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This section is in advanced English and is only intended to be a guide, not to be taken too seriously!
April Fool's Day - April 1st
April 1st is the day people try to trick their friends, to make them behave like fools. Ranging from the elaborate practical joke to the obvious Your zip's undone the joker gloats April Fool when the unsuspecting victim falls for it. No one is exempt until noon but after that the joking must cease or the prank rebounds on the joker with the rhyme "April Fool is gone and past, You're the bigger fool at last." A favourite joke is to send someone on a fool's errand, a search for something that does not exist, a friend of mine was sent to buy tartan paint once.
Origin
In Britain, fooling at this time of year has gone on for centuries, however the origin of the custom still remains obscure. There are several theories to account for it.
One theory is that in Europe, until the sixteenth century, March 25th, the first day of the Vernal Equinox Festival, was New Year's Day. On April 1st, the last day of the festival, people used to give presents to one another. In 1564, Charles IX, the French king, adopting the Gregorian calendar and fixed January 1st as New Year's Day. Those who were against the revision continued to express their complaints by giving presents or paying New Year's visits on April 1st. In the following years, these traditionalists who insisted on celebrating the New Year at its old time were mocked as fools and people would play pranks and tricks on them and called them ` Poisson d'avril ', meaning April Fish. This must have been so much fun that it spread all over the world and people played tricks on everyone, not just the people who didn't accept the new calendar.
Other people say it's just a continuation of a festival in honour of the Celtic god of Mirth but most popular belief is that it's a reaction to the change in season and the start of spring. Whatever its origin, making fools of people on this day remains one of the most flourishing of all British customs.
In Scotland, for example, April Fool's Day is actually celebrated for two days. The second day is devoted to pranks involving the posterior region of the body. It is called Taily Day. The origin of the "kick me" sign can be traced to this observance.
Famous hoaxes
Even the television stations and newspapers get in on the act.
Some of the more famous April Fool's include.
- A report that hawks carrying cameras would be used on the motorways by police to catch speeding motorists.
- A news report about sheep with grass growing on their backs because the weather was so wet.
- Numerous news reports about official sightings of the Loch Ness monster.
- A documentary on Spaghetti was broadcasted a few years ago by the BBC claiming that spaghetti grew on trees .
Some companies get in on the act too - BMW run a spoof advert every year.
- A full-page BMW car advertisement was run on On 1 April 1986, about their new car for driving between Great Britain and the Continent. It was both left and right hand drive, had pedals on both driver's and passenger's side, had a detachable steering wheel which could go either side and a full set of instruments on each side, the unused one being covered by a lovely walnut panel. (I would have bought one!)
- A mechanism that inflated the car tyres automatically was described by BMW one year.
Even the most serious Brits can't resist, the British magazine, New Scientist, often puts April Fool articles in their issue near the 1st of April. The rest of the magazine would have the correct date at the top of the page, but this page would have "1 April" at the top.
Basically don't believe anything you read, hear or are told on April 1st!
Best April Fool's Jokes 2004 - 2009
April Fool's Jokes In 2004
CBBC's Newsround website claims the planets of the Solar system will be renamed after characters from The Lord of the Rings - Earth will be named Gandalf.
Both The Independent and The Today Programme claimed Brian Eno had crafted an electronic remix of the theme tune of the radio soap opera The Archers to replace the theme that had been used for over 50 years.
An advert by BMW claimed new 'SHEF technology' would allow car drivers to cook their evening meals whilst driving home.
The Sun reported that British Police were fitting hawks with speed cameras to catch lawbreaking motorists.
The Daily Mail included photographs purporting to be the Queen gambling on horse racing amongst her subjects at a local Bookmaker.
Google announced to start interviewing candidates for their new lunar hosting and research center. An email to the address listed return.
April Fool's Jokes In 2005
MozillaNews reported that Google would be acquiring the Mozilla Foundation, as a whole.
BMW printed a full page ad in a number of national UK newspapers (including The Times, The Guardian, The Independent, and the Daily Mail) saying that in 2007 the EU was to ban right-handed cars being driven in mainland Europe (effectively banning every British car), and that they had invented steering wheel-less technology.
The Today programme on BBC Radio 4 reported that, as a result of an obscure 19th century rule of succession of the House of Saxe-Coburg, Camilla Parker-Bowles's son, Thomas Parker-Bowles, who is older than Prince William, will become second in line to the British throne following the wedding of Prince Charles and Camilla on 8th April 2005.
The Guardian reported that Charles, Prince of Wales had been appointed 'Countryside Tsar' by Tony Blair in the run-up to the imminent general election. The ban on foxhunting will be revoked, as long as it is made into a sport of the people.
The Sun reported that EU bureaucrats wanted to ban April Fools' Day because of physical and mental injury caused to the victims of jokes;
The Sun also reported that gypsies had camped in Windsor Castle, claiming a centuries-old right to pitch tents there.
April Fool's Jokes In 2006
On Newsround, a BBC news program for children, presenter Jake Humphrey announced that David Beckham will not be playing in the 2006 World Cup as his parents are Scottish.
BBC Radio 4's Today Programme announces that the UK Theme Tune was to be replaced with a European Union Theme.
On 2-Ten FM in the United Kingdom, station claims that an elephant is causing traffic problems on the M4.
The Daily Mail announced that the door at Number 10 Downing Street that had been black for 270 years had been painted red by Tony Blair.
The Sun published an article about a penguin found on the River Thames. The article had a comment from Lil Faroop, an anagram of April Fool.
April Fool's Jokes In 2007
BMW: As ever BMW UK ran an April Fools' newspaper ad; this year's, in The Sunday Times, The Sunday Telegraph and The Observer announced a new instant messaging technology that allows drivers to display text (in mirror writing) on their windshield to "communicate advice, warnings, helpful driving tips and salutations ... without even lifting a finger".
Burning Man: The annual festival announced on their website announces that the annual theme will be changed from "The Green Man", a nature related theme, to "Sports", "to celebrate man's relationship to games of skill, and competitive challenges with small round balls".
Christ Church Cathedral, New Zealand: According to a newspaper report, the cathedral was to be pulled down next week due to structural damage, and the site was purchased by a Russian businessman for a hotel and aquarium. The office of Dean of Christchurch received numerous phone calls about the story from concerned locals.
Daily Mirror magazine Celebs on Sunday, claimed that Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair was to become a full time actor once he left Number 10 - starting off as Catherine Tate's Nan character's boyfriend.
DeviantArt released a news article stating that the Help Desk was going to become a pay-only feature. Letters in the article were bolded which spelled out "April fools" and some punctuation, when clicked, linked to an image announcing the joke.
eBay added an "Unbelievable Deals!" section to its home page, with the following list of "Top 10 Deals":
o Cow Licks
o Flying Carpets
o Happiness
o A Clue
o Your Face on Mt. Rushmore
o Dream Date
o Electoral Votes
o Ocean Front Property in Arizona
o A Vowel
o Evaporated Water
Google announced several new services including:
Gmail Paper, a free paper archiving service for any and all Gmail messages.
Google TiSP (beta), free in-home wireless broadband "via fiber-optic cable strung through your local municipal sewage lines.
The Independent reported that a "Grow-your-own Viagra craze" was occurring, because the active ingredient could be extracted from winter heath.
The Japan Times reported that the famous landmark / meeting place statue of Hachikō had been stolen, and that a sister city in France had offered to replace it with a bronze poodle.
The Mail on Sunday reported 'Council inspectors to demand £5 'carbon offset' for barbecues'.
News of the World published an article announcing the introduction of the square dartboard at this year's PDC UK Open Darts.
PC Magazine discussed "10 Revolutionary Technologies" including a helmet for Wii usage and a Wi-Fi toothbrush.
Ryanair's website has a picture relating to Ryanair space travel, which when clicked went to a "GOTCHA" page with an offer of free flights.
The Sunday Telegraph ran a story about the organisers of the 2012 Olympics in London considering the possibility of sharing the Olympics with Paris due to lack of funding. Also, in the section where the newspaper normally profiles a well-known figure, the well-known figure of the week was Satan. The newspaper also contained an advert for "ParkUp", a new vehicle technology that allowed cars to park up walls to save urban parking congestion.
The Sunday Times Travel section reported the launch of Filipino budget airline "QuikAir" which offered "the world's first commuter service" with middle and aisle seats removed to provide standing room on flights.
April Fool's Jokes In 2008
BBC - As part of its promotion of the new BBC iPlayer, the BBC showed alleged video footage backing up the claim that one of its wildlife documentary teams had secured never-before-seen footage showing penguins flying in the Antarctic skies
BMW: announced the Canine Repellent Alloy Protection system.
Daily Express: published a story that the clock faces Big Ben were being taken down and repaired, and a digital clock would stand in its place. It even showed a picture of this.
Daily Mail: published a picture of the British chancellor, Alistair Darling, playing a National Lottery scratchcard in a newsagent
Daily Mirror: announced a new type of dog racing: Dog Racing on Ice.
Google: introduced a scratch-and-sniff feature for certain books on Google books.
Guardian: announced Carla Bruni, France's First Lady, was to head a government initiative to improve style amongst Britons.
The Sun: reported that Nicolas Sarkozy was to enter surgery to make him as tall as his wife, Carla Bruni, after being subject to ridicule over his height during his trip to London.
Virgin Media: announced that the US was to scrap the dollar and join the Euro.
April Fool's Jokes In 2009
Google introduced CADIE a "Cognitive Autoheuristic Distributed-Intelligence Entity" stating that "For several years now a small research group has been working on some challenging problems in the areas of neural networking, natural language and autonomous problem-solving. Last fall this group achieved a significant breakthrough: a powerful new technique for solving reinforcement learning problems, resulting in the first functional global-scale neuro-evolutionary learning cluster." It linked to a blog that showed Cadie had a liking for pandas.
The BBC announced the BBC iPlayer Toaster Edition. Which looked at first glance like a regular toaster, but with the front panel sporting a 7" 1280x800 OLED display.
YouTube invited some users to look at a new "viewing experience", which actually caused the whole layout including the video they were watching to flip upside down.
Ice cream company Ben & Jerry's created a fake Web site, Cyclone Dairy, which claimed to only sell milk coming from cloned cows.
The Guardian announced that it was shutting down both its print edition and Web site, turning instead to a Twitter-only format. "Experts say any story can be told in 140 characters," they said.
Hotels.com ran an advertisement offering hotel room bookings on the moon which would be offered on European websites starting at £800 a night.
Car manufacturer BMW announced that it had developed "Magnetic Tow Technology," an ingenious new system that locks on to the car in front via an enhanced magnetic beam and once your BMW is attached you are free to release your foot from the accelerator and turn off your engine."
The Taipei Times, one of three English-language dailies in Taiwan, fooled many readers with a report that two pandas donated by China to the Taipei Zoo were, in fact, brown forest bears dyed black and white.
The Daily Mail ran a doctored photo of Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, walking out of a sexy lingerie store. She had recently been embroiled in a scandal after her husband downloaded two pay-per-view adult films, the cost of which Smith then included as part of an MP expenses claim.
The London Telegraph revealed a plan to generate electricity by harnessing the power of fish migrating upstream. "The project, codenamed 'Finetics', builds on Japanese technology that captures energy from people walking over pressure sensitive mats at train stations.
Research found that a typical salmon, which zips through waters at a top speed of 12 metres (40ft) per second, can over a 100m (330ft) stretch generate enough electricity to make 18 cups of tea, while the more shy rudd will only trigger enough power for three cups.
Multiplied many times over by the millions of fish that thrive in rivers and waters across England and Wales, the Environment Agency scientists estimate the amount of electricity generated could power around 30,000 homes a year."
British supermarket chain Waitrose placed ads in newspapers announcing the availability of a new fruit, the pinana (a combination of pineapple and banana). The text of the ad read, "Pinanas. Fresh in today and exclusive to Waitrose. If you find that all Waitrose pinanas have sold out, don't worry, there's 50% off our essential Waitrose strawberries."
A Virus/Worm, called Conficker spread to millions of computers, releasing personal info and deleting files. This was supposed to be a joke, but no one was laughing.
"The first of April, some do say,
Is set apart for All Fools' Day.
But why the people call it so,
Nor I, nor they themselves do know.
But on this day are people sent
On purpose for pure merriment."
Poor Robin's Almanac, 1790
