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posted by martyb on Monday April 01 2019, @12:37AM   Printer-friendly
from the just-kidding! dept.

Microsoft leads the way in banning April Fools' Day pranks

Everyone hates April Fools' Day, and Microsoft is taking a stand against its own corporate pranks. Microsoft's marketing chief Chris Capossela has warned all employees to not participate in the process of annoying hoaxes on Monday. In an internal memo, obtained and verified by The Verge, Capossela explains that "data tells us these stunts have limited positive impact and can actually result in unwanted news cycles." He encourages all teams inside Microsoft not to do any public-facing April Fools' Day stunts.

"I appreciate that people may have devoted time and resources to these activities, but I believe we have more to lose than gain by attempting to be funny on this one day," says Capossela. That's probably a safe bet, as we've seen some April Fools' Day pranks backfire spectacularly in the past. Google was forced to apologize for adding Despicable Me minions into emails and muting threads a few years ago, causing email havoc for Gmail users. Microsoft has also participated in many April Fools' Day pranks over the years, including an MS-DOS mobile for Windows Phone and Google insults.

#FakeNews?

Also at BGR.

See also: Everyone Should Follow Microsoft's Lead in Banning April Fools' Day Pranks


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  • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday April 01 2019, @02:50AM (4 children)

    Laziness is my second favorite tradition but being a wiseass is still in the lead. Fear not though, I plan on putting an "Okay, I've seen it. Now stop doing it." button on any future site pranks. The Geocities-looking theme even annoyed me after a while and I'm the one who made it.

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  • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday April 01 2019, @05:08AM (3 children)

    by aristarchus (2645) on Monday April 01 2019, @05:08AM (#822972) Journal

    OReilly? then why is my Soylent Blue?

    • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday April 01 2019, @06:10AM (2 children)

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Monday April 01 2019, @06:10AM (#822984) Journal

      Go to preferences, select the Homepage tab, on "Select Theme" choose "Chillax", click "Save".

      Actually that's my default theme because I like the blue more than the standard red.

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      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.