The ALS ice bucket challenge that started over a week ago does not look like it's beginning to lose momentum as a viral campaign. In fact, the popular challenge has just been accepted by the highly influential billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates in order to help the effort to raise public awareness of the disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, according to NDTV.

As one of the brightest minds in a tech-savvy industry, the founder of Microsoft Bill Gates engineered his own rig to perform the chilly stunt. He accepted the challenge from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg as the younger billionaire nominated him through a video clip on YouTube prior to doing his own version of the ALS ice bucket challenge.

In the video, Bill Gates is seen in front of the structure that he designed himself, where he nominates more celebrities to join the challenge thereby bringing more attention to the disease before pulling on a rope attached to the bucket. Gates chose to pass the challenge to Chris Anderson of TED, Ryan Seacrest and Elon Musk, who all have 24 hours to accept. Other celebrities who have joined the campaign include Justin Timberlake, Chloe Grace Moretz, Kris Jenner, Emmy Rossum, Mickey Rourke, Martha Stewart, Jimmy Fallon, Andy Cohen and members of the Cleveland Browns and New York Jets.

According to a previous report by Daily Mail, the Kennedy family members have also taped themselves taking on the ALS ice bucket challenge and President Obama was nominated by Ethel Kennedy. However, a spokesperson for the White House later announced the President's participation in the challenge. Eric Schultz told the Boston Globe that the President's contribution would be monetary, meaning that there would be no video of Barack Obama pouring a bucket of ice over himself.

So far, the ALS Association has received donations amounting to $2.3 million since the awareness campaign was launched.