With the current state of the news, April's fools aren't fun anymore because they can't be distinguished as easily as before

Yeah, no newspapers in Norway have been doing April fool's since around that time

Tomorrow:

No, after trying it, I decided being an arrogant, spiteful, narcissistic, selfish, hateful, vengeful, judgemental piece of shit is exhausting as all hell and also just kind of a little bit wrong, don't ya think?

zomg pls update

Is this something they'd be delighted or horrified by?

I mean, Google announcing a Möbius-shaped keyboard would still be a good April 1st joke, “obviously fake news” from a news source wouldn't be because it's not obvious, anymore.

I loved the time I tried to copy something on StackOverflow and a fake ad popped up for a SO-branded copy/paste device.

Nah, I'm not autistic and have always hated the idea of pranks like that.

The pointing an laughing at one or a few people is always assholish. A good prank involves everyone laughing together, and if it is targetted at anyone in particular they have to be comfortable with being the target.

Jokes that are aimed at a widespread audience get a pass because there will always be someone who doesn't like something or feels foolish when they feel tricked no matter how lighthearted the joke is. So a game company announcing something ridiculous for their game needs some leeway when someone takes it personally when they fall for an announcement that Fortnite is removing dances or there would be no room for humor.

Widespread ones can still be mean spirited of course, but tricking people isn't what makes it so.

I'm autistic and I loooaaaathe April Fools. 99 percent of the 'jokes' are just mean spirited assholishness I feel.

Random side note, feel suddenly didn't look like a word to me.

Being ASD definitely makes it harder to enjoy April Fools pranks that are harmless and clever.

My ASD friends and family will frequently perceive the omission of information as an offensive lie, when the reality is us not on the spectrum didn't consider it information worth sharing. Extend this to April Fools Day jokes, which should be intentional, harmless, clever pranks, and they just can't.

Really good ones stick in my mind forever. Guild Wars once turned all the players into stick figures. I still laugh at that. Prior to enshitification Reddit had some great ones, like Orange Red vs Periwinkle. RuneScape always released upcoming features at the beginning of the month, and April Fools Day was always a fake one that sounded almost believable. I had friends swap clothes and classes for an entire day in college. I had a physics professor teach biology to each of his classes - a different lecture in each period. I had two friends announce they were ending their friendship on Facebook but intended to remain roommates, and continue to hang out with the rest of us.

It's a social norm. Just like how sarcasm is difficult for some ASD to pick up. But, a lot of us non-ASD do need to choose our audience more carefully. I don't play pranks on my family and those friends. I also refrain from sarcasm and exaggerating too.

I'm also autistic, and usually pretty bad at spotting jokes. But most April's fools jokes that I've come across were just lighhearted fun and pretty obviously fake. Just real enough sometimes to make you go "really?! oh nvm it's April 1st...". What kind of mean spirited jokes are people making?

I've seen the Tiktoks a million times, yes.

Light hearted pranks are still great for April 1st!

It's extra not fun when you're not in the US, April 1st isn't a particularly relevant date and you still have to endure all the "fun" bleeding into real world news because you're in the cultural imperialism splash zone.

Yeah, I think the mean prank vibe sucks (obvs, ymmv) but the 'fake news' aspect was a positive. Like the original and sadly long lost art of og trolling, the purpose was to remind everyone that you cannot believe everything you read, and you should not suddly react to something just because you read it in a newspaper. If it sounds wild or incendiary, maybe check a couple of other sources before passing it on to friends and looking like a 'fool'.

Unfortunately, we've past the stage where gentle friendly reminders of media literacy are likely to help. Most of us are all too aware we live in an age of misinformation (but don't agree on what is 'fake') so it's no longer funny.

I chuckled at "Trump wants to annex Wisconsin" because it is just plausible enough that he would say something like that.

I would almost find the Wisconsin one funny since it's already a state and I'd just assume grandpa Hitler was sundowning.

Goddamn this is fucked...

Businesses doing April Fools was fun until every gigantic corporation started doing it. Now it’s just bland, thinly-veiled marketing.

Onion is almost spherical, it doesn't have any problems.

I think corporations using it in unfunny ways to sell something is the worst and killed it for real. But all your examples are good too.

Nintendo Switch 2 getting more details, and knowing Nintendo probably a release date within a short time span, is true.

For one, April 1st has always been a date to make big announcements in Japan, not one for jokes. Nintendo just learned to move that one day for westerners (: