The Surrender Your Say campaign from the Tourette’s Syndrome Foundation of Canada is calling for volunteers to hand over their Twitter feeds as a way of stepping into the shoes of Tourette’s sufferers.
Twitter users who subscribe at SurrenderYourSay.com will see random tweets fill their feed June 19. “That’s what the haircut said,” “Squeeaakk,” or “Bette Midler” are examples of the tweets being used to mimic the uncontrollable verbal and physical tics of Tourette’s.
“What you tweet and how you tweet is totally out of your control for 24 hours,” said Helen Pak, co-executive creative director at Saatchi & Saatchi, the agency behind the pro bono campaign.
To add to the realism, the tweets will have peaks and lulls in frequency, and some of them will contain profanity, Pak said.
Saatchi worked on another pro bono project for TSFC back in 2011, the @Random documentary series, which mashed up 30 short films about people with Tourette’s. @Random won multiple awards, including a gold in Public Service at the Marketing Awards last year.
To promote Surrender Your Say, the agency has sent out press releases and contacted major influencers on Twitter. It’s generating some buzz, but it’s hard to predict who’s actually willing to participate in the campaign. In the words of Rick Mercer, giving up control of social media scares the hell out of a lot of people.
“Scares the hell out of me. June19 brave folks surrender their say for tourette syndrome.” http://t.co/Sdltlfw9Or #surrenderyoursay
— Rick Mercer (@rickmercer) June 14, 2013
Pak says unnerving people about losing control is the point of the campaign. “TS is completely out of control and random and involuntary,” she said. “We know that there’s no way you could possibly experience what TS is like, but this campaign comes close.”
What do you think of the SurrenderYourSay campaign? Will users be willing to hand over their Twitter account for a good cause? Share your comments below.
