It's important not to oversell the impact of the Ice Bucket Challenge. Some of those donations came from ALS Association state chapters, for one thing. Moreover, there was a real concern that the original awareness message got lost in the shuffle. While there's no question that the fundraising was wildly successful, there were likely some who didn't realize that it was connected to ALS at all -- the internet's tendency to dilute information might have worked against the campaign. On the balance, though, the discovery stands as proof that the buzz created by social networks can accomplish great things.