbooks. And I suspect that a big reason for that is that BetUS is an offshore sportsbook that’s headquartered in Costa Rica (their Twitter account is also based on Costa Rica) and their domain name is registered in Panama. That means that they aren’t heavily regulated like US sportsbooks, which would no doubt risk having their state gaming licenses pulled over an ad like this.
The company has also faced scrutiny from multiple states, including Maryland, Florida and Michigan, accusing it of illegally offering online gambling to residents of the state without a license. And a quick Google search of the company name shows countless complaints from customers who have had issues with the platform.
Unfortunately, the fact that it’s an offshore company makes it harder – though certainly not impossible – to actually go after them (and collect) in court. But man, if this is the kind of business they’re running I hope Smith takes them down.
