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Hardware Projects (and Pranks) That Have Scared Observers

Posted by timothy on from the telling-you-marge-the-kid-freaks-me-out dept.

In the wake of the arrest of Ahmed Mohamed in Irving, Texas, for carrying to school an electronics project believed by a teacher to look like a bomb, Make Magazine has a timely reminder that Ahmed's project is one of many home-brew efforts that sparked (or could have sparked) extreme reactions. Make's list includes a few from tinkerers -- and pranksters -- that not only looked like bombs, but were fully intended to look that way. ("Back in 1967, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak was arrested for building a metronome and storing it in a friend’s locker. He rigged a tin-foil contract sensor to the metronome in the locker, and set up the device to tick faster when his buddy opened the locker.") The article doesn't note the 2007 incident in Boston in which a guerilla advertising campaign for "Aqua Teen Hunger Force" raised fears of a terrorism and led to two arrests. Gawker has a slightly more pointed article about other students who have specifically brought home-assembled clocks to school, without being arrested.

10 of 193 comments (clear)

  1. Ahmed's story doesn't hold up under scrutiny. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Here's a guy who reverse engineered the clock he built.
    http://blogs.artvoice.com/tech...

    1. Re: Ahmed's story doesn't hold up under scrutiny. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      His accomplishment was repackaging a clock using a box of his own design. To me, this is more creative than simply soldering a kit off eBay. It's also an accidental flavour of what made Jobs great: he identified someone else's decent electronics and repackaged it in a way that caught the attention of the world!

      Since clocks were invented thousands of years ago, and digital clocks decades ago, it is up to you to not deliberately misinterpret the word "invent" just to start a pathetic Internet argument with a 14 year old boy who can't even answer back. He "invented" it in the simple sense that he designed and built a style of clock packaging that did not exist before. Similarly, the original creator of the innards did not "invent" the digital clock - merely lay out a familiar design. His invention was that design.

      Now, this previously non-celebrity non-English-professor child could have chosen words that were harder to deliberately misinterpret, to deal with people like yourself who would surely come out with the perfect choice of language. The availability of pictures demonstrates that he did not want to mislead, though, so who cares?

      You seem salty about the fact that he got (I wouldn't say "earned") a visit to the WH and MIT. You do realise that he wasn't invited because of his accomplishment, but as a message to encourage people to carry on tinkering even in the face of authoritarian dullards? Sometimes people enter the limelight, even if only for a few days, not because of what they did, but because of what was done to them. Unless you're an eternally bitter sort, there's no need for this to bother you so.

  2. Actually... by kenh · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The teachers believed Ahmed wanted the teachers to believe it was a bomb. The school called the police about a possible bomb hoax, not a possible bomb, as evidenced by the police response that did not include sending the bomb squad to the school and the school's decision not to evacuate.

    Can we talk about the really troubling thing about this story - that a 14 year-old high school student thinks removing the case from a store bought clock radio is a process of 'invention' as evidenced by his repeated claims he 'invented' this clock and that he was 'proud' of his project and wanted to show it off to his teachers?

    --
    Ken
    1. Re:Actually... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Seriously - when this story first broke, I was on Ahmed's side, because - well, he was presented as a tinkerer, and who doesn't want to stand up for people who tinker?

      But it's become clear that he doesn't tinker. He didn't make anything. He took the pieces out of a clock and shoved them into a pencil case. I can break a clock and dump it into a pencil case. Anyone can. It reminds me of a story I read growing up about a 10 year old "building a computer." He didn't. He shoved parts into a case. I can do that. In fact, I did do that. I didn't get an article written about me.

      What people need to understand is that the police believed him when he said it was a clock. So did his teachers. What they never did find out is why he felt the need to pull the parts out of a clock and shove them into a pencil case and bring it to school.

      There's a war on law enforcement by the media these days, and this was being used as an example of "overreaching law enforcement" except that it turns out it WASN'T. Ahmed didn't build a clock. He built a PROP. And the police wanted to know what he was planning on doing with prop bomb at school, which Ahmed simply wouldn't answer. And that's why he was arrested.

  3. Re:Clear evidence of over-reaction by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The problem is Boston repeated the scare later, closing down their airport briefly when an MIT student brought an electronics project to the airport.

    And again, after the Marathon bombings, they illegally shut down the entire city in order to catch the bombers that turned out to no longer be in the city. Oops!

    Basically, Boston police don't know what the fuck they're doing and people should stay the fuck away from Boston if they value their freedom.

  4. Re: Poptarts have gotten the same response by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Really? I initially thought the kid had a kit clock or something more innovative. When you find out he took the guts out of a commercial clock and put it in a box and to boot he is 14? I was tearing things apart at half his age. Tying this to stem is interesting even with reports that the stem issue is pretty bogus. Take the things he did to an airport and also claim you invented it -- they should rightly give you a heck of a hard time. Then look at his father. The whole thing wreaks of a publicity stunt for a 3rd Sudan election....

  5. Re:So is this a project or a prank? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    That could just as easily have been myself when I was his age. That would be a naive young kid wearing a NASA t-shirt who likes to take stuff apart and muck around with it.

    "Look what I invented mom!"

    Media/police get involved and everything is blown out of proportion for the young man.

    So, was Ahmed an inventor? No. He just repackaged a clock in about 20 minutes. That would make him a budding 'Maker' or 'hacker'. Ahmed probably wouldn't know the difference.

    Anyways, he's heading in the right direction, and I hope he has a bright future.

    On the other hand are the haters. And haters gonna hate. Maybe it's a conspiracy, may the kid's a *troll*, or is being used as a troll, get those Muslims out of America, he didn't invent anything, he's a fraud . . . and so on. Shameful!

  6. Re: Clear evidence of over-reaction by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Bomb vests have blinking lights?

    I always thought that they were manually detonated.

  7. Re:Poptarts have gotten the same response by taiwanjohn · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Speaking of guns... when I was a HS sophomore (1978-79) we needed a "gunshot" sound effect for the school play. Finding it too difficult to synchronize a tape recording with the action on stage (not to mention, it just sounded like a recording, which was distracting), one of the sound crew guys brought a .410 shotgun from home, along with some wadding-load shells (ie: blanks). That way, he could stand in the hallway, looking in through the backstage door, and deliver the sound right on cue.

    This was all done with the school's full knowledge and approval. And Andy kept the gun and shells in his locker for the last few days of rehearsals and performances. Alas, those were different times.

    Funny thing though, on the night of dress rehearsal, he was paying such close attention to the onstage action that he didn't really notice where he was aiming. He ended up shooting the face off the clock on the opposite side of the wall. We still razz him about that to this day. ;-)

    --
    XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, you're not using enough of it. --AC
  8. Re:Poptarts have gotten the same response by circletimessquare · · Score: 1, Interesting

    ah yes, another responsible gun owner, never having any accidents

    statistically speaking, owning a gun increases the danger to you and your loved ones, a notion your anecdote supports

    --
    intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it