Nuclear blast on Czech TV compares to Orson Welles’ Martians

 
This is what Czech viewers witnessed last June. The group of radical artists, members of the Ztohoven collective, who caused the disruption, are to be put on trial and could face up to three years in jail.

“The impact of the broadcast was compared to Orson Welles' War of the Worlds radio broadcast of 1938, in which listeners were led to believe that Martians were invading Earth,” reported the Guardian.

The artists’ intention was to illustrate how today’s media can relatively easily manipulate the public’s perception of reality.

“Our aim is not to intimidate society or manipulate it, which is something we witness on a daily basis both in the real world and that created by the media. On June 17 2007, [we] attacked the space of TV broadcasting, distorting it, questioning its truthfulness and its credibility," the group said in a statement.

The group gained recognition from some mainstream institutions, as it won an award in the Czech National Gallery’s young artists competition.

But the action was criticized by many as irresponsible, and the group is to be tried. "The fake broadcast was really very inadvisable and could have provoked panic among a wide group of people," said Martin Krafl, spokesman for the TV channel that got hijacked.

In any case, Ztohoven got their point across about media’s potential for manipulation.

Watch the footage here.

Source: Guardian Unlimited