Man Kickstarts $55k To Make Small Potato Salad

Poor people, pay attention. This week, one guy used Kickstarter to raise $55,492 (that's what? £40K?) to make potato salad. In definitive proof that humans are stupid, a Kickstarter user named Zack Danger Brown posted a Kickstarter campaign that seemed pretty simple – perhaps even doomed to fail. His pitch ran as follows:

Basically I'm just making potato salad. I haven't decided what kind yet. "

Brown then posted a series of rewards for backers, that included saying their name whilst he made the salad, accepting suggestions for additions to the salad, and for the really high bidders, a bite of the salad itself. He then sat back and the internet worked its big dumb magic, with bidders round the globe adding immeasurable meaning to their existence by pledging money. When the campaign closed earlier this week, he'd scored $55K from  6,911 backers, and ended up promising to send bites of potato salad worldwide. Here he is ruminating on the nature of the salad.

Predictably enough, a host of copy cat campaigns have sprung up, with desperados trying to grab a bite of the potato salad action (and, with the exception of this kid who actually seems to have some sort of purpose, they've by and the large raised bugger all). To be honest, we're just bitter we didn't come up with the idea first. Toad-in-the-hole anyone?