A spectacular light show visible from northern Norway has energized the UFO crowd. Was that blazing pinwheel in the sky a signal from the aliens? Was it a practice run for an elaborate worldwide messianic hoax?
You'd expect the experts to come out with a less sensational explanation, and they have: They suggest that the display was caused by a Russian submarine-launched missile that went into a midair spin, causing a spiral-shaped rocket plume.
The glowing spiral, with a bluish column of smoke trailing down toward the horizon, was seen in eastern skies early this morning from a wide area of northern Norway. Photos and video clips of the display quickly proliferated - first in Norwegian news media, then around the world via the Internet. For a sampling, check out NRK, The Daily Mail and SpaceWeather.com.
The effect looks almost too good to be real, and tabloids floated some out-of-this-world suggestions for its cause - such as a previously unknown manifestation of the Northern Lights, a black hole or a "Stargate" to another dimension.
A former UFO analyst for the British Ministry of Defense, Nick Pope, was mystified by the flare-up. "It's ironic that something like this should happen the very week after the [Ministry of Defense] terminated its UFO project,"he told The Sun. "It just goes to show how wrong that decision was."
Russia Today's video clip about the sightings, posted to YouTube, was headlined "UFO show in Norway sky welcomes Obama for Nobel Prize ceremony."
One Internet forum debated whether the fireworks were a test run for"Project Bluebeam," which supposedly involves creating huge projections in the sky that show scenes of the Second Coming or an alien invasion. The hoax would clear the way for a one-world government to take over - well, at least that's what the conspiracy theorists think.
Russian and Norwegian news reports gave strong support to the missile hypothesis. The Infox.ru news site and Norway's Barents Observer referred to Russian advisories about missile test launches that were to take place around the time of the sighting.
"The missile was most likely yet another failed test launch of a Bulava missile from the Typhoon submarine Dmitry Donskoy in the White Sea area," the Barents Observer said. A similar phenomenon was spotted a month ago, but without the spectacular spiral.
Over at the Bad Astronomy blog, Phil Plait points out that a simulation of particles being spewed out from a spinning rocket booster can produce an effect that looks much like the Norwegian sighting.
NBC News space analyst James Oberg, an expert on UFO sightings as well as the Russian space program, says the missile spin is a plausible explanation.
"But it is still not clear that the missile actually failed. ... Spiral rocket plumes are also created by rocket stages spinning to create gyroscopic stability," Oberg said in an e-mail. "Also, Norwegian observers were looking 'up the tailpipe' of the rocket as it sped eastward, away from them - so even a slight thrusting wobble might manifest itself as an expanding spiral, exactly what was seen."
View article| In a report published by Movieline, Spider – Man 4 will feature John Malkovich playing the Vulture. |
| Finally, The Wolfman is hitting the theaters on February 12, 2010 and is putting a period to all the rumors of the movie being shelved. |
| The Hollywood Reporter brings all rumors to a stop by reporting that the casting for ‘The Hobbit’ will be starting this week. |
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
![clip_image002[5]](http://pics.livejournal.com/thetruth71/pic/0000k6az "clip_image002[5]")
On December 2, 2009 @ 7:00 P.M. PST
Phil Morris – actor who’s first appearance on Star Trek dates back to the original Star Trek series episode “Miri”, has appeared in Star Trek: The Search for Spock, Star Trek:Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager. Fans of Seinfeld will remember him as Jackie Chiles. Join us for a special Wednesday evening conversation on Blogtalkradio's: NDB Media channel.
Program call-in: 914-338-0314 or e-mail your questions to: radio@noriega.biz.
Contact:
Roger D. Noriega
323-566-5925
Fax 323-357-3868
Weekly Announcements for the Jericho Fandom
Jericho Electronic Broadcast System (JEBS)
November 14, 2009
If you wish to submit an announcement to this service, please e-mail the announcement to Ichthus at jerichotownhall@gmail.com or ichthusrep@sbcglobal.net by 8 p.m. ET on Friday. The announcements will be sent out by Gwen near midnight (PT) on Friday. There will be a midweek update on Tuesday night (same deadlines), if there is more information to send out.
JEBS now goes to all the regional mailing lists. Anyone who subscribes to JEBS is automatically enrolled in their regional mailing list. Please e-mail gwen@jericho-kansas.org and say subscribe and list your state. You will get an acknowledgement after you've been added.
Weekly Gatherings
Beau's Bark - Co me join our "open house" chat for most of Tuesday evening to accommodate the ti me zones!! This is a fun time to get together with old friends and make so me new ones! Looking forward to seeing you there! http://www.radiofreejericho.com/chat.htm
Sportsman Lodge Bar- Every Friday 9:30 pm EST/ 6:30 pm PST, drop by have a drink and share a story. Go to last page of this thread: http://boards.nbcuni.com/universalHD/ind.
Tuesday Night Ranger Watchers - Co me chat and watch with us on Tuesdays at 5 pm Pacific/8 pm Eastern. http://www.jericho-kansas.com You will need to be logged on to see the chat room link, which is under the community menu (chat for members).
Comic Previews
There will be some special preview pages posted next week. They will be posted on some of the Jericho boards and you will need to check the different boards in order to find the preview page.
JKI will be offering a prize to the first fan who finds the location of the daily preview page.
Prize will be an 8.5 x 11 cloth Allied States Flag. Once you find the preview page, e-mail Gwen at gwen@jericho-kanas.org and put Comic Preview Page in the subject and the URL of the preview page.
The comic will premier on Wednesday, November 25th - just 11 more days!
Dave Murphy to the White Courtesy Phone
I am trying to contact Dave Murphy, who wrote the original Save Jericho petition. The e-mail address I have is murphyd@gmail.com but that doesn't seem to be an active account. Does anyone have current contact information for Dave or can someone give him a message to contact me (gwen@jericho-kansas.org)?
WHTJ Weekend of Memories DVD
Dear Jericho Ranger,
The lengthy delay with shipping the WHTJ Weekend of Memories DVD has been because of possible litigation. Unfortunately, the litigation has advanced to the next level. Due to the impending litigation, we regret to inform you we will not be able to ship the WHTJ Weekend of Memories DVD.
A refund will be possible by request only. Attendees who paid by credit card through registration will require a refund by check. Individuals who ordered the DVD and paid by paypal will receive their refund through paypal. Refunds will be in the amount of $14.00 for individual paypal orders and $14.00 per family who attended.
If you desire a refund, please email me, Steve Wood, at scoobud3@cox.net and put REQUEST REFUND in the subject line. Requests for refunds must be received by me no later than December 31, 2009. You may also request your $14.00 be donated to Operation Homefront or Jericho Comics for the Troops.
Your patience and understanding over the past few months have been greatly appreciated.
On behalf of JR4OT, Inc, I offer my deepest regrets.
Steve Wood
Station 4 ARG
Come join us in the hunt for clues to this new Jericho story. It's been rumored for awhile that an official ARG is coming and we hope the current mystery provides a clue to the next adventure.
Discussion thread: http://boards.nbcuni.com/universalHD/ind.
Archive thread (quick read to catch up): http://www.jericho-kansas.com/Community/
Outside Jericho
Jericho Birthdays by Mud62
D. B. Sweeney (John Goetz) - 11/14
James Parks (Agent Hicks) - 11/16
Thom Williams (Burlyman) - 11/16
Frankie Martinez (Electrician) - 11/16
Roxanne Bruso (Texan Doctor) - 11/19
Natasha Leigh (Skylar's Friend) - 11/21
Kitty's News Corner & Reminders
Aasif Mandvi (Kenchy Dhuwalia) is also in the movie "It's Kind of a Funny Story" slated to be released in 2010 in selected cities.
http://www.indiewire.com/article/finally.
Lennie James (Robert Hawkins) gets a mention in an interview with Jim Caviezel about "The Prisoner" http://www.ifmagazine.com/feature.asp?ar
The Village Tour article (also has a Jericho comic mention)
http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=
Jon Turteltaub (Jericho Executive Producer) signs on to direct a film chronicling the birth of Greenpeace.
http://www.firstshowing.net/2009/11/13/d.
For those watching ABC's Flash Forward, yes you heard "Jericho" in this past episode. Interesting... this Jericho is a private security hired by the US government ...
http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2009/11/12/fla.
REMINDERS:
Skeet Ulrich (Jake Green)will be on TV this November 18th and 25th on CSI NY!!
http://csi-ny.otavo.tv/csi-ny-season-6-e.
DB Sweeney (John Goetz) is scheduled to be on Criminal Minds on November 25th...... =0)
http://community.livejournal.com/crimina.
Lennie James (Robert Hawkins) as prisoner 147 in the mini-series "The Prisoner" on AMC November 15th-17th.
Carol Barbee (Executive Producer) "Three Rivers" on Sundays on CBS
Bob Stephenson (Jimmy Taylor) is in "The Forgotten" Tuesdays on ABC
Jazz Raycole (Allison Hawkins) ... She was on "Eastwick" and ABC will not be continuing the show past the original 13 episodes.
![[Image: KrzyKitty-Sig.gif]](http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll304/KrzyKitten/KrzyKitty-Sig.gif)
JERICHO ON SYFY
DECEMBER 9 2009 @ 8 am
Devils Due Releasing
JERICHO comic book
NOVEMBER 25 2009
David Goyer, a screenwriter for Batman Begins and Super Max, was recently asked by MTV about what to expect from Ghost Rider 2. He has mentioned that it’s not exactly a reboot, and the story picks up eight years after the first film. “I hate to say it’s more realistic, because he’s got a flaming skull for a head, but it’s a bit more stripped down and darker. It’s definitely changing tone. What ‘Casino Royale’ was to the Bond movies, hopefully this will be to ‘Ghost Rider.’” The movie is ...
The sale, which comes weeks after the rights to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were sold for $60m -- and is likely to exceed that -- has sparked considerable interest because Terminator is a rare example of a blockbuster film franchise not controlled by a big studio.
The interest in the future rights of Terminator underscores the value of IP during a tough time for Hollywood. That value has held up, with Walt Disney recently agreeing a hefty premium in its $4bn deal to buy Marvel Entertainment.
Several financial buyers have expressed interest in Terminator, including Platinum Equity, the Beverly Hills firm that owns Delphi, the auto parts maker. Platinum could not be reached for comment.
All the big film studios have also registered interest in the rights, with Sony Pictures a leading contender, according to a person familiar with the situation. Sony declined to comment.
Summit Entertainment, the company behind the Twilight series, is tracking the sale, as is Media Rights Capital, which produced Sacha Baron Cohen's Bruno, the person added.
The rights are being sold by Halcyon, the production company behind Terminator Salvation, the latest instalment in the series, which grossed $380m worldwide. The auction does not cover earlier Terminator films.
The rights will give the buyer the ability to make new Terminator films, TV programmes and other spin-offs that build on the popularity of the franchise.
The sale is being conducted by FTI Capital Advisors, recently appointed by Halcyon when it sought bankruptcy protection. Halcyon filed for Chapter 11 after a dispute with Pacificor, a Santa Barbara-based hedge fund that lent Halcyon funds to buy the Terminator rights.
The rights to the franchise have changed hands many times and were sold to Halcyon for $25m two years ago by Mario Kassar, who produced Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
Kevin Shultz, senior managing director at FTI, pointed to the recent $60m purchase of rights to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise by Nickelodeon, the cable network owned by Viacom. "We have a property that has made three times the box office [takings of the TMNT films]," he said.
Yes that’s right Amanda is joining SportsGeeks this Sunday at 7pm Central 5pm Pacific to talk about her MMA career and what in store for her future.
If you want to join us make sure you sign up at Blog Talk Radio to participate in the chat room or you can just listen as a guest, we can take a few calls(Call-in Number: (347) 215-7545) if time permits so join us live at SportsGeeks
If you want to email some questions in email us at: sportsgeeks@mysportsgeeks.com
DALLAS - Warrants for more than 90 people in North Texas were issued Wednesday as part of a nationwide roundup led by the Drug Enforcement Agency.
The multi-agency raid started before sunrise. Sources told FOX 4 many of the suspects had ties to a Mexican drug gang.
Joy Cisco lives down the street from where one person was arrested. She said flash bangs thrown into the home were so loud they woke her family up.
“It was right before my alarm, between 6:30 and 6:45 a.m. It was very loud. It set off the car alarms,” she said. “They had a SWAT truck in front, the house surround and drug sniffing dogs around vehicles over here.”
FOX 4 learned that an Allen police officer fired shots inside the home, but no one was hurt.
Cisco hopes the raid prompts others to join their neighborhood watch group. She said it is the only way to keep the streets quiet.
“It’s okay to be nosey and be aware of who you are living next to,” she said.
The DEA is expected to release more details about the raid during a press conference Thursday.
Well I am glad that everyone is ok, but I do have to say that if there is high water please turn around you will save your life and your vehicle, I remember when I was younger that I would go for it, but now a days I know I would turn around.
FORT WORTH, Texas - Constant rain on Wednesday caused flooding in some areas of North Texas. In Fort Worth, several drivers were trapped by high water.
http://www.myfoxdfw.com/dpp/weather/Floo
This is great news! woohooo that would so rock if we get another movie by the x files crew, you know what would be even better if the Lone Gunmen showed up, LOL
Fox Mulder is ready for the coming apocalypse in 2012 — in fact he's so excited, he thinks the occasion deserves another X-Files movies. But really, we need another X-Files to banish the stink of the last one.
In an interview with MTV David Duchovny said he was completely open to a new X-Files movie, in fact he thinks the possible Mayan apocalypse in 2012 almost demands it.
"As far as the X-Files movie I'd like to do next, if we get a chance to do it, would be a return to the heart and soul of the mythology, which is the alien-oriented conspiracy," Duchovny said. "I think it's natural for 'The X-Files' to have another movie in 2012, so we'll see if we get to do it."
I'm all for this — we need to end the series on a preferable alien note. Because I still believe that the truth is out there.
David Duchovny Wants Another X-Files Film By 2012 - X-Files - io9
Whilst attending his very own question-and-answer panel at a New York City-based convention, Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Joe Quesada has provided fans with a tease about Marvel’s upcoming feature film, The First Avenger: Captain America.
“I’ve seen a couple of outlines and an initial screenplay, and it’s going to rock everyone’s socks off,” he said. “It’s very unexpected, the kind of movie it is.”
Quesada also confirmed that the film’s story sets up the lead into The Avengers, adding that it does so in “a fantastic way.”
So far all we ...
“FlashForward” showrunner Marc Guggenheim departed ABC’s sci-fi drama for good Tuesday, sources tell AICN exclusively.
Reasons for the departure remain muddy. Ratings for the sci-fi drama have slid in adults 18-49 from a 4.1 (at its premiere) to a 3.1 for its fourth installment, but ABC just gave the show a “back-nine” order that will keep it on the air long enough to hit the April 29 six-months-hence “flash forward date” central to the series’ mythos.
Evidence suggests network executives were unhappy with the quality of the show's post-pilot storytelling.
Guggenheim, the “Eli Stone” creator whose resume includes stints on “Jack & Bobby,” “In Justice” and ABC’s “Brothers & Sisters,” joined “FlashForward” subsequent to its pilot shoot. (“FlashForward” co-creator Brannon Braga, who co-created and ran “Star Trek: Enterprise” and “Threshold,” is contracted to the now-shooting 2010 season of Fox's “24” and was not available to run “FlashForward” himself.)
We’ve no word on whether “FlashForward” co-creator David Goyer will now serve as sole showrunner, or if someone else will be brought in to take over.
The radiant of the Orionid meteor shower is in the constellation of Orion, the Hunter. You can find it easily overhead in the predawn sky The Orionid meteor shower is expected to put on a good show tonight for viewers across North America, lasting well into the predawn hours Wednesday — weather ...
The Weather Channel plans to show movies for the first time in its 27-year history. First up? "The Perfect Storm." The network has slipped longer programming into its constantly rotating forecasts in recent years. But over a four-week period starting the night before Halloween, the cable ...
In Association with Temporal Studios
And
NDB Media (NDB Radio),
On October 20, 2009 @ 7:00 P.M. PDT
The cast and crew of the internet Star Trek series Star Trek: Phoenix joins us. Our listeners will get the first look at the raw footage from their pilot episode “Cloak and Dagger”. Join us for a special Tuesday evening conversation on Blogtalkradio NDB Media channel.
Contact:
Roger D. Noriega
323-566-5925
Fax 323-357-3868
European astronomers have found 32 new planets outside our solar system, adding evidence to the theory that the universe has many places where life could develop.
Scientists using the European Southern Observatory telescope didn't find any planets quite the size of Earth or any that seemed habitable or even unusual. But their announcement increased the number of planets discovered outside the solar system to more than 400.
Six of the newly found planets are several times bigger than Earth, increasing the population of so-called super-Earths by more than 30 percent. Most planets discovered so far are far bigger, Jupiter-sized or even larger.
Two of the newly discovered planets were as small as five times the size of Earth and one was up to five times larger than Jupiter.
Astronomer Stephane Udry of the University of Geneva said the results support the theory that planet formation is common, especially around the most common types of stars.
"I'm pretty confident that there are Earth-like planets everywhere," Udry said in a Web-based news briefing from a conference in Portugal. "Nature doesn't like a vacuum. If there is space to put a planet there, there will be a planet there."
What astronomers said is especially exciting is that about 40 percent of sun-like stars have planets that are closer to being Earth-sized than the size of Jupiter. Jupiter's mass is more than 300 times that of Earth's.
Depending on definitions of the size of super-Earths, the discovery suggests that planets that have a mass similar to Earth's are "extraordinarily commonplace," said Alan Boss, an astronomer at the Carnegie Institution of Washington. He was not part of the European team. "The universe must indeed be crowded with habitable worlds."
Boss said finding 32 planets at once is a record "and it really shows that the Europeans have taken the lead" in finding planets outside the solar system.
The discoveries were made by the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher, which is an attachment to the European observatory telescope in Chile that looks for slight wobbles in a star's movements. Those changes would be made by the tug of a planet's gravity on the star. There are no photos of these planets.
European Southern Observatory finds 32 new planets outside Earth's solar system
Is 2012 the end of the world?
If you scan the Internet or believe the marketing campaign behind the movie "2012," scheduled for release in November, you might be forgiven for thinking so. Dozens of books and fake science websites are prophesying the arrival of doomsday that year, by means of a rogue planet colliding with the Earth or some other cataclysmic event.
Normally, scientists regard Internet hysteria with nothing more than a raised eyebrow and a shake of the head. But a few scientists have become so concerned at the level of fear they are seeing that they decided not to remain on the sidelines this time.
"Two years ago, I got a question a week about it," said NASA scientist David Morrison, who hosts a website called Ask an Astrobiologist (astrobiology.nasa.gov/ask-an-astrobiolo
Morrison said he tries to reassure people that their fears are groundless, but has received so many inquiries that he has posted a list of 10 questions and answers on the website of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific (www.astrosociety.org).
Titled "Doomsday 2012, the Planet Nibiru and Cosmophobia," the article breaks down the sources of the hysteria and assures people that the ancients didn't actually know more about the cosmos than we do.
"The world will not come to an end on Dec. 21, 2012," E.C. Krupp, director of Los Angeles' Griffith Observatory, declared in a statement released Thursday by the observatory and Sky & Telescope magazine. Krupp debunks the 2012 doomsday idea in the cover story of the magazine's November issue.
Morrison said he attributes the excitement to the conflation of several items into one mega-myth. One is the persistent Internet rumor that a planet called Nibiru or Planet X is going to crash into the Earth. Then there's the fact that the Maya calendar ends in 2012, suggesting that the Maya knew something we don't. Finally, end-of-the-worlders have seized upon the hubbub about the 2012 date to proclaim their belief that end times are drawing near.
Morrison, who heads the Lunar Science Institute at the Ames Research Center in Northern California, has coined a term for the phenomenon: "cosmophobia," a fear of the cosmos. According to Morrison, for the most vulnerable among us, all of the things we've learned about the universe in the last century have only increased the number of potential threats to our existence.
Besides fearing a rampaging planet, the worriers think the sun might lash out at the Earth with some calamitous electromagnetic force. They also fear that some sort of alignment between the Earth and the center of our galaxy could unleash catastrophe.
Krupp said that the scare-mongers would have us believe that the "ancient Maya of Mexico and Guatemala kept a calendar that is about to roll up the red carpet of time, swing the solar system into transcendental alignment with the heart of the Milky Way, and turn Earth into a bowling pin for a rogue planet heading down our alley for a strike."
According to Rosemary Joyce, a professor of anthropology at UC Berkeley, the Maya never predicted anything. The 2012 date is approximately when the ancient calendar would roll over, like the odometer on a car; it did not mean the end - merely the start of a new cycle.
Some authors have tried to merge that idea, Joyce said, with Maya mythology that said the Earth had gone through multiple ages of creation, each ending in a disaster. "But there's no prediction," she said. "They did not predict the end of the world."
Morrison says it's hard to know whether the people who have written to him with their fears represent a fringe or a larger cross-section of Americans who, distrustful of traditional sources of information and the authorities behind them, are falling victim to the Internet's snake-oil salesmen.
In such an environment, the viral marketing campaign for the movie "2012," which encourages people to "Vote for the Leader of the Post-2012 World," can seem like confirmation of the apocalypse, rather than of an upcoming 90-minute entertainment vehicle.
A spokesman for Sony Pictures, Steve Elzer, said: "We believe consumers understand that the advertising is promoting a fictional film."
Morrison said the movie's distributors are feeding the "panic" by creating some of the fake science websites. Most of the sites, Morrison said, are full of misinformation and speculation, often by people who have written books they are trying to sell.
Morrison said he could not address the motives of people who were feeding the alarm, but added: "It's wrong to tell lies to frighten people merely to make a buck."
What most worries him is the level of alarm in some of the most recent messages.
"I'm getting more and more questions from people who are upset and scared," he said. Some people say their children are refusing to eat.
In the publication Morrison has posted online, he says that astronomers would long ago have spotted a rogue planet headed for Earth, that the so-called photos of Nibiru on the Internet are fictitious, and that just because the Maya calendar in question ends in 2012, it doesn't mean the Maya were predicting the end of the world.
"The calendar on my desk ends on December 31, 2009. I do not interpret that to mean the world is going to end that day."
Free Internet Press :: Scientists: The World Won't End In 2012 :: Uncensored News For Real People
OMG, this looks like Mulder’s picture on his wall at the FBI, hahaha, X Files-The Truth is Out There
Two years ago we asked the question: Could the mass hysteria of the 1938 "War of the Worlds" scandal, in which a Halloween radio drama orchestrated by actor Orson Welles was mistaken for a real announcement of Martians landing in New Jersey, still take place in the Information Age?
The answer: Yes, it could. And it happened this week.
Like millions of Americans, you were probably glued to your computer watching some news outlet's live video stream or hitting refresh on Twitter for updates on "Balloon Boy," the twisted saga of a 6-year-old Colorado boy who had allegedly floated away in a flying-saucer-shaped hot-air balloon that his parents had built. Was he alive? Had the helium suffocated him? Had he, heaven forbid, fallen out of the balloon?
And the media flipped out.
"This Is Wrong: A Six Year Old Child Could Die On Live Television," industry blog Mediaite warned. Keywords related to the missing kid started to dominate Twitter's trending topics. More details started to pour in: the boy was revealed to be Falcon Heene of Fort Collins, Colo., whose parents were avid storm-chasers and whose family had appeared on reality show "Wife Swap." Audiences grew captivated as the whole situation became weirder and weirder.
Thankfully, "Balloon Boy" was safe. But rather than being dramatically rescued from a flying saucer in an uplifting ending worthy of the "Miracle on the Hudson," it turned out that he'd been in a box in his parents' attic the entire time: and then the really weird details began to emerge. The family quickly hopped aboard the TV news circuit, and not only did little Falcon blithely say "we did it for the show" on "Larry King Live," he proceeded to puke on two network morning shows. Later in the day, the Business Insider floated a claim that a former video intern for the boy's father, Richard Heene, was attempting to sell evidence that the entire affair was fabricated for a TV show. (This has not been proven whatsoever.)
It's annoying. It's annoying that the whole thing could have been an attention-grabbing stunt. It's even more annoying that hours of workplace productivity were slurped down the drain by streaming-video footage of a wacky silver balloon that didn't actually have a traumatized 6-year-old on board like we all thought it did. Likewise, it was probably pretty darn frustrating back in 1938 when scores of Americans realized that they'd mistaken a "War of the Worlds"-themed radio drama for a real emergency broadcast--especially for the people in the New York and Philadelphia metro areas who reportedly fled their homes in panic. (Try to explain that one to the neighbors.)
But maybe this cloud (balloon?) has a silver (tinfoil?) lining. Much has been made recently of the death of "watercooler" media: the TV show everyone is watching, the news story everyone is following, the topic that the whole world seemingly can't stop talking about. The Internet's ability to slice and dice culture into niches and easy-to-follow subcultures was supposed to more or less destroy that. Yet we had another "War of the Worlds": something weird and bizarre that made us all completely freak out like spooked chickens.
For better or for worse, just about everyone on Thursday was talking about "Balloon Boy." They were worried about him. They were incessantly searching Google News for any kind of update. They were cracking snarky jokes and wondering if it was "too soon." They were biting their nails when a photograph started to circulate that seemed to show an object falling from the silver saucer balloon. They were relieved when "Balloon Boy" was found safe. And they were angrily cursing themselves and the national news media when it became clear that the whole thing could have been fabricated. This was the news story that disproved our cynicism over the viability of true, mass-media phenomena in the Digital Age. In fact, it was the tools of the Web--streaming video, Twitter, news aggregators--that made "Balloon Boy" into the sensation that he became.
And honestly? If we have to look like gullible idiots, we might as well all be in it together.
Orson Welles' Martians finally land--in a Colorado attic | The Social - CNET News
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