April 28, 2026
Quantum? RNG says hold my beer
The predictable failure of the QDay Prize
1 Bitcoin ‘Quantum’ Prize Fooled by Random Numbers? Commenters Roast QDay
TLDR: A 1‑bitcoin “quantum” prize picked a winner whose result matched when the quantum parts were swapped for random numbers, per a public demo. Commenters blasted organizers for skipping a basic randomness test, while a few defended the team and blamed today’s weak quantum hardware.
The community is cackling and cringing in equal measure after the QDay Prize—1 bitcoin for the “biggest” win with Shor’s algorithm (a quantum method for cracking codes)—appears to have crowned a winner whose “quantum” result worked just as well with plain randomness. Researcher Craig Gidney warned last year this contest was doomed because today’s quantum computers are too error-prone, and small demos can “succeed” by luck. The organizers even promised “no Falling With Style-style tricks.” And yet, @yuvadm’s demo shows swapping the quantum parts for a random number generator produced indistinguishable results—sparking a pile-on.
The strongest sentiment? This should’ve been caught. Commenters are roasting the prize for not adding a basic “randomness swap” test. One user flatly said the fix was obvious and should’ve been in the rules. Others noted the code’s circuit looked legit, but the entire premise was flawed: without error correction (the tech that keeps quantum bits from glitching), any “win” on tiny problems proves nothing. A smaller faction defended the team, arguing the rules were vague and the prize was trying to push the field forward—however messy.
Meanwhile, the memes wrote themselves: “QDay became RND-Day,” “RNGesus beats quantum,” and jokes about paying 1 BTC for /dev/urandom. The community is split on blame, but united on the lesson: until quantum hardware grows up, contests need sharper rules—or better yet, a reality check. Links for the curious: QDay Prize and the winner announcement.
Key Points
- •The QDay Prize offered 1 bitcoin for the largest problem solved with Shor’s algorithm on current quantum computers.
- •Craig Gidney declined to participate, citing two core issues: the need for quantum error correction and small-instance luck.
- •He argues present hardware error rates necessitate error correction for cryptographically relevant runs, making uncorrected benchmarks misleading.
- •For small instances, Shor’s algorithm can appear to succeed irrespective of quantum hardware quality, complicating fair evaluation.
- •After a winner was chosen, a GitHub test showed replacing quantum calls with randomness yielded indistinguishable results; the winning code implemented a Roetteler et al. (2017) circuit.