Like Secret Quonsar, but for reddit

December 23, 2019 2:08 AM

/r/secretsanta and Reddit Gifts were started in 2009 to provide a Secret Santa for the Reddit community. Yesterday, user szor discovered that Bill Gates was her secret Santa. Here she's showing her gifts.
Here are u/Szor account and the main Secret Santa link.
posted by growabrain (18 comments total)

There should not be billionaires, and I have literally no desire to be a billionaire, but the one awesome perk of being a billionaire would be to be able to do random internet Secret Santa things without paying any attention to money. Anyway, she seems cool, and those were thoughtful gifts.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:44 AM on December 23, 2019 [13 favorites]

Someone must have been matched with Bill Gates and I need to know what they got him.
posted by Feminazgul at 8:34 AM on December 23, 2019 [10 favorites]

I have a confession.
I can't hate Bill Gates.
20 year-old me wants to kick my arse.
posted by fullerine at 9:15 AM on December 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

I’m frustrated that this recipient still wants to use this opportunity to milk Youtube views. I’m curious to see what they got, but I’m not going to watch two separate Youtube videos. Can’t even just show pictures and descriptions on a Reddit post?
posted by xtine at 10:38 AM on December 23, 2019 [1 favorite]

Hey Bill Gates, if you ever get matched with me as a Secret Santa, I'd like you to end homelessness in the United States, something you have the power to do without any change to your own life but choose not to.

Thanks and keep the table scraps, even though a billionaire's table scraps seem way cool to me!!!
posted by Krawczak at 11:31 AM on December 23, 2019 [3 favorites]

Wow. This seems like an unreasonably nasty response. You can read a write up of the gifts from this link accessible from her posts on reddit.

Thanks, I would have appreciated this link in the main post. But when the only option seems to be from YouTube, it isn't always accessible to everyone.
posted by xtine at 11:39 AM on December 23, 2019

Careful. That mountain of consumerism looming above her might come crashing down and she should could be seriously injured.
posted by humboldt32 at 11:55 AM on December 23, 2019

Thank you, missmerrymack, for that link
posted by growabrain at 12:13 PM on December 23, 2019

Hey Bill Gates, if you ever get matched with me as a Secret Santa, I'd like you to end homelessness in the United States, something you have the power to do without any change to your own life but choose not to.

I can't decide which part of this comment I have less respect for; the idea that someone knows how to "end homelessness in the United States" with a hundred billion dollars, which seems simply false, or the idea that Bill Gates could do it "without any change in his own life", which is sort of true on a technicality, since he is currently giving away that money to try to help different people in the world instead, including people who do not happen to be in the United States.
posted by value of information at 1:36 PM on December 23, 2019 [7 favorites]

I guess this is a thing he does every year -- everyone on Reddit knows that someone will match Bill Gates. Seems like kind of a weird dynamic, but cute result.
posted by value of information at 1:43 PM on December 23, 2019

the idea that someone knows how to "end homelessness in the United States" with a hundred billion dollars, which seems simply false

It would cost about 20 billion to end homelessness in the US (admittedly an annual cost). Considering Gates probably stole at least that much from the public sector and the citizens of the US with his illegal monopoly I'm also not giving him any slack for spending the equivalent of a cup of coffee for anyone here.
posted by Mitheral at 2:14 PM on December 23, 2019 [4 favorites]

It would cost about 20 billion to end homelessness in the US (admittedly an annual cost).

Well, he's pledged to give away half of his net worth by the time he dies, but despite giving away $5 B in grants, his net worth still rose by $18 B over 2019. So, it seems that this is almost within his “budget”, even without cutting into his charitable work, his Secret Santa budget, or reducing his ridiculous net worth.
posted by JiBB at 3:51 PM on December 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

I’m frustrated that this recipient still wants to use this opportunity to milk Youtube views.

This young lady is adorable and enthusiastic. I might have glanced at a written list (but probably not), but the video allows me to see her personality and how she interacts with and feels about what she received. Hearing her talk about having lost her mom, and seeing the deep appreciation she has for the effort put forth (and honestly, he and/or the people who work for him obviously put a LOT of effort into picking these gifts, and HE GAVE MONEY TO CHARITY IN HER MOTHER'S MEMORY).

It feels really grinch-y to begrudge someone (especially someone whose mom died) whatever "YouTube views" she's gotten I hope this young lady, and Gates, and everyone can have a more joyous and less cynical 2020.
posted by The Wrong Kind of Cheese at 7:52 PM on December 23, 2019 [9 favorites]

A long-term, but mostly quiescent, Metafilter member is the Renaissance magician and philosopher Giovanni Pico della Mirandola.
I can reveal that last year a lucky participant in Secret Quonsar received a hand written copy of the long believed lost De omnibus rebus et de quibusdam aliis!
Let's hope that person can read Latin and knows what they have!
posted by thatwhichfalls at 8:45 PM on December 23, 2019 [5 favorites]

While I cannot definitely confirm Bill Gates does not live inside an active volcano with henchmen (the Argosy Lake Washington Cruise Tour will take you right up to his house), I can confirm that he drives himself in a late model Honda Accord to get his teeth cleaned at a totally normal suburban Redmond dental clinic that my friend Jenny the hygienist used to work at. I can also confirm that he does not own any professional sports franchises, nor is he running for any political office. Whenever the issue of instituting a Washington state income tax on the highest earners comes up, he seems to be a (lukewarm) supporter. I can also say, as a physician connected to global health and infectious disease, he is doing an enormous amount to address malaria, HIV, syphillis, among other things. I think he’s made the (correct) calculation that malaria in Africa is a more pressing humanitarian need than homelessness in America.

I don’t think there’s any reason for any human to accumulate a billion dollars, nor can they alone do any good on their own more than the government can do, but Gates has been far far more responsible than Bezos, Zuckerberg, Bloomberg, Ellison, or the Waltons.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 12:19 AM on December 24, 2019 [8 favorites]

To put a fine point on it, Jeff Fucking Bezos, who has fucking destroyed this city that made him one of the world’s richest people, actually could end homelessness here, homelessness that his company significantly contributed to, without affecting his income or his company’s stock price at all.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 12:25 AM on December 24, 2019 [3 favorites]

I just came to say that her cat is pretty adorkable.
Carry on.
posted by Multicellular Exothermic at 6:49 AM on December 24, 2019 [1 favorite]

Bill Gates seems like a nice guy

Except for the part where he's considering voting for Trump over Warren, because he's afraid she might tax him so much that he'd only have 7 billion dollars left.

I mean. Only seven billion! Obvs anyone stuck living below that poverty level would vote for Trump to reduce their taxes, right?!
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 12:11 PM on December 24, 2019 [1 favorite]