Hello Dragonfly. I had actually thought that I replied, but I guess I only thought that I did. Old age will do that to you LOL What I write below is certainly not a criticism of your views, I have a slightly different view, but I hope that's ok too.
I don't mind when a charity comes up with a novel idea as long as the good stays there. This started out as a good thing, but people don't seem to realize that the challenge is " Pay 100 bucks or get ice water dumped over their heads. " It seems to me that a lot of celebreties are getting ice water dumped over their heads and a lot of publicity for themselves, rather for the illness.
I wouldn't partake in either/or, just because ALS is not my thing. Not that I can't sympathize with the people who have it, the average life span is 39 mths from onset of symptoms and there is no possibility of a cure. Occasionally someone will live a long time(scientist Steven Hawkins is a very rare exception).
One of the problems with ALS is that in North America only about 35-40,00 people who are alive have it. In comparison there are several million of us with Bipolar at any given time. I know that the drug mfg's are not knocking themselves out looking for a new med for bipolar and I know that the various Gov't are not looking for novel new ways to support those of us who have bipolar and with the exception of one think tank(Crest BD) I don't see very much original research being done by scientists about bipolar.
That's with 2 million of us, I can only imagine how little research etc is being done for people with ALS.
Has ice Challenge raised awareness? According to Wikipedia their article on ALS used to draw an average of 8000 hits a mth, (bipolar by comparison draws about 400,000 a mth) The peak # of hits in August for ALS was 27,000 in one day, it has since tampered off to about 1500 hits a day, but it still has increased awareness of ALS tremendously. (I searched only the English language articles)
There has been criticism in the press that a lot of money has been donated to various ALS societies , when it could be going some place else more worthy(not my words).
My own viewpoint is that any research on any illness linked to neurological problems is good for a lot of people.
The ALS society in the USA have rec'd about 100 million bucks and while that sounds like a lot, it amounts to about 35 cents per American. But is big bucks for the ALS society, I hope that they use the money wisely. Take Care. paul m