Global hoax says web experts as text messages reach Iloilo
From internet rumor to forwarded text messages (via Short Messaging System – SMS), purported "global phenomenon" of a longer-rising sun come Friday reached Iloilo.
Albeit edited thus with additional data from the supposed original form, the message was the same – sun will rise continuously for 36 hours or 1.5 days. And to give further credence to the text, supposed source were CNN and BBC News.
Fact or fiction? Web experts on similar 'urban legends' and world's most common hoaxes said "fiction," thus outrightly false. In fact, it was dismissed as one "ridiculous notion." Yet another fact is, here in the Philippines and in Iloilo in particular, the transfer of the message from one sender to another translated into added revenues for the country's telecommunication companies.
"Coming October 17, 2008, the sun will rise continously for 36 hours (1.5 days). During this time, the US countries will be dark for1.5 days. It will convert 3 days into 2 big days. It will happen once in 2,400 years. We're very lucky to see this. This is a global phenomenon... Courtesy of CNN/BBC News..Mark ur calendars now n pass 2 relatives n frends ..," the text message went.
The News Today (TNT) got numerous queries on the message's validity. Further still were SMS of said forwarded messages from various sources that interestingly, were the original form and another with "CNN/BBC News" as purported source.
A check in the internet led to David Emery, Urban Legend Guide of About.com. Emery established here that the internet rumor began circulating in August of this year. Saying the status is "false," Emery summed up the hoax while presenting the two versions circulating in the web.
"Physicially impossible," was how he labeled the idea as he went on to establish over 15,000 postings in the web back in August to September. Nearly all postings had the same words and nearly all originated from India, Emery added.
Fast forward to the version reaching Iloilo and TNT, the phrase "Courtesy of CNN and BBC News" was somehow added.
Discussions on the web linked the October 17, 2008 supposed occurrence to the biblical event in the passage of Joshua of that day the sun stood still.
Clearly now though, no such "rising sun" phenomenon per se come Friday. Yet at the rate the rumor has spread from India, to the Bahamas, from all over the US to the Philippines, the rumor itself was what has seemingly become the real global phenomenon.