Billionaire CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg performed the ALS ice bucket challenge and invited Bill Gates, Sheryl Sandberg, and Reed Hastings to perform the task next.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg threw a bucket of ice over his head after being challenged by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. The act was a part of ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, which is being used on social media to raise awareness about a fatally dangerous neurodegenerative disease, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). ALS attacks the brain and spinal cord and causes eye movement impairment, difficulty swallowing, speaking and breathing.
The Ice Bucket challenge has encouraged people from all over the country to dump ice over their heads and donate to the ALS Association, a non-profit organization fighting the deadly disease. The challenge went viral as the fundraising phenomenon asks people to perform the ice bucket task within 24 hours and nominate more friends. With each person nominating more and more friends, the trend has exploded.
After Zuckerberg performed the ice bucket task, like many others, he shared the video on his own social networking site, Facebook. The less-than-a-minute long video shows the Facebook boss throwing a bucket full of ice over his head.
"That was really cold," he exclaimed.
Zuckerberg went on to nominate his friends to the challenge, as a part of the fundraising phenomenon. He chose Bill Gates, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Netflix CEO Reed Hastings.
"Yesterday, Governor Chris Christie challenged me to do the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. I accepted his challenge, and now I'm challenging Bill Gates, Sheryl Sandberg and Reed Hastings next," the 30-year-old Facebook founder captioned the video.
Other notable figures who performed the ALS Ice Bucket challenge include Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella and challenged Amazon CEOs Larry Page and Jeff Bezos to do the same.
"We have never seen anything like this in the history of the disease," Barbara Newhouse, President and CEO of The ALS Association, said in a press release, Wednesday. "We couldn't be more thrilled with the level of compassion, generosity and sense of humor that people are exhibiting as they take part in this impactful viral initiative."
The association has raised $5.7 million since July 29, compared to $1.2 million during the same period last year. People can send their donations online, by mail, or telephone.
