For many us, after screeching and squirming to get all the ice cubes out of our shirts, the ALS ice bucket challenge was over. Some, in addition to willingly taking a fast and frigid shower in our backyards, embraced the other option our gracious nominators gave us: donate $100 dollars to the ALS Foundation. And now these videos are fading from our newsfeeds, just like countless other internet “memes”.

Certainly the ALS ice bucket challenge had a more gracious presence than planking, but was it any more substantial than all the other passing fads the internet chews up and spits out like sunflower seeds?

Like the end of a ‘80s action movie, the pace of modern life has been mercilessly ramping up over the past ten years. Much of this hyperactive bombardment is fueled by the internet and its ability to take a small spark of an idea and turn it into wild fire, quickly lighting up screens across the globe.  For charity and activist organizations, this seems to be a godsend as it used to be difficult for non-profits to get publicity due to small or non-existent advertising budgets.  While a large portion of the audience reached through tools like social media are easily drawn to a new cause, they are also easily distracted.  We’re like hydrogen scrolling through post after post until we are suddenly lit up by a new story or cause that catches our attention. Our reaction is powerful, loud, and impressive, but over in an instant and all that’s left over is hot air.

The ice bucket challenge is certainly not the first social-media driven charity movement. Two years ago saw the growing momentum of Invisible Children, Inc with their short film “Kony 2012.”  Joseph Kony, a name only a small number of the general population had ever heard before was now suddenly being thrown in outrage across dinner tables and living rooms.  It got people talking, but not for long. Two weeks after the film was released on YouTube in March of 2012, it reached 85,000,000 views. In the two years following its release, it’s only garnered an additional 20,000,000. While that is still sustainable, it illustrates a trend: that interest for a cause popularized by social media peaks early-on, then flat-lines.  Further emphasizing this point, the little-known sequel to Kony 2012, “Kony 2012: Part II – Beyond Famous”, which was released on YouTube just one month after the original in April, 2012, has acquired less than 3,000,000 views to this day.

It’s important to understand that the Kony 2012 and Ice Bucket Challenge campaign have done a lot for their respective organizations to affect change. Invisible Children, Inc lit a fire under politicians and got them talking about the somber reality of the crimes of Joseph Kony.  The ALS Foundation reports that it received an additional 100 million dollars in donations because of the ice bucket challenge.  Social media ought to be an inviting canvas to charities, but we must learn to be patient participants and have a firm grasp on our intent, actions, and impact.  This is the key to creating the informed and sympathetic citizens who will soon be handed the world.

As our eyes twitch up and down, trying to keep up with our fingers sprinting down the track pad and touch screen, it becomes difficult to let a thought linger for more than moment.  We are incredibly lucky to have this near endless supply of information and access to essential stories and movements at our fingertips, but it can be mind-boggling at times. When we log into our precious Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr accounts, our mind is like a magnet suspended in the middle of a sphere of opposite poles; our attention jumps chaotically and randomly.  If we slow down and actually take in the information given to us, then we will feel motivated to be the change we want to see.  Then we can see real progress against disease and injustice and not just passing drops in the bucket.