The videos are taking over social media, mainstream media and public events. Public figures, celebrities and everyday Joes are dumping buckets of ice over their heads and then nominating their friends to do the same.
It’s classic viral marketing. Get one person to do something ludicrous, then have them nominate three of their friends to do the same. Most of the time it peters out into nothing pretty quickly. But the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge has taken on a life of its own.
On Tuesday, the organization took in $8.6 million. In just one day. Overall, the flood of donations in the amounts of just $10 or $100, have driven $31.5 million into research for ALS.
ALS is more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease and is a neuro-degenerative disorder that slowly renders people immobile and then kills.
While there has been no shortage of criticism from people who don’t like the campaign — calling it everything from narcissistic to useless — the results can’t be denied. The challenge has shattered records for the ALS foundation, which has never seen donation amounts this high since the gene responsible for the disorder was discovered in the early 1990s.
Of course, as with any viral trend, there are those people who inevitably take it too far and hurt themselves.
And then there was this guy.