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Some Gmail Users Lost Their Jobs Due To Google's April Fool's Day Prank

Accepted submission by -- OriginalOwner_ http://tinyurl.com/OriginalOwner at 2016-04-05 02:49:22
/dev/random

from the mirth-gone-awry dept.

fossBytes reports [fossbytes.com]

Just for a single day, Gmail users were able to choose 'drop the mic' during email conversations.

"Simply reply to any email using the new 'Send + Mic Drop' button. Everyone will get your message, but that's the last you'll ever hear about it. Yes, even if folks try to respond, you won't see it."

If you used this feature, you could find the [replies] in [the] 'all mail' tab, but they would remain absent from the typical notifications. As a result, many people easily missed their mails.

Google [thought up] this prank to give you some kind of relief. If you felt [you were] being unnecessarily [...] tagged in an email, [you could say] goodbye to that email thread forever.

But, according to the claims made by a writer called Allan Pashby, he ended up losing his job, as he sent an email with [the] mic drop GIF to his boss. Pushy wasn't so lucky and his boss took offence and fired him with an angry voice mail.

The placement of the button could be held responsible for this backlash, as it sat directly next to the default Send button.

"Accidentally hit this new 'mic drop' button halfway through composing a professional email. Dying to remove this thing", wrote one user on Google's product forum.

Another user wrote, "This is horrible--just sent an email to a client with this stupid icon on it. I can't afford these stupid pranks!"

Considering the fact that it's April Fool's Day, many of these claims could be fake. However, keeping in [...] mind the possibility of some outrage, Google has removed the feature from Gmail:

"Well, it looks like we pranked ourselves this year. ?? Due to a bug, the MicDrop feature inadvertently caused more headaches than laughs. We're truly sorry. The feature has been turned off. If you are still seeing it, please reload your Gmail page."


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