MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
🙁
Just deleted my FB account (was the push i needed) due to this sh1t
...
Not impressed, right thing to do or overeaction?
If you're [i]really[/i] asking then yes, massive over reaction IMO.
In Gaza, they're doing the Rubble Bucket Challenge:
It'll be interesting to see the post challenge analysis of this.
Wonder if there'll be a lull in donations as folk have done their bit already? Curious as to whether some charities will also lose out as a result of not being 'in focus'
I'm pretty sure you were a STW hall monitor once.
You, sir, have me confused with a grown up. I've never had a position of responsibility here.
Wonder if there'll be a lull in donations as folk have done their bit already?
Maybe, but I guess you'd see the same thing after any successful charity fundraising.
If you want to get into the ethics then an earnest friend posted this on Facebook:
http://ethicsalarms.com/2014/08/23/ice-bucket-challenge-ethics/
Funny how folk are different ....
My kids... who just happen to be 3 and 6 ... did their challenge this morning
Bless 'em ... I didnt really need to pour water over they heads its was raining cat n dogs as we did it.
They got their own back by my nominating me... and then we all jumped in the bath together to warm up.
Hope they remember a silly wet morning we had once.
Ooh the language on that one 😀
FunkyDunc: that vid is the one I posted earlier that Drac pulled.
Probably not a good plan to repost it.
[s]FunkyDunc[/s] CountZero: that vid is the one I posted earlier that Drac pulled.
Probably not a good plan to repost
I saw a good one this morning . Irish lass doesnt like it , runs off at full belt and smashes face square into the washing pole arm ( not a spinny one ) knocks her clean off her feet.
Was a belter
I just completed the "challenge" this very evening. Except I did it in the shower. With warm water. From the shower. And donated £200 to a cancer charity as mum just got told she was 5 years clear from her last of 3 rounds with cancer. Anyone nominating me will get told [s]to **** off[/s] a polite "no thanks".
Although I don't know if it counts as charity as I didn't film myself and plaster it all over Facebook. Does it count?
The whole campaign is a form of bullying
I've had a long hard think about this.
As someone who was systematically bullied for a number of years in his schooldays, I have a zero tolerance policy towards bullying and will fight the most minor of bullying on a point of principle.
I think that calling this 'bullying' trivialises bullying, outside of a schoolground environment. One adult nominates another, that nominated adult can then decline the challenge. They may then choose to make a donation, or may not.
I've been receiving [url= https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodtimes_virus ]messages[/url] urging me to do things for quite a while now. "No" is a perfectly acceptable answer.
The ice bucket campaign has, perhaps accidentally, raised a [i]lot [/i]of money for an otherwise neglected charity. It's not for me, but I can't condemn it.
I go away for 2 weeks, and come back to an fb feed full of vids and nominations, but jack all about a charity to support.
Since one has just seemingly earned a shedload of dosh, I'll gladly make a donation to a totally different cause. In about 3 months time when the fad is over. Don't want my donation linked to a social media coercion.
And I'll save the ice for something on the rocks tyvm.
More amusingly, Spanish TV reports that a Belgian living in Spain is now in hospital after he managed to persuade his mate to use his firefighting plane to drop a load of water on his head to do a more spectacular version of the challenge. The muppet didn't realise that nearly two tons of water hitting you at 200kph might not be the best of ideas...
Oh, right. I did look back through the thread, and couldn't see it. Network was being a bit slow, though.
Sorry 'bout that.
Still makes me giggle watching it, though!
I've only been aware of this in the last week or so and apparently I've just been nominated to do it 😯
At least this latest craze has raised a lot of money but things like this are the reason i don't even have a wasteofspacebook account as i bet a big percentage of people just do it for attention and haven't donated a penny to charity 😆
Will probably just ignore it and donate a few £££ to the motor neurone disease charity as the owner of the company I work for died from it just over 3 years ago 🙁
This looks like a [i]much[/i] more fun way of raising money for charity.
http://uproxx.com/filmdrunk/2014/08/japanese-porn-stars-want-you-to-squeeze-their-boobs-to-stop-aids/
Where do I get to participate?
Maybe they could do a high-street 'chugger' type thing...
Don't want my donation linked to a social media coercion.
The charity won't care either way. Not sure why you would either.
Seems a really weird thing to be thinking about.
.... things like this are the reason i don't even have a wasteofspacebook account as i bet a big percentage of people just do it for attention and haven't donated a penny to charity
So what?
Loads of people have donated so what difference does it make. And loads of people are now aware of the charity, and making donations, because of those "attention seekers"
Will probably just ignore it and donate a few £££ to the motor neurone disease charity as the owner of the company I work for died from it just over 3 years ago
Make sure you let them know you haven't got a Facebook account,
Apparently it's important to differentiate between "genuine" donations and "attention seeking" ones.
With all this water being thrown about, I think my next charitable donation will be to a charity assisting with access to clean drinking water in all poorer regions of the globe.
Nealglover has done it and not donated 😆
Will probably just ignore it and donate a few £££ to the motor neurone disease charity as the owner of the company I work for died from it just over 3 years ago
Still had the desired effect then.
With all this water being thrown about, I think my next charitable donation will be to a charity assisting with access to clean drinking water in all poorer regions of the globe.
Good for you.
My lad just got challenged to do it. I asked him what it was for. He told me it was started by some bloke called Al. 🙂
He's happy enough to do it, and it fills up the school holidays, I guess.
For some people - not many I grant you - it is a mild form of bullying, because they really don't want to do it, or donate money to that particular cause, but fear being mocked by the people who nominated them. Not everyone is self-confident enough to say no to peer pressure.
Lets have done and bring back ducking stools , that should speed it up !!!
My reticence about these viral "awareness raising" campaigns is the apparent lack of awareness being raised. What proportion of participants and observers have genuinely become more aware of MND since this started and what difference does it make? I know of people who have participated who thought it was all about Macmillan for example.
As for the bullying angle, it is a very public request for charitable support that many people will feel pressure to say yes to. If bullying is the wrong definition I'd need my thesaurus for a similar word. Take away the nomination angle and will the same number of people still participate?
We all get asked to donate to a variety of different charities and - speaking for myself - I like to use my own personal experiences to cherry pick who gets my money.
Call it what it is; it's a fund-raising campaign. I might start a new campaign tagging people on Facebook to see what they know about MND that they didn't know before.
I bet it's more than it was before it started.
What proportion of participants and observers have genuinely become more aware of MND since this started
Dunno about proportion but the [url= http://tools.wmflabs.org/wikitrends/english-most-visited-this-month.html ]"Most visited on English Wikipedia this month" page at WikiTrends[/url] reports "Ice Bucket Challenge" at number 4 with 4,063,844 views and "Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis" at number 10 with 2,703,178.
They were number 1 and 2 [url=http://]for most visited this week[/url].
I think if 2.7 million people were interested enough to seek out a Wikipedia article about it then you have to say it has been pretty successful in raising awareness.
I know of people who have participated who thought it was all about Macmillan for example.
That would be because Macmillan [s]jumped on the bandwagon and bought up all the Google AdWords[/s] coincidentally [url= http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/macmillan-cancer-accused-of-hijacking-the-ice-bucket-challenge-9688310.html ]also have an ice bucket challenge[/url].
As for the bullying angle, it is a very public request for charitable support that many people will feel pressure to say yes to.
So as I jokingly suggested earlier is it any different to a sponsor form being passed round the office or the enforced hilarity of a corporate red nose day?
We all get asked to donate to a variety of different charities and - speaking for myself - I like to use my own personal experiences to cherry pick who gets my money.
Speaking for myself I didn't know much about MND before this campaign and I didn't realise it was so poorly funded. I do now.
Well I donated, not doing the challenge though, ferk that. 😉
None of the videos filling up my feed make a particularly obvious link to any specific cause or charity, to the extent that I thought it was just a slightly less harmless viral bullying than the challenge your friends to drink alcohol to extreme craze.
The only one that does mentions a totally different cause.
I'm sure there is a bit more awareness, but there are a lot more people having fun caving in to a challenge than promoting a charity from what I can see.
At least put direct click to donate links in the text if it supports a cause, in a position where it's visible on the feed, and not only if you click the video or whatever.
I've been nominated, twice, by friends on facebook, (who are actual good friends). I'm not doing it, I give to charity as and when I want to, and generally to cancer charities as cancer has greatly impacted my family.
I'm just ignoring the facebook stuff, I don't want to do it, so I'm not, and won't give in to peer pressure.
None of the videos filling up my feed make a particularly obvious link to any specific cause or charity
Try these two then:
At least put direct click to donate links in the text if it supports a cause, in a position where it's visible on the feed, and not only if you click the video or whatever.
You might want to point that one out to your Facebook friends.
So as I jokingly suggested earlier is it any different to a sponsor form being passed round the office or the enforced hilarity of a corporate red nose day?
I think so yes. I don't have dozens of friends and family waiting for me to say yes or no when someone asks me for sponsorship in the office.
At least put direct click to donate links in the text if it supports a cause, in a position where it's visible on the feed, and not only if you click the video or whatever.
MNDA suggest that you post the video on their Facebook page. That way you are linking to the association for which you are raising money as well as keeping the viral element going.
afaict none have posted to a charity FB page. none call it "ALS/MND Ice Bucket Challenge". all (that I saw - I cba to scroll back the entire 2 weeks) just have "Here's my Ice Bucket Challenge - I nominate..."
either I have special friends that are forgetful, don't know how to post to a page, and expect me to mind read, or shedloads of fad followers have done the same. I'd guess it started off with good intentions, then the fad bit took over from the support this cause bit.
found out the cause by reading this thread.
funnily enough, event this thread only refers to Ice Bucket Challenge too.
I think so yes. I don't have dozens of friends and family waiting for me to say yes or no when someone asks me for sponsorship in the office.
On the sponsor form in the office, everyone from your boss to your subordinates can see if you've given and exactly how much.
On Facebook you could quite easily give nothing and no one would know.
MNDA suggest that you post the video on their Facebook page.
Personally I didn't do that, mostly because it was a private video for the amusement of my friends not for the entire world and I wouldn't want people accusing me of just being an attention-seeking media whore (oops.. too late).
When I posted the video I did include a comment saying [b][i]"Text 'ICED55' followed by your donation amount to 70070 to give to the #MND #IceBucketChallenge."[/i][/b] as did most of my friends.
On the sponsor form in the office
What?! Like on a notice board or something? How quaint. It's all about JustGiving pages in our workplace these days.
On Facebook you could quite easily give nothing and no one would know.
True. These viral campaigns have a life-cycle and I reckon this one has reached the stage where it's all about participating in the challenge rather than raising money or awareness.
It's all about JustGiving pages in our workplace these days.
We're a software development company - we don't trust technology 😀
I reckon this one has reached the stage where it's all about participating in the challenge rather than raising money or awareness.
Really? The [url= https://www.justgiving.com/icebucket4mnd/ ]JustGiving page for MNDa Ice Bucket Challenge[/url] is at £2 million now - it was at £1 million yesterday.
I think money is still being raised!
funnily enough, event this thread only refers to Ice Bucket Challenge too.
Funny how they call it the Ice Bucket Challenge too.
[img] 
[/img]
https://twitter.com/mndassoc/status/504505180743032832/photo/1
I think money is still being raised!
That's good.
To be honest I'm struggling to articulate in my own mind - never mind an internet forum - why I feel a little uncomfortable about this. Maybe it's the fact that there are so many other worthy charities out there and the MNDa are raking in donations orders of magnitude greater than them. As a worldwide community we're still clearly very happy to donate to charity, yet those charities still have to rely on highly paid executives to come up with successful fund-raising ideas.
What I'd like to see is a viral campaign where the participants can choose which charity to donate to as well as include an explanation of why. That way donations AND awareness are spread more evenly and effectively.
Maybe I should just get on with getting a soaking 😀
As a double cancer survivor I was more than happy to do it and donate. Just because 1 devistating illness screws with your life, don't for one minute think another can't do the same down the road. Just because I've had cancer doesn't mean I won't give to other causes if I feel moved to do so, even if......shock...... theyve not effected me directly (yet).
Many many years ago my wife (not at the time) and I helped raise money for the building of a childrens hospice (I'd already "beaten" cancer twice by then) we did all kinds and probably raised a few hundred pound. We didn't have kids or know any one with a child that would need such a place. Then, years down the road we where unfortunate enough to need it, I was pretty glad people had got off their arse and done something for a charity they had no need of.
Always makes me laugh when people say I only give to this or that as they are the things that effect me. Thing about something like MND and the likes is that they could rip somebody you love (or you) away from this world at any moment and they don't care if you've battled against something else for years.
It's turned out to be a clever campaign, through blind luck nothing else. It's raised awareness of a terrible illness, I spent time with my kids talking about it and it has raised a pile of money. People who claim some moral standing against it because "it's not their charity" (to me) just look like they are using some dodgy high ground as an excuse not to do it. If you don't want to do it/donate, that is 100% your choice and nobody should bully you into it! just don't use the "I'm already so generous" as you excuse.
What I'd like to see is a viral campaign where the participants can choose which charity to donate to as well as include an explanation of why. That way donations AND awareness are spread more evenly and effectively.
Others seem to be the same so choose a different charity, few friends of mine chose a local one instead of MDNA.
Maybe it's the fact that there are so many other worthy charities out there and the MNDa are raking in donations orders of magnitude greater than them.
True, but this is the first time MND/ALS has had such success - they were one of those worthy but drastically underfunded charities before this campaign
e.g. The [url= http://www.alsa.org/news/media/press-releases/ice-bucket-challenge-082514.html ]ALS Assoc said[/url] [i]"As of Monday, August 25, The ALS Association has received $79.7 million in donations compared to $2.5 million during the same time period last year (July 29 to August 25)."[/i] 😯
(which is why Macmillan, with an annual donation pool of £187 million, have been heavily criticised for stepping in and trying to grab the action in the UK).
People who claim some moral standing against it because "it's not their charity" (to me) just look like they are using some dodgy high ground as an excuse not to do it. If you don't want to do it/donate, that is 100% your choice and nobody should bully you into it! just don't use the "I'm already so generous" as you excuse.
If people feel they need an additional 'excuse' for saying no (apart from 'I don't want to'), perhaps that is more indicative of the underlying pressure they feel from others to take part.
Well said johnikgriff.
Always makes me laugh when people say I only give to this or that as they are the things that effect me.
Why? None of us can afford to donate to [i]every[/i] charity so we all use some rationale to determine which charities to support. This is as good a reason as any. A charity being thrust onto your Facebook feed is another valid reason.
Oh FFS I've just been challenged. I've nothing against dowsing myself in freezing cold water, I do that on most MTB rides, I just can't be arsed with bandwagon jumping viral campaigns where you're pretty much guilt tripped into following the crowd and accused of being a miserable party pooper if you don't. And I like to choose when and who I give charity money to, rather than being cajoled into it by people who can't make independent decisions. Yes, I am a miserable git.
Think I'll start a p*ss and sh*t bucket challenge in response.
And I like to choose when and who I give charity money to, rather than being cajoled into it by people who can't make independent decisions
Yes you can.
Think I'll start a p*ss and sh*t bucket challenge in response.
You have to go first remember.
Nealglover has done it and not donated
I haven't done it or donated actually, I probably will donate though at some point. Probably won't do the challenge though.
For anyone worried about other charities losing out because of the ice bucket thing ....
My other half is doing the Great North Run to raise money for [b]Teenage Cancer Trust[/b] in memory of her Friend who she lost recently.
It's a great charity, and they helped her friend so much.
You can read about it here, and donate if you feel like it ?
https://www.justgiving.com/CarolineHarms/
You can read about it here, and donate if you feel like it ?
Bully!
Good luck to your Mrs on Sunday.
I like to choose when and who I give charity money to, rather than being cajoled into it by people who can't make independent decisions.
So would you have considered giving to MND/ALS charities before this campaign?
I suspect most people would have been fairly unaware of them (as I was).
So would you have considered giving to MND/ALS charities before this campaign?
No. And that probably won't change. Not because I have any particular problem with those charities, I'm sure they're very worthy. I'm just a contrary sod who doesn't like being cajoled to do things by a herd like mentality. And on a more serious point, I have a little bit of a problem in that these sort of charity campaigns are replacing the real solution, which is having a fair and equitable society where people help and support each other out of compassion and a recognition that it's for the greater good, rather than an ego-boosting 'look at me aren't I great' motivation.
No. And that probably won't change. Not because I have any particular problem with those charities, I'm sure they're very worthy. I'm just a contrary sod
Okay, perhaps that was the wrong question. If this campaign had never existed would ALS/MND charities have been on your personal list of charities you were aware of and would consider giving to?
I ask because they weren't on mine.
an ego-boosting 'look at me aren't I great' motivation.
Oh is [i]that[/i] why I did it?
I thought it was because I was a [i]"media whore"[/i] or [i]"attention-seeking"[/i].
What a truly awful self-centered person I am. 🙄
Oh is that why I did it?
I'm sure it wasn't. And it wasn't meant as a criticism, I was just making a general point that individual charitable donations, and the myriad activities and 'challenges' attached to them, seem to have replaced collective responsibility organised and facilitated by a progressive state as the main way of providing support to those unfortunate enough to have illnesses or conditions which they need help with. I know it's boring, but wouldn't it be far more effective to have a properly funded health service and welfare state?
wouldn't it be far more effective to have a properly funded health service and welfare state?
Yep, I agree, couple of answers to that though I suppose.
1) the campaign started in the US where they have a rather different take on welfare and healthcare.
2) but even in the UK healthcare and welfare budgets are pretty tight
3) someone has to pay for research - it isn't in the interests of private pharmaceutical companies (or nationalised health care) to spend billions researching relatively rare conditions no matter how devastating they may be to individuals.
[url= http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/wrexham-man-faces-assault-charge-7668456 ][/url]
Not really in keeping with the spirit of things.
My mum died of MND ten years ago. Awareness and funds back then were virtually non existent and this had remained the case right up until this pesky social media explosion.
It doesn't matter to me that not everyone will do it, nor will they all donate money, nor even that they'll all take the time to find out what it is - but the fact that SOME people have, has meant that awareness and fundraising has gone through the roof compared to where it was. That to me makes this totally worth it.
While it's too late for my mum, it's amazing to think that a cure is at least now a possible thing in the future for all those facing the same fate as her.
someone has to pay for research - it isn't in the interests of private pharmaceutical companies (or nationalised health care) to spend billions researching relatively rare conditions no matter how devastating they may be to individuals.
This is the crux of it. It's a somewhat taboo subject, but isn't it about time we started asking where the line should be drawn in terms of the resources directed towards various diseases and conditons? It seems a ridiculous situation that the deciding factor on which diseases/conditions are targeted for research is whoever can think up the most attractive viral marketing campaign.
Interesting article here.
[IMG] 
?1[/IMG]
But the secondary question to that is, where will my donated pound have the most chance of saving a life?
It is so difficult for scientists, let alone lay people, to work out where research/disease prevention money can do the most good.
My best guess is that money spent on malaria prevention in developing countries - bednets/swamp drainage, or tropical disease vaccine development/distribution is probably the most effective in terms of lives saved and suffering alleviated.
River blindness is a good example.
[url= http://www.who.int/topics/onchocerciasis/en/ ]link[/url]