Here are the people I am sorry for this April 1st:
- The 30-something marketing manager of a mid-level business, who after filing for an extended leave until Tuesday, received a call from the CEO (who’s also the founder) to come up with a “cool Facebook April Fool’s prank” targeted to millennials, which are the biggest market they have yet to tap. They work in property management.
- The marketing manager’s teenage nephew, who has to explain “What is loss” and “Ugandan Knuckles” after explaining what memes are. His attempts are futile.
- A young ad agency team—graduates from top universities, raring to earn their mark in the advertising world—who, after months of preparing their content calendar, are executing their social media campaign for their wealthy client’s April Fool’s Day special. They have the gut feeling the campaign wouldn’t be as good as their client expected.
- Anyone within the proximity bomb that is content publishing. Content is king. What’s your plan?
When it comes to April Fool’s Day, the only community truly engrossing themselves in the tradition are the people working in tech. The rest of us? We have to move on. Because April Fool’s in current day means break ups and pregnancy announcements, social media campaigns turned corporate social responsibility and advertorials with beautiful copy but an empty message, all of which are played out, which makes it terribly unfunny. Besides, the humor of our youth is so far up our own baseline comprehension that it’s borderline impossible to reproduce in television or radio.
That is to say: April Fool’s, or rather the environment created by the circumstances of April Fool’s, already happens year-round. Here are some examples from the past couple of weeks:
Duterte declaring the withdrawal from the ICC
Duterte’s decision to close Boracay indefinitely while it just so happens that two mega casinos are being built
Robin Padilla calling Duterte a reincarnation of Andres Bonifacio over Instagram, among other things
Every headline with a Harry Roque quote
If you’re reading this now, cooking up a prank before the day ends, don’t be disheartened. There’s still time to give this day new meaning.
by Lex Celera
Art by Bryan Sochayseng