Celeb Charity Challenge 2013

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KateR
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Celeb Charity Challenge 2013

Post by KateR »

This came up in another thread, and I still get asked about what happened with the BiLLe Celeb Charity Challenge of 2013, so I might as well bring the original thread over to the new Forum so that the information is available.

About two years ago, fans discovered an online voting page that allowed fans to vote for a celebrity, and the celebrity with the most votes each month would win a sizable donation to the charity of his choice. A fan nominated RDA, other fans were encouraged to vote multiple times, and many considered that a win in January would be a special birthday gift in RDA's honor.

Unfortunately, what started out in October as a selfless way to honor RDA and raise money for charity became, by early January, a ruthless campaign with the goal of meeting RDA in person, with some fans declaring that anyone who did not vote often enough was not a true fan, and with a certain individual insisting that RDA himself should be asking fans to vote for him for his own birthday present.

The original thread can be found here: http://rdanderson.com/forum2/celeb.htm

But in the interest of summary, I will copy here my post that explains what was going on behind the scenes and what the final resolution was.

Tue Nov 05, 2013 6:04 pm
Pamk1950 wrote:
Paul Brown posted this in regards to the RDA's win at the Celebrity Challenge

There is a bit more to the story than that.

You'll remember that the rules of the BiLLe Celebrity Challenge stated that a celebrity could be nominated and voted for without his knowledge or consent, that the nominating fan could select a charity but that the celebrity could change the designated charity, and that the celebrity needed to give his acceptance within 30 days or the money would be lost.

When a fan nominated RDA and the voting began, it was Alexa who vouched for the BiLLe organization and led the intense campaigning. She insisted here on the Forum (and elsewhere) that BiLLe was legitimate, that fans should be voting because a win would guarantee a donation to Sea Shepherd, and that RDA should endorse the organization and promote himself by tweeting to his followers and asking them to vote for him.

Of course, such a self-promotional tweet is entirely out of character for RDA, especially when he knows nothing about the organization, but Alexa did manage to get someone at SSCS to contact RDA and tell him exactly what message he should tweet. RDA had no idea what the suggested tweet was for, so instead of tweeting he asked me if I knew what was going on.

I gave him the background, and the links, and explained the guidelines. He was not happy about being asked to promote himself on Twitter, and he asked me if it was possible to remove his name from the voting, at least until he knew more about it. I told him it was possible, but I suggested that he let the voting play out because he still had the opportunity to make a decision afterward, win or lose, and he agreed.

When his win was announced, I let him know what had happened, and his first inclination was to politely decline as other celebrities had done. But then he expressed his gratitude and appreciation for the generosity of all the fans who had wanted merely to show their support for him and for charity, and he asked me to find out some more information about how the donation would work. His main concern was for the legitimacy of the organization, he also wanted to be certain that the presentation could be done in a completely private setting in LA, and he asked if he could change the designated charity and/or split the donation among two (or more) charities.

I contacted BiLLe and got answers to his questions, and then passed the information on to him. He was reassured by the answers and more willing to pursue the possibility further, and he decided that if he were to accept the donation, he wanted to change the designation, to split the amount and give the greater portion to one of his other charities. BiLLe said that would not be a problem.

It was then that Alexa told BiLLe that they should be working through Paul Brown as a contact. BiLLe reached out to Paul, Paul had no idea what the CelebChallenge was, so he contacted RDA, and RDA sent Paul to me since the groundwork had already been done. I passed on to Paul all the background information and questions and answers that I had accumulated so far. He told me that he would be taking over from that point and promised that he would cc me on his progress to keep me in the loop. First, he wrote to BiLLe and asked the same questions I had asked and got the same answers. There followed one or two more emails concerning the method of splitting the donation and depositing the payment. Then RDA and Paul went to Australia, the cc's stopped, and the deadline of 30 days had passed.

Two or three months later, I got an email from BiLLe saying that a new person was now handling the presentation of donations, that they were still waiting for RDA to accept or decline, even though the deadline was long past, and they asked if there was an alternative way to reach him. I gave them the contact information for RDA's agent, and I also passed on their message to RDA, asking if he had made a decision or sent a response, since I was no longer getting the promised cc's. He responded that he had neither formally accepted nor declined, and that since the deadline had passed so long ago, he had assumed that the money was no longer available. That was at least four or five months ago, and it seems that the issue was not pursued since then.
Pamk1950 wrote:
It's a shame it ended this way.
Indeed. If it had been easier to know more about the background of the organization itself, if the "ambush" aspect could have been softened by requiring the celebrity to approve the nomination before voting, if the method of payment were better suited to splitting the donation among multiple charities as BiLLe had promised, or if the 30-day deadline were extended to allow more time to finalize details, the outcome might have been different.

In spite of it all, RDA's emails dating back to when his win was first announced did emphasize his gratitude toward his loyal fans who tried to show their selfless support:
RDA wrote:
For the record, it's very nice and something I am grateful for; to have such support and loyalty throughout, and enough "1st Timers" to bring in this kind of success. Bottom lining it, I am very grateful to everybody who voted me to the top.
Kate
This was posted after the BiLLe Celeb Challenge finally shut down and donations were no longer being awarded. It was a full 8 months after the deadline had passed for RDA's acceptance, yet some people still tried to blame BiLLe for the fact that a donation was never made to RDA's charities.

I think sometimes fans see RDA's public persona and assume that they know his thoughts or reactions. He does indeed appreciate acts of generosity, but I think this incident is worth keeping in mind as an example of how good intentions can be hijacked.

Kate
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tvero80
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Re: Celeb Charity Challenge 2013

Post by tvero80 »

I remember :(
V
Alexandra
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Re: Celeb Charity Challenge 2013

Post by Alexandra »

Hi Kate

Thank you for your information.

Although Rick is a famous and well-known person .... so he decides what he accepts and what not.

Kind Regards from Switzerland
Alexandra
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Annelies
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Re: Celeb Charity Challenge 2013

Post by Annelies »

Thank you Kate, good to be reminded again!
Lots of love,

Lies

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