2010
Un post de televiziune din Georgia a pus în scenă o farsă sinistră. Postul a anunţat că armata rusă a invadat din nou ţara, iar preşedintele Saakaşvili a fost ucis. Oamenii au intrat în panică, iar autorităţile au reuşit cu greu să restabilească liniştea.
De fapt, crainicul precizase, la început, că acesta era doar "un scenariu posibil", dar menţiunea nu a fost afişată pe ecran şi a trecut aproape neobservată. Panica s-a dezlănţuit în toată ţara: oamenii au asaltat magazinele ca să-şi facă provizii, iar reţelele de telefonie mobilă au căzut, deoarece toată lumea încerca să afle amănunte. Până la urmă lucrurile s-au lămurit, iar telespectatorii furioşi au luat cu asalt sediul postului.
http://www.jurnalul.ro/stire-externe/rusia-a-invadat-georgia-un-post-tv-georgian-creeaza-panica-din-cauza-unei-farse-538551.html
1938
The War of the Worlds was an episode of the American radio drama anthology series Mercury Theatre on the Air. It was performed as a Halloween episode of the series on October 30, 1938 and aired over the Columbia Broadcasting System radio network. Directed and narrated by Orson Welles, the episode was an adaptation of H. G. Wells' novel The War of the Worlds.
The first two thirds of the 60-minute broadcast was presented as a series of simulated news bulletins, which suggested to many listeners that an actual Martian invasion was in progress. Compounding the issue was the fact that the Mercury Theatre on the Air was a 'sustaining show' (it ran without commercial breaks), thus adding to the dramatic effect.
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Some listeners heard only a portion of the broadcast, and in the atmosphere of tension and anxiety just prior to World War II, took it to be a news broadcast. Newspapers reported that panic ensued, people fleeing the area, others thinking they could smell poison gas or could see flashes of lightning in the distance.[citation needed]
Richard J. Hand cites studies by unnamed historians who "calculate[d] that some six million heard the CBS broadcast; 1.7 million believed it to be true, and 1.2 million were 'genuinely frightened'".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_of_the_Worlds_%28radio%29
