"It's a hoax -- and it's not funny," said Gov. Deval Patrick.
Not a hoax, Deval. A hoax is an intent to decieve, to make something look like something else. These are small blinking signs intended to look like TV characters.
These blinking lights were in place for two weeks!
Because you will not back down, and admit that this was not a hoax, people are threatened with serious jail time.
He will never back down. He represents the State, and the State is never wrong.
I don't think it's fair to point a finger at Boston authorities for overreacting. They were getting reports of suspicious devices. What are they supposed to do? They've got no choice but to react to the report, until they learn otherwise. We sure don't want them to start ignoring reports because of... what? They don't know what they have until they go out.
What's curious to me is that these gizmos were sitting in place for something like three weeks without anybody taking much notice of them, or raising any particular suspicion... then all of a sudden one day some six or more of them are simultaneously reported as "suspicious devices"??
There's your hoax. The publicity gimmick wasn't working. I'd bet money that it was the guys that put them up that had people call in and make reports of "suspicious" devices. They needed to nudge their project into public view... and that's how they did it.