Mr. Komarnitsky gave radio interviews to stations as far away as Australia. Web sites from NYTimes.com to geek hangout Slashdot.org linked to his site. An Associated Press item about his site was picked up by newspapers from Los Angeles to Columbia, S.C. As of midday Monday, according to Mr. Komarnitsky, the “Web cam” was asked by online visitors to snap a new picture in the same spot 334,832 times. The lights had supposedly been changed 91,978 times. But instead of a live camera, komar.org is really showing off 32 high-resolution digital photographs, taken in four sets with different amounts of snow on the ground. A sophisticated computer program, which Mr. Komarnitsky wrote with input from a friend skilled in digital imaging, serves up a section of the appropriate photo, depending on actual weather conditions and what lights the online Web visitors expect to see. –Charles Forelle —High-Tech Holiday Light Display Draws Everyone But the Skeptics (WSJ Online)
But it was all fake.
Journalists are human beings, and they do sometimes make mistakes.
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Ooops - URL wasn't converted to a clicky link - there should be one below this.
Good writeup/comments - YEP, christmas lights aren't nearly as important as leaked political memo's ... although I sure spent a lot more time/effort on my christmas light display/webcam than the guy who typed up a letter on Microsoft Word (using default settings no less!), copied it a few times to smudge it up, and then FAX'ed it in - go figure on that whole sorry episode.
BTW, since this is a media site, you might be interested in my tracking/comments on the media coverage of the hoax - please see http://www.komar.org/xmas/hoax/media.html - I tell the handful of people that were upset about the whole thing to be sure to read that first (since there were inaccuracies/insinuations in the hoax reporting - not surprising - media wasn't too happy about doing the correction) and THEN form their OWN opinion whether I was naughty or nice! ;-)
Good point, Will!
Also, with good reason, journalists are much less likely to really check into the authenticity of pretty web cam photos than they are into, say, the source of leaked memo's about an important political figure.
At least they should be :-) A fake story about pretty lights just doesn't have the same impact. ;-)