Janet CollinsApril Fools' Day Pranks
March 31st 2009 20:00
Today is April Fools’ Day although it is hard to verify its origins. Legend has it that the day dates back to the changing of the calendars from the Julian Calendar to the Gregorian Calendar back in the 1700s, the new calendar moving the first day of the year from April 1 back into March. April Fools were the ones who continued to celebrate New Years Day on April 1 many believe.
No one needs clarification of this it seems to pull a prank and for some reason which also remains obscure, it has been tradition to pull pranks, hoaxes and practical jokes on friends, family members, enemies or neighbours on this day in the year. The intention is to embarrass or make the victim of the joke feel gullible.
Here in Australia, as in the UK, New Zealand and Canada it is also tradition that the jokes have to be done before noon. Anyone pulling a prank on someone after that time, it is believed, becomes the April Fool himself.
While most of the pranks are pretty silly such as changing clocks to fool people, prentending to call an early meeting and them turning up to find there is no meeting or even calling people to tell them they had won a lotto or something, there have been a lot more clever pranks done by corporations and media outlets over the years.
Here’s a few of them:
In the 1950s a report by the Dutch television news that the Tower of Pisa had fallen over had many shocked people contacting the station.
In 1957, the BBC’s current affairs program, Panorama, broadcast a 3-minute spoof report on a Swiss spaghetti harvest beside Lake Lugano. The spaghetti tree is a totally fictitious tree.
An estimated eight million people watched the program that reported on how a mild winter had resulted in a bumper spaghetti harvest in Switzerland including a discussion how to breed a harvest that produced the perfect length.
The BBC switchboard was clogged the next day with audiences ringing up to either verify the authenticity of the story or ask about spaghetti cultivation.
In 1965, a BBC report about a trial of new technology allowing the transmission of odor over the airwaves to all viewers had many of its audience phone in to report its success. The BBC website repeated an online version of the hoax in 2007.
In 1976 listeners of BBC Radio 2 were told by British astronomer, Sir Patrick Moore, that a unique alignment of two planets would result in an upward gravitational pull. This, he said, would make people lighter at precisely 9:47 am on that day. He even invited his audience to jump in the air and experience “a strange floating sensation”. Dozens of listeners phoned in afterwards to say their experiment had worked.
In 1998, Burger King ran an ad in USA Today for Left Handed Whoppers. The new Whopper they said was designed for left-handed people and the condiments dripped out of the right side. Customers flocked to get the new Whoppers but some were quite adamant about having the “old right-handed” burger.
In 2005 the official NASA website ran a story claiming to have pictures of water on Mars. The picture was really a picture of a glass of water on a Mars Bar.
Not all pranks are funny as we all know and one of the worst has to be that of Boston shock jocks Opie and Anthony on WAAF. In 1998 they reported that Boston mayor Thomas Menino had been killed in a car accident.
The report was false but because Memino was on a flight at the time, he was unable to be contacted and news spread quickly around the city. News stations were forced to issue bulletins denying the report. Not surprisingly, the pair of DJs were out of work shortly after.
Most of the pranks are done in good fun though and it’s pretty well accepted everywhere that playing jokes on someone on this day is OK.
So have a Happy April Fools Day everyone and may any pranks you fall for have you laughing out loud!
sourced: wikipedia
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Comment by Morgan Bell
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Comment by moonglow
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Comment by Janet Collins
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That was pretty good. My favourite is the spagetti-trees.
Comment by Janet Collins
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How did you go this year? Were you the but of someone else's prank or was someone else the but of yours?
Thanks for the visit.
Comment by Janet Collins
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Yes, kids love jokes - probably would be disappointed with the carrots though.
Thanks for the comment.
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Comment by Deanna B
They're all on to me now, but those were some fun times!
Comment by Janet Collins
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I tried to pick some of the best ones and it was difficult because some of the ones I left out were up to par. I thought they were all good but the spagetti trees one was a classic.
I found one today that UK's Guardian newspaper did and posted it earlier. If you are interested, take a look at:
Really Long Link
Thanks for dropping by.
Comment by The Rusty Can
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I think the BBC did one about flying penguins too. They had Michael Palin covering the "story" complete with footage of penguins taking flight.
Comment by Janet Collins
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The Guardian newspaper did one today that was pretty funny. If you want to take a look, go to:
Really Long Link
Thanks a lot for the visit.
Comment by Janet Collins
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That was my favourite too only making a random selection I had to leave out quite a few good ones.
In the last two comments I have put a link to one I did from the Guardian this morning. It's pretty unbelievable but very funny.
Thanks for the comment.
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Comment by The wonderful Peter Yang
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Stay healthy and loose weight
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Cheers
Comment by Janet Collins
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Thank you Peter.