liz_marcs | I'll Be Over Here...Headdesking

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I'll Be Over Here...Headdesking

I would be just a little bit remiss if I didn't make note of the City-Wide Boston Chaos of 2007.

Pop quiz:
What happens when you take one viral marketing campaign for Aqua Teen Hunger Force on the Cartoon Network, dress them up in blinky lights and magnets, and attach them to bridges, underneath a highway overpass, and near a hospital?

Answer:
A bomb scare, city-wide panic, traffic snarls, and city and state police turning the entire city upside-down in an effort to find out what those blinky things are, where they are, and how to remove them without getting blown up.

Am I glad that I don't have to go into Boston proper for work? You betchya. My sympathies for my local peeps who do, though.

Nice of Turner Broadcasting to call the city at around 4:15 p.m. to let the locals know. I even love how the New England News Network phrased the mea culpa: "Turner Broadcasting has taken responsibility..."

Making Light has the best summary of what happened.

The hilarious/really sad thing about all of this? These blinky things have been up for 2 to 3 weeks and no one seems to have noticed. Worse, they've been up in ten cities, including Boston, and no one seems to have noticed.

There's a pretty good round up now up on Boston.com (Note: Link will expire.)

A State Police Bomb Squad officer removed a "Mooninite," the culprit of today's confusion, from a support in Somerville. Picture from Boston.com

Yup. That's one marketing campaign that won't be forgotten any time soon. Round of applause for the geniuses at Turner Broadcasting!

ETA: As it turns out, the person who planted the Mooninites around the city had a Web page showing them doing the planting. Before you ask, yup, the guy's been arrested.

ETA2 There's some confusion on whether Turner Broadcasting bothered to get the proper permits to put up the blinky things. If they did, well it's a bad on the city of Boston since apparently the proper authorities were notified. If they didn't, I can't blame the city and state for freaking the hell out. People not familiar with the city might not realize that the blinky things were put on two of the major bridges into and out of the city that span the Charles River.

So while the whole thing is funny (it's good to laugh), on the other, if the city was never notified, the freak-out is understandable given the location of the blinking ads.

ETA3: The peeps over at

b0st0n are already on the case and have voted "hilarious." Check out the awesome icons that have taken over the community!

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Really glad I'm nowhere near the traffic problems, so perhaps it's why I can laugh. I do find it very strange that they were there for so long. Have the other cities been identified? (I have to admit that I didn't work too hard at clicking links to find out.) LOVED the Making Light column.

NECN interviewed this one lady who passed by one of these things at Sullivan Square for weeks and didn't think anything of it. It was pretty clear to her that it wasn't a bomb when she saw it.

Turner said it contacted DHS and the other cities to let them know about the viral campaign, you know, just in case another city overreacted on seeing a cartoon character flipping the bird at the local traffic.

I don't watch the news but Mr WG heard about it and told me when he got home. All I can think, really, is "typical."

*Headdesks with you*

I can understand why city and state officials freaked, since two of them were planted on the Longfellow Bridge and the BU Bridge. (Full list here). Two of the major bridges into Boston over the Charles? If the blinky things were a real threat, no one would be giggling.

The overreaction is funny (okay, kind of hilarious), but I can understand why it happened — especially since the feds chose not to tell the city of Boston the last time there was a legitimate threat. (The Natural Gas Terminal on 9/11.) I think that, coupled with the shit that went down in New Orleans during Katrina, probably has at least some state officials thinking that if the worst happened the feds would point and laugh instead of helping.

The confluence of events that got us here though? Wow. That is freakin' hilarious in a 'What were they thinking?' kind of way.

Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

The looks on state and city officials' faces can be summed up in two words: "Fucking furious."

They're planning to throw every single criminal and civil charge (and probably make up a few more more) at Turner that they can find. The cost for today's hilarity was something like $750,000.

The Athens of America, brought to its knees by Aqua Teen Hunger Force. Somewhere, Osama is laughing so hard that he'd peeing his pants.

*snerk*

True. But in looking at where they were some of the blinky things were found, I can actually see why the city and state went a little bonkers. Plus, if they were bombs dressed as cute cartoon characters, no one would be laughing.

Yup. Overreaction, they name is Boston. On the other: I hope the state throws the book at Turner and collects every cent in civil fines it can suck out of the company.

Still, the thought process behind the viral campaign makes me giggle like a little girl. Can't they use spray paint and random posters like everyone other company?

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA. ATHF is one of my favorite shows on AS, and I love that people freaked out. WEEKS LATER. Heee!

(Dallas is another one of the cities with this campaign, too.)

Obviously the marketing campaign didn't work, since it took two to three weeks for anyone to notice. ;-)

On the one hand, it's eyerolling there was an over-reaction. On the other, two of those things were slapped on two of the most important bridges that gets people into and out of the city. So, I can understand why the state and city went into overdrive to find and remove every thing they could find and I can understand why city officials over-reacted.

But the marketing geniuses the put them there? The thought process behind it makes me giggle.

"Obviously the marketing campaign didn't work, since it took two to three weeks for anyone to notice."

Well, no, and that's pretty disingenuous of you to say so.

What it took two to three weeks for was for someone to be stupid enough to mistake a Lite-Brite for a bomb.

People have in fact been noticing the ad campaign in other cities for weeks, and loving it.

Also, the fact that the very first OMG BOMB phone calls came four at once, all together, in Boston, so very very late in the ad campaign, makes in sound suspiciously like the people calling the police were orchestrating a hoax. I blame them first, and then whichever doofus determined the "devices" were not explosive and then blew them up anyway. And the media, who keep referring to these things as "suspicious devices" hours after the devices have been positively identified.

Sure, have the bomb squad check out the situation. But then freakin' admit it was a false positive--don't shut down the city and blow up the Lite-Brites once you know that the damn things aren't dangerous. Morons.

Actually, if I were a terrorist, I'd watch this and think. "Hmmm. They made fun of Boston for overreacting to the cartoon character blinking things. Cool, let's put some real bombs in some cartoon character blinky things and hope they're too embarrassed to react to them."

And I'm not a Republican right winger. I'm so far to the left that I hit the left and bounce back again. I want to have Al Franken's love child. Jon Stewart's mother is a sort of friend/aquaintance of mine. We've worked together on public education issues. She's a doll, in case you're wondering.

I'm just thinking out loud.

I agree with you there.

Another one: And if those really were bombs, no one would be laughing.

The fall out definitely isn't funny.

But the thought process that got those blinky things slapped on at least two of the major bridges in and out of the city? That makes me giggle with, "What were they thinking?"

Truthfully, I hope the state throws the book at Turner.

There was a similar series of events with cardboard blocks that people had fashioned in the likeness of the "?" blocks from Super Mario Brothers.

*snerk*

Jumpy? Who, us?

Really, some presidential candidate on the D side of the aisle seriously needs to ask, "Do you feel safer now than you did four years ago?"

Actually, as long as the Dems in Congress keep pulling the brakes on B*sh's runaway freight train, I do feel a little safer than I did before.

But point taken, and I think you are completely right.

Oh my god. Most certainly TNT and Turner himself needs to suffer for this.

All the time, I think about me. I'm a college graduate. Pretty darn intelligent, if I say so myself. I don't make near the money that the *IdiotJeds* make who dreamed up this campaign. I'm a teacher at a private school, for gods sake. Of course, by choice. I took a several thousand dollar pay cut when I left public education last year. But sheeeeeeeeeyat.

My Grandma Brown would say about the people who dreamed up this brilliant campaign post 9/11: "That's when several fools met."

"What were they thinking?"
Well, to be quite honest, they were probably thinking that those are the places where their little blinky things were most likely to be spotted.

So either everyone who saw them for the last two or three weeks realised that they weren't bombs, or everyone has to concentrate so hard on driving that they don't get a chance to see them, and it was very, very poor target choice!

My guess is that once someone panicked and notified the police either other people thought OMG - maybe that thing I've seen for the last couple of weeks is a bomb as well (with a very long time delay, presumably!), or the police themselves noticed them at that point - not very reassuring if they haven't spotted them over the last two weeks.

Or, the totally cynical view might be that Turner realised no-one was taking much notice, and so arranged a couple of anonymous worrried phone calls to the local police....

*winks* I bet their target audience noticed them, however. Hee!

And in conclusion, Mooninite Breakout!

Bwah! That snippet's hilarious.

I love how the little blinky things Boston was running around and blowing up today had their middle fingers raised. *grins*

Luckily, in Seattle people watch Adult Swim.

And I hope if Turner gets the book thrown at them, thed ciuty ends up paying penaties for false arrest.

Right now there's a question on whether Turner got permits to do the campaign. If Turner went through proper channels, than the city and the state don't have a leg to stand on. If they didn't, the city and the state definitely have cause for complaint.

I agree, blaming the artist for doing the job he was hired to do is not a smart move. For all anyone knows, he did it in good faith thinking the paperwork part of the campaign was taken care of. It's not his lookout if Turner didn't get the proper permits. I suspect those charges will be dropped, and yeah, he probably does have a good case against the city.

According to the Seattle links I've been chasing, there was proper notification and permitting. Whether that also happened in Boston is an open question.

I'm feeling sort of fed to the teeth with security theater this week, as the Army's cessation of their gang related activities progran has resulted in a fatal gunfight in the apartment complex across the street; I vastly prefer the government to pay attention to real, known, problems.

Julia, cranky in general, I fear

Gah. My sympathies.

But, yeah, the more I think about the rampant security paranoia, the more nervous I get. No one appears to be putting the brakes on the whole chest-thumping that's going on among the politicians in the city or calling for a cool-off period so people can find out what actually happened.

Makes me wonder what would've happened if this was a real emergency. It doesn't bear thinking about.

Yeah, that's kinda stupid. I don't know what's worse: that the company thought that blinky lights would make an effective marketing campaign, or that everyone started freaking out after they said that the blinky things weren't bombs.

Yes, everything that is thicker than a piece of paper can hold a bomb. That's why when someone finds a stray backpack there's going to be a security offical ushering people around the area. And why they sent people to check out the blinky things, which was smart.

But freaking the fuck out isn't helpful either. And why charging Time-Warner anything other than graffiting plus the money spent on removing the things, because throwing the book at them doesn't accomplish anything. (Though it does bring funding to the police department, and who would say no to funding a police department?)

Good probably has come out of the situation though: I bet there's going to be someone making sure no one is pasting things to the road inferstructure in Boston.

I think it's a case of rumor outrunning fact in this case, at least among the populace. I think the news broke somewhere around lunch that the blinky things were just blinky things and not bombs, but by that time people are at work and all they know is that the city and state police are going bonkers.

I just want to know why it took Turner/Time-Warner so long to call the city (4:15 p.m.), since this hit the nation-wide news somewhere in the middle of the day.

Also, I think there's definitely a "you made us look stupid so you gotta pay" angle behind Mumbles Menino's and Deval Patrick's legal threat. I'm sure if Turner makes nice and lavishes lots and lots of money on the city and state those lawsuit threats will calm right the hell down.

You know, all this publicity debacle was missing was Les Nessman reporting.

*snicker*

I'm following the updates, but maaaaaannnn, no one's looking good in this right now.

As God is my witness, I thought the Lite Brites were bombs!

As God is my witness, I thought the Lite Brites were bombs!

Oh, the laugh from that HURT. I think I snorted my own nose.

Lord, what next. You'd think they'd be smart enough to tell someone what was going on. *shakes head*

That's assuming Turner and/or its marketing company didn't get the permits. (I can't seem to get a definitive source on that for sure.) If they did, the bad's definitely on Boston because someone, somewhere knew what was going on. If they didn't, I can see why the BPD and Mumbles Menino might be just a tad upset.

Yup, I remember hearing about this on the radio towards the end of the workday. Absolutely bizarre, and finding out what goes on with the fallout in the next days and weeks is going to be veeeeerrrry interesting.

I'm torn between wanting the politicians to dig themselves into a deeper hole just for the LULZ and the politicians to suck it up and act like adults.

What am I talking about? This is Boston. There will be LULZ. Oh, yes.

... *tries to figure out the acronym*

OK, I give up. LULZ? *grin*

LULZ...interwebs speak for chuckling. Not as intense as LOL.

Oh, come on. They put up little LiteBrite pictures of cartoon characters. It's hardly an outrage. The same things went up in ten other cities, and nobody panicked. If you want something to blame, try years of unrelenting "be very afraid" campaigns. If you want something closer to home, blame your city government for listening to Chicken Little.

You've seen the fiendish devices by now. Where is there room in them for explosives? The City of Boston recovered a bunch of them. Did they think to have one sniffed by a bomb squad dog?

Now all those officials look stupid. That's why they're mad: they're embarrassed. They're calling the incident a deliberate hoax because they want to charge Ted Turner for the money they wasted on today's complete abnegation of common sense.

As for Turner's organization not phoning: I suspect they were consulting their lawyers, on the not unreasonable grounds that the City of Boston had temporarily gone bonkers.

Oh, I agree. The macho-man chest thumping going on in Massachusetts right now is definitely a case of "we look stupid, you gotta pay." And the widespread panic — led in no small part by politicians — was over the top.

Certainly the continued hysteria, even though everyone now knows what happened, is definitely making Boston look stupid. Yes, they should be taken to task for some of those choice hysterical comments. As some people on

b0st0n pointed out, some politicians are trying to equate "guerrilla marketing" with terrorism. There should be a round of horsewhipping for that.

As for the situation at the time before the whole thing came to light, I can't exactly blame the BPD for going into overdrive. Sure, the one at Sullivan Square was essentially a Lite Brite on batteries, no telling if the next Lite Brite was really just another Lite Brite. *shrug* So I can see the Chicken Little point there if you're going by "better safe than sorry."

Although the stupid comments issued by officials during the Great Lite Brite Hunt of 2007 and in the aftermath isn't helping make the "better safe than sorry" argument, that's for sure.

All in all, if Turner or its marketing company failed to follow the law and get the proper permits, yes someone should be held accountable for failing for that(IMHO). However, it appears they did get the proper permits in other cities (as someone on my FList pointed out, they did in Seattle for sure). I can't imagine that someone didn't do it in Boston. If they did have permits and they did cross the 't's and dot the 'i's, then horsewhips should definitely be broken out.

I would have loved to be a fly on the wall when that police analyst rose his/her hand. "Sir, Mr Mayor, Mr Police Chief, that drawing on the IED, well it's a cartoon character. No, it really is, see I've got the DVD set to show to you."

I'm just wondering... Did they take 24 8x10 color glossy pictures with circles and arrows on the back of each one to be used as evidence?

OK, now that had me laughing really hard. I'm old...

Ooooo!

Must post Alice's Restaurant!

Yaye!

"This just in: Colorado State Police are allegedly conducting a statewide search for the remains of a fourth grade student identified only as 'Kenny.' Officials would offer no comment except to say that they have already, quote, 'got the bastards who killed him, oh my god.'"

And now for the hog report...

Sorry, the Less Nessman thing just keeps going.

Regarding the lack of permissions, etc., I can't be sure, but I think that the apology posted on the Adult Swim bumpers last night made mention of a third-party marketing firm. Maybe Turner said, "Do this." to a Boston firm, and the Boston firm failed to do all that "this" entailed?

No facts, just an impression I got from trying to read the 30-second white text on black background that Cartoon Network aired at about 10 pm Central last night.

I posted something new on this.

Yes they did contract out to a New York City marketing firm for the whole Lite Brite campaign. For whatever reason, said marketing firm got permission in several other cities, but failed to do it in Boston. Why? *shrug* I have no idea.

However, as a someone who works for a company that subcontracts out to larger companies, Turner is still ultimately responsible for not overseeing the marketing firm and for failing to make sure the legal paperwork was filled out properly (at the very least, Turner's legal department should have copies on file if the permitting process was completed).

Now, how Turner takes it out of the hide of the marketing firm they hired is up to them, but Turner is the one left holding the bag, legally speaking.

That said, Turner has taken immediate responsibility and they are already in negotiations (from the looks of things) to make the problem go away — or at least turn it into a win for them. Granted, the whole thing is already "a win" for the Cartoon Network and the Adult Swim set, but Turner's interests are a little bit bigger than just the Cartoon Network, so corporate has to make nice with the TPTB.

I'd wouldn't be shocked if the city and state settled for restitution and the payment of civil fines and that it was settled fairly quickly.

I just want the charges dropped against the artist and his friend who were arrested. None of this is their fault.

Austin was one of the cities the Lite Brites were placed. Sad to say, I never noticed them. I wonder if this falls under the category of no such thing as bad publicity?

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I'll Be Over Here...Headdesking

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