Coinbase, a cryptocurrency exchange, ran an ad during the Super Bowl on Sunday that featured a bouncing QR code logo. Viewers who scanned the code were taken to a site offering $15 in bitcoin to folks who signed up for a Coinbase account before Feb. 15. At least, that is what it would have done if the site had been able to keep up with the traffic.
Sorry, we're at capacity. Within a minute of the ad running the site had 20 million hits, 6 times higher than previous benchmarks. This sudden surge in traffic caused the site to crash for about an hour. The Apple App store saw the Coinbase app jump from 186th to 2nd
Coinbase is down in the market by 23% this year after only recently going public and along with other crypto-based companies are seeking to branch into courting sports fans.
Telling it like it is - 20 million hits at $15 for every new account? We’d “crash” the site too.