Sodapoppin’s mom initially didn’t believe he was earning real money from streaming. She thought his first donations through PayPal were just play money until she understood that he could make a living creating content online.
Soda started streaming on Twitch when he was very young – before he was even 18. At the time, he and his family had no idea how popular it would become.
On his Punching Down podcast, Sodapoppin reminisced with his mom about the beginning of his streaming days. They talked about how confusing it was to earn money online when the streaming industry was still very new.
She described watching her son pursue an online career as confusing, and confessed she initially didn’t believe online payment systems like PayPal actually worked with real money.
She admitted she’d always assumed PayPal wasn’t legitimate, comparing it to play money like in the game Monopoly.
She recalled telling a friend: “Oh, he’s got some money, but I don’t think it’s real money.”
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Sodapoppin explained that the initial confusion was reasonable, particularly when they first began receiving significant donations during his streams.
He recalled a key early moment when affluent World of Warcraft players, particularly those from Dubai, started making large donations via PayPal – one contribution even reached $10,000.
He admitted that at eighteen, he felt lost and overwhelmed. He said, ‘I don’t even understand what it means to not care, I’m just all over the place, really excited and anxious at the same time.’
His mother admitted she didn’t know what he was up to in his room besides playing games, and she couldn’t grasp how gaming could become a legitimate career.
“I just didn’t know that there was such a thing as making money playing games,” she explained.
Sodapoppin couldn’t get a condo with his streaming revenue
The misunderstanding wasn’t just within his family. Sodapoppin later explained that early streamers often faced difficulties because banks, landlords, and other traditional financial institutions didn’t recognize their income as legitimate.
Even though he had the funds to pay for housing immediately, he kept facing rejection because lenders saw his income from streaming as unconventional.
He explained they couldn’t qualify for a condo because lenders didn’t consider funds from PayPal to be legitimate income. Essentially, people didn’t view his work as a real source of earnings.
After reviewing his income statements, someone questioned him, saying, “Are you a dancer? What’s with all these small, one-dollar tips?”
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2026-04-09 18:49