There's nothing quite like putting up an April Fool's story - only to have another member of the media fall for it hook, line and sinker. That's what happened to AM 640's Ben Mulroney on Tuesday, after he was shown a story from BlogTO about a restaurant that lets staff tell patrons how much they have to tip.
Mulroney was livid about the idea, and how tipping itself has gone out of control. So he devoted a entire block of time talking about it during his show and taking calls of outrage from equally fooled listeners. It wasn't until he saw the French name of the supposed diner - Revoir le Calendrier - that it finally dawned on him the whole thing was a fake. (It means "Look at the Calendar.")
Alex Pierson also got taken, although not on air. She walked into the station to find her producer, Mike Drolet, on the phone with the program director, telling him which topics and segments she was no longer allowed to do - all of which she had prepared for and which would have forced her to start her show with nothing planned. He quickly revealed it was an April 1st joke.
And at first, she was not amused!
We used to play jokes on listeners, not on each other. But times, as they say, have changed.
newsguy1 wrote: