Mark Cuban, the outspoken billionaire entrepreneur and former "Shark Tank" judge, has become one of the first high-profile figures to publicly embrace OpenAI’s Sora by giving users full permission to create AI-generated videos featuring his likeness. And he’s having a blast doing it. In a surprising move that blends viral marketing with emerging AI creativity, Cuban posted on X that users of Sora OpenAI’s social generative video platform can “have at it” when it comes to making content that features him. The result has been an explosion of videos showing Cuban in various surreal and humorous scenarios, and they’re catching fire online. But there’s one key condition: every video that uses his face must also promote his company, Cost Plus Drugs.
While many celebrities have been wary or outright resistant to having their digital likeness replicated by AI, Cuban is flipping the script. For him, Sora is less a threat and more an opportunity to experiment. In a comment to Business Insider, Cuban described the experience as fun and noted that the real motivation was to see how people could creatively plug costplusdrugs.com. The strategy has been surprisingly effective. Within a day of announcing his open-use policy, Cuban's deepfakes flooded X, Sora, and other platforms, often ending with the now-familiar tagline: “Brought to you by Cost Plus Drugs.” In one particularly viral clip, Cuban sits in a kindergarten classroom wearing a cartoonish yellow cardigan, rhyming about drug pricing to a bouncy children’s song. In another, he dances his way through Madrid and performs as a fictional pop star. It’s AI-powered, comedic marketing at its finest and it’s working.
Cuban is not only tolerating these deepfakes, he's actively promoting them. He has been reposting dozens of Sora-generated clips to his own followers on X, helping to supercharge their reach. Many of them rack up tens of thousands of views within hours. This level of engagement turns Sora into a kind of social-commercial playground, where the lines between user-generated content and brand messaging are intentionally blurred. The current beta version of Sora, available only in the U.S. and Canada and operating on an invite-only basis, lets users grant permission for others to use their Cameo or visual likeness in AI-generated videos. Cuban has leveraged this feature to maximum effect, essentially creating a crowd-sourced commercial campaign that doesn’t cost him a dime in ad spend.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Sora head Bill Peebles took note of Cuban’s move on the podcast "TBPN." When co-host Jordi Hays pointed out that Cuban had previously been vocal about his concerns over AI advertising, Altman remarked that we’re witnessing an entirely new media dynamic. According to Altman, this is a “fun period” where the rules of engagement are shifting rapidly, and innovation is happening in real time. Cuban's shift from skeptic to experimenter highlights that tension. While he had hesitations about AI's role in advertising, he's now using Sora not just as a toy but as a tactical branding tool one where creativity and humor drive reach and virality.
Cuban has also praised Sora for maintaining a relatively clean and non-creepy platform, stating that the company has “done a great job keeping the creepy stuff out,” which he believes makes the experience even better. His strategy is as much about brand safety as it is about brand amplification. Instead of being a passive subject of deepfake content, he’s taken control of the narrative, setting a precedent for how public figures might collaborate with AI communities moving forward.
This strategy could open the door to a new kind of celebrity endorsement, one where digital avatars become the face of decentralized brand campaigns. Cuban’s experience may serve as a test case for other influencers, entrepreneurs, and public figures curious about how AI content can be used in a controlled yet open-ended manner. It’s also a signal that the future of advertising may lie not in highly produced commercials, but in dynamic, participatory ecosystems where the audience becomes part of the ad creation process.
By cleverly embedding Cost Plus Drugs into the DNA of each AI-generated clip, Cuban is demonstrating how to turn potential chaos into controlled messaging and have fun doing it. As Sora evolves and access expands, it’s likely that more personalities will follow his lead, ushering in a new era of brand-meets-AI collaboration where permission, creativity, and virality are the currency of influence.
