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The crushing lameness of April Fools Day on the Internet.

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The crushing lameness of April Fools Day on the Internet.

#1
I have a sense of humor. Really I do.

I just don't find being pounded with systematic absurdity for an entire day every year as being very funny.

I don't know how to solve it. It seems every single company and publication that communicates via the web has a corporate communications department or something that thinks it's a corporate priority to come out with something for April Fools. The Internet systematizes, amplifies, focuses, fully resources, funds, schedules, plans and implements high production value foolery. Corporate drone: "Larry, Sergey, have you signed off yet on this years $4M April Fools budget? How are we going to attract and recruit the best engineers unless we've got a reputation for the very best and most foolish April Fools trickery?" Ugh.

It's just kind of silly and boring and makes we wish April 2 would come as soon as possible. As I read the Internet on April 1 I just try to self filter out all the silly unbelievable garbage. Most news sites (including HN) are hardly worth reading April 1.

You know when someone who thinks they are funny insists on telling lame jokes, and the audience feels an obligation to give an acknowledging guffaw? It's like an whole Internet day worth of that.

I feel like the Grinch Who Stole April Fools but really it has to be said. If you've got it in mind to do some fine ol' foolin then maybe the classy thing to do is leave the foolin to others and spare us one more depressingly lame absurdity.

Re: The crushing lameness of April Fools Day on the Internet.

#8
> It seems every single company and publication that communicates via the web has a corporate communications department or something that thinks it's a corporate priority to come out with something for April Fools.

It's not really the lameness of April Fools Day, it's the lameness of internet businesses, social media marketing, or marketers and salesmen in general. They need to take over, trivialize, devaluate and destroy every thing that becomes special in society, in hope to get some additional sales. I also don't know how to solve this, but April Fools Day is only a more visible than usual demonstration of a problem that happens every single day.

Re: The crushing lameness of April Fools Day on the Internet.

#9
20 years ago, the average person was exposed to a handful of media channels. So, if they each produced one April Fools gag, they wouldn't have been annoying.

Now, our media diet consists of hundreds of channels, sites and blogs, and it seems like every single one of them does an April Fools gag

The result is tired, formulaic humor, repeated ad nauseam.

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