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Bribe Celebrities For A Good Cause With “Charity Bribes”

Have you ever had the burning desire to see Harrison Ford do an a cappella cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” while balancing on a stool and holding a kitty? How about...
Bribe Celebrities For A Good Cause With “Charity Bribes”
Written by Josh Wolford
  • Have you ever had the burning desire to see Harrison Ford do an a cappella cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart” while balancing on a stool and holding a kitty? How about something a bit simpler, like getting your favorite Luddite celebrity to join the wide world of Twitter? If so, a new site might appeal to you.

    It’s called Charity Bribes, and it crowdsources the bribing of celebrities – but always for a good cause.

    The premise is simple. Once there is a bribe on the table, you can “join the bribe” by pledging money to the cause. If the celebrity agrees to perform the action mentioned in the request, then all of the money that has been pledged goes to a specific charity. If the particular celeb does not agree to perform said activity, nobody has to pay out anything.

    The site went live about three weeks ago, and since the “bribe period” for each idea is 30 days, there’s only been one bribe on the table so far. Right now, there’s about 17 hours left in the “Get Larry David to Join Twitter” bribe. Users have pledged close to $10,000. If he accepts, the money will go to the National Resources Defense Council.

    But will he accept? It’s already been weeks.

    The site’s creators, William Spencer and Chris Baker know that getting the celebs to notice is a challenge. They told EW:

    “What’s really fun, what gets people excited is the element of uncertainty. We’re putting celebrities in an awkward situation without them knowing about it. If we went to them ahead of time and set everything up, it would lose a lot of the fun.”

    As you can see, tweeting at other prominent celebs is one viable strategy:

    @PreMatchMeal @rickygervais @jerryseinfeld We’re trying to get him on Twitter. Check it out and help the cause http://t.co/TQV6rYT6 1 day ago via Twitter for Mac ·  Reply ·  Retweet ·  Favorite · powered by @socialditto

    So, Mr. David has less than one day to hop on Twitter or that money doesn’t go to the NRDC. Either way, there will be a new bribe on the table tomorrow. The site determines what bribe to feature based on a community voting system. Users submit their ideas for a specific bribe (who, what, and which charity), and the one with the most votes wins.

    Right now, the leader is “Get Conan O’Brien to to wear an eye patch (and turtle neck, also holding a pipe) while interviewing a guest on his show. If asked about it, he should say “I don’t want to talk about it.” This bribe would benefit Autism Speaks.

    Two of the other top vote-getters really have my attention. One asks Morgan Freeman to spend an afternoon narrating animal videos on YouTube to benefit The Red Cross, and the other wants Celine Dion to sing George Michael’s “I Want Your Sex” to benefit Cystic Fibrosis Quebec. Oh well, maybe next month.

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