Gooseman offers apology, changes stance on $GOOSE crypto: "I made a mistake in accepting this coin"

On March 2nd, Counter-Strike co-creator Minh "Gooseman" Le shocked many in the wider CS community by announcing his tacit support for $GOOSE, a cryptocurrency/memecoin named after him that was allegedly created by fans of Counter-Strike as a way to thank him for creating CS, with the coin immediately netting Le a "considerable" amount of money.

While some in the community were ambivalent to the memecoin and others even supported Le receiving money as thanks for co creating CS, concerns were raised that Le was damaging his reputation and "selling out" by supporting what could be a "rug pull" run by unknown figures.

After a series of initial posts on X about the coin, Le suddenly backtracked in his support for the coin on March 4th, announcing that he would be using the money he received as fees from $GOOSE transactions to take as many coins as possible out of circulation while also putting out an apology on X and YouTube for supporting the crypto coin.

In the apology video, Le said that he was initially thankful for the financial support given by the $GOOSE coin and, however he had since come around on the position that receiving "free money" was not worth the negative feedback from the community. With that, Le said he made the decision to cut involvement with the coin, stating, "the thought of free money intoxicated me so thoroughly I didn't see the harm it was doing to my reputation."

In a more emotional portion of the video, Le discussed the legacy of Counter-Strike and his feelings about leaving the game 20 years later. He said that after years of reflecting on his role in creating the influential title, he has a more positive relationship with his legacy and no longer feels regret for leaving Valve's team. With that

So far, the response to Le's apology has been overwhelmingly positive, with a particular comment by Mohan "launders" Govindasamy stating on YouTube that Le should not feel guilty for people investing in crypto in 2026 with all of the risk being well known.

Overall, it seems unlikely this will have a lasting effect on Le's standing in the CS community while he has hopefully learned an important lesson about the value of his personal brand.