16-Year-Old Wins 10 Bitcoins in Blockchain.info Giveaway

Popular bitcoin wallet provider Blockchain.info revealed via Twitter that Travis Wright, a 16-year-old and bitcoin entrepreneur from Duluth, Minnesota, has been named the grand prize winner of a contest to commemorate its 1 millionth user.

Blockchain.info announced the milestone on 7th January via its official blog, just two months after the wallet service passed 500,000 downloads. The service has seen more than 800% growth year-over-year: it had just over 110,000 registered users as of January 2013.

The company told CoinDesk it received 13,192 entries to the contest, which was open to anyone who liked the Blockchain.info Facebook page. It then used Rafflecopter to generate a winner using a Random.org number generator.

"We wanted to do it differently this time, so that all users could participate through Facebook or with an email address," a spokesperson for Blockchain.info said.

Our 10 BTC Winner is: Travis W! Travis, we've emailed you w/details on how to claim your prize! Please contact us within 24 hours! Congrats!





— Blockchain.info (@blockchain) January 15, 2014

As the winner, Wright had the option to receive either 10 BTC ($8,786 at market price as of the time of writing) or a vacation of equal value through BTCTrip.com.

Wright told CoinDesk that he elected to receive the 10 BTC prize package, as his minor status might prohibit him from truly enjoying his vacation. But, despite the implications, the young photographer says he plans to spend his money responsibly.

"I have been getting a lot of suggestions to buy cocaine and hookers, but I'm probably going to save instead," Wright said.

Wright learned of his prize through an email from the Blockchain.info team giving him just 24 hours to respond to claim the prize. Because of the nature of the email, Wright initially thought the prize was a scam, but says he was thrilled once he confirmed its validity online.

The high school junior aspires to go to college in Colorado with his brother, and says he will dedicate 1 BTC to his shopping list in preparation for the big move. But, though his focus is on the future, Wright says the increased notoriety is having implications at his high school. He noted that he's already been approached by several casual acquaintances about the prize.

Since the price of bitcoin hit $1,000 USD, Wright says he has become involved in cryptocurrency, but primarily in dogecoin due to its low mining difficulty. Wright currently runs CoinWrite, a content and news outlet that pays writers in cryptocurrencies such as dogecoin, bitcoin and litecoin.