- Hello America, my name is Dan Spoon,
and I'm the CEO of GoFundMe,
the personal crowd funding website
that gives you the tools you need to achieve your dreams.
Honeymoons, dream vacations, the world is your oyster.
That vision of the company vanished almost immediately.
As we, instead, became an unwilling lynch pin
of the American Healthcare System.
Over a third of campaigns on our platform
are intended to raise funds for medical debt.
Which, for many Americans can be overwhelming,
to the point of, personal, uh, bankruptcy to--
- [Director] You, you okay Dan?
- Yeah, um, I think the, um--
There might be an issue with the prompter
because their faces are staring out at me,
asking me for help from it.
- What? - What?
I didn't, could we, could we cut?
While we do take a grim and haunted sort of pride
in being the only option for America's 80 million
un- or underinsured inhabitants,
it also is slowly but surely destroying our will to live.
Put simply, it would really help morale around here
if there were a few light-hearted campaigns on the site.
Just a few.
We could really use some fun ones.
So, we've started an initiative to rebrand the company,
and remind people, hey, this site's for more
than just begging for your own life.
For example, Jan Smelt, from Cedar Rapids
needs only two hundred dollars to build a cat tree
for the fuzzy friends at her animal rescue.
As you can see here, Jan just needs
40 more dollars before her--
This project has been postponed as Jan and her cats
have been diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma.
Jan's insurance company is denying coverage
because Jan recklessly chose to be secretly poisoned
by the asbestos mill up river
from her house for over 40 years.
And Jan is also being sued by the mill
for damaging their brand image?
What is the brand image of an asbestos--
What is an asbestos mill??
Oh God, I hope Jan's all right.
An actual great example of a fun GoFundMe project
is Devon Boone, who wants to go kayaking
with his friends Tad and Steve.
Devon writes, "'Sup bros?
"Me, Tad and Steve all f'inna hit those tasty waves
"out at this year's SurfCon.
"Our plan is to paddle out to sea,
"eventually crossing the border into Mexico.
"None of us have passports (sighing),
"and Steve's pancreatic cancer
"has unfortunately metastasized.
"He can't afford surgery in the States, but if me and Jon
sell our kidneys to the Sinaloa Cartel..."
Oh.
- [Director] Do you, should we,
do you want us to keep rolling?
- Hmm?
- [Director] Um, are you, are you okay?
Do you need a minute?
- I run a website that hosts popularity contests
where if you lose, you die.
Would you be doing all right?
You promise, this does not have any illness in it.
No medical, nothing, right?
Matt Smith and Doug Craig are raising money for
a new podcast called Podcast,
where they review the previous episode of their own podcast.
This is actual, this is actually somehow
sadder than the cancer ones, I--
- [Director] So, should we run the images?
- Yeah, I mean, you know, I didn't get
a chance to look over them but,
it seems like the rebranding initiative
is maybe a wash at this point.
So, maybe, maybe just run the demo slugs
and just take a look at those?
(inspirational instrumental music)
- [Director] Oh, oh, you know what?
I, I think there may have been a mix-up.
These seem to be like, they're the wrong factoids.
- Oh?
I feel like I have sharp nails in my body.
Is that normal?
Do I need a GoFundMe?
How did we get here?
Look, ultimately, I'm not even saying we do anything
as extreme as single payer health care.
I'm just saying, what if we had something
along the lines of like one giant GoFundMe every year,
that would just pay for all the people
who got sick or hurt that year?
- [Director] Well, that's single, single payer healthcare.
- Ah.
Our new online newsletter, Sickness is Storytelling:
How to Make Your Cancer More Marketable,
(sighing) will give you tips and tricks
to have your life's greatest misfortune go viral.
I can't do this anymore.
I actually can't do this anymore.
Also, please consider donating to our staff's GoFundMe,
entitled Our Funky Little Kickstarter
Turned into a Dystopian Pressure Valve That, While Helpful,
Is Only Delaying Our Collective Reckoning
With Our Society's Pathological Hatred
of the Working Class, and Now We All Need Therapy.
(sighing) Okay, guys, title's a little long on that one.
Maybe we shorten that up?
Not very punchy, probably won't go viral, and it needs to.