Can the internet make one guy rich?

What the experiment actually is

There is no product, no service, no reward and no equity. There is one progress bar on one page. When someone sends money, the bar moves. When the bar fills, a bigger one opens. That is the whole mechanic, and the whole point is to see how far a crowd of strangers will carry it.

The ladder of goals

• $1,000 proof that people will actually click.
• $5,000 the experiment has an audience.
• $20,000 it left the small internet.
• $50,000 a life changing amount in many countries.
• $100,000 the internet decided this should work.
• $1,000,000 the moment the joke becomes history.
• $10,000,000 the ceiling nobody expects to reach.

Above the main bar there is a smaller one: $1,500 a month, the amount needed to simply keep living while running this. It is the least romantic and most honest number on the site.

Why people take part

Most contributors are not donating in the charity sense. They are buying a seat at a strange live experiment, the same reason people bought pixels on The Million Dollar Homepage or watched a stream of a button being pressed. It costs a dollar to be part of the story, and the bar is public proof that you were.

Is the number on the bar real?

Yes. Payments run through Stripe and the total shown on the homepage reflects the money actually received, refreshed automatically. Nothing is inflated to make the experiment look busier than it is, because a fake bar would kill the only interesting thing here.

What happens with the money

It goes to one person. That is the design. Contributions are voluntary gifts, they are not refundable, and they buy nothing except the movement of the bar. If that sounds absurd, that is exactly what the experiment is measuring.