1. Summarize
The text “A Czech War of the worlds” published on Spiegel Online on the 4th of January 2008 deals about a hoax that was shown in 2007 on a certain Czech weather channel.
Six artists from Prague created a hoax and showed in on a weather channel by hacking a camera in Bohemia. The hoax is a digital explosion in form of a big yellow mushroom that expands in the air. Many people panicked, thinking that a war had started and called desperately the channel to inform themselves. The artist could have been sent to jail for three years because of doing this hoax.
2. Explain the title of the article
The title of the article “A Czech War of the worlds” refers to the Orson´s Welles´s radio hoax “War of the worlds”.
Orson Welles´s hoax created a mass panic, because it is about Martians attacking the earth. People really thought that it was true and not part of a story. That success is similar to the mushroom cloud created by six artists from Prague. Both were believed by the people and archived their aims; to get attention and to panic. The big difference is, that Orson´s story shocked more and almost killed many people. It was also created 70 years ago, so people only had one source, the radio, to inform themselves. The Czech war of the worlds was made in 2007 so people had the possibility to check if a new nuclear war has started with other sources like the internet. The title fits to the radio hoax, because there are many similarities and both needed a lot of creativity to be made believable.
3. Speculate on possible reasons for the differences
The original War of the Worlds by Orson Welles´s was broadcast in 1938 years, while the “Czech War of the worlds” was shown in 2007. Even though the Orson Welles´s story was only broadcast through the radio, it caused more panic than the other hoax, which was broadcast on television. This was because people back in 1938 only had the radio as a source of information, not like nowadays that we have the internet and others. Seventy years ago people didn´t know as much as nowadays and easily believed in anything.
