Gmail
Google’s April Fool’s Hoaxes
I find Google’s April Fool’s hoaxes quite funny. They’ve started this tradition of theirs since 2000. I have only come across their hoaxes last year though. Three of these many hoaxes they have had I will share with you.
Okay, have you ever wanted or wished you could go to the moon? Apparently in 2004, Google had an open job opportunity to actually work in the moon! “Google Copernicus Center is hiring.” How cool could that be? Well unfortunately, this turned out to be a hoax.
They did not and are not going to build “a fully integrated research, development and technology facility at which Google will be conducting experiments in entropized information filtering, high-density high-delivery hosting (HiDeHiDeHo) and de-oxygenated cubicle dwelling” like they said on the Google Job Opportunities page.
Another one is Virgle. Last year (2008), Google announced a joint project with Virgin Group to establish a permanent settlement on Mars. The announcement included videos of the founders of both Virgin Group and Google.
They had this online application form with some sort of serious questions but with some choices that were a bit funny. After submitting the application, the site notifies the user that he/she is not fit for space, or that the application is fine and “all you have to do is submit your video” [as a response to their video on YouTube].
Third. As more and more everyday communication takes place over email, lots of people have complained about how hard it is to read and respond to every message. So Google introduced this year the Gmail Autopilot to help users reply to emails easily.
They said that it could actually match your personal style in writing as it sends autopilot responses. The more Gmail messages Autopilot can sample, the better. That means with fewer than 100 messages, there may not be enough data to calibrate Autopilot effectively. Really quite funny concept, isn’t it? Again, it’s purely another hoax.
So did you fall for any of those pranks by Google? [Laughing]
Stop! Please Don’t Send! Click Undo (Gmail)
There have been times when I wrote an email, pressed send, then suddenly realized that I missed to mention something, or that I wanted to reply to all instead of one or vice versa, or some other likely reason.
During my Wireless Networking school days, I was working on this project with my group mates and we were communicating through email. I’m supposed to reply to all so everyone will be updated of the new developments, but sometimes, I already sent my reply email then realize that I only sent it to one person. That kind of situation is a little bit okay since it only is among my friends, and I could always just send again.
In my job email applications though, that probably has happened to me a couple of times or so. There was this time that I suddenly discovered that I missed an “s” in one word. It was so grammatically wrong and that simply irks me. Or there was this other time that I forgot to attach my resume and then realized it a second too late. No! No! Please don’t send!
Thankfully, Gmail has introduced the Undo Send feature in its Gmail Labs recently last March 19th, 2009. You can now take back the email you just sent as long as it is done within a five second time frame. It also has an option to adjust the time to ten seconds, if you prefer. However, it cannot pull back the email you sent once it’s already gone after five seconds.
In addition, there is also a Forgotten Attachment Detector feature in Gmail Labs that will stop you from sending an email if it detects that you mentioned attach but haven’t included any attachments. This actually has saved me once so far.
Of course, the best way to prevent these bloopers from happening is to be extremely careful in the email content you are sending. Double check, or even triple check. Be alert. Try to avoid sending an email when you’re not completely awake, or when you are feeling sluggish. (This is sometimes the reason why these things happen to me. Haha!)
Happy emailing!
Tech-Life in Pink 