We live in strange times. This past week or two we’ve probably seen more celebrities getting soaked in ice water than all of our ancestors’ combined.
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Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg poured a bucket of ice water over his head last week. Among those he then nominated was Microsoft founder Bill Gates who then challenged Elon Musk. The nominations go on and on. It stretches further to include Apple CEO Tim Cook, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and even the main cast of Star Trek (almost).
These tech personalities represent only a fraction of the people trying to raise awareness for Lou Gehrig’s Disease (or Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis).
The US based non-profit ALS Association has managed to create a viral sensation that’s seeing everyone from politicians, celebrities, and normal folk like you and me, take buckets’ worth of ice water to their heads.
The challenge is to either donate US$100 to the charity or take the icy plunge. Naturally, most people decided to partake in the wet T-shirt contest, and then donate. The non-profit has since received more than US$15.6-million in donations compared to US$1.8-million during the same time period last year.
We’ve decided to round up our favorite videos of tech and geek personalities taking on the Ice Bucket Challenge:
Mark Zuckerberg
Bill Gates
We have to admit, the fact that Gates took the time to add some creativity to the video (albeit a stodgy skit), makes the stunt our favorite of the bunch. He even managed to add a few seconds of Microsoft’s latest Surface Pro 3 tablet PC.
Elon Musk
Gates then went on to challenge SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk and TED talks founder Chris Anderson. Musk used the skills of his five children to help him out:
Markus Persson
Musk challenged creator Markus Persson, Johnny Depp and skateboarding legend Tony Hawk. Here’s Persson being a sport:
Tim Cook
Apple CEO Tim Cook also took the cold bath after being challenged by Apple’s senior VP of marketing, Phil Schiller. Needless to say, Cook had a band and an audience of screaming Apple fans:
Chris Pratt
Hollywood actor Chris Pratt (Guardians of the Galaxy, Parks and Recreation) also added a different spin to the cause… by downing a small bottle of Smirnoff Spin and a small bottle of vodka. We don’t know if he got confused with the Neknominations video trend of earlier this year, but he sure got a surprise:
Satya Nadella
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella accepted Steve Gleason’s Ice Bucket Challenge and challenged Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Google Co-founder Larry Page to do the same:
Larry Page and Sergey Brin
These two Google founders never go solo, so naturally Page was joined by Sergey Brin:
Jeff Bezos
After scratching Edward Snowden, the Queen of England, Pope Francis, and Kim Jung Un off the list of nominations, Bezos decided to look deep into himself, and to his childhood heroes. He then nominated the main cast of the original Star Trek, namely William Shatner, Patrick Stewart, and George Takei.
Maybe Patrick Stewart didn’t get the memo? We couldn’t find his Ice Bucket Challenge video. In any case, Captain James T. Kirk and Lt. Sulu are definitely worth the watch:
William Shatner
George Takei
