Response to this year’s April 1st ‘issue’ was mostly positive, though there was one significant Not Amused e-mail from a well-known, indirectly involved professional. I’m sure he was right, though whether the offense was to be expected as part of the territory of running April 1st type spoofs, or whether it was due to a lapse on my judgement, I’m not certain. Probably the latter…
I also got some flack about the pop-up ad, which on that day appeared as an overlay on the homepage (for something called The Grudge) that disappeared after about 15 seconds. The income from the various service-provided ads isn’t so great that I’m willing to put up with pop-ups myself, but the agency assured me this was a worthy deal. I won’t know any time soon, since ad agencies seem to have a 3-month cycle time for doling out commissions. Anyway, the immediate feedback will make me less likely to agree to such deals in the future.
I’m tempted some year to run no spoof articles at all, but to save up three or four legitimate news items and post them all on April 1st, and let readers figure out if they’re spoofs or not. Would that be too cruel? It would certainly be easier.
