2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting

2017eventclassic

The 2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting was a mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival on October 1, 2017 that killed 58 people and wounded more than 500. Online, it was defined by a fast wave of hoax photos falsely naming Sam Hyde and TheReportOfTheWeek as shooters, and by MGM Resorts' 2018 lawsuits against victims that sparked boycott calls on Twitter.

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Overview

The 2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting was a mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival on October 1, 2017, in which 64-year-old Nevada resident Stephen Paddock opened fire from a Mandalay Bay hotel room and killed 58 people while wounding more than 5001. It was the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history at the time1.

Online, the 2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting is remembered for a fast misinformation cycle: within hours, hoax photos falsely named comedian Sam Hyde and YouTuber TheReportOfTheWeek as either shooters or victims, following a template internet users had already run after previous mass casualty events4. Nearly a year afterward, the story returned as a corporate PR problem when Mandalay Bay owner MGM Resorts filed preemptive federal lawsuits against more than 1,000 victims to shield itself from liability2.

How It Spread

After the shooting, photos of comedian Sam Hyde spread on Twitter as the alleged gunman, alongside images of YouTuber TheReportOfTheWeek, both falsely tagged as either shooters or victims1. Hyde had been a 4chan hoax target since October 2015, when CNN mistakenly aired his image in a report about a college shooting in Oregon, and BBC Trending documented the recycled hoaxes on October 2, 20171.

The story returned to headlines on July 16, 2018, when MGM Resorts filed federal complaints against more than 1,000 shooting victims in Nevada and California2. The company argued that its security vendor Contemporary Services Corp. carried Department of Homeland Security certification under a 2002 federal anti-terrorism act, extending liability protection to MGM itself3. The complaints did not seek money but asked judges to dismiss existing victim lawsuits and rule the 2002 act applicable3. Las Vegas attorney Robert Eglet, representing several victims, called the federal venue 'a blatant display of judge shopping'2.

On Twitter, users pledged boycotts of MGM-owned properties in response, with one viral post calling the litigation 'ultra-disgusting corporate behavior' and drawing about 1,400 retweets and 3,800 likes in a day4. Fortune wrote that the move would be a PR black eye for MGM regardless of the legal outcome3.

Frequently Asked Questions

2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting

2017eventclassic

The 2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting was a mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival on October 1, 2017 that killed 58 people and wounded more than 500. Online, it was defined by a fast wave of hoax photos falsely naming Sam Hyde and TheReportOfTheWeek as shooters, and by MGM Resorts' 2018 lawsuits against victims that sparked boycott calls on Twitter.

hoax memes misinformation memes death hoax tragedy memes 4chan memes 2017 memes

Overview

The 2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting was a mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival on October 1, 2017, in which 64-year-old Nevada resident Stephen Paddock opened fire from a Mandalay Bay hotel room and killed 58 people while wounding more than 5001. It was the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history at the time1.

Online, the 2017 Las Vegas Strip Shooting is remembered for a fast misinformation cycle: within hours, hoax photos falsely named comedian Sam Hyde and YouTuber TheReportOfTheWeek as either shooters or victims, following a template internet users had already run after previous mass casualty events4. Nearly a year afterward, the story returned as a corporate PR problem when Mandalay Bay owner MGM Resorts filed preemptive federal lawsuits against more than 1,000 victims to shield itself from liability2.

How It Spread

After the shooting, photos of comedian Sam Hyde spread on Twitter as the alleged gunman, alongside images of YouTuber TheReportOfTheWeek, both falsely tagged as either shooters or victims1. Hyde had been a 4chan hoax target since October 2015, when CNN mistakenly aired his image in a report about a college shooting in Oregon, and BBC Trending documented the recycled hoaxes on October 2, 20171.

The story returned to headlines on July 16, 2018, when MGM Resorts filed federal complaints against more than 1,000 shooting victims in Nevada and California2. The company argued that its security vendor Contemporary Services Corp. carried Department of Homeland Security certification under a 2002 federal anti-terrorism act, extending liability protection to MGM itself3. The complaints did not seek money but asked judges to dismiss existing victim lawsuits and rule the 2002 act applicable3. Las Vegas attorney Robert Eglet, representing several victims, called the federal venue 'a blatant display of judge shopping'2.

On Twitter, users pledged boycotts of MGM-owned properties in response, with one viral post calling the litigation 'ultra-disgusting corporate behavior' and drawing about 1,400 retweets and 3,800 likes in a day4. Fortune wrote that the move would be a PR black eye for MGM regardless of the legal outcome3.

Frequently Asked Questions