Topic: Tournament gave 25 bitcoins as prize to last places (Read 528 times)

I'm a gamer and this is especially true. In my circle of friends alone we got steam money cycling where we sell games, sell in-game items, and pretty much everything that you've earned from playing games and transacting for them with real money, in that way we wouldn't have to spend pocket money for games anymore, which is certainly a good thing, and a massive blunder for those starcraft players if that's what they did with the 25 bitcoins they earned lol. Although these are the same people that got their greatest paychecks from the last crypto bull run, with some of them even earning a single bitcoin from literal nothing all because they held, played, and grinded their asses off till their earned their keep. So besides the fact that they are gamers, I think you should also include the consideration that bitcoin way back then was worth literal snot, and to the people of that time period, they'd much rather spend that money instead of keep it and collect dust, and possibly lose access cause this is bitcoin that we're talking about, I've seen people lose access to their wallets for a shorter amount of time, so what more would these people?

There's a lot of things at play here besides "they are just gamers, of course they're going to spend it", that's some hasty generalization right there unbacked by any sort of evidence whatsoever.

That's right, most of us upon receiving that consolation prize might not keep it and just sell it as-is because Bitcoin has no place before in everyone's pocket and it's still new to everyone's ear. Well, for these scenarios, what we can learn is about the value of Bitcoin that has been treated as a consolation prize now has grown a lot.

A sad twist for this piece of history then. Those winners don't even keep a few bucks from having it after winning as a consolation prize. But on the brighter side, they've just donated this to the community as it's considered burned and lost Bitcoins forever.

I've been looking for this thread as I've seen someone posted that in socials and he's right with what he's said. I can't imagine how much enthusiasm that this guy has. Because before when you talk like this in front of people, you'll be just laughed by them not knowing what you're saying and even asks you what you're talking about. He's even talking about 10 bitcoins and $10k at that time. While even having less than 10 right now is a wealth that one can keep and have a life changing transformation in our lives.

I bet that these people have been ROFcrying and still regretting that they've talked sh*t about Bitcoin and never even got a handful of it.

It's likely that they have never kept them and that's sad on their part. That only shows on how Bitcoin was treated as if it's nothing even if it's given to them as a consolation prize.

I'll even use it to buy a new game or some items that will make me happy and that's for sure. But past is past, the lesson is there and I don't think we'll ever see another tournament that will give Bitcoin as its prize whether it's a major or consolation.

It's much like that these are cypher punk things and those winners will have to figure out how they're going to keep or sell them. But then, no one cares, no one even moved them as said.

But they didn't , and that's the point. Back then bitcoins were worth shit, and to get these as a prize for winning a mini starcraft tournament's like getting a participation trophy for that one competition you joined as a kid for the lols but secretly hoped you'd get the first place. It's upsetting but you know why you got it. Pretty sure there's an interview/reddit deep dive made by someone back then about one of the winners (particularly Jumper) of that 25 bitcoin prize, if I'm not mistaken (and don't quote me on this) they spent the tokens and hadn't seen a dime of it ever since, they're regretful of course, as I would assume but not so much that they'd swear off of crypto anymore, although it's a massive bummer realizing you could've loaded up and became a millionaire had you just saved what practically is the worth of 25 bucks back then.

Makes me think of the mini tournaments held as well these days with crypto as prizes, most of them for their own utility coins that have little to no outside purpose besides their network, much like what bitcoin is back then. Will they flourish? Will some of the winners keep their coins only to lose their seed phrases/passwords? Will they spend it and eventually be remorseful when they find out they could've cashed out, saved, and sat on a million dollar paycheck in the future? Ahh, it makes me all excited and giddy about the future of Esports and cryptocurrency.

These were gamers we're talking about. If they see the price of each bitcoin go up even by a dollar or ten dollars, they'd immediately sell those for equipment or gears in game. The chances of them still having those bitcoins are pretty slim, and if ever they still have them, they'd probably be famous by now since they are millionaires.

If I was one of those people in that tournament, I wouldn't believe it if I find out that me losing a tournament would have made me a millionaire.

That's the best prize in that tournament if they only knew back then, if they only managed to save those bitcoins until now, surely they have been living a decent life nowadays with that money and those who won the 1st to 4th places wish that they had been the ones who won the last places. It's really good if they can find someone who took part in the tournament and won those 25 bitcoins, I wonder how they are now and how they spend those bitcoins after they finally convert them to fiat. Just like the Pizza guy who accepted to be interviewed these guys right here also deserve such exposure and documentaries if they also want to.

Plenty of people did, see below about the people who got the potential for bitcoin, plenty of people didn't, but there were plenty of people who understood in 2010 and 2011 that bitcoin was going to be worth a whole lot of very little and that it was something of a binary out coming.  As time progresses, one way increases in likelihood more and more.


But the negative comments related to bitcoin in some of these are just golden, and are still repeated now, nearly 14 years later, see e.g.:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/i-am-pretty-confident-we-are-the-new-wealthy-elite-gentlemen-12156

https://themonetaryfuture.blogspot.com/2011/06/bitcoin-is-economic-singularity.html

https://news.slashdot.org/story/10/07/11/1747245/bitcoin-releases-version-03



Things like this from tomhudson on slashdot:
"... except I didn't have to even read that to figure out the system was insecure. The description from Wikipedia was sufficient. In other words, if someone who is not familiar with the system can spot the main flaw in 2 minutes or less, then it's garbage.  ...
Summary: Bitcoin is worthless."


AC: "So it's slashvertising AND garbage. Three cheers for kdawson"

"The first thing the client did was try to connect to a webserver on port 80, probably a version check. The second thing it did was try to connect to a an IRC network. Can you say, botnet?"


"I see no reason this would be preferable to any number of already-available systems for valuing goods (like, say, US dollars), unless you're an anti-government paranoid."

Probably lost but I still like to lie to myself that those that got them still have their bitcoins or that they've probably sold this already but not when the price is in the five digits, they've probably got an access to it when it was still around 100 USD or a bit higher and they saw that it's a big money for them and they don't mind not hodling on to it or if they're lucky that they still got those bitcoins, they'd be talking about it right now but I don't see the players that have participated from this StarCraft tournament showing in public that they've sold their bitcoins at five digit price so they've probably sold it a long time ago or you could be right, that they've forgotten about it and is rolling around crying because they remember they've got a bitcoin but they forgot where they've put it.

I can imagine what these players felt when they've got bitcoins as consolation prices, they're probably stupefied or something like that and that they want to cash it in quick for a real money.

I am pretty sure most of those coins are lost. If you search the block explorer for that day and you find an address which sent 25 BTC to the 4 participants you will see that they were never spent.

They probably just delete the email or threw away that piece of paper with the private key and it’s gone forever. Bitcoin was like less than $1 back then and not worth it setting up a wallet, finding an exchange to sell just to get $20.

This isn't something surprising. Because then it was placed based on the Bitcoin price, and wasn't it popular? We can't complete this with the current situation. The world has changed a lot, so everything is changing. For me, even if I won that bitcoin when it was placed, I may sell it when the price becomes double. I can't imagine holding on till now unless I totally forget about Bitcoin. Maybe after 10 years, some people still can't imagine Bitcoin was $50K and we haven't bought it. Everything will change from time to time. 

During the times before, we've seen that it's just like a consolation of the last placers but then no one knows that it would be a great value in the future. And just as what everyone is seeing it right now, we may not be able to predict how high it can go but if you are holder and you believe that there will be of a greater value soon, you'll hold. The limit that it has got, the total number of bitcoins that are lost forever, they'll never get replaced. That's why the longer the time passes by, the rarer that these Bitcoins that we're holding will be and the institutions are craving to have it soon because they want us to sell these to them but not for now and the time will come when the price is higher. 

Absolutely people need to understand the value of the coin. This thread is the perfect example and motivation for the people to buy the coins and hold it. Bitcoins have really done great in the past few years and have given a lot of returns in return. So people need to understand that Bitcoins are limited in numbers and very rare. So just buy and hold to earn maximum profit.

After a year, I don't think that there's a need for me to create a new thread encouraging people. I just want to use this thread as a motivation that situations like this will keep us holding and in accumulation. It's the logical thinking that in the past, we can accumulate Bitcoins in many quantity but as time passes by, the more it grows, the higher value it gets then the lesser Bitcoin in quantity we get as we purchase. That's the reason why we have to keep on holding but some taking profits are necessary during the bull run. If there are folks that have been discouraged that they've never bought at the dip, it's never too late. Situations like this were already part of the history so as these days that we have and we will have are gonna be part of it too in the future.

None could've taken it with the best understanding. Maybe if someone have known about its technology, there was possible chances that the person have kept them secure. In another thread found a person questioned about $100 cash or bitcoin and the answer is $100 in cash. This is happening in 2023, what could've been the scenario almost 12+ years back.

I hope the winner has kept this prize till now. I believe the goal of giving prizes in the form of Bitcoin was to introduce Bitcoin to new people. In the same context, I remember the faucets that were giving reasonable amounts of Bitcoin in 2015 and 2016, as well as other crypto currencies that heavily raised in value later, like Dogcoin. Actually, these ways could have built a fortune for some people, but at that time, there was only a small portion of people who knew that Bitcoin and the crypto domain as a whole would reach this point of value and popularity.

And it was a different mindset before for those that have heard bitcoin but the enthusiasts know what's best for them and they'll surely keep those bitcoins or would probably asked the gamers to exchange those bitcoins that they've taken. No one expected it to be this big and if we're in their shoe, we perhaps have sold either - in case that they did.

I'm not sure if someone has posted this already but it seems that no one has made a thread for this topic before at least for this board. We can just extract the lesson that nobody knows the future of bitcoin but while many are full of uncertainty. We're all here having that positivity that we're looking up to that the time will come for which the price of bitcoin will be even greater.

Yeah but I don't think so. 
I'll spend that quickly if ever I've won such amount before from a game tournament.

No one knows the future and that's for sure and back then we don't know if something this big would come out from those consolation bitcoin prizes but then, we've seen the present and it has grown big. There were for sure more sad stories about selling bitcoin earlier because of many reasons and circumstances that has happened in the past.

Nobody knows if they've kept all, a few or sold all of it. I hope that out of nowhere even just one of them would fill this thread and discuss the story how it was spent.

---

Guys, there's also another interesting story and thread that I've posted that's the same as these folks who has received bitcoin during the early days of bitcoin.
Thread: A painter received $50 worth of bitcoin on June 2013.

Well, after seeing this tournament, I think the people who got 5th to 8th place will rethink where bitcoin is, and wish they hadn't sold it then until now.
I hope that among them, there are those who don't care about the prize but at that time and still keep the private keys they have. If they forget the private keys, then they will definitely think hard about it 

This is a pointer to what we should expect in the future from Bitcoin, back in 2011, bitcoin's value was far less than $100 which is the lowest cash price in this situation, and at that time throwing 25BTC was far easy than $50 or even $20 cash.
But unknowingly for them that it was a fortune in disguise, if it is held for the long term it has been nearly 10-11 years since 2011 when the contest took place and the Bitcoin amount has multiplied significantly, but the highest cash prize in the context which is $500 has lost it purchasing value significantly due to inflation, this goes a long way to show how bitcoin has evolved and proven to be the hedge over inflation.

I wonder if the 1st place winner used those $500 to buy Bitcoin and still keeps those bitcoins as of today.

That would be a true winner 

It surprises me that this story with the awards from the tournament appeared in the english section only now. Or maybe there have already been similar topics here? Personally, this story has been known to me for a relatively long time, because it was published in the local section. If I am not mistaken. I'm sure I saw it somewhere on the forum. I think 25BTC for 5th-8th places will haunt the minds for many years to come. Especially newbies.

My thoughts on this screenshot are as follows. No one knew and could not even imagine in those years that btc would rise in price so much and gain world value. Undoubtedly, now it looks funny when the winner of the 1st place, what's there, all the winners received a thousand times less (even taken together) than the outsiders of that tournament.

I looked at the scenario deeply and simply had a beautiful smile and then compared the situation to what we have now. It is just like giving anyone $500 now or giving them bitcoin equivalent to $50. Honestly no one will value the bitcoin because with $500, you can simply and easily buy bitcoin worth of $50 and still have your $450 dollars remain with you.

At everytime, people always measure the value of bitcoin with the current price it is to fiat. That is why someone bought pizzas with 10,000 bitcoins. 1 btc was around $0.45 dollars then if I am not mistaking.