In a sense, it doesn’t matter how ridiculous it sounds to think Pepsi would genuinely honour that. Pepsi said that they would, therefore they have to, or else they’re guilty of false advertising. Companies can’t be allowed to say whatever they want in adverts, and when asked to pony up pull “it was just a joke, bro”. To use a slightly less ridiculous example, Fallout 76. One of the preorder editions can with a canvas backpack. But when they finally shipped, the durable canvas backpacks somehow became flimsy nylon. Complaints to publisher Bethesda got the response that the canvas version advertised was a prototype that was too expensive to make, so they handed out the cheap imitations instead. It took like two years in the courts for Bethesda to give people what they actually pay for. And they won because advertising law says you have to deliver on what you promise, even if it’s a Harrier jet. Introducing any level of “it’s just a joke” makes that effectively meaningless.
"I genuinely thought Pepsi was giving out fighter jets" Pepsi genuinely SAID they were giving out fighter jets. They went to some trouble to specify the conditions under which they were giving out fighter jets, in fact.
You can't shake the Devil's hand and then say you were only kidding.
It's just that sometimes the Devil shows up in the form of some guy with a lot of time on his hands and an interest in getting himself a fighter jet.
This is like a case out of contracts 101 that any first year law student knows. Pepsi made a valid offer to enter into a contract and someone accepted the offer. In this case, it was a jet for points. There's no few law school cases about this.
