Author: Chris Hoffman / Source: How-To Geek
April Fools’ Day used to be fun, but no longer. It’s a day of cringe-worthy jokes, fake press releases, and bad pranks that break services like Gmail. Everyone should follow Microsoft’s valiant lead and put a stop to it.
How April Fools’ Day Has Gotten Worse
April Fools’ Day seems to get worse every year.
And no, we don’t think it’s just us getting old. The way the Internet works—and the way everyone from tech companies to news websites approaches April Fools’ Day—is fundamentally different.The BBC’s famous 1957 hoax showed spaghetti being harvested from trees. Sure, maybe this fooled some people, but it was funny. With a bit of knowledge or research, you could discover that this just wasn’t physically possible.
The spaghetti piece aired on the BBC on April Fools’ Day and didn’t become a segment that aired over and over throughout the year—unlike online, where you can stumble into fake articles months later and be misled before realizing they were published on April Fools’ Day.
The Internet is different now. Tech companies often “announce” products that could actually be real—but they aren’t, because it’s April Fools’ Day!
Of course, to make things extra confusing, crazy announcements on April Fool’s Day can be real. Gmail was famously announced on April Fools’ Day in 2004, and people thought it was fake because there was no way Google could offer 1 GB of email storage. After all, Hotmail only offered 2 MB (0.2% of Gmail’s storage) at the time. So is it any surprise when people believe Google might actually announce a lawn gnome with Google Assistant, or , or even ? People expect companies not to deceive them with fake press releases, and it’s easy to overlook the date—especially when you find that story days or weeks later.
It’s…
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