It Rocks Everything.

April Fools hoaxes in 2006

Hoaxes for this year included:

On the internet

• Ubuntu Pastebin The entire ubuntu pastebin has been turned ROT13 on us…
• PlanetHalfLife.com Large Half-Life news site turns pink.
• Givemebeats.com It’s a website where people sell music beats on. Starting March 31st 2006, The owner of the website, Mardix, told all the producers on the website that he’s filing a lawsuit complaint against them, and he’s going to sell everybody’s beat so he doesn’t go to jail. This created a panic on the website. People wanted to remove their beats, but their account was locked, making them impossible to make any changes. But later on that day, a new version is released.
• AOL UK announce a new reality show, where celebrities will operate on members of the public. This entertainment news item seems to be in AOL members only pages. The link for members of the public to apply to be operated on goes to April Fools hoax on Google.
• The online retailer ThinkGeek offered for sale various fake products such as a grow your own 1-up mushroom kit, a caffeine inhaler, wireless extension cords, an iZilla player, and a desktop tanning center. Their tagline: “Stuff for the Smart Masses” has the “M” crossed out to say, “Stuff for the Smart Asses”. ThinkGeek also put a banner announcing PlayStation 3 “now shipping”. The banner says: “click to order” but nothing happens as it is a not linked banner. On the bottom, you can see “Stop reading this. Your life surely can’t be so bad that you’re reading this useless swill. Avert gaze now. Go away.”
• Chicago-based furniture retailer Walter E. Smithe announced on their website (at http://www.smithe.com/field.htm) that they had signed an agreement with the Chicago Cubs to construct a dome over Wrigley Field, and to rename the park Walter E. Smithe Field.
• The Economist announced that GeneDupe is working on genetically engineering such mythical creatures as dragons, unicorns, and gryphons.
• Mobile Gazette announces plans by the British government to close down the country’s GSM networks for re-use with a top secret citizen surveillance program.
• Esctoday.com, a website covering the Eurovision Song Contest, reports that from 2007, the competition will be open to 55 countries, with five simultaneous semi-finals being held across Europe to determine which countries qualify for the final competition. This story actually leaked out on March 31 2006, due to the need to release press releases on the day before publication.
• Whirlpool, an Australian broadband news site, announced that Telstra will be rolling out its ADSL2+ service with useful bandwidth limited 2Mbit while “the remaining ADSL2+ bandwidth will be reserved for Telstra branded services such as Foxtel Digital via streaming set-top box, BigPond Movies, and an as-yet unnamed consumer VoIP product targetting consumers interested in a second phone line.”
• IWOOT, a UK gadget site, offers for sale a tiny device that downloads your brain’s memory to a 2GB USB Flash Drive.
• BMW UK BMW announce the new slow cameras gizmo.
• Blizzard Entertainment announced that the new Alliance race for their upcoming World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade will be Wisps. They possess the racial ability to detonate themselves in order to strengthen their fellow players or weaken enemies. Due to the fact that the player would be permanently dead after doing this, many players claim that this is a joke, considering the news was released on March 31 – the day before April Fool’s Day.

Source

Tech: april, fool, funny, joke