According to Website Growth, noted Los Angeles Mobile Marketing Service, Google has been the subject of intense scrutiny due to their April Fool’s Day prank.
We all know that April Fool’s Day can be lots of fun, but sometimes the pranks done have awful and unforeseen consequences. Website Growth is here to give you a rundown and what Google’s prank entailed, and the current controversy surrounding it.
On G-Mail, Google’s e-mail service, an option to include an animated .gif picture of one of Dreamworks Animation’s Minion characters was added. The .gif shows one of the characters dropping a microphone, which is symbol in pop culture to convey that you’ve had the last word on a particular subject. When a person wants to send an e-mail on G-Mail, they have the option of pushing the regular send button. However, Google placed the minion button right next to the regular send button. The controversy surrounding this April Fool’s debacle is that some people inadvertently pressed the Minion button instead of the regular send button.
Today, there have been several examples talked about across social media about how people have accidentally sent e-mails including the gif.
For instance, one twitter user went online to complain about the button being too much like the normal send button. This user accidentally clicked the Minion button when replying to a potential employer about a job interview. Another twitter user clicked the Minion button when replying to an e-mail about the death of an acquaintance’s daughter.
Many companies engage in April Fool’s Day shenanigans, but are rarely ever reprimanded for them. The overall problem with this prank is that Google’s minion button actually has the possibility to affect the G-Mail user. Due to the highly interactive nature of this prank, many people have unwittingly caused unnecessary complications in their lives.