Today is the first day of April and people all over the world “offically” celebrate April Fool’s Day. This means people will be pulling off different types of pranks and jokes. In the Internet, this means another set of April Fools Day pranks or hoaxes from Internet giant Google which I’m sure will fool a lot of people like last year’s Topeka prank.
Here’s a list of the Google pranks/hoaxes for 2011:
1. Youtube 1911 Phrygian Mode
YouTube added a new button on the YouTube video player which when clicked by the user, applies a video filter on the video and replace the audio with piano music resembling the film style of 1911 in a Phrygian mode. If a video have subtitles enabled, intertitles will be displayed displaying the dialogue.
To enable the Phrygian mode, just open any video on YouTube and click on the 1911 button (lower right corner).
2. Gmail Motion
The mouse and keyboard were invented before the Internet even existed. Since then, countless technological advancements have allowed for much more efficient human computer interaction. Why then do we continue to use outdated technology? Introducing Gmail Motion — now you can control Gmail with your body.
3. Google Autocompleter
We’re hiring autocompleters for Google Search! Are you passionate about helping people? Are you intuitive? Do you often feel like you know what your friends and family are thinking and can finish their thoughts before they can? Are you an incredibly fast Google searcher? Like, so fast that you can do 20 searches before your mom does 1?
4. Chromercise
Want to increase your hands’ STRENGTH and DEXTERITY while browsing the web FASTER and fitting into sleeker, SEXIER gloves?
Chromercise is the finger fitness program you’ve been drumming the table for. BUILD muscle tone and flexibility! ELIMINATE unsightly upper-finger flab! Surf the Net like a speed-typing master! Put the world in your hands–GET CHROMERCISED!
5. Google Japan Doodles
Because of the devastation caused by the recent earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Google Japan featured never-before featured drawings from its 2009 Google Doodle competition themed “What I Love About Japan” instead of having an April Fools Joke or hoax. This year’s April Fools joke is postponed for next year.
6. Google 穿越æœç´¢ (Google Teleport)
Google Teleport is a service that allows users to travel in time. The site is in Simpliefied Chinese and claims to take users on a journey through space and time.
6. Google Search Fonts
Search for “helvetica” or “comic sans” on Google Search and the user will be brought to a whole page using the Comic Sans font.
7. Comic Sans for Everyone
Here at Google, the Webmaster Team is always running experiments and conducting research to improve user experience and increase conversion rates across our websites.
Following some rigorous user testing of 41 different fonts, investigating how each affected user experience, we discovered one font consistently outperformed all others when it comes to user satisfaction, level of engagement, understanding web content, productivity, click-through rates and conversion rates: Comic Sans.
8. Google Cow
The Google Body homepage appears as Google Cow, and the male/female toggle button now also toggles to cow, where a 3D cow’s body can be browsed.
9. Google Maps Creatures
Google Maps displays a dragon in Germany’s biggest forest, the ‘Pfälzer Wald’. Also a shark in Holland’s lake called IJmeer, East of Amsterdam was featured. When viewed in Earth Mode or Google Earth. These can be rendered in 3D. There is also a narwhal in the Thames in London, opposite Millbank Tower. The Loch Ness monster also makes an appearance in ‘Loch Ness’ A giant red lobster sits atop the Zakim Bridge in Boston.
See all animals featured on Google Maps and Google Earth 2011 hoaxes – April Fools Day 2011 LIVE Models
10. Google Voice’s Voice-alyzer
Google Voice has a new function called Voice-alyzer that makes users spell out common words like “embarrassed”, ”dizzy” or ”Czechoslovakia”, before they connect your call in order to prevent embarrassing messages.
11. Google Adwords Blimp Ads
After years of meticulous design, our brand new fleet of blimps is finally ready to take to the skies. Soon you’ll be seeing Google blimps (a.k.a. gBlimps) flying over major cities, displaying AdWords ads to a larger audience than ever before.
12. Google I/O
Announced sessions for the Google I/O Conference for software developerss includes talks featuring technologies from the 1990’s – SMS, HTML 3, IRC, Netscape Navigator, etc.
13. Contoso Gone Google
From the Google Enterprise Blog, Contoso (a fictional company used by Microsoft for its product documentation materials) announces they have switched from using Microsoft Office and Microsoft Exchange to Google Apps.
As a subsidiary of a traditional software company, we went against the grain and switched all 1,200 Contoso employees across nine continents to the cloud. After previously considering Google Apps, we were finally convinced to make the move when Google Docs began supporting the Corsiva font. I still can’t find track changes in Docs, but now we can use Corsiva from anywhere, on any device. We decided against Microsoft® Office 365 beta, because we’d heard for years that beta software was too risky.
—
This year’s most popular Google April Fools prank or hoax is the Gmail Motion because it was featured on the Google homepage. My favorite pranks for this year are the YouTube Phrygian mode, Gmail Motion, Google Autocompleter and Google Adwords Blimp Ads.
Btw, as long as it’s April 1st its still officially April Fools Day so don’t trust anyone especially anything you see or read from the Internet.
What do you guys think of Google’s April Fools Day Pranks for 2011? Which prank/s do you like the most or which one do you think is most deceiving prank? Anyone here who fell for one or some of these pranks and actually believed they were true?
Google motion lol , cant believe it :D
@Selina – actually, its Gmail Motion, not Google Motion. hehe :D
I was fooled by Gmail motion. I was like “is google really serious?”. Belated Aprl Fools everyone
@John – Hahaha..I’m sure you’re not the only one. :D
I like the gmail motion. I think it is really cool. I can do exercise while sending email. lol
i actually thought it was real , maybe something google wants to do with xbox kinect like technology with gmail .. lolz
@Joie – same here. Gmail Motion is the best prank they pulled this year. btw,
@Joie & Sourish – btw, some scientists from the University of Souther California’s Institute of Creative Technologies have applied the “principles” of Gmail Motion and made a real version of it – https://jaypeeonline.net//technology/the-real-gmail-motion/
makes the world realize that google geeks can be humorous too . it was a fun day for all of us . everyone playing pranks on each other on facebook and twitter
@Sourish – That’s true. I used to post April Fools Day pranks here on my blog but decided to discontinue it and rather do a roundup of Google’s pranks instead. :D