Social challenges are becoming more and more mainstream - every month we can see tons of different examples of these internet phenomenons going viral, ranging from harmless to horrifying: silly ones (such as the Mannequin Challenge); helpful charity ones (like the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge) and slightly riskier ones (such as the Make Your Own Slime or The Knife Game). These provocations have changed the world forever - for example, ALS Ice Bucket Challenge raised well over $220 million dollars and in 2014 it reached just over 1 billion views on YouTube. Today we will cover some of the biggest and most entertaining challenges that have happened in the past couple of years and how they became an anomaly that united all of the internet.
The Ice Bucket Challenge is a campaign to promote awareness of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — also known as Lou Gehrig's disease — and encourage donations for research. A person is filmed as a bucket of water and ice is dumped over the individual's head. The individual then nominates a minimum of three people to do the same thing, having only a 24-hour time frame to complete the challenge and make a donation to the Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Association.
It went viral in July and August 2014, using social media as a platform to reach a worldwide audience. More than 17 million people posted videos online, including Bill Gates and former president George W. Bush. Over a two-year period, the money raised through the challenge helped fund research and development of treatment drugs.
The origin of the campaign has been attributed to Pete Frates, a Boston College alumnus who was diagnosed with ALS in March 2012.
How much money was raised?
The Ice Bucket Challenge raised more than $115 million for the ALS Association. A chart from the ALS Association shows that $77 million, or 67%, of the funds were designated to research and another $23 million, or 20%, were given to patient and community services.
How many people participated?
More than 17 million people participated in the challenge worldwide. In the U.S., there were 2.5 million participants who donated $115 million to the ALS Association.
The Harlem Shake – not the dance from the 1980s – is a 30-second video that begins with one person in a mask or helmet on, dancing to the beginning of “Harlem Shake” by Baauer surrounded by people not paying attention. At 15 seconds, the song features a bass drop and that is when the video includes a jump cut to the entire crowd dancing wildly usually using props and costumes. The Harlem Shake trend was created by Youtube user “DizastaMusic.” Youtube users began replicating the original video and uploading their own.
"Harlem Shake" by Baauer, the stage name of American music producer Harry Rodrigues, was uploaded to YouTube on August 23rd, 2012. The lyric "do the Harlem Shake" is a sample from the 2001 track "Miller Time" by Philadelphia party rap crew, Plastic Little. The lyric was taken from an incident in member Jayson Musson's life where he got into a fight and finished by getting up and doing the dance. Bauuer's song was met with positive reception from electronica & trap music blogs, as well as other artists including Diplo, Brodinski, and Flosstradamus. On January 30th, 2013, video blogger Filthy_Frank uploaded an episode that opens with four people dressed in latex suits dancing to Baauer's "Harlem Shake"
The knife game, pinfinger, nerve, bishop, stabscotch, five finger fillet (FFF), or "stab between the fingers game", is a game wherein, placing the palm of one's hand down on a table with fingers apart, using a knife (such as a pocket or pen knife), or other sharp object, one attempts to stab back and forth between one's fingers, moving the object back and forth, trying to not hit one's fingers. The game is intentionally dangerous, exposing players to the risk of injury and scarring, and, before antibiotics, an incision or penetration risked sepsis and death. A foldable blade carries the additional danger that, "as the faster you go, the more likely the blade will fold back in on itself trapping the finger of your stabbing hand." It may be played much more safely by using another object, such as the eraser side of a pencil. In European culture it is traditionally considered a boys' game. However, its focus on motor coordination and dexterity is comparable to girls' clapping games.
The Mannequin Challenge is a viral Internet video trend which became popular in November 2016 in which people remain frozen in action like mannequins while a moving camera films them, usually with the song "Black Beatles" by Rae Sremmurd playing in the background. The hashtag #MannequinChallenge was used for popular social media platforms such as Twitter and Instagram. It is believed that the phenomenon was started by students at Ed White High School in Jacksonville, FL. The initial posting has inspired works by other groups, especially professional athletes and sports teams, who have posted increasingly complex and elaborate videos.
News outlets have compared the videos to bullet time scenes from science fiction films such as The Matrix, X-Men: Days of Future Past, X-Men: Apocalypse, Lost in Space or Buffalo '66. The portrayal of ordinary people in a scene from normal life by movement-suppressed actors appeared in the 2015 music video for Alessia Cara's song "Here". Meanwhile, the participatory nature of the challenge on social media makes it similar to memes such as Makankosappo or the Harlem Shake. Others have noted similarities with the HBO TV series Westworld, which debuted around the same time, where robotic hosts can be stopped in their tracks.
But the challenge has, like so many memes before it, leapt from an expression of teenage boredom to a marketing gimmick for adults, making its way into political campaigns and TV ads. In doing so, it may have started to take on some queasy significance for anyone recently yearning to to hit pause on history. The kids who make these videos are freezing themselves in a, fun moment they’ll never get back. So are the pro-sports teams that have gone mannequin during victory celebrations after a game. So did the Hillary Clinton campaign, which filmed a chipper still-life featuring Bon Jovi just before Election Day. Watching these videos is like pretending there’s no future to worry about at all.
https://twitter.com/HillaryClinton/status/795955854059171840
We have made a huge change to the whole concept of Provoco — it has become the social challenge experience that we wanted to initially release. We will be releasing separate articles regarding these updates really soon. We are thanking you once again for your continuous support. Do not forget to share your most memorable challenges with us through our social media!