Last weekend’s flash mob/fitness event in Sheffield

On Saturday people gathered in Barker’s pool for another flash mob-style event, this time with aim of getting the people of Sheffield moving.

It was the unofficial follow-up to The day Sheffield stood still, where over 1,000 people stood motionless in the Peace gardens for five minutes back in January.

Inspired by the success of this and also a flash mob in Lincoln, the organisers of Saturday’s event did their best to galvanise support with Facebook promotion, a Twitter account and coverage in the local media.

This video shows how the action unfolded:

Judging by the number of people that turned up (about 100), it seems that the public didn’t take to this event quite as well as the previous flash mob in the Peace gardens – possibly because of the extra effort required to participate.

The video shows an instructor with a microphone calling the moves from the front, which doesn’t make it look very spontaneous. In fact, it looks less like a flash mob and more like a public fitness event, and having looked again at the Facebook page, it turns out that The day Sheffield moved was indeed organised by Sheffield International Venues.

Perhaps using this type of event as a publicity stunt isn’t in the true spirit of flash mobbing, but you have to admit that events organised by marketing teams and PR firms can still look impressive, as demonstrated by T-mobile with their dance in Liverpool Street train station:

There is more coverage of The day Sheffield moved in The Star, on the Real Radio website and also a set of photos on Flickr.