The Celebration of April Fools and Foolishness
Every year we celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, commemorate religious events, honour individuals, and other equally important occasions such as the Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Christmas etc. However, April 1st stands out as a truly bizarre celebration of foolishness and stupidity. While some unsuspecting individuals go about their day in a regular manner and fall to tricks of others, a few others go on an overdrive to dupe their friends and acquaintances. But the best ones often come from least suspected sources - businesses and media.
On 1st April 1957, BBC played the first recorded media hoaxes by running a three minute segment on the popular news show Panorama. Hosted by celebrated broadcaster of the times Richard Dimbleby, the programme featured a Swiss family plucking out strands of spaghetti from a tree and laying them for drying under the sun. Subsequent to the broadcast BBC was deluged with telephone calls from hundreds of people who wanted to know how they could grow spaghetti in their backyard. To read more about the Spaghetti incident and to watch the video, visit the BBC website here.
Ever since BBC’s broadcast, businesses and media have found novel ways to fool the public. Continuing with the trend, on the third page of today’s edition of Metro is a big editorial on how BMW has invented a new system to discourage canines from relieving on the vehicles wheels. The new system apparently works by delivering harmless electric shock to the canine. Could this be true? Of course, Page 3 on the Metro often has weird announcements. But still strange news to come on April Fool’s day. Further on one of the inside pages, Guinness runs a one page advert of a pint of froth and a tiny amount of stout as the top with the words “For One Day Only”. Save the paper for the article and the advert.
2008 April Fool’s Day seems to be high on the list of a few businesses. Here’s a list of few of the April Fool’s hoaxes for this year:
- Google: From 2014, Google in association with Richard Branson’s Virgin Group aims to colonise Mars. More details here. Google also offers a Free Wake up Kit, lets people send emails to the past etc. Google has consistently fooled people around for years. A more comprehensive list of Google’s Hoaxes can be found here.
- Pizza Hut, owing to the popularity of pasta among its customers is renaming itself as Pasta Hut.
- Pizza Hut (UK) to offer domestic cleaning services to all customers for an additional fee of £5, if they place an online order for a Pizza for home delivery.
- The Sun reports that the French President Nicholas Sarkozy is set to have an operation to increase his height by 5 inches to make him an inch taller than his gorgeous wife Carla Bruni.
There are many more out there. If you have not already been fooled and would like to keep on top of all the fast ones others try to pull on you, you should check out the April Fool’s Index on Museum of Hoaxes and familiarise yourself with the various pranks people could play on you.
Filed under: General, Matters Webby, Uncategorized on April 1st, 2008
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