16 replies to this topic

[Oliver_R]

In Britain the Atheist Bus Campaign was a success this year and gained worldwide interest -- putting colourful adverts on buses saying "There probably is not God, so stop worrying and enjoy your life." It was done with some press publicity, a campaign website, a Facebook group and a justgiving.com site for donations. It rapidly raised 150,000 pounds and frankly could probably have gone on to raise more if it had gone on longer, if the founder Ariane Sherine had not had other commitments she wanted to focus on, and if the charity she did it in partnership with, the British Humanist Association, had been a bit more proactive in doing something with the publicity. The facebook group got 25,000 members. Ariane is following it up with a book full of contributions from well-nown British atheists called The Atheist's Guide to Christmas. There are also to be some new advertising of some as-yet unspecified kind using remaining money from the campaign.

I was just wondering if something like this could work for SENS? I live in France so it would not be so easy for me to organise (even if I had the time, which I don't really at the moment) , but I just thought I would throw the idea out there. If we did do it, what do you think the best slogan would be?

[Vgamer1]

I think the idea has a lot of potential and I think it's been brought up here before. Do you know how much money was required for the campaign?

I'll try to think of slogans. These come to mind at first thought:

"Death to death!"

"Together we can fight the reaper! End aging now!"

"Aging is curable. The SENS Foundation is making it happen!"

I just thought of these on the fly.

I still think the pressing question is: How much money?

[Oliver_R]

Well nothing much really, just people's voluntary efforts mainly. It did get a boost in the first place however from the fact that the person who had the idea, Ariane, sometimes writes for a national UK paper's website (the Guardian) and got it off the ground there in their Comment is Free beliefs section (where journalists or other writers or well-known people, will post an article, which the public is then able to comment on). She then set up a www.justgiving.com page, where donors each time they donate (it was a mimimum of 2 pounds a time) can leave a comment, and that became what someone called the world's most expensive internet forum... then a Facebook group was set up and a website etc. and there was a press conference before the actual buses hit the streets. It took off just through the publicity it generated. It made its first 100,000 pounds in about a week. It was the novelty and audaciousness of it that interested the media, and it didn't hurt that Ariane is a pretty young woman with a sweet personality. Also it gained support from people like Richard Dawkins. As to use justgiving.com you have to be raising money for a registered charity, Ariane agreed to do it in partnership with the British Humanist Society, which also helped a bit with marketing the idea. They collected in the money, which was then spend on bus adverts and also some in the London Underground. Although the BHS helped a bit with organsing things, Ariane did a lot of it and ended up having to take six months off work to do it and to appear on chatshows and do press interviews etc. The money raised was good - but as I say, I think could have been more - but the publicity generated was also good for improving the image of non-religious people in the UK (which although its people are actually quite secular on the whole, still has a state religion, and has religious morning assemblies in schools, 26 bishops in the upper house of parliament etc.).

[Vgamer1]

But how much money do you think we would have to raise? Looking for a ballpark figure here.

Edited by Vgamer1, 25 September 2009 - 06:50 PM.

[Oliver_R]

If it has been mentioned before here, it might have been me musing on it previusly. I can't remember now. I spent quite a lot of time helping to promote the ABC online, and I also very much support SENS, so I guess it is logical I would think of it

[Oliver_R]

Well the ABC initially was only supposed to raise a few thousand pounds for a few buses around London. In the end it raised 150,000 which was ample for buses in all major UK cities for a month or so and also London underground posters and two big screens on Oxford Street, with some left over which is to be spent on some more advertising of some sort shortly. The money seemed to go quite a long way, especially compared to something like television adverts, for example

[Oliver_R]

I think maybe this is along the right lines: "Aging is curable. The SENS Foundation is making it happen!" I will see if I can think of anything

[Vgamer1]

It makes sense. Although, I worry if the world is ready for such a large rush of anti-aging publicity. We would have to be careful to frame it right. For example, no talk of immortality in my opinion.

[Oliver_R]

The other good thing about the ABC was it was copied in something like about 20 places around the world. So it was really good publicity for its cause

[Oliver_R]

[I agree talking about immortality might not be the way to go. But it should not be too wishy-washy either

[Vgamer1]

Yes, it can't be too mild or else no one will pay attention. Would you like to chat in skype, gtalk, or the like?

[Oliver_R]

How about: Help us end aging - you know it makes SENS

[Oliver_R]

Or : Aging is a disease: help us find the cure - www.sens.org

[brokenportal]

Im glad you support this Orlando. I think its a great idea too. Maybe we are wrong but if you want then lets dig in to this and see what we can do.

We have a rough draft outline started on line 12 here: http://docs.google.c...evision=_latest

We should combine that list with your ideas. If your interested in editing it all together then let me know and we can transfer that old list there to the imminst wiki and move it along more.

As a wide ball park figure, I think this project can be done for between 30 and 100 thousand dollars, and I think that is something that, although ambitious, that we can definitely raise. We are thinking that we should fund the bus to tour for long stretches of time. Probably during the warm months for at least 2 years giving speeches and meeting with officials when we can, going from venue to venue, schools, hospitals, colleges, health conventions, town parks, etc... They could bring a variety of materials with them, pamphlets, yard signs, books to possibly stock libraries and book stores and to sell and give out in some circumstances etc...

We are also thinking that it would work to have a large clock be specialy fabricated for the bus to pull behind it to attract media attention. It could also act as a huge dewar for collecting funds in a touring fund raiser. Some of these details are plotted out at that link.

Like Vgamer says, maybe we can all get into a skype meeting about this sometime this week. I dont have much time for this myself right now, but Im very eager to see this happen and I can at least help facilitate somebody like you if you want to find a team of people and work on this. One thing we need is some contacts for people that have experience doing this kind of thing, and it sounds like that person with such contacts might be you.

[Oliver_R]

Actually the campaign in the UK involved paying to put adverts along the sides of ordinary buses, rather than the kind of thing you are referring to here (though this sounds good too - but maybe quite complicated). eg. http://www.humanism....bus-cut-out.gif And I don't personally have time to do a lot of organising at present, but I just thought I would put the idea out there. Also I am based in France and am British and my main links/interest at the moment with life extension is with having met Aubrey de Grey and helped him with a few small issues to do with promoting SENS in France, generally supporting SENSF and the Methuselah Foundation and also the group Heales, based in Brussels. I did mention bus ads to Aubrey, who thought it might work and was familiar with the atheist buses in the UK earlier this year, but he though it would need careful thought about issues like the best time to launch it. Obviously working out where it would be launched - which country (first) - and which organisations would back it and who has time to organise it and be interviewed in the press if necessary etc. would be rather important. Happy to have a Skype chat sometime though (and in fact just did with Vgamer).
Bye for now.

[Ben Simon]

The real issue would not be merely getting the adverts on the busses. It would be properly capitalising on those adverts by attracting the attention of the world's media.

If that doesn't happen it's a waste of time and money.

I never saw a single atheist advert, but I'm very familiar with the campaign because of all the publicity it got. Sure, I thought it was wrongheaded and self serving and stupid, but I'm familiar with it... so from a publicity angle I guess it worked.

As for raising the funds, that can be done. My facebook cause has about one hundred thousand bucks worth of pledges to SENS research, and it's climbing almost every day. David Robert's has close to the same amount. There are people out there ready to give money to these ideas. They just have to be mobilised effectively.

Edited by ben, 26 September 2009 - 01:54 PM.

[brokenportal]

Oh, I was thinking a little more complex. That would work too, same as billboards really I guess. What is your skype id? Do you want to get in on the various meetings we have there?

Actually the campaign in the UK involved paying to put adverts along the sides of ordinary buses, rather than the kind of thing you are referring to here (though this sounds good too - but maybe quite complicated). eg. http://www.humanism....bus-cut-out.gif And I don't personally have time to do a lot of organising at present, but I just thought I would put the idea out there. Also I am based in France and am British and my main links/interest at the moment with life extension is with having met Aubrey de Grey and helped him with a few small issues to do with promoting SENS in France, generally supporting SENSF and the Methuselah Foundation and also the group Heales, based in Brussels. I did mention bus ads to Aubrey, who thought it might work and was familiar with the atheist buses in the UK earlier this year, but he though it would need careful thought about issues like the best time to launch it. Obviously working out where it would be launched - which country (first) - and which organisations would back it and who has time to organise it and be interviewed in the press if necessary etc. would be rather important. Happy to have a Skype chat sometime though (and in fact just did with Vgamer).
Bye for now.