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Top 10 April Fools Stories

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the true-history-in-the-making dept.

SlashRating© 10 slashdottit! tm ddelmonte writes with a link to a brietbart story on the top ten April Fools Day hoaxes, as determined by the San Diego-based Museum of Hoaxes. Two great British examples: "In 1957, a BBC television show announced that thanks to a mild winter and the virtual elimination of the spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. Footage of Swiss farmers pulling strands of spaghetti from trees prompted a barrage of calls from people wanting to know how to grow their own spaghetti at home. In 1977, British newspaper The Guardian published a seven-page supplement for the 10th anniversary of San Serriffe, a small republic located in the Indian Ocean consisting of several semicolon-shaped islands. A series of articles described the geography and culture of the two main islands, named Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse."

13 of 234 comments (clear)

  1. And so it begins... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Be back on April 2, although I'm not sure it'll be any different than a usual Sunday with Taco at the helm.

    PONIES~~~! etc.

    1. Re:And so it begins... by Seumas · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yeah, I won't be back for about 48 hours. Slashdot typically suffers from a severe case of mental retardation on April first. More than the usual Slashtardation, even. It would be interesting if they at least tried to just slip one or two believable items in and worked them in a humorous way, but it just turns into one large guffaw. It's like when a four year old kid learns the "pull my finger and fart" thing and then does it every two minutes for an entire week straight.

    2. Re:And so it begins... by coolgeek · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Make sure to click the "slashdotit" link to get the full effect...

      --

      cat /dev/null >sig
  2. OMG PONIES!!! by Red+Cape · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I LUV CUTE THINGS!

    --
    I Hate Allan
  3. Ponies by jibjibjib · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Mod this comment Insightful, for no particular reason.

  4. Re:"slashdottit!"? by GrumpySimon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm looking forward to fanboy posts about what Kevin Rose had for breakfast, and the turning off of threaded comments mode. Yay!

    --
    henry -- the human evolution news relay
  5. Re:"slashdottit!"? by DaveM753 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    While you're at it, would you mind taking care of my eyes, too?

    (bleehhhhh....)

  6. Oh yeah... by Speare · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Thanks for reminding me a bit early that the entire techno-hip tragically-leet intarweb will be a steaming pile of uselessness for the next 30 hours or so. I can just skip the inanity and catch up on anything interesting later.

    And by the way, on Safari, the new voting doohickey completely and unavoidably obscures the left chunk of the story's blurb.

    --
    [ .sig file not found ]
  7. Re:"slashdottit!"? by Falladir · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Have you read the comments on digg? We don't want them here anyway. It's better that they leave.

  8. Re:Stupid by jimmydevice · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Goddemmed Newfies!

  9. It is non-slashdot day for me by houghi · · Score: 2, Insightful

    What would be nice is if only two or three stories would be pranks on april first. Now all editors will be falling over each other to get some childish and stupid prank trough.

    The best would be to have just 2 or three great ones, instead of many, many, many bad ones. And the best ones are prepared way in advance.

    This is just like if everybody telling you all day that your shoelaces are undone, and you wear shoes without laces. The first time you fall for it, The 50th time you hit somebody in the nose.

    --
    Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  10. The BBC seems to have the best ones by John+Jorsett · · Score: 2, Insightful
    In 1980 the BBC reported that Big Ben, in order to keep up with the times, was going to be given a digital readout. It received a huge response from listeners protesting the change. The BBC Japanese service also announced that the clock hands would be sold to the first four listeners to contact them, and one Japanese seaman in the mid-Atlantic immediately radioed in a bid.



    - Museum of Hoaxes #35 (Google cache. Real site seems to be down today. One guess as to why.)

  11. Another article (the guardian)... by karldane2020 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ...from last year. Includes more on the San Serriffe thing.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,174 4581,00.html