[Marketing] April Fool's Article

[Aleksander Charatonik]

I think a good April Fools joke draws attention, but it's generally not
positive or negative. People will link to the April Fool's joke on
social media with a title like "look at what Fedora did for April
Fools!", find it funny (or not), and move on with their day. A joke
that's not funny isn't a grave offense.

 If people hate an April Fools joke, they're more likely to blame the
day than the source, eg "I hate how everyone's making these desperate
unfunny bids for attention on this particular day" and not "I hate this
obvious bid for attention from Fedora."

Plenty of people and communities do April Fools jokes. You see them from
individuals, from huge companies like Google or Microsoft, and from
communities like Gentoo. Even if April Fools isn't a global event, it's
more-or-less been made one on the internet.

The largest risk is probably just making a joke that's in poor taste,
which I don't think is a /huge/ risk, but better safe than sorry. People
can be fickle, and hopefully someone can make that call.

I'd say +1 for the April Fools' joke.

It's relatively low-risk, and it's a break away from what some may
perceive to be a "generic, sanitized, playing-it-safe uninspired blog
that exists solely to promote Fedora and doesn't provide anything of value."

It's fun, and given a choice between marketing and not marketing, I'd
rather lean towards marketing than arguing whether something is safe enough.

I'll be the first to admit I know nothing of marketing, though.

Aleksander Charatonik

On 03/31/2016 08:22 AM, Ryan Lerch wrote:
> I can't really think of any potential PR or marketing gain for us from
> making a joke like this.

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