A post where a man claims to have earned USD 1,00,000 in just 16 days by taking 1,000 OVID vaccine shots is viral on social media.
Sharing my most lucrative side hustle on Linkedin pic.twitter.com/K7Kuoqie4Q
— Jack Raines (@Jack_Raines) October 25, 2022
In a LinkedIn Post, one Jack Raines suggested that he made $100,000 by getting 1,000 Covid-19 vaccine shots in just 16 days with an average of 63 shots per day. How he made money, you ask? According to him, he took advantage of a $100 incentive that was announced by New York’s mayor Eric Adams in February this year to encourage the city’s residents to get vaccinated.
Raines said in his post that as New York depends on paper-based Covid-19 vaccine certificates, no two pharmacies were aware if he had gotten the shot or not. Moreover, with 2,600 pharmacies in the city, it was not a problem for him to get 1,000 shots in 16 days.
Soon, the post got viral on various social media platforms.
It is noteworthy that by the time this report was published, the post on Twitter had already gained almost 2,000 Retweets and over 27,000 likes.
Twitter user Priya Sridhar questioned, “What about the people who needed the vaccine and could have benefited from those doses?” to which Raines said, “You snooze, you lose.”
you snooze you lose
— Jack Raines (@Jack_Raines) October 26, 2022
Twitter user Isaiah Webby seemed shocked and concerned. He said, “No way you actually got the shots. Used like a fake arm or a patch. Half a shot made me sick for 3-4 days.”
No way you actually got the shots. Used like a fake arm or a patch. Half a shot made me sick for 3-4 days.
— Isaiah Webby (@iwebtw) October 25, 2022
Another user Whorwe Whererwe was flabbergasted over the money Raines “made” by scamming taxpayers. He said, “You do realize the money you were paid comes out of taxpayers’ pockets, don’t you? Essentially, you scammed your fellow citizens, not the mayor.”
You do realize the money you were paid comes out of taxpayers pockets, don’t you? Essentially, you scammed your fellow citizens, not the mayor.
— Whorwe Whererwe (@whorwe_whererwe) October 26, 2022
The LinkedIn audience was no different. Negar Rajabi said, “I don’t know which one makes me more disappointed: the insanity of the scam or the number of likes and kudos it has gotten! Also, for an investment that crosses ethical lines and may put you at risk physically, I can think of some other options with much higher ROIs.”
Raines expressed his disappointment and said, “I’m most disappointed that a Wharton MBA thought this was real! That’s why I went to CBS.”
Kat Galloway said, “You should apologize to the families of 1000 people who suffered because there were not enough vaccines for them.”
Grant Allen said, “Bravo! You scammed the city of New York and risked your life, likely harming others who may not have access to the vaccines due to supply shortages.”
Satirical post mistaken for real
However, the above post where Raines had claimed to have taken 1,000 vaccine shots in just 16 days was actually satire. After his post went viral on multiple social media platforms, Raines took the opportunity to express his views about the cringe posts he comes across on the professional social media platform LinkedIn. Notably, it has over 850 million users and ideally, as it is a professional platform, people should avoid publishing anything that is untrue, unreliable or unprofessional.
Another point that he raised was that people on platforms like Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook get clowned if they post a clickbait lie. On LinkedIn, the story is different. No one would call out a lie. Raines said, “The platform is so professional, no one is going to comment and say, “Actually, Joey, this post is literally a lie. None of the stuff that you wrote about even happened” because no one wants to be seen posting negative or derogatory content on a professional site.”
Raines added that this is the reason people openly support cringe posts on LinkedIn and ‘upvote’ them.
Raines’s satire on free food fooled many!
As an experiment, Raines had earlier decided to post an absolute satire on LinkedIn. The idea was to make the post ‘so cringe’ that it formulated into a satire. He published a ‘side hustle’ suggesting people can eat free food at hotels. He suggested people should just walk into the hotels in the morning and have breakfast buffet just as other guests. Even for lunch, if one dresses well, according to his satirical post, people can enjoy free lunch and run away by writing a random room number and name before the hotel realizes what happened.
Obviously, he was joking. Anyway, satire is not a cup of tea for everyone. Speaking to OpIndia, Raines said a major publication actually approached him to do a story on him stealing from hotels. “Satire isn’t understood by all, it appears,” he said. He compiled some of the best reactions (read outrage) and added screenshots on Twitter.
— Jack Raines (@Jack_Raines) October 23, 2022
Raines advised everyone to be cautious
Raines spoke to OpIndia in detail about his views on ‘sh*tposting’ on social media. He said, ” I don’t think we need to “stop” people from doing it, per se. But if you use company layoffs and similar content for social media clout, you should be published in the court of public opinion.”
He added, “In the crying CEO example, he probably thought he would get “good leader” internet karma for that. Why else would you, as a grown man, take a picture of yourself crying and publish it on LinkedIn?”
Speaking on the benefit of such posts, he said, “I can assure you that the 1,000 likes on a LinkedIn post didn’t help the laid-off employees put food on the table.” Furthermore, “Like, there’s more to life than engagement farming social media. Forty-year-old dudes posting cringe stuff on Linkedin are the white-collar version of 19-year-old girls dropping thirst traps on Instagram. It gets attention, but everyone knows what you’re doing,” he added.
Advising people to be cautious on social media, he said, “Don’t trust everything you read online, including this. If you read something ridiculous, it probably is. If you read something ridiculous that a lot of people enthusiastically agree with and you at outraged at it, you probably missed the point.”
