Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2023-04-03/From the archives: Difference between revisions
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|title = April Fools' through the ages |
|title = April Fools' through the ages |
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|blurb = A retrospective of the best and worst pranks |
|blurb = A retrospective of the best and worst pranks. |
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Revision as of 16:33, 1 April 2023
 Article display preview: | This is a draft of a potential Signpost article, and should not be interpreted as a finished piece. Its content is subject to review by the editorial team and ultimately by JPxG, the editor in chief. Please do not link to this draft as it is unfinished and the URL will change upon publication. If you would like to contribute and are familiar with the requirements of a Signpost article, feel free to be bold in making improvements!
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April Fools' through the ages
To simplify things, years in the headers will link to the documentation for all pranks that year. The Signpost coverage - where available - will be linked in the text highlighting some of the best or most controversial pranks.
2004: Let's delete the main page!
We didn't have The Signpost to document Wikipedia's first April Fools, and it was fairly tame compared to later years: A proposal to delete the Main Page, an attempt to block localhost for vandalism, and other things mentioned in joking that feel like things that would later happen. We did get one [https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Template:In_the_news&diff=3009374&oldid=3009333 rather good news item on our main page:
- Santa Claus' elves go on strike at the North Pole, they threaten that if talks don't resume by noon EST, they will become elf-employed.
...but it was shortlived, and compared to what was to come....
2005: Britannica takes over Wikipedia, fake articles get flushed down the loo.
While having an Arbitration Committee was controversial in 2005, publishing a blatant hoax as featured article on the main page and announcing Wikipedia's imminent takeover by Britannica was apparently fine and dandy. And things got more and more goofy as the day went on:
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Just some of what today we would consider outright vandalism that struck that day. Check out the tragic deaths right next to blatant hoaxes!
Even the interface changed. The text you clicked on to "edit this page" was [https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard&oldid=11759440#Wikipedia_Has_Been_Hacked replaced with "vandalise this page". And then later...
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Things got weirder from there.
Our coverage attempts to dig through this chaos. An attempt to set rules was put in place, and the original plan for this year - just using a silly article that sounded fake, but was actually real - would be used in later years, instead of inventing fancy mediæval toilet paper holders.
2006: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2006-04-03/April_Fools
2007: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:April_Fools%27_Main_Page/2007_(2) No Signpost
2008: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2008-03-03/Dispatches https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2008-04-07/April_Fools%27
2009: None
2010: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2010-04-05/News_and_notes
2011: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2011-04-04/News_and_notes
2012: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-04-02/Featured_content snake handling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-04-02/WikiProject_report - goofy-ish?
2013: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-04-01/News_and_notes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2013-04-01/Featured_content https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Today%27s_featured_article/April_1,_2013
2014: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-03-26/Comment
FPC gets into it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-04-02/Featured_content
2015: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2015-04-01/News_and_notes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2015-04-01/Featured_content https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Wikivoyage:Joke_articles/Time_travel
2016: Our most controversial year, with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-04-01/News_and_notes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-04-01/Wikipedia_Weekly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2016-04-01/Technology_report
This was the last year for any real April Fools' celebrations up to now.
2017: Gap in articles from Feb to June
2018: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2018-04-26/Humour
2019: This year was kind of reeling from Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-02-28/Humour = a very bad attempt at humour. Hence, we apologised for april fools> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-03-31/From_the_editors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-03-31/Humour fares better.
2020=1: As COVID began devastating the world, we... did nothing humourous whatsoever for April Fools. We also skipped out on 2022, largely because the timing was off - late March and late April publication, and the War in Ukraine won out for coverage.
Optional: Give a short WP:LEAD-like introduction statement here.
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