Man claims he accidentally created an online hoax
Jan 12, 2016, 6:50 PM
It was a story that quickly went viral, but one man says it was a mistake and all a hoax.
User “Johnson Thompson” made a video depicting some strange lights over cloud cover in Canberra, Australia. The person said it was to practice his composition skills, but the video gain attention around the world, with media outlets all over picking up the story.
Thompson started the YouTube video by taking two shots during the day and night and using various effects to add footage of a northern sky, a light vortex and more. It ended up looking like a lightning ball in the sky, somewhat alien in nature.
Thompson didn’t think the video would be seen by that many people and hoped that it would at best get “a few laughs and/or critiques on the canberra subreddit.”
It’s a lesson that what you put online can easily be seen by others and misconstrued. Thompson said a lesson has been learned, and it won’t happen again.