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February 01, 2007
ATHF Shenanigans
My friend Ed Adkins is in Guam for some crazy ass reason and just IM'd me that line of text. I demanded he make a sign and send me a photo immediately. Clearly he's good at taking orders.
Xeni just sent me this link to The Boston Weekly Dig, they completely nailed it: "Next, let's all get out our dictionary and look up "hoax", shall we? Because while "War of the Worlds" was a hoax, this was not. There was no subterfuge involved, and no effort made to convince people that these devices were bombs. If I see a scary looking tree out my bedroom window, think it's a monster, and then discover upon closer inspection that it isn't, it doesn't mean the tree has perpetrated a hoax against me. What it means is that for a moment I took leave of my senses. And just because I'm embarrassed about it doesn't give me the right to go cut down the tree." Posted by sean on February 1, 2007 05:04 PM | View blog reactions
Previous Entry: Oh, The Horror Next Entry: links for 2007-02-02 It really is ridiculous. All I had to do today to get news about this thing as it unfolded was go to digg and boing boing. If I had turned on the TV I am sure I'd get some talking head speaking in words small enough for grandma to understand, and not get upset while she's eating her strained peas. More and more the US mainstream media is just completely out of touch, especially in technology matters. Do they just not research anymore? Did they just stop learning after they graduated whatever shoddy communications college they graduated from? Posted by: frodo on February 1, 2007 06:49 PM
Frodo, It isn't a matter of researching or not; it's that their whole reason for being is not the noble purpose of the fourth estate but merely to maximized shareholder return...and that means selling ad space...and that means not challenging the semi-literate masses too much. Posted by: beau on February 1, 2007 07:24 PM
Good grief, the smugness of ultra-devoted bloggers knows no bounds. Just because you LIKE the little Lite Brite moon guys doesn't mean the overreaction was as extreme as you jokingly make it out to be. The devices were built in such a way as to at least suggest the appearance of something harmful, and some were placed near bridge supports and other vulnerable spots. The marketers may have thought they were poking fun at terrorism fears, but they chose these sensitive places on purpose. To then wonder why people got upset it something like wondering why the jumpy convenience store clerk panicked when you walked in with a toy gun sticking out of your waistband. And I'll answer two more questions for outraged "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" bloggers: 1. No, those chunky eyeglasses don't look good on you. 2. Yes, you're too old to be watching cartoons. Posted by: Steve on February 1, 2007 08:02 PM
More and more I'm starting to think that bloggers are the real voice of the people in this democracy. If I'm looking for truth, I'm certainly not going to go to elected and appointed officials. And the media seems to be 'he said she said' without regard for critical evaluation. This is just like the 'cell phone terrorists' up in Michigan. The local government there didn't understand why Arab men were buying cell phones, so they jailed them and created all sorts of crazy accusations to justify it. "They were going to use one of the phones to blow up OUR BRIDGE!" "Cell phone batteries could be used to make meth!" "Even if everything they say is, true, the profits from their business could be used to finance TERROR!" Turns out none of this wild terror fantasies were true, and the only people being terrorized were the men who were arrested. And the media didn't question a word of these outrageous claims until bloggers made it so painfully obvious to them. Changing topics for a minute, the needle has swung too far in terms of terrorism and public safety. I think I can safely say that in many respects, we've given too much power to people who don't have enough common sense. Posted by: Mantari Damacy on February 1, 2007 08:03 PM
As a follow-up to Steve, above. I find it interesting that people try to label reasonable people as "Aqua Teen Hunger Force Fans". Having never seen the cartoon, I was hardly threatened by the image. And with the simple resources available at hand (the Internet), I could have posted the picture to a generic forum and likely gotten a quick response as to what the character was or meant. Get it straight. "Something I don't understand" does not equal terror. It is ignorance. And that ignorance somehow becomes fear. And fear becomes a government sponsored (and, in fact, government driven) snowball. They made mistakes. Big mistakes on how the handled the whole thing. Any reasonable person standing there would have been laughing at them trying to detonate a light bright (more or less). Yes. A light bright "with bomb components". But heck, even if it said, on the back, in big words, "THIS IS NOT A BOMB", the police would have just ran to the media, "The device has writing on it in regards to being an explosive device!" "We cannot elaborate on the specific nature of the message at this time!" Face it, the response was ridiculous. The city of Boston is being called on it, and deservedly so. It is time our law enforcement returns to just a little bit of sanity and common sense. A touch of detective work before the next Chicken Little event would be nice. Posted by: Mantari Damacy on February 1, 2007 08:11 PM
Sturgeon's Law continues to be accurate. The only enjoyable thing to come out of this is hearing talking-head newscasters say "Mooninite". Posted by: AMB on February 1, 2007 08:18 PM
Trust me, I haven't tried to label any reasonable people as "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" fans. Those fans are not reasonable people... Your argument that "'Something I don't understand' does not equal terror" is valid on a cultural level, but not so much on a specific, tangible level. A strange electronic device with wires and a power source placed next to a bridge support isn't cultural bias to be defeated with education and understanding, it's something possibly dangerous that could cost lives. Only AFTER the area is secured and the device examined do you know it's a Lite Brite. Ask yourself this: If the scare had been caused by oil drums with exposed wires leading to a power source, would you call it an overreaction then? Posted by: Steve on February 1, 2007 08:31 PM
If the last six years needed a punchline, it was delivered in Boston yesterday. Posted by: Stretch on February 1, 2007 09:01 PM
Steve, I'm not going to entertain your scenario because it isn't what happened here. It is pretty clear to me that these advertisements weren't intended to cause terror. And the people putting them up likely had no inkling of the hysteria that was to follow in one city. Really, this is a problem with law enforcement in Boston. (And the greater atmosphere of fear and panic in America, and a mentality to treat everything as a worst case scenario.) These same 'infernal devices' were placed, in quantity, in a large number of major cities. These same 'terror causing devices' were in these cities for weeks. Including Boston itself. No reaction. I can tell you right now, based on that information alone, this pretty much disqualifies it as a a suspicious device. Either that, or everyone else BUT Boston failed to be suspicious enough. Boston's first mistake was a forgiveable one, perhaps, which was mis-identifying it as something threatening. Everything after that point was one failure after another. Boston wasn't an example, on any level, on how this sort of thing should be done. Instead, it is an example of how it SHOULDN'T be done. Something wrong happened here, and that is what needs to be investigated. How to prevent law enforcement from making this mistake once again. Posted by: Mantari Damacy on February 1, 2007 09:15 PM
Steve is an idiot. Sorry Steve, but your suggestion that one couldn't tell what these 'devices' are, shows that you can't think very well either. Framing this story the way that it's been framed:ie: electronic devices, doesn't mean that it was A: Dangerous B: Newsworthy C: or gasp an bomb! George Orwell was right! aoxomoxoa Posted by: dean jordan on February 1, 2007 09:16 PM
@amb: Sturgeon was an optimist, off by at least one decimal point, as the content of the alt. categories on usenet and far too many web sites shows. @steve: rotflmao. What a maroon. It is the hour of the knife, when we separate the literate from the Fox News consumers. (Sorry, Steve, you'll have to wait outside until we find a brain for you.) @stretch: A-men. But before we blame Boston, remember, them corporate news shows exist to sell ad space. They do _not_ exist to serve you or me. And whatever disclaimer the viral marketers have put up at their site, well ATHF got an awful lot of free press, and all them Boston news shows probably had high market share for the day. The infotainment industry has definitely won here. Even if we can forgive the bomb squad for some lame decisions, it's the media that put it so far out that we all are jawin' about it. $.02 Posted by: beau on February 1, 2007 09:33 PM
Steve, when your closing argument is a "what if" scenario, it is thin at best. Posted by: Nico on February 1, 2007 10:54 PM
Well done Metrobloggers we have rocked the boat yet again. LAME OLD MEDIA watch-out, here come the bloggers Posted by: Teeth Maestro on February 1, 2007 11:47 PM
Ok, ok, I've got a really cool guerilla marketing idea: Let's invade a school and take a bunch of 3rd graders hostage...wrap them in what look like (to the uneducated in the ways of bomb-making) sticks of dynamite, and then...after the stupid police respond and we're surrounded by guns and cameras and crying parents...reveal that we're just artists, and that the dynamite was made out of lego, and we were creating a 'happening' and the film will be available on YouTube. We could pre-sell the exposure to corporate sponsors who want to be 'cool.' The authorities and civil society in general are just so lame, they'd take it seriously, the fools. Posted by: jonathansalembaskin on February 2, 2007 04:15 AM
^^^^^^ idiot ^^^^^ Posted by: testsicles on February 2, 2007 06:46 AM
You said, "No, the problem is when a goofy cartoon character made out of a home made Light-Bright giving you the finger if your idea of terrorism you are the one who needs a Bahamavention." Good point, if it were only true. The thing wasn't spotted at night when it was lit up as an obvious sign. It was spotted in the daytime, at a distance. As for the panic, no, clearly the artists were not trying to start a panic. But their bosses new that the jig was up at 1:30pm, and they watited until 4:30 to fess up, right at rush hour. I fight that traffic every day, and I do not appreciate them holding off on the true info. I suspect that they felt that any publicity is still publicity, so let it build for a while. What dicks. Did the Boston authorities overreact? Yeah, probably. But a bag with wires and gizmos does look a little odd. I guess that we have a new urban camouflage - just make your bomb look silly, then detonate. Posted by: Mark on February 2, 2007 09:56 AM
Terrorist are not going to make their bombs look silly, or decorate them with blinking lights. They won't put them in visible places. Two things to keep in mind about urban terrorists: 1) they have no sense of humour; 2) they hide bombs where people will not see them. Usually they hide them under coats and dresses, or pack them in a van. Clearly the Boston authorities made the right call in treating the objects as potentially dangerous, but if we ever did have to deal with terrorism as it occurs in other parts of the world - with people and cars in downtowns going kaboom every few days - then we would never spot it. So let's stop fearing ambiguous objects and start fearing each other, like god intended. Posted by: palinode on February 2, 2007 10:48 AM
If the terrorists were smart, they would start putting mooninites on bombs for now on. Posted by: Cameron on February 2, 2007 11:35 AM
I love it, I love it. Posted by: Chris G on February 3, 2007 07:24 AM
Reguardless of anything else, Did anyone else see the size of these things? maybe 8 inches square and a quater of an inch thick!!! How much explosives could you put in it? Cheese and rice almighty people ya don't have to shut down the whole darn city of boston. Get a grip. Posted by: mark on February 3, 2007 11:41 PM
You guys missed the point as always. Even if Turner pays 1,000,000.00 it got what it wanted GREAT Advertising, and they didn't have to pay BIG dollars. Wake up and smell your Star Bucks. Posted by: Larry Bozek on February 4, 2007 03:34 AM
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