100 Happy Days Challenge

Submission 47,371

About

100 Happy Days (hashtag: #100HappyDays) is a social media experiment which challenges people to take a picture of one thing a day that makes them happy and share it through a social media platform or the project’s website.

Origin

The 100 Happy Days project^[1] was launched on December 30th, 2013^[2] by 27-year-old Zurich resident Dmitry Golubnichy who started the project and the website after realizing he needed to remember what makes him happy. He launched the project and website, which allows you to sign up for the challenge and outlines the ways you can share your 100 happy pictures:

* Share your picture via facebook, twitter or instagram with a public hashtag #100happydays;

* Come up with your own hashtag to share your pictures with to limit publicity. (Don't forget to tell us how to find your pictures though ;) )

*Simply send your pictures to myhappyday (at) 100happydays.comto avoid any publicity.

As of May 2014, 71% of people who signed up for the challenge have failed, most citing a lack of time.

Precursor

In 2004, American web developer George Taylor McKnight^[9] began taking a photo every day as a personal challenge for himself as well as a way to hone his photography skills. The initiative eventually became known as the Photo-A-Day Project.

Spread

On January 3rd, 2014, Buzzfeed^[4] published a post titled "39 Reasons To Be Happy Every Day For 100 Days," which featured a roundup of #100happydays Instagram photos and tweets. As of May 2014, it has gained over 130,000 views. While most coverage of the challenge was positive or neutral, there was some backlash against the idea. On January 31st, 2014, LinkedIn^[7] published a post titled "#100happydays: why I stopped at Day 10," and on March 31st, Thought Calalog^[8] published a post titled "6 Reasons Why I Think #100HappyDays Is A Waste Of Time." Several celebrities have joined the challenge including actress Emmy Rossum^[5], who started her challenge on March 7th, 2014

On April 10th, 2014, The Huffington Post UK^[6] published an article titled "100 Happy Days Challenge: Empowering or a Waste of Time?," which focused on the rules, pros and cons of the challenge. As of May 2014, the hashtag #100happydays has been used on Instagram^[3] over 9.2 million times.