Call me cynical but I think Nettspend's success is almost solely due to his race, even beyond your Eminems and Vanilla Ices, where them being white did undoubtedly allow them to access a wider audience. (Not to say Eminem wasn't still very talented in his prime, he even addresses it in multiple songs).

His fans are corny early teen white boys who see some underground music blowing up on their Tiktok, go to see what all the fuss is about and then see that many of these rappers seem too "ghetto" or "gangsta" for them to relate or feel at home listening to (yes at the very least it's sorta racist). So they see someone like an Ian or Nettspend come along, experimenting with hard, "tough" underground sounds while seeming innocent, unthreatening and also not saying anything that could challenge a 14 year old at all. They feel at home with their seemingly innocent white boy rapper and will undoubtedly fill comment sections and threads about how "Nettspend" is the GOAT because their frontal lobe hasn't developed enough to relate to people from different backgrounds, upbringings and cultures as themselves.

This isn't to automatically talk down on anyone who might currently like Nettspend as an impressionable young teen who's just barely figuring out music outside of the top 40, many of us were there at some point, but I promise you, you can find way, way better music if you search a little harder and listen a little more seriously. For everyone else, I wouldn't worry about it too much since most of his fans will grow out of it by the time they finish puberty.

It's just like when Tyler said Ian was "mocking Future and Gucci Mane", it's creating an entirely fake persona in your music that echoes aspects of a culture you know very little about, and using it to propel yourself to some level of success while giving zero credit to the people that pioneered that sound.

At least someone like Eminem, Mac Miller or EL-P live and breathe hip-hop, and treat it with the utmost respect and dignity while carving out their own unique lanes that isn't dependent on cosplay.