A British Reddit user wishing to thank a fellow-user in the US got drunk and mistakenly bought £300 worth of pizza for strangers in the States using bitcoin.
A Nice Gesture
Daniel Sobey-Harker suggested to his boss that they should reward the US user who had gained their startup (Campus Society) some exposure by ordering him a pizza online. Unfortunately, Daniel found it wasn't quite as easy as he wanted, so he appealed to the Reddit community for advice, asking:
“Can someone help me (UK) buy a pizza for someone in the U.S? I’ll reward whoever can get me a method that works.”
Several hours and 9 beers later, he was a “tad merry” but finally had a solution. He could use bitcoin to buy Papa John's vouchers, which he could then use to get the pizza delivered.
Buoyed with success (and alcohol), and not having considered that the value might have risen since he last heard anything about bitcoin in 2010, he bought two with his company PayPal account.
That's a lot of Pizza!
This left him saddled with around US$550 in bitcoin he didn't really want or need. But he didn't just sell it back (and it is unclear whether this was due to levels of sobriety or generosity). Instead he decided to reward everyone who had been involved in helping him to buy the pizza in the first place. He left this open offer in the thread:
“Are you in the States? Do you want Pizza? Talk to me. May have gone overboard with Bitcoins.”
In total he gave away over 100 pizzas to random strangers as far afield as Chicago, Hawaii and even one UK user who posted:
“Any chance of a pizza for a fellow UK person! Come on man, no discrimination against your national brethren haha.”
Jesus of the Internet
Unsurprisingly, Daniel has been the recipient of some impressive hyperbole and offers:
“OP doing more for the starving masses than local politicians.”
“As the good book says, ‘And so Jesus turned bitcoin into pizza...’”
“[C]an confirm pizza has arrived and OP is a legend! Thank you so much, will buy you a pint or two if you are ever in the neighborhood!”
“Will send boob pic for pizza.”
Sadly (and also unsurprisingly), he received an almighty ear-bashing from his boss the next day, although the amount of publicity he has inadvertently received for the company, surely makes £300 pale by comparison.