Slashdot Mirror
Alek's Christmas Lights: Humbug
g00set writes "Alek's Christmas lights story was previously covered on Slashdot here, however the Denver Channel is now reporting that it was all a hoax: 'The Lafayette man said he accomplished the trickery by taking 12 "base" photographs of the house with lights on and off and then constructed a Web page that appeared to show lights going on and off when the Web visitor clicked.'"
Ho ho hoax!
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
Thank God the rest of the internet is hoax-free. Now I can get back to my penis enlargement pill popping and free ipod winning in peace.
"Wow. Now THAT'S a lot of angry Indians." - Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer
How many times can you piss off the neighbors before the homeowner's association punishes you, coupled with the desire to please your audience?
Still though, oh the humanity Alek, couldn't you just leave one string of lights internet controlled next year? Wouldn't be too bad...
...in bed
May he incur the wrath of thousands of angry slashdotters! He's in for a whooping!
I discovered the same thing at 12 noon Denver time when a night time shot of the house was listed as "live".
You grab the pitchforks, I grab the torches.
;-)
And by pitchorks and torches I meant: Let's find this guy's adress and BURY HIM IN SPAM!
'tis the season of giving, after all
You can't take the sky from me...
So the guy said he did something on the web, and turned out he didnt. Isnt this the way most of the dot-com bubble companies operated?
NAH!
Is it fascism yet?
With wireless and what not, how fucking hard would this be to fact check?
I'm more amused than anything else. It wouldn't make sense to be indignant over an April Fools-style joke.
You really HAVE to give it anyone that can pull this off, especially to /.ers.
Bravo, bravo...
clap, clap, clap, clap
So I think Google should pay him with Monopoly money or something.
Although it hurts to be fooled, you have to commend him for pulling it off.
I think this guy deserves mad props for pulling this off.
ASAP! you can't let this sort of thing go unchallenged.
Go in there, liberate this fellows house... make sure he's not on steroid while we're there!
-pyrrho
One would think that a tech/science-oriented site such as Slashdot would do a little bit of backround research before publishing articles that will eventually turn out to be hoaxes.
I am very, very disappointed at the current level of professionalism shown by the Slashdot crew. I mailed the article to several friends of mine and now, thanks to Slashdot, MY integrity is in question.
"I apologize to those people who may be angry with me, but hopefully most will see the humor in the whole situation ... and realize that my attempt to bring joy and a smile to people's faces was successful"
Personally I wasn't too impressed with the site to begin with, hoax or not. It didn't hold a candle to the likes of the Chaos Computer Club's Blinkenlights project.
also... there are protons decaying AS WE SPEAK!!!!
what of the protons!?
-pyrrho
It's already hard to find someone who RTFA, imagine someone checking REALITY.
... but on a much smaller scale. The idea was that it was a webcam in my kitchen, which you could click on to turn the lights on and off. One guy I know was fooled by it for a week. No-one had the heart to tell him...
Devistating, simply devistating.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
it's not in question any more.
now they know!
-pyrrho
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/holidays/4027215/d etail.html
"I got a chuckle out of putting a clock up in the window and having the hands of the clock display the right time (it actually started out 3 minutes slow, but then gained a minute a day, until it was 4 minutes fast, and then reset itself) -- again, all computer trickery!" Komarnitsky said on his Web site Monday.
The Lafayette man said he accomplished the trickery by taking 12 "base" photographs of the house with lights on and off and then constructed a Web page that appeared to show lights going on and off when the Web visitor clicked, but after performing web server stress testing, he replaced the test images with real-time camera generated images for the holiday season.
Not everything on the internet is a forgery.
IANAL(tm), but I would imagine that with no commerce involved, no parties have any actual damages, and therefore no cause against him. Except maybe chopper 7, I guess, for the cost of the ride they were duped out of. But IMHO going after him would be bad form on anyone's part. Let's chalk it up to a good practical joke at our collective expense, figuratively speaking. He got us but good, and that's that.
I'm an animal lover -- they're delicious!
Hey /.'ers ... it was all fun ... I'm SLAMMED ... will say more later ... but be SURE to read MY story of the events and also what Wall Street Journal guy wrote ... and then if you want, go to that Channel-7 site and cast your vote if I was naughty or nice!
Hulk SMASH Celiac Disease
Now the news guys need to get together and start calling him and saying how pissed they are that they lost their jobs for not checking the facts, and right after xmas no less. When he is finally reduced to a gibbering crying mess they can tell him, "Just kidding". I bet he would get a big laugh out of that lemme tell ya.
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
I think it would've been ok if this was just a generic site for the general public (oh! pretty lights!), but posting to a thread with all kinds of "technical" details (check my 1337 skillz) is just plain lying. Not to mention 2003.
So much for the xmas spirit of giving (nice excuse).
So for three years running (and this Halloween?) this guy had millions of hits onto his site.
All the while he was raking in the dough from his Google AdWords banners.
I wonder how much money he has made.
Read what Alex himself has to say about the hoax. Pretty interesting to hear it from the man himself instead a news agency ticked off at him for fooling them.
Hook. Line. Sinker.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Wha?
It doesn't say that, at least not now.
The Lafayette man said he accomplished the trickery by taking 12 "base" photographs of the house with lights on and off and then constructed a Web page that appeared to show lights going on and off when the Web visitor clicked.
"I got a chuckle out of putting a clock up in the window and having the hands of the clock display the right time (it actually started out 3 minutes slow, but then gained a minute a day, until it was 4 minutes fast, and then reset itself) -- again, all computer trickery!" Komarnitsky said on his Web site Monday.
It's all fun and games until somebody loses an eye. Then it's fun and games without depth perception.
For the love of god, how could he do this to us?!!
Plus what about weather conditions? Plenty of local people must have seen the site. What about when it was raining or snowing and the webcam wasn't showing that?
It's like when little kids in the 3-6yo range walk up to a video game that's in attract mode and start playing with the joystick - a lot of times they'll think they're actually playing the game when it's just the demo running.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I love how the Denver story tells us that the lights were controlled by a "Well known computer device controller." For one thing, any english high school student will laugh at you if you try to use that sentence in a speech. For another, does the media actually think we are so dumb we can't handle the name of the "Computer device controller?" I, for one, am laughing my christmas ham off right now. I'll admit I didn't think about it before.. But 1.2 million web site viewers a month... each one individually controlling something... Wouldn't be possible. ... Err... Right?
TO THE GEEK CAVE!
Strangely enough, I can't find the bolded part of your "quote" anywhere... maybe your post should be modded funny?
Hmmm.
- Faked a demo of a cool concept.
- Lacked the geek talent and dedication required to pull it off.
- Reaped the benefits (web hits and publicity) by duping the users.
Yep, clearly the guy is made for marketing/management.
Just get an X-10 firecracker set, download the BottleRocket X-10 linux controlling software, and write a cgi to run on your webserver that allows users to turn the lights on/off. Going through the whole hoax thing sounds like MORE work..
Isn't everything on the Internet true? This sure is a crazy turn of the trend!
Join Tor today!
Although it was a hoax. It's a clever one and very harmless. I just can't help but feel amused by this. Nice one Alex. Now I can't remember if he had any banners on the site but he could have made some good cash if he did.
Specks
Batteries not included
The BSD Daemon in me wants to code up a little project to do what his sight was supposed to do. Sure the neighbors would be annoyed. But something about really doing it and being able to prove it would be a little satisfying. Pride -- yup. Oh well. Maybe we'll see the Christmas Light project on Source Forge soon....
The views expressed are mine own and do not express the views of my employer.
Yeah, I noticed. Now people just like to use it to perpetuate hoaxes apparently. With all the effort that went into the hoax (the interviews, the website, convincing the neighbours, convincing people to contribute bandwidth (or were they in on it too?), I don't know why he just didn't put the effort into implementing the thing for real.
Unless this hoax claim is a hoax!
Alek, how much did you make from the Google Ad placement last year?
Furthermore, from the article:
Komarnitsky said when he went up in Airtracker 7 for a live report on his Christmas lights that his wife was actually on the ground turning them on and off -- not Internet visitors. so yes, the whole thing was a hoax.
you should always demand a girl be present in the webcast who will answer your live questions.
that way you can verify that she is actually there with the christmas lights...
in fact forget the lights... and the questions.
The larger question is why hoax something that is easy to do? X10 + Linux + Perl + WWW and blamo. Fakeing it just means the guy is an attention whore (IMHO).
Except that this guy admits it was a hoax, when he was called on it.
The puppet government in place in AD ~30 took steps to make sure the Apostles wouldn't perpetrate a hoax, including the (standard) death penalty for soldiers who abandon their guard posts. Whole lotta good it did, huh?
(Oh, and if you were hoping for a flame, sorry to disappoint.)
yhbt
Not only did you get modded up +5 Informative(!) at one point. But you managed to trick someone into thinking were you for real.
Bravo.
Just a guy with an opinion
He was definitely trying to justify it on his site by saying it cheered people up. It seems to me it went a little far for something like that. He could have "come out" earlier and passed it off as a "virtual house" without tricking people.
This was a frivolous holiday item that everybody forgot about the day after they checked it out.
I think that for more high-profile stories fact-checking online has proven to be quite illuminating at times. (Such as with the CBS memos and Dan Rather's on-air capitulation as to the doubts about their authenticity.
Next thing you know they're going to tell us pro-wrestling is fake too.
Seriously though, I didn't see the point of this anyway. Does it really make a difference if it was real or not?
I tried to visit his house when he had the haloween lights up, but found it was in a gated community that was closed to visitors after 7pm. His house is a bit out of my way & I was a bit annoyed that this heavily-promoted house wasn't on public display, so I never returned. I wanted to see how often people where flipping the lights -- the webcam didn't refresh often enough to show that.
His response to my post was interesting.. it seemed legit and appropriately paranoid about strangers knocking on his door (which I would never do!!).
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
IMHO, the hoax (and how he did the hoax) is actually more entertaining than if it had been the real thing. It's interesting to see his attention to detail (right down to fiddling with EXIF headers to make it look like it was generated by a webcam, rather than photos he took earlier).
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
It seems like for all the trouble he went through to set up this hoax, it would actually have been easier to hook up the X10 to his computer and plop a real webcam outside.
What it took for the hoax:
- Taking 12 pictures for the various "on/off" states
- Taking those 12 pictures in varying amounts of snowcover
- Dynamically inserting airplanes overhead
- Dynamically changing the position of the garage door by superimposing the garage on one of the 12 pics.
- Dynamically adding stars in the sky that move over the course of the night
- Occasionally Adding "cars" driving by
- When the local news crew took him up in the helicopter, his wife stayed at home flipping the lights on and off.
- Putting a real (but disconnected) webcam in the neighbor's tree so snoopers would see the webcam.
For all that trouble, he might as well have just done it up real.I guess at least now we know who is really responsible for the moon landing video.
... Grilled cheese sandwich portraying the Virgin Mary was entirely real.
And my Elvis potato chips.
And my guinea pig that is Alexander the Great reincarnate.
But lights? No way!!!
--Xan
"Congratulations, Boots. Your robot has become self-aware. You're a daddy now." -- Dr. Rho Bowman
While it is humorous I do find it bothersome. The least he could have dome is automated the show so his wife didn't need to stand there. What would it have taken? An X10 controller and a few X10 appliance modules. Lazy basturd!
... that gives me an idea!
Unfortunately for the rest of us hwo actually use home automation he has created a situatuin where doubt is place in the minds of those we are bragging to. Thre goes my collness points. Now I'll have to stick to the talking fish. Hmm, Christmas, talking fish, ethernet controller, X10,
Neil Cherry - Linux Smart Homes For Dummies
Anyone know how to hack into this guys electricity and turn it on and off randomly? I'm sure he'd see the humor. :)
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
It's just that he hacked you, not his light setup
Thank you, I'll be here all week (except Friday, coz that's a holiday :)
;-)
cLive
-- Trinity in high heels carrying a whip: The donimatrix - there is no spoonerism
The Lafayette man said he accomplished the trickery by taking 12 "base" photographs of the house with lights on and off and then constructed a Web page that appeared to show lights going on and off when the Web visitor clicked, but after performing web server stress testing, he replaced the test images with real-time camera generated images for the holiday season.
Can you please cite your source for this quote? It does not say that anywhere on the main article.
Downloaded 3 images. Found out the fixed noise patterns were the same.
You'd think that, as a camera would operate, the temperature would change and some of the random noise would be different.
Sad to say, it wasn't.
Conclusion: Either he had a very good noise removal algorithm... or he was faking the images.
Proof: None. Just smile, snicker, and keep loading his pages until his bandwidth exceeds his heating...
only it was many years ago when the web was new and shiny and the trojan room coffee pot was still really cool. The nerds down the hall had acutally gone through the trouble of wiring up their lamp, fridge, etc. to their web server.
So us geeks couldn't let ourselves be out done by them. But all that soldering, that's too much like work. So we wrote a quickie perl script that showed how many inches the window was open, how many soda cans were in the trash, how many flies were buzzing around last night's pizza, and finally it would tell if Mike was wearing his pants. All based on the values of a few pseudo-random numbers.
Uh, not only was 9/11 not a natural disaster, less than 20,000 people died in it, so it would be "since" something before 9/11.
That said, you may notice at the top of the page that it says "News for Nerds." Anyone can go to one of the hundreds of world news sites to find out what is going on in the world.
No, wait...
Yeah, right.
We did this for real, not using X10, using FreeBSD, in 1999 and 2000.
Details:
http://www.757.org/main/projects/xmas00/
http://www.757.org/main/projects/xmas99/
No hoax.
It might re-appear next year.
Southeastern Virginia REPRESENT!
Bad spelling either goes unnoticed, or invites comments.
Devastating (right), Devistating (wrong), who cares, this thread will soon be off the front page and life goes on.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Donate them to someone who wants to actually pull off a legitimate version.
This along with the fact that the Perl Advent Calendar hasn't been updated since Dec. 21 ruined my Internet Christmas.
So you've got a well-deserved +3 Funny, and I've got no mod points, but I see no one has said "good job" and as such, let me:
Good job, man.
"I apologize to those people who may be angry with me, but hopefully most will see the humor in the whole situation ... and realize that my attempt to bring joy and a smile to people's faces was successful," he said.
Right. I see after reading the previous thread the author was ready to pump us full of technical information and carry on as if this were some grand creation. This "joke" seemed to want to give us the idea the original prankster was a sharp gadget guy right up until getting caught so I don't buy it. This cat needs his head checked for Attention-Whore Syndrome (AWS).
You know, I have been wanting to say that for so long, but never had the chance....
I was OWNED!!
Great job...only thing is he is too brilliant for his own good....bet he never thought the media would ever show up!
is indistinguishable from technology
There was a web site with a chicken. You typed and told him what to do and he did it.. But it wasn't real either, but prerecorded stuff...
Bah.. Fakery..
If the secret had been kept, would we be any more the wiser?
For the past number of years I have had computer controlled Xmas lights at my house in Edmonton, Canada.
Although not controlled via the internet it would be relatively easy, just some software mod's and a web server required.
The computer is a Pentium 90 stuck out in the garage, running a hand coded C' program to sequence the lights. The program checks the state of the real time clock in the computer and the light show is automatic between 18:00 - 22:00 nightly.
The C' program runs under DOS (although this year it's now under Win98, because I was going to use VNC for control over the house LAN.)
The program controls the printer port which is connected to 4 solid state relays, I currently have 4 channels with 4 strings of 5W bulbs on each channel (4*4*5*25=2KW) all these strings are strung around a 20' spruce tree. The lights fade in/out and the sequences have variable delay times and some random sequences so each time it runs the output is slightly different each time.
Sorry no video or stills of this yet.
I don't understand why he had to make this a hoax. It would have been very easy to purchase all the necessary hardware to make this work. My guess it would only cost maybe $500 in hardware to implement this. The only problem would be controlling how often the lights were switched. It would be impossible to have 1,000 of users simultaniously executing commands to the lights. You would have to limit the number of users who could control the system at one time.
Better yet, make a strand of 1,000 lights where each light can be turned on/off individualy. Then you could assign a single light for each client to control. That would be kind of interesting.
If you're interested in turning a real light on/off try this
It's kind of ho-hum, but it's an interesting example of their product.
The fact of the matter is that this guy pulled off a seamless hoax. He even hoaxed the EXIF data in the image just in case some snooping hacker decided to do some checking up. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Kudos to you, Mr Alek!
i was on his site! U can change the cams zoom, and zan it around. Plus the garage door, and cars and pedestrians. He problably admited it was a hoax to get teh ./ers away from his site!!
my karma ran over your dogma
"Huh? 10,000 Slashdotters all jostling to flip half a dozen toggles on some guy's house lights? As if that could possibly work. Talk about bottle necks! So either this is a Fool's plan, or it's a hoax and anybody who believes it has been Fooled, --as well as demonstrating themselves to be immature enough to still believe that they are the center of the universe where all rules including band-width averages only apply to other people. (Bad things can't happen to me because I'm special!). --Either way somebody somewhere is playing the Fool, and how the heck did this rate being posted on Slashdot?"
I almost posted something to that effect, but then I figured, "Aww. Don't be a humbug. It's Christmas. I'm sure the editors are just being cute."
-FL
His electric chair won't suffer the same flaw
Table-ized A.I.
The easy way out is never really all that much fun...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Exactly! How does the grandparent figure that eradication of the Jews he mentioned would be a blow to the human genome? He's nuts.
I think I'll manage so long as noone tries to take away my subservient chicken.
I run a similar site, even linked from that one. I have SO much trouble trying to convince the average techno-illiterate people of the world that computer controlled lamps ARE in fact not only possible, but extremely simple to implement. And up until now, I've tried to instill in them the fact that it'd be too much trouble to fake it and it'd take too much work.
Now it's gonna be just that much harder. Argh.
Do we really NEED another internet hoax? If the average clueless idiot wants to forward endlessly the Snopes fodder of the week, fine. Let the scourge of the internet propogate as they will. Forward their chain letters, buy their spam, and bug me endlessly about how my internet controlled lights MUST be fake, simply because they've never heard of X10 before. But someone who's obviously smart enough to know better has ruined it for the rest of us. And he seems pretty damned proud of himself too. Makes me sick.
-Restil
Play with my webcams and lights here
By restricting your neighbors freedom of expression so you can get a neighborhood of houses that all look exactly alike you think your life is better.
Personally I'd like to live next door to someone who is creative enough to paint his house strange colors. I want nothing to do with the neighborhoods I've seen where every house looks the same, down to the flowers in the garden out front. To each his own I guess.
(AdSense policies span more than one page.)
Actually, he may not be able to disclose the dollar amount he received, although I'm not sure how to interpret it and I don't feel like making the effort. Here, check out Item b from Google AdSenseTM Online Standard Terms and Conditions:
-j.
I think that Alex can redeem himself by posting all of the code it took to put in all the variable details, clock, cars, people, planes weather etc.
Slashdot needs RATINGS. A rating is work by an independent party who verifies claims stated or written by a party. All the individuals in the independent party cannot have any connection whatsoever, directly or indirectly, to the party whose veracity is in question. Forget six degrees of separation to Kevin Bacon, we're talking mono y mono.
Ratings are done all the time in scientific circles but they need some way of being defined, evaluated and engaged quickly in normal settings. Once an evaluation/assessment is done by a rating group the rating is published. Ratings are standards and should be sanctioned by non-profit boards for what they are (what do they say about actions of other people) and how they work (What does each rating mark or star signify? 1 to 4 stars? 1 to 6?).
Case in point: if some party gets a reputation for defrauding others they get a low rating from independent parties. You can apply mathematics to this but it is by and large a trust network. Ratings groups are essentially in effect on message boards and newsgroups when registered users comment other users positively or negatively.
Reference:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=109249&cid=928 1878
Re:Without IT... (Score:3, Insightful)
"Slashdot should come up with a scale or ratings system with a moon as an icon signifying the quantity + quality of tech topics in crescent, half, three quarters and full moon chunks. Topics represent either the light or dark side, open code and hidden code respectively. To expound on software architecture differences there can be a series of moons each with a classification."
(nt)
Pretty good joke. Although a little depressing. ..Kinda like finding out the truth about that Santa Claus hoax all over again.
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
If you wander into his daily weblog reports, on 12/27, the Firefox browser was 40.32% of all requests.
./ readers lemmings or what?
Are
</rhetorical-question>
Final 2006 "Proof of Global Warming" US Hurricane Count -> 0
I say we take this guy, connect electrodes to his balls, and let web visitors turn the current off and on. Let's see how he lights up.
Successfully condensing fact from the vapor of nuance since 1998.
I've done this sort of thing before, but inside the house. I used a simple webserver with PHP w/ CURL to use specially crafted URLs to query a secondary internal x10 server. I had a rotating disco ball and various lights controllable via the web. And people want to put him on Letterman for faking this?
Out of nearly 4,000 votes 84% are not mad they were lied to about the lights. How can this be? This guy completely ruined it for anybody else out there that was thinking of doing something similar, now everyone will think all sites like this are a complete fraud.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
Interestingly enough, the FARK guys linked my Hoax page which includes a pointer to the WSJ article and those FARK guys wrote some HILARIOUS comments - so I wonder how many comments above were biased by the original press report?
Hulk SMASH Celiac Disease
..on the scam is available here.
:)
Darn it, one of these days I'm gonna get an article submitted.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens.
Bullshit.
I may get modded down for calling you the loser that you are, but I hope instead enough people are pissed off enough at you that they mod me up to +5 instead. Or someone with a slashdot account reposts this, so someone at Google sees it.
You created a fraud. Congratulations. Only losers such as yourself know what runs through your mind during all the time you took to create your fraud. It would make an interesting psychology class.
Not a big deal if it was confined to the slashdot crowd. But your site was picked up by mainstream press, and kids and adults from all over the world were entertained in believing your site to be real. Hopefully most non-slashdotters will continue to believe that, since they are unlikely to return unless they bookmarked the site and remember to return. Or maybe you'll continue your fraud and they won't know the difference.
It may also serve as a good lesson on fraud for the older kids. But the younger kids? You gave them a lollipop, and it turned out to have a castor oil center. Hope you got a good laugh out of it, because you and a small minority of slashdotters are probably the only ones. I'd guess that most others, including most slashdot regulars feel let down or disappointed. And from the handfull of posts I read, also feel that you are a fraud.
"Oh my God... think of the children!" Get a grip, dude. If you don't want to disappoint your kids don't tell them. Were you emotionally scarred when you found out that Santa wasn't real? Or are you just pissed off because you fell for it and you have no sense of humor?
Yoda of Borg am I! Assimilated shall you be! Futile resistance is, hmm?
How very unprofessional of you to post Alek's email address, and also his place of employment. In your quest to take the wind out of Alek's sails, you dragged Lockheed Martin and CSC into this situation. Did you stop to think about how that might reflect on you, or these companies? So Alek pointed out our gullible humanity--big deal. He said he wanted to spread some Christmas cheer and I believe him. There are worse things to be than a wanna-be elf....like an anonymous coward, perhaps. Good luck to you. I hope your anonymity holds tight.