When a bunch of geeks live their life online, it’s tempting to do things to disrupt those lives and watch the fun from the comfort of your computer. So it’s no surprise that some fairly funny pranks have already been played on four day old Justin.tv.
The best so far? Wednesday at 1:40 AM someone spoofed the caller id of the Justin.tv official cell phone number (which is listed on the Justin.tv site), called the San Francisco police department and reported a stabbing in the North Beach apartment.
See the embedded video above: Police arrived soon thereafter, guns drawn, and entered through the front door to find a bunch of (surprised and nervous) geeks laying around with laptops and web cams. All of this was shown live to hundreds of amused viewers.
The next day, someone reported a fire at the apartment. Six big red fire trucks showed up to deal with the situation. Sadly, this occured off camera.
The police and fire departments are not amused, of course. Future emergency calls from that phone number will require a confirmation call before emergency services will be dispatched.
Luckily, San Francisco’s emergency services won’t be wasting any more time dealing with these pranks.
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The right stuff for tv. Congrags.
Oooh, sounds like the guys at Justin.tv are NOT happy about this post!
Personally, I don’t find any of the pranks from the audience amusing — and neither should you, Michael. I don’t know about you, but I personally wouldn’t want the police drawing their weapons on me just so some sick f*ck can get a chuckle.
Justin and his crew are using Justin.TV as a proving ground for technology they’ve developed, and just because the general public is invited to view their lives doesn’t mean it’s an invitation for distasteful — and potential harmful — pranks.
Don’t play with fire, Michael, because given your visibility, you could encourage others to repeat similar pranks. Let’s not join the ranks of the psychos calling the police and ordering pizzas. Instead, let’s appreciate what this is all about: new technology that can be adopted for mass consumption.
Ronald - consider my hand slapped.
(but I bet you watched the video)
“I’m not very technical, I just shoot people.”
Very poor to see the emergency services’ time wasted in this way. People die every year because of things like this.
“All of this was shown live to hundreds of amused viewers.”
At this rate Nielsen will have no choice but to start tracking Justin.tv. Viacom look out!
Ow! My tax dollars!
At first I thought someone dressed as a cop and “raided” the Justin.tv shack. But this prank is so WRONG.
Oh come on now….lighten up. That is hilarious and it is publicity for their site too. At first, I thought they may have even known about it. Probably not the last prank that will be played on these guys. Does anyone have other ideas for pranks?
Re: bdb
Yes, call Homeland Security and tell them that Justin is harboring a dirty bomb.
Okay before anyone jumps on me…I am JUST KIDDING.
What’s funny about calling the emergency services for by the boredom of some idiots and potentially risking the lifes of people who cannot be helped, because some prank-morons are being served at this time?
Have those Justin.tv-idiots drive one whole day with the fire department or the police and see, if they understand their “fun” at the end of the day.
It’s not hilarious when these departments are played on. I wish they could find other forms of entertainment to amuse themselves.
Yeah, that’s not exactly a prank, it’s more of a crime.
I still think that it is pretty funny to see the police barge in on a bunch of half awake geeks.
It’s just so amusing to celebrate the abuse of city emergency services.
Yeah, it’s funny
But.. perhaps it’s time for the US to develop some telecoms standards so that pulling spoofs like this is impossible and that all numbers are trackable. At least, that’s how it works here (admittedly I only know this because I wanted to pull a April Fool’s trick on someone ;-))
It isn’t a case of “lighten up”. Emergency Service time is valuable. A video of some fool(s) wasting that time and putting lives in danger (drawn guns) is just not amusing. And to have it done twice - ridiculously stupid.
“The best so far?”… well done for publicising this and giving other morons the idea - exactly how many copycats are we expecting now?
“Does anyone have other ideas for pranks?” Here’s one…cut halfway through the cords on a parachute and jump out at 10,000 feet. We’ll all have a hoot watching to see if you make it down with your pants dry. How funny would that be?
“Instead, let’s appreciate what this is all about: new technology that can be adopted for mass consumption.”
Frankly I can think of a few web trends over the past 10 or so years that I wouldn’t have minded being shut down by the cops.
I don’t think it is funny this was done, but I did find the part whee the guys were like “uh, yeah, hi, can I help you?”
Guys, These Justin.tv guys are playing you! They wanted publicity, and they are getting it…have you considered that they may have spoofed the number themselves?
**Bob
going to repost David’s mention of the transcript…
“I’m not very technical, I just shoot people.”
ummm, i’m not okay with that SFPD statement. i love my city but damn.
So your blog is comfortable covering dangerous pranks on a site that only appeals to folks with no life? What’s next? Live DNA tests for Anna Nicole’s daughter? Are you forgetting your audience or is this content actually reflective of your target?
What kind of camera/technical setup does this guy have? Anyone know?
mountain - I write about what interests me and let the rest sort itself out.
Michael,
I’m sure this *is* very funny to you, considering you make over $100,000/month and can afford your own private nurses, hospital room, and care, but for us “normal” people who rely on the police and medical departments, things like this can mean life or death to us. I demand you write an official apology, in a NEW POST, to all of us with whom you’ve offended.
I smell a setup … the justin.tv guys appeared a little un-surprised. They probably did it so they could get coverage like this.
There must be a way to convert feeling guilty about emergency services and time wasting into positive action, like watching the video (I did) then donating cash to the San Francisco police department ( I’ve got as far as sfpd.org but can’t find a donate button).
Jaquater - Ok, I’ll do that. keep checking back at the site until it’s published.
were waiting on that post to be published mike!….lol
I guess he read #4…
I’m not sure, but I think this guy called me a couple months ago. I was too busy to call back but if I had, I would have given him the following advice:
1. If you want to attract mainstream advertisers, keep it clean. I remember my publicist wanting to quit when I turned down an interview from Howard Stern, yet a few weeks later when I landed UPS as a sponsor, they confirmed that had I interviewed on Stern, they wouldn’t have become a sponsor.
2. Sell as much advertising in advance as possible. We sold about $1,000,000 before I entered the house. The next 12 months the “sales” team sold about $200,000. (At the time, we paid Yahoo! about $100,000/month for the streaming video so you can see the problem we had.)
3. Don’t skimp on the video. Use a video camera not a web cam.
4. Find something to build hype. For us, it was Y2K. You would have thought I was plannign to go to the moon. People were genuinely worried that the Internet would go up in flames before I entered the house at noon on 1/1/2000. But since situations like that are once in a lifetime (unless daylight savings time is changed and Microsoft doesn’t patch their OS) don’t expect too much media attention.
5. Partner with traditional media. Invite the journalists to “walk in your shoes” for a day. They have a larger viewing audience and they are too conceited to think you’ll glean any viewers from them.
6. Bands, bands, bands…. Local bands are always looking for exposure (myspace anyone?). More importantly, people always want to find a fresh sound that hasn’t been jaded by the industry which = more viewers.
7. Blog! I had a “Daily Journal” (wish we’d thought to call it blogging) built on a Lotus Domino platform I had created. Fortunately now you can blog with free software and even video blog and interact with your viewers as they blog their responses.
8. Don’t sign with CAA. I was told it would make us more money but it was one of the biggest mistakes I made. They did nothing but prevent me from breaking the actor’s strike in commercials at the time. But what more do you expect from an “interactive media” agency with a website like this: caa.com.
9. Don’t “be the guy” if it’s your idea. Anyone can be the guy but only you can run the business with the passion and integrity it needs. You can’t always trust people to run your business for you. They might not pay payroll taxes they withheld from employees, use their salary to support a drug habit, or spend all the money before you see a dime. Not that any of that happened, but I’m sure it’s possible
10. And most importantly keep it clean. (See #1) There’s enough trash online. You actually will stand out more from the noise with clean, educational, and compelling content. My favorite moments were the US premier of the Wiggles, the launch of eHarmony, and a sunrise service on Easter Sunday by Watermark.org.
PS
Justin-
I’m sorry I didn’t have time to call you back.
Mitch
I think thats really hilarious!
Nice find mike.
And for all the offended ones.
ITS A JOKE!!! Only carried out a few days earlier. Hint Hint…
Hot damn, and April Fools’ day, the only holiday some celebrate religiously — is rapidly approaching
Mike,
Techcrunch traffic killed this site also. It doesn’t load live video anymore. Says site full.
Congratulations, another one bites the dust / fails the traffic test.
You forgot to tell everyone who did it! (both times) Justin knows…
from irc:
[04:20] My IP Relay: exactly what happened qq ga
[04:21] jessicasmith486: i need to report a fire Ma’am
[04:21] jessicasmith486: im trapped in my bathroom with flames coming from the other side ga
[04:21] jessicasmith486: theres no possible way out ga
[04:22] My IP Relay: tell him i ll send the police
[04:22] jessicasmith486: no ? ga
[04:22] My IP Relay: out there and just deal with him
[04:22] My IP Relay: ga
[04:22] My IP Relay: i m sorry
[04:23] My IP Relay: to help now they
[04:23] My IP Relay: will evacuate his building ga
@ Jaquater - You are insane. To claim that anyone can afford not to care about 911 services? I like Mike and I like this blog and I don’t always agree with him but it’s just stupid of you to think that Mike has some sort of private emergency service access or anything of that regard.
To everyone else who is offended - grow up. This is Mike’s blog. Yes, this prank may have been a bit over the top but Justin.tv’s crew should understand this is the only compelling reason to watch.
Remember the problem of start-ups having a target market of TechCrunch readers? Well guess what? Without stunts/pranks like these, Justin.tv’s target market would be even smaller than all of the geeks like us who read this blog. There’s not much that is particularly compelling about a 23-year old Yale graduate eating at overpriced San Francisco cafes, having mundane conversations with founders of other Web 2.0 companies, and lifting his head up while he urinates to keep it G-rated.
Furthermore, it would be smart for Y-Combinator not to completely underfund their start-ups to the point that they crash with 145 users. The site is currently showing rainbow lines.
I respect what they are doing but I think there is no business model here. A couple of problems:
1. Not a Compelling Product - No offense to Justin, but his life isn’t particularly compelling. He’s going to keep it mostly G-rated. That’s boring but that’s the only way for him to get sponsors.
2. Small Target Market - The target market is too small - Web 2.0 entrepreneurs with an hour to burn or bored employees wasting time in the Lingr chatroom that barely functions properly.
3. Sustainability - Justin himself is going to get annoyed doing this. It must be really stressful for him. He’s 23. He wants to be dating, out having fun, saying things that are inappropriate. Even a 40-year old married man would not want to be wearing a camera around at all times. Ali G already taught famous people they have to be careful what they say on screen. They certainly aren’t going to agree to appear on Justin.tv and say some hilarious things. No offense to Justin again, but he’s no Sasha Baron Cohen.
4. No Moat/Defensability - Some claim the real model is to have hundreds of cameras like these. Okay so what? Unless you get a super model wearing these around in NYC and taking it to all of her shoots and parties, no one really cares. Even if this does happen, why would Justin.tv reap the benefits? A smart super model (and yes, they have brains, some of them at least) will have an agent and business manager who will just buy Justin.tv on eBay for $100,000 and plug her stuff into it. Why give Justin.tv a major cut? If the cut gets too high, someone copies them. This is not proprietary stuff by any means.
5. Branding - they named it Justin.tv. That’s great for now, but that allows for no brand extensions and expansion.
6. Revenue - severs crashing at 145 viewers. Ads are likely to turn people off and product placement is not likely to work. The target market here (25 - 35 year old men with undergrad if not graduate degrees and high tech careers) doesn’t pay attention ads - not banners, not TV ads, not product placement, not anything.
7. Lack of True Social Aspect - this isn’t going to spread like wildfire. As I already mentioned, the Lingr chat is cool but chats turn into b.s. very fast and this one is already going that way. Furthermore, Justin.tv is about him, not about you - that’s not very social.
I won’t say cost/expenses because we all know that bandwidth (hardline and wireless) keep getting cheaper so while the model may be negative gross margin right now, that could change.
That being said, good luck to the team. I’d really love for you to prove me wrong and I’d be happy to admit I was wrong
This is bullshit. Fuck those viewers who did this. These geeks wouldn’t last one day at my fire house.
this is an embedded ad for the sfpd.
Good stuff. So they broadcast their lives and phone numbers on the web 24/7 and don’t think that this could possibly happen? Makes you wonder how well the entire concept was planned out in the first place.
After this venture fails why don’t they chronicle the effects of identity theft? Post your social security number and birthdate on a website, then provide your bank account number and pin so users can log in and monitor how fast your bank account is depleted “live”. That’s sure to give ‘em another 15 mins of fame.
“Unless you get a super model wearing these around in NYC and taking it to all of her shoots and parties, no one really cares. Even if this does happen, why would Justin.tv reap the benefits? A smart super model (and yes, they have brains, some of them at least) will have an agent and business manager who will just buy Justin.tv on eBay for $100,000 and plug her stuff into it.”
At least somebody else agrees with me that the only chance in hell anything like this would work is if you strap it onto somebody who is either really interesting to the average person (not Justin, sorry) and/or pretty on the eyes.
As a technology play, there is nothing compelling about having to wear this gear on your head. I doubt that a supermodel, for instance, is actually going to do that. Want to do a show (online or on TV/cable) where you follow a supermodel around? They will have a professional camera crew. And even if they wanted to do this for some strange reason, do the investors in this really believe that the people with resources to create a viable video venture of a similar nature would not be able to put together a setup of their own? The only people who are really likely to use this product are geeks and/or people who will attract a marginal audience (just like Justin). Note to fanboys: many celebrities, models, entertainers, etc. already have reality TV shows. I know, I know. Television will be dead by May 1 and the Justins of the world will take over. But until that happens, I guess several hundred unfortunate souls will be forced to watch a preppy Yale graduate putzing around doing nothing useful and even worse, nothing entertaining.
# Michael Arrington
March 23rd, 2007 at 5:42 pm
I still think that it is pretty funny to see the police barge in on a bunch of half awake geeks.
—
Michael,
Even though I’m just someone who reads your articles and makes comments on occasion, this is the first time I can say I’ve been disappointed — not that this makes a difference, either.
Here’s the idea, in simple terms: You have great influence, so why not use it to your benefit and that of others? Seeing how your own community can behave at times, consider yourself being pranked upon by the TechCrunch community.
Would it be a laughing matter then? It’s one thing to pull off an elaborate joke, but it’s something entirely different when we place one’s life at stake, thus, it’s simply tasteless to find any humor in this — those guys were put at extreme risk for the sheer enjoyment of a sick few.
Lead by example, for you know you have thousands of followers. Be well.
Signed,
Mr. Humility
For those of you who attack Michael for posting this, you must be forgetting the definition of a blog. For a blog you don’t write to please a certain audience. You write what you find funny/entertaining/interesting, and those who agree subscribe and come back to read more. There is no obligation to an audience like other forms of media.
I do find this prank to be pretty serious, and someone could have gotten hurt. It would have been funnier if someone had like 20 pizzas delivered to the house, someone dress up as UPS guy and deliver a friend in a box, etc.
It’s interesting to see such passionate responses on all sides.
ronald and jacaufer - don’t be gay.
drama2 - you’re always right-on.
as for mike and TC - it’s the booommb, lol
Ryan,
While I cannot comment for other posters in disagreement, I can say that my disagreement isn’t an “attack” at all. I respect Michael for what he does, and I do not disagree entirely with this post, but I do find his insensitivity to the prank a little troubling.
Again, everything in the universe is “interesting” and “funny” until we’re subjected to it ourselves. Then, it’s no longer fun and games. I’ve seen Michael attacked several times by the envious and the usual trolls here on TC, and it’s never been an amusing experience.
I too am a blogger, but it doesn’t grant us a license to disregard compassion and consideration for others. If anyone made the wrong move that morning, the SFPD had every right to use self defense given the nature of the call. Think about it, and again, picture yourself in that scenario — it’s far from pretty.
Mike, Apologies for the blantant Plug - though it may be relevant to some
“Debbie Davies
March 23rd, 2007 at 7:01 pm
There must be a way to convert feeling guilty about emergency services and time wasting into positive action, like watching the video (I did) then donating cash to the San Francisco police department ( I’ve got as far as sfpd.org but can’t find a donate button).”
Well, anyone who feels that way can certainly visit Heart of a Hero - an organization Michelle and I started to raise money for Families of Fallen Firefighters by selling a cd of the song I wrote and Michelle sings (Heart of a Hero). Fully produced in Nashville and costing only $6.00.
We also hope to hold more benefit concerts in the near future - our first was help in December and thanks to good friends like Big & Rich, Brooks & Dunn, Aaron Tippin, and many others, we were able to raise over $14,000 for the 5 families of fallen firefighters in the Esperanza Wildfire that took place in October last year.
We’re currently sold out of cd’s, but if you become our friend and write me a note, I’ll put you on the list to be notified when we begin selling them again.
Paul King
http://www.myspace.com/heartofahero
or
http://www.nashvillehype.com
This is _exactly_ what you Americans should be doing to deal with the stress caused by Islamic fanatics and their fcuked up ideologies. I suppose it lets the stressed-out cops & firemen laugh it off a little too.
Reminds me of the Howard Stern show where some asshole was making jokes live about the WTC attacks even as they were underway!
Not a prank.
A boneheaded crime that’ll make our protection services less responsive in the future.
Idiots
I could not agree with Michael more - I too found the pranks amusing.
Of course you guys are right - it is a waste of police time etc - and indeed the thought went through my head as I watched it, as I am sure it went through Michaels.
But life is too short, and if you laugh at it, that is not bad.
This is also Michaels blog, and he is being legitimate and honest, and telling us what he likes and dislikes - respect for that.
He highlighted pornotube the other month - are you are going to get upset about that as well?
He is not a school teacher. As long as he does not break the law, all is well and he can say and highlight what he likes in his blog.
Then it is up to us whether we look at it or not…I know I shall…
Ian
IanG wrote: “He highlighted pornotube the other month - are you are going to get upset about that as well?”
And what exactly does porn have to do with this?
The whole thing’s not a matter of morality, it’s a matter of common sense.