A Fortnite streamer recently shaved his entire head, eyebrows included, for a big $2,500 donation from a viewer that wound up taking the money back.
Lacy is a 20-year-old content creator on Twitch and YouTube. He started uploading in May 2020 and has since amassed 9,000 subscribers on YouTube and nearly 83,000 followers on Twitch, making him one of the fastest growing Fortnite players, according to analytics from TwitchTracker. Since June 18, Lacy’s been running an uncapped subathon—a marathon livestream that runs for as long as the streamer receives bits, Twitch’s proprietary currency—as he plays and watches Epic Games’ popular battle royale shooter (among other things like YouTube videos) for days on end. But around day three, Lacy found out that a top donor to his long-running livestream wasn’t serious about the donation they sent the Fortnite player.
Esports journalist and Twitch watchdog Jake Lucky tweeted on June 26 that the Twitch viewer who gifted Lacy 251,092 bits (approximately $2,510 USD) refunded that donation even after the Fortnite player shaved his whole head.
“You made me shave my head bald,” Lacy said in a June 20 stream. “Shaved my fucking eyebrows. To refund? I don’t even wanna finish the subathon, bro.”
Keeping his promise to his fans
In Twitter DMs with Kotaku, Lacy said he shaved his head on June 21 and has since dyed the growing peach fuzz pink. He wasn’t sure why the donor rescinded the money but explained what happened next.
“[The donor] didn’t explain anything,” Lacy said. “They deactivated their Twitch, then blocked me on Twitter and Fortnite. I found out because a few people in the streaming space DMed me and said the same person donated hundreds of dollars to them and also refunded.”
Lacy said that although he loves his hair because it’s by far his “best trait,” he made a promise to his viewers during the subathon and would never break his word even if the money never materialized. That said, he still isn’t the biggest fan of the new look he’s rocking.
“It didn’t feel bad at first, to be honest,” Lacy said.” I loved my hair, though. I had long curly hair and never shaved or did anything to it throughout my entire life. But once I dyed it pink (which was another goal of the subathon), it really sucked because I don’t like the look and I don’t even wanna go into public looking the way I do right now.”
It’s unclear why the viewer rescinded the donation, though they later sent in a dollar. Despite being audibly and visibly disappointed with the situation, Lacy’s chat still cheered him on, sending extra bits to make up for the vanished $2,500. And each bit donated increased the length of Lacy’s streams, so as of the time of this writing, the rising Fortnite player has been marathoning for nine days and will be live for another four, if you want to check him out.
Update 06/27/2023 6:25 p.m. ET: Added comment from Lacy.