Woot.com and the Bulgarian Olympic Committee

Known for its witty and irreverent writing style, Woot.com is an online store that offers a new deal every day, for one day only. Interestingly, a whole community has evolved around this curious enterprise.

The deals are posted at midnight central time and frequently sell out long before a full day elapses. Typically the item for sale is at least vaguely tech related. Every so often, though, this unusual web store offers up their infamous Bag of Crap.

This offering is so momentous that Wooters, as their regular patrons are known, regularly buy out the supply of six dollar (including shipping) Bags of Crap in less than five minutes. The Woot.com community message board is full of posts by both exultant and despondent Wooters, depending on whether they successfully placed their order.

The Woot subculture has even evolved its own idiomatic lexicon thanks to a randomizing bot that variously refers to B.O.C.s as Bulgarian Olympic Committees, Barrel O' Crackers, Boards Of Canada, Busty Obese Cheerleaders, etc. Although I, myself, have no idea what wonderous crap might be contained in one of these mysterious bags, this sale has clearly taken on a life of its own.

What, one continues to wonder, is in these most desirable bags? A bit of community mob mentality, mixed with the idea of some great bargain, compounded by a desire to finally reveal the secret has driven large numbers of people to conclude that it's worth their time, effort, and six bucks to find out.

I'm abusrdly amused by this whole phenomenon. I invite you to share in my ridiculous fascination by reading the last Woot posting for a Bag of Crap:

The day is here! The time is now! The anticipation is over! Our bags are packed! We’re ready to go! The eagle has landed! And in his mighty talons, he clutches the infamous Bag O’ Crap!

Join us, as we once again stress-test our servers by passing off mystery junk, sight unseen, onto our otherwise discriminating customers. What is the meaning of this bizarre ritual? Like most hoary traditions, its origins are forever lost behind the shroud of (relatively) ancient history. We needn’t understand it; we need only perform our traditional roles. Ours: to fill the ceremonial bags with the ceremonial crap. Yours: to buy ‘em up as fast as you can.

But LOOK HERE. Somebody misunderstands this concept every time, so please READ THE BIG PRINT:

1. WHEN YOU ORDER THIS ITEM, YOU’RE ORDERING ONE (1) BAG WITH up to THREE (3) PIECES OF CRAP IN IT.

2. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR SELECTING THE QUANTITY: THREE WHEN YOU ORDER. If you select ONE, you’re going to get one bag with one piece of crap in it. If you select TWO, you’re going to get one bag with two pieces of crap in it. If you select THREE, you’re going to get one bag with three pieces of crap in it. Your shipping costs are the same either way. So you can see why the only sensible thing to do is ordering THREE.

3. YOU WILL WASTE FREIGHT IF YOU ORDER FEWER THAN THREE.

You’re only getting one bag, no matter what. The order quantity you select is the number of crappy items we’ll put in your bag. Select THREE. Later, you can watch with smug satisfaction as a surprisingly large number of less observant Wooters complain on the forums about their two missing bags. Refer them to this item description, where we explained over and over that PURCHASERS WILL ONLY GET ONE BAG.

We make absolutely no promises about the quality of these bags or the desireability of their contents. If you knew in advance what you were going to get, there’s a very real chance you wouldn’t spend perfectly good American money on it. But who knows? Maybe this time out, one lucky customer will get a bag containing a real, live, flying unicorn to be his friend and traveling companion on many adventures to magical lands! And its coat will smell like butterscotch, and its mane will be made of spun silver! You never know—it could happen! But it definitely won’t.

THE HOLY CRAP COMMANDMENTS v2.0:

I. Thou shalt expect nothing beyond one bag of some kind and your chosen quantity of crappy items (which should be THREE).

II. Thou shalt not whine and complain when some people’s crap turns out to be nicer than yours.

III. Thou shalt take a moment to consider whether you might be better off just not buying this crap.

IV. Thou shalt not order just one crap and blame it on anything but your own inattention.

V. To paraphrase Stephen Stills, shalt thou not get the crap you want, want the crap you get.

Oh, and did I mention the podcast.