Who Paid 99 Cents? is a wacky website that charges curious visitors a standard fee of 99 cents for the chance to see a list of people who had previously paid 99 cents for the same reason.
Would you pay 99 cents and share your credit card details with a mysterious website just to see who else was crazy enough to do the same? If so, know that you’re not the only one. Dozens of people have already paid the standard fee just to have a look at a list of people who had previously done the exact same thing. Interestingly, if you want to check the list again to see if any new names show up, you have to pay 99 cents again. It’s genius!
The website itself is very simple and doesn’t reveal very much. All you see is the Who Paid 99 Cents header, some fields for your name, email address and credit card number, as well as a See Who Paid 99 Cents button. The fine print at the bottom reads “Your name will be public. Obviously. That’s the point. Just use a fake one if you want. Your receipt will be emailed to you.” and under that, in even smaller print, the makers of the site let you know that “All sales are final. Please don’t sue us.”
Photo: Who Paid 99 Cents?
Business Insider’s Sean Wolfe recently took a leap of faith and learned that 43 people before him had paid the 99 cents. However, most of the names on the list appeared to be fake. Some people plugged their SoundCloud profiles and other just put in lines like “9/11 was an inside job”.
Who Paid 99 Cents? is apparently the brainchild of Thinko, a computer entertainment studio based in Brooklyn. New York. Contacted by Business Insider, Thinko’s Pasquale D’Silva said that they like building funny things and basically created the website to make people laugh.
“People are paying because it gives them something funny they can talk about,” D’Silva said. “I think people like the feeling of making other people laugh too. It’s just good energy. Especially given that it’s at their expense.”
Photo: PublicDomainPictures/Pixabay
As for the money that the website will raise, D’Silva says the company will just use it to build even more wacky stuff: “We have an endless queue of things. Ideally we fill the internet up with them, and everyone can laugh a little more.”
So if you’re bored out of your mind and can spare 99 cents to satisfy your curiosity, this website should keep you busy for a few minutes.
