Waxy.org is the sandbox of Andy Baio, an
independent journalist and programmer living in
Portland, Oregon. I created Like last year, I'll be keeping a running list of my favorite examples of the web's April Fools Day (aka "Internet Jackass Day") silliness. (There's another much more thorough list being updated constantly.) Wired has a roundup of the bigger pranks, with a confirmation by Google that Gmail isn't a hoax. Gizmodo added a gadget-oriented list.
- Interactive fiction Quake port, with playable downloads!
- Google's hiring for their lunar lab
-
Cold war bomb warmed by chickens(not a hoax) - 1UP's Metal Gear Solid 3 preview
- Teevee.org bought by Salon
- Maddox gets happy
- Dave Winer revives Netscape comeback, steals back RSS
- EFF merges with the DOJ
- Homestarrunner loses its domain name (give it a minute)
- XML Control Protocol
- Apple adds bleeper to Garageband
- Low Culture and J-Walk both find their femininie sides
- Mezzoblue and Stop Design swap designs
- Java ported to Apple //c
- Google files IPO
- Metafilter becomes a wiki
- ThinkGeek's new products
- Video iPod announced
- Python on the C64
- First Annual March for Web Standards
- Streaming audio over Usenet
- W32ValidXHTML.A validation worm
- Livejournal's Serial Adder hacker, and the community response
- Gawker, Weblogs Inc, AlwaysOn merge
- Duke University buys public domain
- RIAA sues Google, Internet doomed
- IRS announces social networking service
- Super-wide flat-screen TV
- GMail screenshot (confirmed fake!)
- Day lost to stronger trade winds
- Avril's Theorem
- OpenBSD on the Gameboy Advance
- Special Edition "Virtual Boy" Gameboy Advance
- Podboy, Gameboy emulator for the iPod (this one almost fooled me)
- NPR's Vanity ZIP Codes
8:44 AM
I don't know if you like Homestar Runner, but their prank is one of my favorites so far.
10:00 AM
Check out this April Fools Joke: "Bush tries to outsource the deficit".
11:18 AM
Gapers' Block got bought by The Reader.
12:21 PM
andy... you rule. i would even go so far as to say "you roxors my soxors".
12:45 PM
LMAO - "I shopped at ThinkGeek on April Fools Day, and all I got was this lousy shirt!"
1:09 PM
Even Nature has contributed to the jackassishness.
1:57 PM
The Motley Fool has gotten in on the skylarking, with some headlines like "Buffett Buys Krispy Kreme," "The Motley Fool X-Treme Visa," and the bit about their compliance with the FCC is actually a bit chuckle-tastic...
1:58 PM
*sigh*
That link above should have been:
http://www.fool.com/news/take/2004/take040401.htm
3:23 PM
Yum Cha L-Plates in Sydney
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/03/31/1080544541410.html
3:26 PM
That Gmail screenshot is almost certainly fake unless Google is using a slightly modified version of the default layout of SquirrelMail.
5:32 PM
i like these kinds of jokes- as long as they're clever, that is. i also think it was brilliant of google to make gmail "public" on april fool's day. nothing gets people talking online more than "is it real? or are they being jackasses?" dilemmas. it's so smart, really- no way they did it on accident.
5:40 PM
Thanks for the link. I passed around the teevee link to the Salon office and we're quite amused.
6:25 PM
http://www.yourethemannowdog.com and http://www.dustindiamond.com
7:23 PM
Check out the case of someone actually believing the NPR story about portable zip codes
7:40 PM
I successfully played the terrorist plot card.
9:21 PM
My favorite April Fools Day prank was from NORML
12:55 AM
http://www.designdetector.com/permalink.php?p=0404_FirefoxRenamedAgain
8:30 PM
Wow, those green screen shots of the Apple IIc really bring back some memories. I had a IIe myself, but my friend had a IIc. Mostly I played games back then - the one that really stands out in my memory is Sammy Lightfoot, a super early side-scroller where you played as this little guy bouncing around on trampolines and elevators.
12:42 PM
I've heard about some of these jokes but I found much more of them here. All of us in the office were laughing our heads off for a while...