Link Love Monday: Improv Everywhere
Sorry this is a day late. I’m visiting my family this week and was busy spending time with them yesterday.
Improv Everywhere’s stated goal is to ”cause scenes of chaos and joy in public places”; and they do that by organizing “missions” of all sizes where participants perform an organized prank. Some of these pranks have included “freezes”, where a crowd of a few hundred people freezes at exactly the same time in a public place, or their annual ”no pants” subway rides, where hundreds of people ride the New York Subway in their underwear… in January.
Why do they do it? They do it for fun, both for themselves and for those who witness the pranks. We’ve all had moments where we think “hey, wouldn’t it be funny to get a bunch of people together and …..”, Improv Everywhere has taken this natural creativity and given it an outlet. As long as it doesn’t break any laws or harm anyone, why not do it? With the power of the internet, finding a few hundred people willing to participate (especially in a city like NY), and then organizing the event, is really quite easy.
And Improve Everywhere is succeeding in their mission. Their pranks have drawn widespread attention, being featured on The Today Show, ABC’s Nightline, in the New York Times, and in other media, with almost zero negative publicity. In fact, Improv Everywhere is now part of the Urban Prankster Network, a network of sites, communities and individuals from around the world dedicated to bringing fun and a little bit of chaos into your everyday life through public pranks.
It all just goes to show what a website, a little creativity, a little bit of guts, and a LOT of volunteers, you can pull of just about anything, and have a great time doing it.
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