Bounties

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We Them Media x Pizza DAO Bitcoin Pizza Day 2026 Philadelphia · May 22

We asked the world one question. Eleven pieces came back from Philadelphia.

Pot: $530 · winner announced · recap below

Submissions closed May 29. The announcement video below is how it started. The gallery below that is what came in.

The announcement · 1 min · how it started

Maceo from We Them Media on the bounty, the rules, what we were looking for. The frame for everything that came back.

Watch the submissions Join the Telegram

Winner announced. Read the recap below.

01 · The winner

Announced · August 2026

And the winning tape came from…

Winner · $530 pot

Lorah · [piece title coming].

One sentence on why the team picked this one. What moved us. Why it holds up as the record of Pizza Day 2026 in Philadelphia.

Read the recap ↓

02 · The recap

By Maceo · August 2026

Pizza Day, in retrospect.

Maceo Whatley · Founder, We Them Media · ~5 min read

Placeholder scaffold below. Maceo drops in the real recap when ready. Everything from here through the closing sign-off is his to rewrite.

Why we ran this in the first place.

The frame Maceo sets up: what Pizza Day means to WTM. Why crypto-native journalism needs a moment like this. What we were testing by running the first #QueryTheWorld bounty on Bitcoin Pizza Day 2026.

What actually came back.

Eleven pieces from Philadelphia. Five threads. The Pizza DAO OGs. Carol on deaf rights and Rise Up. Scarlett on crypto and Philly politics. The ERC-721 lead author at a pizza party in his own city. Temple students discovering the space for the first time. What patterns emerged. What surprised the team.

How we picked the winner.

The room, the conversation, what tipped it. Named the piece. Named what moved the team about it. Honored the runner-ups by name and by what they did that mattered.

What this teaches us about the model.

The bounty model worked in these ways, cracked in these ways, would run different next time in these ways. What we would fund again. What we would not. What we owe the contributors going forward.

What's next for #QueryTheWorld.

Community projects coming from Marissa and Kafani. What questions they are chasing. When they drop. How the model repeats. How anyone reading this can post a bounty of their own.

Sign off. One line. Something specific to the moment. Not a manifesto. Not a call to action. A closing.

03 · The submissions

Bitcoin Pizza Day 2026 · shot in Philadelphia

Eleven pieces. One day. One city. Five threads.

Shot in Philadelphia on May 22, 2026 by Maceo with Benny and Estaban, local Temple University students. What follows is not a highlight reel. It is the record of who showed up to Bitcoin Pizza Day in this city, what they had to say, and what crypto looked and sounded like on the sixteenth anniversary of the first transaction.

Saucy Saucier · Pizza DAO OG.

Three cuts of one subject. The on-camera piece, the sit-down interview, the behind-the-scenes.

Philadelphia · Field

Pizza DAO OG since day one.

Philadelphia · Sit-down

The real interview.

Philadelphia · BTS

Behind the scenes.

Carol · deaf rights, the ADA, and Rise Up.

Three angles on access, inclusion, and what crypto has to learn from civil-rights organizing in Philadelphia.

Philadelphia · Field

Deaf rights, the ADA, and Bitcoin Pizza Day.

Philadelphia · Conversation

Hope and Pizza DAO. Rise Up and Philadelphia.

Philadelphia · Field

Carol drops game.

Scarlett · crypto and Philadelphia politics.

Philadelphia · Field

“Crypto as the real free trade.”

John · Pizza DAO, inside the OG room.

Philadelphia · Field

Inside Pizza DAO. John and the OG members.

Will Entriken · ERC-721 lead author.

The protocol thread. The author of the standard that made digital ownership a thing, at a pizza party in his city.

Philadelphia · Field

ERC-721, sixteen years into the experiment.

Temple students · first contact with crypto.

Philadelphia · Field

Temple students discover crypto.

The room · group photo and crypto talks.

Philadelphia · Ambient

Group photo. Crypto talks. The texture of the night.

More from the field on the portfolio and the YouTube channel.

04 · The pot

Closed at $530. One winner. Decided on stream.

$530 in the pot. One winner takes it.

The pot closed at $530. Twenty-three names on the record. Live on poidh. Payout follows the live vote.
Winner announced. Read the recap below. A few of us from the team sat down on stream, watched the strongest submissions back to back, and decided in conversation. Stream link drops in the Telegram the morning of.
Finalists who don't win the headline still get paid for their footage and still get the conversation about joining the network as a regional reporter.

The math, in public: $560 raised across 23 names. $25 paid to Coinbase to move the pot into a payable form. $530 goes to the winner.

05 · The backers

Who put the pot together

The people who made this real.

Pam · Nathan · Angel · Hannah · Dawilka · Maryann · Kenny · Tony · Lior · Zaal · Isaac · Erica · Renee · Zach · Drew · Dr. Young · Omar · Nam · Arikia · CY · Donna · Aja · Phyllis.

Twenty-three names on the record. They funded the pot before the network had earned the right to ask.

06 · Field credits

Who shot Philadelphia

Three people, one camera kit, one night. Philadelphia, May 22.

Maceo Whatley · founder, We Them Media. Directed the night. Ran most of the interviews on camera.

Benny · Temple University. Field producer. Helped run the room and pull subjects in.

Estaban · Temple University. Field producer. Camera support and on-the-ground coordination.

Pizza Day was the first #QueryTheWorld campaign. If this model interests you, the project page shows how the next campaigns work.

07 · How we pick

The winner · announced · recap by Maceo below

The winner is picked live. A few of us on the team, in conversation.

We are not running this through an algorithm and we are not putting it to a public vote on social. We will sit down together on stream, watch the strongest submissions back to back, and decide in conversation. You will hear what we think. You will hear why one piece is moving us and another is not. The standard is supposed to be visible. Stream link drops in the Telegram the morning of.

What we're weighing: authenticity, range of voices, the kind of human impact that lasts past the scroll. Did the piece make us see the room. Did the subject get to speak in their own register.

08 · The Telegram chat

Where the community lives

Join the chat. Watch the winner picked. See what comes next.

Submissions landed here. The community lives here. Everyone who shot for the bounty, everyone who backed the pot, everyone who wants to see what comes back from cities they will never visit. All in one room. The stream link for the live winner pick goes in the Telegram first.

This is also where the next bounty briefs land first, before they go public.

Join the Telegram

Thank you for being in this. The world gets recorded by the people who live in it, or it doesn't get recorded at all.

Submissions closed May 29, 2026. Winner picked on stream. Details drop in the Telegram first.

Let's Query The World.

#QueryTheWorld · wethem.xyz/pizzaday