An uplifting three-minute commercial from True Move, Thailand's third-largest mobile operator, has gone viral, stirring the emotions of internet users across the world.
'Giving is the best communication' is the theme of the advert, which was posted on YouTube by TrueMoveH on Sept 11, 2013. As of 5pm, the ad had racked up more than 5.3 million page views, eliciting around 52,000 "thumbs-up" endorsements from YouTube users, and 300 "thumbs-down" responses.
The plot centres on a noodle vendor and a boy who is caught stealing medicine for his sick mother.
As a pharmacist scolds the boy, the noodle vendor intervenes and pays for the medicines. The vendor then hands the drugs and a bag of soup to the boy, without asking anything in return.
The story becomes more poignant when it jumps ahead thirty years, as seen in the commercial below.
True Move said it made the ad because it believes in the power of giving without expecting anything in return, and claims that the story is inspired by real life stories shared on the Internet.
In YouTube's comment section, a poster using the screen name TheSkileton wrote: "40 seconds in. That was all it took for me to get that slight tingling feeling that I get in place of emotions. Because I'm a man. And men don't have emotions. *sniff* Nope."
Another Youtube user, jelkeaco88, wrote, "I'm not crying, I'm just allergic to youtube..."
Reaction to the commercial was covered on international news websites, including the Daily Mail, stuff.co.nz and Gawker.
