Two weeks ago teenager Jordan Laub promised to open a mystery safe found in his father’s casino. And he promised to do it live, on Reddit.
As we reported last week, that all changed when producers from Oprah Winfrey’s TV network came knocking.
But redditors didn’t forget about the promise. And, now, they’re a little angry.
It all started yesterday in the site’s r/askreddit section. A post asking about what happened to the safe drew thousands of upvotes and over a thousand comments. It also encouraged redditors to do some serious digging (our own story on the safe saw a jump in Google traffic yesterday).
But all they really needed was to go back and find Laub’s original post.
Laub has been writing updates and responding to questions pretty much continuously since he first posted.
“We are waiting on Oprah’s crew for updates,” he wrote in his most recent update. “As soon as we get the green light, I’ll let you guys know. Sorry to leave you guys in the dark like this.”
Still, some redditors weren’t happy. One posted a photograph of Laub posing with the safe. “Scumbag Safe Owner,” the image was titled. Superimposed over the photograph was this text: “Tells Reddit he will open safe on Tuesday. 13 days later…. Decides to wait for Oprah?”
That post received a few thousand upvotes.
“Raise your hand if you thought this kid was a douchebag even before he lied to reddit and allegedly moved it to Oprah,” wrote redditor ThisistheHoneyBadger in that thread.
Others found a YouTube video of Laub, and quickly peppered its page with comments.
“Open the safe,” wrote a half-dozen people on YouTube.
“Reddit brought me here. OPEN THE GODDAMN SAFE NOW,” wrote another.
Meanwhile, Laub appears to have attracted a platoon of redditors who are downvoting all of his comments across the site. (On Reddit comments with a large number of downvotes are hidden. Users are encouraged to only downvote posts that don’t add to a discussion, but the function is often used as a tool to censor or punish others).
Not everyone on Reddit is angry, however. A good number of people stood up to support him — or at least to say, “who cares?”
“Yeah, like ANY of you would do any different,” wrote paddlesons. “Go for it kid, take Oprah’s money, get on TV, and maybe get a little something extra.”
Unfortunately, it doesn’t sound like Laub is making any money for the deal. The network is paying the locksmith, Laub said, and that’s it.
In fact, the Oprah network broadcast won’t happen until January, Laub said. But he’s still promising to stream the opening live on the Internet.
“I dont know when, but I promise I will,” Laub wrote on Reddit. “I will make sure that everyone who wants to see it being opened will watch it being opened”
Laub has not responded to multiple requests to comment from the Daily Dot.
