Latest Billboard Event - NYC

Harking Back To the Time the War Was Over There
Article Re-print from
The New York Times, Sunday, May 19, 2002
by Sarah Schmidt

It caused a but if a stir, but no one seems to have any clue who posted the billboard reading
"Jihad Is Over! (If You Want It)" on East 14th Street.
    The message is a reference to the Times Square billboard that John Lennon and Yoko Ono famously sponsored in 1969. Their's read "War Is Over! If You Want It." and was a part of their peace campaign.
    But they signed their bilboard "Happy Christmas from John & Yoko," and eagerly talked about it. Whoever was behind the 14th Street sign, which was posted over an existing advertisement, has not claimed credit.
    "We can't imagine who it was, but they must have literally jumped up on the board in the middle of the night, slapped it up there and then scurried off," said Chris Young, chief financial officer fo Vista Media. The company owns the billboards space, which runs along the side of a six-story building at 520 East 14th Street.
    Leslie Singer, whose bedroom window is so close to the billboard that its light sometimes cines into her eyes, noticed the new message when walking home May 7.
    "I'd really like to know who it was", she said, speculating that the perpetrators had both know-how and equipment. "Was it the Jewish Defamation League? An Arab League? Artists? Activists? It's hard to know what they meant and who it was directed toward without knowing who it was."
    Although graffitti and vandalism are common problems on the company's billboards, "We've never had any little political Robin Hoods like this before," Mr. Young said. Vista Media removed the sign about May 9.
    Now the billboard has a far less ambitous aim: to encourage iced tea drinking.
    "Feel Lipton Good," it tells passers-by.