11:00 a.m. 24.Nov.1999 PST
Mike Zieper wanted to tap into current passions with his video art. To do it, he made a grainy, gray tape in which a faceless narrator prepares his soldiers to unleash a government-sponsored riot in Times Square at midnight 2000.

The plan: to create chaos so federal troops have an excuse to move in.

Read ongoing Y2K coverage

Weird thing was, after Zieper posted the video clip on his Web site, the troops did move in.

"This FBI agent called," said Zieper. "He said, 'There are a lot of people planning to vacation in New York this year, a lot of them are coming to your site and they're getting scared. I want to talk to you about how we can stop people from coming to this site.'"

Zieper called a lawyer and didn't pull the site. So both the FBI and the US Attorney's Office went upstream to Zieper's Web hosting company, BECamation in Michigan, and asked that Zieper's site be pulled. There was no threat of legal action, but BECamation president Mark Wieger complied.

"We didn't want to take any chances with our business, so we pulled it down," Wieger said.

In doing so, Wieger pulled a lever that let loose a virtual riot among free-speech advocates. After the Village Voice published a piece about the incident, online message boards erupted in protest. Now the American Civil Liberties Union is considering a lawsuit on Zieper's behalf.

"We think, certainly, that it's very improper for the FBI to be harassing an Internet hosting company to take down content that may be disturbing, but is certainly protected by the First Amendment," said ACLU staff attorney Ann Beeson.

The FBI did not respond to a request for comment.

Meanwhile, the video itself has been copied and posted on numerous mirror sites.

It's a hit beyond anything Zieper could have anticipated. Reality has woven a fresh, relevant, scene into the video's fiction and given it a nice buzz. A grand slam for a struggling artist.

"If this gets people to look at all this stuff seriously, that's fantastic. That's exactly what I wanted to do," Zieper said.

That doesn't mean he's not upset, particularly on behalf of Mark Wieger, who's been besieged by vicious flame emails decrying his decision to pull Zieper's site.

"They're saying, 'Why didn't you stand up for the Constitution?'" Zieper said. "I think that's very easy to say from afar, but when the knock comes for you it's a terrifying experience. They tried to infer that he best get out of the way."

That has Zieper wondering what else the FBI is up to. "I hope this is just an aberration," he said. "I hope that they review the constitution back at the FBI and don't try to do anything like this again."

Related Wired Links:

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