April Fools
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008
Heard any good April Fools’ jokes lately? The Museum of Hoaxes has listed the “Top 100 April Fools’ Hoaxes of All Time” as judged by notoriety, absurdity, and number of people duped. Here are a few that I found particularly hilarious.
#57: Y2K CD Bug
In 1999 a Canadian radio station, in conjunction with Warner Music and Universal Music Group, informed its listeners that the arrival of Y2K would render all CD players unable to read music discs created before the year 2000. Luckily, the deejay said, there was a solution. Hologram stickers were available that would enable CD players to read the old-format discs. These stickers would be sold for approximately $2 apiece. Furious listeners, outraged at the thought of having to pay $2 for the stickers, immediately jammed the phones of both the radio station and the record companies, demanding that the stickers be given away for free. They continued to call even after the radio station revealed that the announcement was a joke.
#45: Daylight Savings Contest
In 1984 the Eldorado Daily Journal, based in Illinois, announced a contest to see who could save the most daylight for daylight savings time. The rules of the contest were simple: beginning with the first day of daylight savings time, contestants would be required to save daylight. Whoever succeeded in saving the most daylight would win. Only pure daylight would be allowed—no dawn or twilight light, though light from cloudy days would be allowed. Moonlight was strictly forbidden. Light could be stored in any container. The contest received a huge, nationwide response. The paper’s editor was interviewed by correspondents from CBS and NBC and was featured in papers throughout the country.
#36: Big Ben Goes Digital
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.
#4: The Taco Liberty Bell
In 1996 the Taco Bell Corporation announced that it had bought the Liberty Bell from the federal government and was renaming it the Taco Liberty Bell. Hundreds of outraged citizens called up the National Historic Park in Philadelphia where the bell is housed to express their anger. Their nerves were only calmed when Taco Bell revealed that it was all a practical joke a few hours later. The best line inspired by the affair came when White House press secretary Mike McCurry was asked about the sale, and he responded that the Lincoln Memorial had also been sold, though to a different corporation, and would now be known as the Ford Lincoln Mercury Memorial.
#1: The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest
In 1957 the respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of 
spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in, and many called up wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti trees. To this question, the BBC diplomatically replied that they should “place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.”
What’s your all time favorite?