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Jokes reign on Internet for April Fool's Day fun
By Katie Packer
Independent Florida Alligator (U. Florida)
04/02/2007

(U-WIRE) GAINESVILLE, Fla. — "Bracket Buster: Ohio State and Florida have mutually agreed on a tie and will not play the championship game," the Facebook Web site reported Sunday.

On April 1, many popular Web sites played practical jokes on the readers they serve.

Facebook, the social networking Web site used by many college students, ran bogus posts through its News Feed.

A new "LivePoke" service, for instance, promised to dispatch a live person to literally poke a friend of the user's choice.

"I thought somebody hacked Facebook," said Michael Hacker, a University of Florida freshman. "It was funny after I realized it was a joke."

Google introduced two prank services: Gmail Paper, which claimed to deliver users' e-mails in paper form, and Google TiSP, which promised a free wireless network that would operate through sewage lines.

Other popular sites posted fake content. NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day, for instance, depicted the first Quidditch match played in space — a reference to the Harry Potter fantasy series.

And fake products, including caffeine sticks that could be inhaled and a helmet attachment for the Wii, were featured on ThinkGeek.com.

"I think it's great that Web sites can have a sense of humor," Hacker said. "It made my day."

Copyright ©2007 Independent Florida Alligator via UWire



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