I read War of the Worlds 45 years ago. I also read about the Mass hysteria when the radio show ran it as if it were for real.
Same thing happened when Radio 1 invented a fictitious “free concert” “somewhere in London”. All roads clogged up as thousands headed in their cars to the suspected location of Hyde Park. That would have been the early 70’s. They were forced by the police to reveal it was a hoax.
Studying collective behavior is interesting because, under certain conditions, people start to behave like one single organism. It's almost like a physical phenomenon like the passage from a state of the matter to another. From now onward, you'll be our steemian Orson Welles @swissclive (and my respect for drinking 15 beer)!