Neknominate

About

Neknominate, also known as Neck and Nominate in the United Kingdom, is a drinking game in which participants record themselves partaking in a physically extreme activity after chugging alcoholic beverages and challenge others to outdrink them in the identical fashion.

Origin

According to the British tabloid The Tab,^[3] the “neck and nominate” game existed in Cambridge, England as far back as 2008. On November 29th, 2012, YouTuber Will Green uploaded a video titled “Neck and Nominate,” in which a young man drinks a beer in front of a woman’s townhouse door before looking at the camera and calling out a nomination (shown below).

Spread

On January 18th, 2013, the StaffsMensFootball YouTube channel uploaded a video titled “Demps Neck and Nominate”, in which a student wearing briefs lays in the snow on a college campus and drinks a beer before nominating another student (shown below, left). On January 24th, YouTuber Tom Jeffery uploaded a video titled “TJ Neck & Nominate”, in which a man wearing swim briefs standing inside a hole in the ground pours milk over his head and proceeds to chug down a glass of beer before nominating someone named “Spartacus” to the challenge. (shown below, right).

In Australia

On January 2nd, 2014, a Facebook^[1] page titled “Neknominate” was launched to highlight various instances of “neck and nominate” challenges, garnering upwards of 19,000 likes within the first month. On January 5th, the @NekNominate Twitter^[2] feed was created with the same purpose. On January 7th, another Facebook^[5] page titled “The Best Neknominate Videos” was launched, which soon became the unofficial hub page for Neknominations after accumulating nearly 200,000 likes in the next three weeks. On the same day, YouTuber ProblemedGamer uploaded a segment from the Australian television news program A Current Affair reporting on the neknominate drinking game (shown below).

On January 11th, Urban Dictionary^[4] user redthehat submitted an entry for “neknominate,” describing the game as the “mating ritual of Aussie Bogans.” On the following day, the single topic blog BestNeknominations^[9] was launched. On January 15th, The Daily Mail^[6] published an article about the trend. On January 16th, YouTuber Hamudi uploaded a video titled “Ronald McDonald’s Extreme Neknominate,” in which a man dressed in a clown costume drinks copious amounts of alcohol in combination with other drugs (shown below).

Notable Examples

As of late January 2014, there are over 4,300 results for the search query “neknominate” on YouTube.

Search Interest

External References