If you enjoy the social media stylings of such celebrities as Alicia Keys, Lady GaGa, Justin Timberlake, and Kim Kardashian, you may want to get ready for some withdrawal soon. On December 1st (that’s this Wednesday, which is also World AIDS Day), those celebrities and others will be going offline for a campaign called “Digital Life Sacrifice” in order to benefit Keys’ charity, Keep A Child Alive, which supports families in Africa and India affected by AIDS.
Here’s the charity’s mission in a nutshell:
Life is more than merely existing. And, although it would be easier, life cannot be bought in a pill. Keep A Child Alive buys more than just the pills needed to fight HIV/AIDS in Africa and India. It buys the essential nutrition, shelter, support and education to help ensure those pills are taken properly and effectively.
The Huffington Post reports that the celebrities have filmed “‘last tweet and testament’ videos and will appear in ads showing them lying in coffins to represent what the campaign calls their digital deaths.” Once $1 million has been raised, all the participating celebrities will “come back to life” and get back online. People can donate via text message, smartphone barcode scanning, and the Buy Life web page.
Does anyone else see the irony of basing a charity campaign on “signing off” social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, yet using those same services to spread the word about the campaign? How will we know when the $1 million has been reached?!
I mean, other than the ominous “EVERY CELEB YOU KNOW WILL DIE” Flash animation introduction on the Buy Life site, the core of the campaign seems a little head-scratching to me. Are we really supposed to be so taken aback by un-updated celebrity Twitter feeds that we are motivated to spring to action? Hell, I’d probably donate money to almost any cause that continues to keep the Kardashians off of any social media platform.
Now, I know the campaign is based on symbolism and understand the need to create a tangible yet realistic outcome (i.e. no actual murders) in order to draw attention to the campaign. But doesn’t it feel slightly hollow to “sacrifice” something that’s probably maintained by a publicity staff anyway?
Don’t get me wrong, Keep A Child Alive is most certainly a worthy cause and a noble one to contribute to. It just seems that unless you feel a strong personal connection with the social media lives of your favorite celebrities, the campaign may just end up being a nice headline.
However, if they could somehow get Twitter/Facebook to entirely black out everyone’s accounts until the contribution quota was hit…we’d have cries of extortion. But also a very effective charity fundraising campaign.
