“Yes Men” disguised themselves as Aristide Feldhol, head of Adidas and DJ Marshmello, and also took to the stage at the Web Summit in Lisbon to announce adiVerse’s new “virtual oasis” and criticize the brand’s labor exploitation practices. During the intervention, no one noticed that it was all a hoax, which the activist duo clarified 24 hours later.
“This Wednesday, an “Adidas executive” named Aristide Feldholt (actually Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men) announced to a huge standing-room-only audience at a web summit that the brand would reward tens of thousands of low-wage workers, many of them with unpaid wages and significant compensation by leaving them to play in a very strange virtual reality world called “adiVerse”, according to a note published by Yes Men.
After Andy Beachlbaum intervened, DJ Marshmello, who was none other than Mike Bonnano, took the stage.
Organizers of the tech event believed they had invited Adidas and DJ Marshmello to give a speech, activists said. They also claim that the Lisbon Breakers, who performed the choreography on stage, did not realize they were hired by “impostors.”
After the performance, the duo was applauded by more than a thousand people watching, and there were even those who asked the artist for an autograph.
DJ Marshmello later confirmed on social media that he was not at the web summit.
“The name of the person who was asked to speak and be interviewed at the web summit was not me. I apologize to everyone who was deceived by this impostor, my legal team has already contacted him,” he wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
Yes Men are activists whose main goal is to raise awareness of social issues, namely labor rights.