April Fool's Day stories

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2013/03/31/bernstein-ucla-hired-a-scumbag/

 

I tend to agree with Riptide. Sidd Finch was a fantastic read, but after that what do you do for an encore? Does your audience expect an April Fool story every year?

It's one thing for Price is Right to do an April Fool showcase or for a TV show to do an AF episode, but at what point do you stop...

 

I would say, "We have a winnah!"

 

SI did it perfectly almost 30 years ago and just about every attempt to do something similar since then has failed miserably...

 

Including Sports Illustrated's latest.

 

I don't think you could pull off a Sidd Finch level prank in this day and age.

 

NPR did one today on national parks allowing for corporate sponsorship as a way to combat budget cuts. Nicely done. At the end -- to make sure we knew it was a joke -- it ended by saying Band Aid would be the corporate sponsor of Wounded Knee.
Worth a chuckle.

 

One year, they tagged out at the end of an hour by saying "Support was provided by Soylent Green - Soylent Green, it's people."

 

At my paper, we did an April Fools page that people bit on. Among the stories was one about a guy who was wanted for breaking into a town's local Taco Bell. The "composite police drawing" was a PHOTO of my boss, who lived in the town and who had a well-known love of the Bell.

The day the paper came out, the town's police department started getting calls from residents who had "seen" the guy in the "illustration". The cops got a good laugh, because the guys looked nothing like my boss. My boss, who had written the story, still laughs about that.

 

I'm surprised nobody went with a story about the Catholic church working with Nike on rebranding and new uniforms to attract a younger demo.

 

I saw two pretty good ones:

1) Google introduced Google Nose, which would allow users to identify objects by smell.

2) The 49ers unveiled a Jim Harbaugh Signature clothing line. Khakis and black sweatshirt for all occasions!

 

It will never be topped. Stop trying.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidd_Finch

Response

The story was released in late March 1985.[2] Mets fans were overjoyed at their luck in finding such a player, and flooded Sports Illustrated with requests for more information.[4] The sports editor of one of New York's newspapers complained to Jay Horwitz, the public relations director of the Mets, for allowing Sports Illustrated to have the scoop. Two general managers called Commissioner of Baseball Peter Ueberroth to ask how their batters could face Finch safely. Meanwhile, the St. Petersburg Times sent a reporter to find Finch, and a radio talk show host claimed he saw Finch pitch.[1]
The Mets gave Finch a locker between George Foster and Darryl Strawberry.[7] The three major networks, CBS, NBC, and ABC, and the local St. Petersburg, Florida newspapers sent reporters to Al Lang Stadium for a press conference about Finch. At the April 2 press conference, Berton announced his retirement.[9]