ALS Associaton never saw ice bucket challenge coming
Anyone regularly on Facebook or even remotely in touch with any social media or television news outlets has probably seen videos of people dumping buckets of ice water on their heads.
If you read the front page of our paper last week you saw a picture of the Sealy ISD school board taking the plunge following the football game at home against Royal.
It’s all part of the ALS ice bucket challenge. It’s an ingenious marketing plan for the ALS Association (ALSA), except there is no marketing or genius behind it. It’s a social media phenomenon that caught the ALSA by complete surprise.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), often called Lou Gehrig’s Disease, is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. Patients with the disease often become paralyzed in later stages and ultimately die. The ALSA is a nonprofit organization that raises funds for research to help fight the disease.
In the challenge, people make a video of themselves accepting the challenge and then calling out or challenging others to do the same within 24 hours. They then dump ice water on their head. There are many variations to the challenge, but in general the idea is to do the icy deed and then make a donation to the ALSA.
According to reports online, primarily from Time Magazine, the phenomenon began in mid July when a golfer named Chris Kennedy of Sarasota, Fla., accepted an ice bucket challenge that was apparently related to the cold water challenge that began a year or two ago and not attached to any specific charity. Kennedy made a video of himself taking the challenge and in return call out his wife’s cousin, Jeanette Senerchia of Pelham, N.Y., whose husband Anthony has ALS.
Kennedy then posted the video, which is reportedly the first time the ice bucket challenge was linked to the ALS charity. It took a life of its own from there. Within weeks millions of people were accepting the dare and then calling out others. What is truly incredible is that by no act of its own, the ALSA has received, at the time of this writing, nearly $110 million in donations.
What you can’t put a price on, however, is the publicity the organization has received. It is probably the most attention given to any effort to fight ALS since Lou Gehrig himself famously stepped up to a microphone at Yankee Stadium 75 years ago and gave his “luckiest man” farewell speech.
It is also a product of the times thanks to the simplicity of shooting videos on smart phones and the ability to quickly post them on Facebook. I have enjoyed watching friends, relatives and celebrities participate in the challenge. I’ve also chuckled at the “ice bucket challenge fails” videos, which are compilations of people slipping up in some way.
Eventually my brother Chip took the challenge and tagged me. I accepted and my video is posted on The Sealy News’ Facebook page. Unfortunately the memory filled on my phone mid-dump, so half my reaction is missing. The Sealy school board was challenged by Asst. Supt. Nicole Poenitzsch and they in turn challenged all the other school boards in Region 6.
One reason this went viral so fast is that the challenge requests a response within 24 hours. A dare and a deadline for a good cause make for lots of fun. If you have taken the challenge, please share your photos and videos with us. We will do our best to post them on our Facebook page and on our website at www.sealynews.com. Feel free to email them to me at editor@sealynews.com.
Oh, and please consider yourself challenged – so get to it!
If you read the front page of our paper last week you saw a picture of the Sealy ISD school board taking the plunge following the football game at home against Royal.
It’s all part of the ALS ice bucket challenge. It’s an ingenious marketing plan for the ALS Association (ALSA), except there is no marketing or genius behind it. It’s a social media phenomenon that caught the ALSA by complete surprise.
Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), often called Lou Gehrig’s Disease, is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. Patients with the disease often become paralyzed in later stages and ultimately die. The ALSA is a nonprofit organization that raises funds for research to help fight the disease.
In the challenge, people make a video of themselves accepting the challenge and then calling out or challenging others to do the same within 24 hours. They then dump ice water on their head. There are many variations to the challenge, but in general the idea is to do the icy deed and then make a donation to the ALSA.
According to reports online, primarily from Time Magazine, the phenomenon began in mid July when a golfer named Chris Kennedy of Sarasota, Fla., accepted an ice bucket challenge that was apparently related to the cold water challenge that began a year or two ago and not attached to any specific charity. Kennedy made a video of himself taking the challenge and in return call out his wife’s cousin, Jeanette Senerchia of Pelham, N.Y., whose husband Anthony has ALS.
Kennedy then posted the video, which is reportedly the first time the ice bucket challenge was linked to the ALS charity. It took a life of its own from there. Within weeks millions of people were accepting the dare and then calling out others. What is truly incredible is that by no act of its own, the ALSA has received, at the time of this writing, nearly $110 million in donations.
What you can’t put a price on, however, is the publicity the organization has received. It is probably the most attention given to any effort to fight ALS since Lou Gehrig himself famously stepped up to a microphone at Yankee Stadium 75 years ago and gave his “luckiest man” farewell speech.
It is also a product of the times thanks to the simplicity of shooting videos on smart phones and the ability to quickly post them on Facebook. I have enjoyed watching friends, relatives and celebrities participate in the challenge. I’ve also chuckled at the “ice bucket challenge fails” videos, which are compilations of people slipping up in some way.
Eventually my brother Chip took the challenge and tagged me. I accepted and my video is posted on The Sealy News’ Facebook page. Unfortunately the memory filled on my phone mid-dump, so half my reaction is missing. The Sealy school board was challenged by Asst. Supt. Nicole Poenitzsch and they in turn challenged all the other school boards in Region 6.
One reason this went viral so fast is that the challenge requests a response within 24 hours. A dare and a deadline for a good cause make for lots of fun. If you have taken the challenge, please share your photos and videos with us. We will do our best to post them on our Facebook page and on our website at www.sealynews.com. Feel free to email them to me at editor@sealynews.com.
Oh, and please consider yourself challenged – so get to it!
posted by Joe Southern | 1:11 PM
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