Upon further reflection about my previous announcement, and the reaction to it, I’ve changed my mind. After a lengthy e-mail exchange with Paul (and a shorter one with Jay Tea), I’ve decided to rescind my decision to make Paul’s hiatus permanent. The reasons are a private matter between the two of us. As for Jay Tea, I’ve assured him that the conflict he feels will be dealt with when he returns from vacation.
There’s one other reason I’ve changed my mind…
]]>< 
Angie:
Spike their food with something. That’ll teach’em to mess with mom!
*shrug* OK, fine joke. And I’m certainly still going to come back every day for excellent news and commentary.
But I think it got tarnished by all the spite and nastiness which got slung around on everyone.
[obligatory whine]
Can’t we all just get along?
[/whine]
So, I suppose I end up relatively neutral about the whole thing. But this reminds me why I rarely read the comment section….
Julie your line was good
Oh, yeah, which line is that? Oh, and you really threw me by your response to the Mark Twain quip.
For the record: this was NOT my idea. My idea was to pretend that Wizbang had been “hijacked” by various liberal bloggers. I had a couple ideas ready, including one noted liberal who has an overwhelming tendency to reproduce his 419 spams in full, but that didn’t go over very well.
In my defense, I was a late-comer to this plot. But I was a very willing conspirator. In fact, I’m rather proud of my efforts.
And I’d like to thank those people who kindly offered me an alternative home (and, in some cases, food and even female siblings). Those offers made my whole day.
J.
Two quibbles and one concurrence with the above comments, though:
1) Julie, I’m Phoebe? Aside from the gender issues, I think of myself much more of a Chandler.
2) Jinx, “Jay Tea” is a pseudonym, derived from my true initials. I don’t know Paul’s real name, either, so that could be a fake as well. Kevin’s the only one who’s on the record.
And how come I didn’t get singled out for special comment?
Finally, Lair’s line that “next week on Wizbang’s Apprentice, the co-bloggers are faced with the hardest challenge yet…” ought to be illegal. I laughed loud enough to scare the hell out of my cat. Bravo, Lair. I doff my hat.
J.
Speaking as an early commenter and a dupee (with reservations of record), I say there’s no percentage in gratuitously dicking with your readership. Now for months we’re going to have that little flicker in the back of our minds: “Should we believe them on this?” You’ve toyed with your credibility, like idiot chidren throwing Mom’s Ming vase around. I know, April Fool’s, lighten up, yadda. But think about what happens if people start confusing Wizbang with The Onion.
I’m not going to respond to each point or issue individually, just give some backstory.
===========
It was never designed to be ha! ha! funny, rather it was a fun way to tweak the people who’ve been railing against Paul, and a chance for the three of us to work on something together. To my mind it “works” based on the fact that there’s such a variety of opinion on who readers like (or don’t like) among the three of us. This play right into (or away from) the prejudices (for lack of a better word) of readers.
The plot wasn’t set in motion until the other day when I said no more creationism/evolution posts. I don’t tell Paul of Jay Tea what to write about. You can count me in the camp of those who thought those posts were getting redundant, but I really didn’t care much one way or another…
What we did hope for is that we’d get a few bites on my post, to the effect that Paul was in trouble. I can’t tell you how many comments and e-mails I got asking me to do this or that to Paul.
We did get those nibbles and it was all downhill from there. Once I put Paul on “warning” it was simply a matter of having Paul cross over the line.
Julie just lucked her way into figuring out the scheme as it was unfolding, though none of us let on or told her anything. In fact Paul discouraged her.
PS – If you checked the sequence number of the URL’s you’ll notice they’re out of order. Jay’s reaction post was written before the firing post or Paul’s post from this morning.
My only regret is that I will probably never get a chance to guest blog. =(
DAMN!!!! I shoulda known I’d make some technical mistake and risk blowing the whole thing.
And here I was thinking I’d had a subtle tip-off with my reaction post being time-stamped 3:41, with the “41” a subtle reference to the date.
J.
All the nasty things said about me today – water under the bridge. I’m assuming Paul and Jay Tea feel the same way.
I think the worst I got was Julie accusing me of “back-stabbing” paul, so I’ll happily go along with Kevin on this one.
On second thought, with a couple reservations. Drew said my writing seemed a little “off,” and Leopold Stotch also said my postings hinted to him that it was a hoax. For insulting my abilities, I may need much more mollifying than has been offered so far.
J.
My idea was to pretend that Wizbang had been “hijacked” by various liberal bloggers.
Now THAT would have been funny…
>I think the worst I got was Julie accusing me of “back-stabbing” paul, so I’ll happily go along with Kevin on this one.
FYI Jay she mailed me and said she knew something was up and was just throwing random shit out there… I think that was her version of playing along.
P
Along the lines of a pretend coup d’tat, You guys ought to do a “king for a day” thing like in “Hunchback of Notre Dame” where the biggest fool in the city gets crowned “king” and its a big party all day long. So go out and find the biggest idiot liberal blogger you can find and make him “king” for a day?
I can hear it now: “Come here Oliver, we want to talk to you…”
And all lameness is to be blamed on me…
Kev and I have been tossing around various ideas for a while and I picked the final execution. (I even fired myself 😉 –Jay Tea should get no blame for its lameness.
Unfortunately, I had a family emergency this morning I had to attend to.. as such I did not get the “firing offense” post up until late in the day and then it was not as smooth as I wanted.
All things considered it was OK… The part that made it worth the effort was some of the replies from some of my “critics” some of them were hysterical.
To anyone offended that the great and mighty Wizbang might pull an April’s Fool’s Joke… Sorry, can’t help ya. Seemed funny to us at the time. I don’t see how it impacts are credibility in the future.
Kevin Said:
All the nasty things said about me today – water under the bridge. I’m assuming Paul and Jay Tea feel the same way.
Yeah, all except for Jeff and Julie. lol
Damn, what timing. I spent the whole day sick in bed.
I log on tonight, start at the top of the page, and read down.
Looks like I missed some fun times…..
Paul needs to revive his reputation; here’s an IM discussion between me and Rusty —
Me: did you see the deal at Wizbang? It must be a joke.
Rusty: no, I emailed Paul about it and he said that it’s for real and he’s pissed.
Jeff: “Kevin, Paul and Jay pulled the strings and made their puppets dance, and then they pointed and laughed. If we can’t point and laugh at each other once the strings are cut, then what’s the point of living?”
Got to hand it to Jeff for his resilient humor and humility. Nice job guys, and nice reaction Jeff.
Pixy, take a page from Jeff.
Leopold I’m not sure I get your point?????
Same here jmaster, I missed the whole thread ’cause i was visiting with my sister on leave from the navy.
oh well, good joke 🙂
So what other items on Wizbang are jokes? Guess there’s no point asking because even if others are, it would just be denied. I don’t know how others feel, but in my opinion Wizbang’s reputation took a big hit tonight. No need for MSM folks to claim bloggers are just a bunch of amateurs sitting around in their pajamas, now they can point to Wizbang as an example of just how unreliable blogs are. Are there so few sources on the internet that anyone needs to get their information form a bunch of jokers?
Why not? Everyone is still using Google.
Mac, you thought Wizbang had a reputation?
Guys … it’s a blog. If Rathergate taught us anything, it’s that you shouldn’t trust anybody implicitly. Everybody lies, overtly or by omission, whether they mean to or not. Sometimes it’s bias, sometimes it’s a prank, and sometimes it’s just plain old human failure.
Frankly, if you folks thought Web sites run by people you’ve never met were somehow trustworthy or credible, maybe it’s good that this little diversion served to take the edge off of your credulity.
Nobody ever claimed that bloggers aren’t, to borrow your word, “unreliable.” We’re all just trying to make the point that the AP and Reuters and the Washington Post are all also unreliable.
The blog revolution — for lack of a better term — isn’t about replacing one bad source of information with one good source of information. It’s about pointing out that all sources of information are intrinsically unreliable, and that none of them should be trusted implicitly.
Think for yourself, you know?
Hell, at least Kevin, Jay and Paul came clean. To this day Mary Mapes still insists that those memos were the real deal. I’d say it’s advantage Wizbang any way you slice it.
Paul: yeah, now that I think of it you’re right. Rusty is kind of a jackarse, so good for you for duping him. I’ll get that jawa bastard next year …
Jeff, if all sources of information are intrinsically unreliable then what makes you think Mary Mapes is wrong? Too bad CBS didn’t think of claming it was all just a joke. Guess the MSM has been wrong for the last 50 years about reputation being vital to a news organization. What major political parties will ever invite bloggers to cover their convention if bloggers agree they are intrinsically unreliable. The MSM sure doesn’t agree and will point out that your statement, coming from a blog, that all sources of information are intrinsically unreliable, is therefore unreliable itself.
1) Julie, I’m Phoebe?
The cutest one of the bunch!
Aside from the gender issues, I think of myself much more of a Chandler.
Too, wimpy. Phoebe has the cojones Chandler can only hope for.
I think the worst I got was Julie accusing me of “back-stabbing” paul, so I’ll happily go along with Kevin on this one.
Hey! I made that up. Since, you knew it wasn’t true, why would you think I would believe it?
Anyway, I sent you an email explaining it before I read your post. But for that snarky comment I no longer think you are the cutest one of the bunch. That’ll fix ya.
As we said, “If it’s an April Fool’s joke, it’s in poor taste and we are not amused.
We seldom are amused by the jokes men play on each other. We prefer the more sophisticated humour involved in sewing shut the fly on every pair of boxers in the dresser drawer.”
I’m just curious if the most disgruntled of us are female, because this does strike me very much as the sort of male humour that does not amuse this female. Men just seem so mean spirited when they pull these sorts of jokes. They don’t know when they go too far.
Female pranks are amusing, nonhurtful, clever little episodes of joy in the lives of the victims. Like the aforementioned sewing shut of the flies on the boxer shorts of all male members of the household. Light, charming, nobody gets hurt….
I believed; therefore I said, “I am greatly afflicted.” And in my dismay I said, “All men are liars.”
Psalm 116: 10-11
Julie just lucked her way into figuring out the scheme as it was unfolding,
No, Kevin, it was my telepathic powers.
Kidding aside – I won’t proclaim myself a great judge of character, but it did come down to judging character – which, of course, led to the only possible conclusion: it was all of joke.
Female pranks are amusing, nonhurtful, clever little episodes of joy in the lives of the victims. Like the aforementioned sewing shut of the flies on the boxer shorts of all male members of the household. Light, charming, nobody gets hurt….
She left out the part that the guy is wearing the boxers, strapped down, and occassionally the needle slips. Ouch!
Nothing like a little overt sexism to suck all the joy out of a room.
Wow, Jeff. You seem to have a diametrically opposite experience from mine. For me, overt sexism injects a huge amount of joy into a room.
Note for the humor impaired: It’s a joke, people!
There’s no such thing as going too far on an April Fool’s joke in print or online. No blood, no foul, period. Some people just hate to be tricked, and they take it personally, which reminds me of people who get mad when you step on their toes by accident, or bump into them. They think they’re being laughed at and it infuriates them, so they act hurt because they don’t know what else to do. Very sad.
That said, you guys are still dicks. But that was definitely a good one. Touche!
P.S. Mac Lorry, unless that too is an April Fool’s joke, get a life
Like the aforementioned sewing shut of the flies on the boxer shorts of all male members of the household. Light, charming, nobody gets hurt…
DeputyHeadmistress has obviously never had to piss like a race horse and not been able to get the damn thing out. Trust me, it hurts!
Julie, I like the way you think.:-D
Jeff, the fact that men and women think different things are funny is a fact, not overt sexism. Me saying that male humour is mean and female humour is all nice nice is clearly a joke- ergo the fly sewing stuff.
Which I think Remy and Boyd got.
Clearly, humour over the internet is sometimes fraught with peril.
-welds DeputyHeadmistress’s purse’s zipper shut-
now how do you feel if you are on ur period and you have to change ur tampon…..
same feeling, remy captured it exactly
=-P
You know April Fools jokes are only traditionally allowed up until noon April 1st. Kevin posted at around 2pm, which officially makes it a Making Us Look Like F*cking Idiots Day joke. Still, well executed.
Assholes 🙂
The best thing about it , at least for the insiders must have been the 30 or so submissions from people looking to fill Paul’s shoes. Are we ever going to get to see them? I can imagine some of the commenters like Joser dusting off the thesaurus, cracking their knuckles like piano virtuosos, and attempting to hammer out that winning essay. Priceless….
Uncle Mikey,
Yes, it was my own lame attempt at an April fools joke on the jokesters. I figured turnabout was fair play an went a bit over the top to see if I could get Kevin or Paul to bite, but they never did. Maybe they just went to bed, either that or they agreed with me.
Not bad, but I thought the Fox News announcement that the Pope had died was more convincing.
I thought Deputy Headmistress point was that women aren’t as mean as men. My point was often they are, but in different ways.
Ha,ha, ha! What fools those readers are, tee hee hee, the fools! Frankly, I’m just disappointed that it’s not true. Timing is supposed to be everything in comedy and while that usually refers to the actual cadence of the delivery of the lines, falling between two well-publisized deaths may have made this less funny for some of us. Sure caught us off guard what with grieving and all that nonsense.
So does this mean Paul and Jay Tea will not be leaving? Darn! Why get my hopes up like that for nothing? Maybe I’m just kidding, too. Maybe not. No somber death watch for Wizbang where frivility reigns supreme. What a riot those stupid readers are anyway. Such fun and merriment!
Leave all that seriousness about the Pope to others who are less clever and just plain lack this kind of originality. Boy, you guys really proved how gullible everybody else really is. Congratulations. I’m just glad I didn’t waste my time reading all the posts involved. Lesson for the future, too.
> falling between two well-publisized deaths may have made this less funny for some of us.
Amelia you bring up a good point… Had we known last week the condition of the Pope, we probably would have done something else. There were dozens of mails and phone calls to coordinate this and a special phone call was made (as I remember) to discuss us trying to make a joke at the exact same moment in time as the Pop’s death.
However when Kevin posted 2 days ago, we were kinda past the point of no return and After I posted yesterday we were really committed to do something.
If the Pope had died, I was going to make a post stopping it wherever it was.
One of the important lessons of life is that you can not control external events you can only manage your response to them. I think we did our best.
There are a number of posts and threads on the Pope and Schiavo here. I am adamantly against thread hijacking, but does every post and thread have to be on those two topics?
you got me, bravo, best April Fools joke of the day, bar none
Damn, suckered twice in one April Fool’s day, and on the same site too. Jeez
– Knowing Kevin and Paul this will turn out to be a massive doublecross in the spirit of a Ludlum novel, ending when J Tea returns from vacation and finds all the locks have been changed on the WhizBang! doors, and he realizes he’s been very cleverly had.
C’mon, anyone who didn’t pick that joke off wasn’t thinking clearly. Stop complaining, it’s their blog, they can do what they want, and besides, this wasn’t a mean joke and we set ourselves up for it.
You know what would have really been funny? If you guys had posted a bunch of stuff supporting Osama and Saddam, that would have been a riot.
The only, and I mean ONLY reason I visited this blog was because sites worth reading linked to Paul’s idiocy.
Now, I’m no marketing genius, but I do have to run a small business so I know a little about getting exposure to new customers, and I don’t think playing juvenile tricks that insult their intelligence is necessarily a good way to go about it, since you only have once chance at a first impression.
You guys blew it, and I have to believe that you really are collectively no smarter than Paul’s stupidest post. You are morons in my book and nothing you write on this site will ever carry any credibility with me, and I think probably with a lot of other people.
Of course, that’s likely just fine with you guys, and it’s your blog, you can post whatever kind of moronic drivel you wish, and insult your readers all day long, and some people are stupid enough not to know the difference, but some do know better.
Welcome to Dan Rather’s world, idiots.