The War of the Worlds (radio drama) soon dismissed. The FCC also received letters from the public that advised against taking reprisals. Singer Eddie Cantor urged the commission not to overreact, as "censorship would retard radio immeasurably." The FCC not only chose not to punish Welles or CBS but also barred complaints about "The War of the Worlds" from being brought up during license renewals. "Janet Jackson's 2004 'wardrobe malfunction' remains far more significant in the history of broadcast regulation than Orson Welles' trickery," wrote media historians Jefferson Pooley and Michael Socolow. H. G. Wells and Orson Welles met for the first and only time in late
The War of the Worlds (radio drama) into it. A study by the Radio Project discovered that fewer than one third of frightened listeners understood the invaders to be aliens; most thought that they were listening to reports of a German invasion or of a natural catastrophe. "People were on edge", wrote Welles biographer Frank Brady. "For the entire month prior to 'The War of the Worlds', radio had kept the American public alert to the ominous happenings throughout the world. The Munich crisis was at its height... For the first time in history, the public could tune into their radios every night and hear, boot by