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Gmail's Mic Drop April Fool Backfires Horribly Costing People Their Jobs (telegraph.co.uk)

Posted by msmash on from the prank-gone-wrong dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report on The Telegraph: Google is facing a fierce backlash after introducing a new tool for April Fools' Day that has cost some people potential jobs. The new Gmail Mic Drop button, which sits next to the normal send button, ends an email thread forever by muting all future replies to the sender, and firing off a gif of a minion 'mic dropping' at the same time. After an immediate backlash the feature was taken down early on Friday morning. Some people using it had failed to see the funny side, saying that by accidentally pressing the button instead of simply sending the email, they have appeared rude or unprofessional, in some cases costing them jobs.

11 of 252 comments (clear)

  1. Good! by Lumpy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    this is how we weed out the dumb people at the office.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    1. Re:Good! by billybob2001 · · Score: 5, Funny

      You mean UTF-1000

    2. Re:Good! by invid · · Score: 5, Funny

      I liked the score better when it was in hex.

      --
      The Moore-Murphy Law: The number of things that will go wrong will double every 2 years.
    3. Re:Good! by Translation+Error · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Falling victim to a bad user interface does not mean someone is dumb.

      --
      When someone says, "Any fool can see ..." they're usually exactly right.
    4. Re:Good! by omnichad · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I can't figure out what a 100 score actually represents

      You don't belong here.

    5. Re:Good! by unrtst · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Ah, it's all in binary now.

      Unless you have mod points and mod someone. Sadly, it then displays in normal base 10 after the mod.

  2. So glad I don't use Gmail! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't need Google's help; I never get a second interview in any case, because I ask the hard questions!

    Are you interviewing applicants just to make yourself look important?
    Are you seriously planning to hire anyone?
    What exactly is it that you think you do here?

  3. I am fed up with these icons and UI changes by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Funny
    I work in software and I sit through endless hours of meeting where we mull over mundane user interface changes. We agonize over minor things like reorganizing a menu tree that has grown too big. Or replacing an icon chosen ages ago in a hurry, which does not really represent the feature it stands for, but our users are used to it and have learned to associate it. Is it worth replacing it? etc.

    Then comes google and android. Menu items and user interface paradigms and rules are changed at the whim. One day it is the "gear", suddenly it is gone and there is a the three lines, suddenly it is nine dots in a matrix, then dot dot dot... Some thing that appears to be some decoration in the phone app is the "new" interface for a well known functionality used to be located somewhere else.

    Ages ago I watched a young boy play Super Mario Brothers. He ran along some path, stopped at some seemingly random location, banged his head on the brick 8 times, a gold bar fell out. Pocketed the points and ran along. I asked him, "how did you know there is a gold bar on that brick?". He said, "Well, you keep banging your head on every brick in the wall to see if there is something?". "You banged your head on EVERY brick eight times on this tunnel?", He goes, "nah, I banged some 30 or 40 times, this brick needs only 8 hits".

    I wonder if that boy grew up, got a job designing user interface for Android apps. They seem to think, after every release the user should try every gesture on every pixel to re-learn how to use this app.

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
    1. Re:I am fed up with these icons and UI changes by safetyinnumbers · · Score: 5, Funny

      "You banged your head on EVERY brick eight times on this tunnel?", He goes, "nah, I banged some 30 or 40 times, this brick needs only 8 hits".

      I never before appreciated just how well video games could prepare you for life in general.

  4. Re:Don't use Gmail for your work. by geekmux · · Score: 5, Funny

    Seriously, free webmail is unprofessional.

    Good luck explaining that to an entire generation who thinks that running a business online consists of creating a Facebook page and signing up for Gmail.

  5. OT: Good Job New Slashdot Owners! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It looks like the new Slashdot owners are posting real stories on April 1 instead of fake stories that weren't even remotely funny. Good job. That alone makes Slashdot better than under any previous ownership, including Malda.

    They did do one cute Easter egg which I found cute. That's doing April Fools the right way.