[humorix] Study: April Fool's Day 37% Less Fooling

[James Baughn <jbaughn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Study: April Fool's Day 37% Less Fooling
April 1, 2008

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS -- A study released today by a prestigious think 
tank suggests that April Fool's Day fabrications are far less likely to 
fool the public.  The culprit?  FOX News.

"We're bombarded with fake news and propaganda 365 days a year.  Err... 
make that 366.  This is a leap year," explained Lirpa Sloof, chairwoman 
of the Boston University Laboratory for Learning Superior Holistic 
Investigative Techniques. "Thanks to FOX News, the White House, and 
various other mouthpieces, people don't believe anything they see on TV 
anymore."

It's hard to fool people jaded by years of "Mission Accomplished" and 
"Heckuva Job, Brownie."  And this isn't just a Republican trend: Dan 
Rather's "Fake But Accurate" newscasts have made it nearly impossible 
for April Fool's Day to compete.

"April Fool's Day tastes great, but is less fooling," explained a media 
analyst with the Center for Researching Advanced Paradigms.  "When 
everything is a lie, it doesn't make much sense to dedicate a whole day 
to lying.  It just gets in the way.  Now, if people were to tell the 
truth on April 1st... well, that could cause panic in the streets."

Could this all spell the end of April Fool's Day as we know it?  The 
answer is a solid 'no' according to the analysts we just invented for 
this story.

Said Dr. Les Klue of the Denver University Nonpartisan Group for Helping 
to End All Problems, "April 1st might contain lots of fabrications, but 
we all know they're fake. It's a welcome change from the rest of the 
year, when we suspect everything is fake, but we can't be 100% certain. 
 It's like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle: we can't accurately 
measure both the authenticity and truthiness of a piece of information 
at any given time."

If you don't understand that quote, don't worry.  I don't either, and I 
just wrote it.  A spokesman for the Federal Enterprise Center for 
Erudite Studies provided a more useful statement about A.F.D.

"Despite a growing lack of effectiveness, April Fool's Day is still an 
important holiday. t lets people see things in a different light, if 
only for a few microseconds before their skepticism sets in."

"For example," he continued, "this morning I saw a story about a 
revolutionary piece of software called 'Linn-ex' or something that's 
free and many times more reliable and robust than Microsoft Windows.  I 
almost believed it for a split second before I came to my sense.  I 
mean, the whole idea is ludicrous!   Still, it's wonderful to dream 
about such things, even if they're only a figment of some prankster's 
imagination."


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