- 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.
The others ones were kind of dark and funny, this one was just straight up depressive and sad ...
No humor involved in this. The US is run by billionaires who see the working class as nothing more than labor drones. They've done everything in their power to distract the people so we're thinking about the holiday season or some football player kneeling instead of the fact that every first-world nation on the planet is far more livable for the average citizen than America.
This country is being held hostage and nobody will talk about it.
That was solid.
Republican: I don't want my tax dollars going to someone else's healthcare.
Also Republican: Gosh, look at this sweet girl who needs money for cancer treatment. Here's $200.
This was great.
Depressing yes, but that's the point.
Some of those new podcasts really do suck.