Trying to cover pop culture news on April 1 can be kind of weird, because a lot of entertainment-centric companies spend their time trying to trick people with fake (even if it's obviously fake) news, while everyone else tends to be wary of their real news being overlooked as an attempted prank.
But I don't mind the holiday. When done right, a good April Fools' Day prank can still be really clever and amusing in the Internet age -- even if few people fall for it.
These are some of the best jokes we've seen around the web this year.
CERN discovers The Force
From the "We Wish This Was Real" department, researchers at the Large Hadron Collider "confirmed the existence of The Force." Y'know, the Star Wars Force.
Unless you have no knowledge whatsoever about Star Wars (which, if you follow CERN on Twitter, seems unlikely), the joke is easy to see through pretty quickly, especially once they start quoting "CERN theorist Ben Kenobi of the University of Mos Eisley, Tatooine," in the story.
Amazon goes retro
They didn't try too hard to hide this one -- they say "April Fools?" right at the top of the page -- but Amazon's throwback to their 1999 design is kind of a neat throwback nonetheless. Sadly it's just an image, not a recreation of the old site, but in a nice touch you can click on the items listed on the homepage and go directly to their (real, 2015) store page.
Data is, in fact, beautiful
Normally, the subreddit /r/DataIsBeautiful is about the kind of data involving charts and numbers. Today, though, it's all dedicated to the Star Trek character Data. Frankly, that's probably how it should always be.
Do It YourSelfie 360°
ThinkGeek has a track record of going all out with their April Fools' Day pranks, and this year they have several. One of the more ridiculous is this dumb selfie rig, so you can act like you're in the worst Matrix movie ripoff ever.
The real Steam Machine
OK, I have to include another ThinkGeek one here, because I'd totally consider buying it for real. I'm not usually gung-ho about steampunk designs, but this one looks pretty cool.
For those unaware, a Steam Machine is a PC designed with living room gaming in mind. Hook it up to your TV and you've got your full library of Steam games at your fingertips. This one, though, runs on actual steam.
Google's brilliant new mail app is just physical mail
Get it? Because taking your mail with you is something you could do before computers? This joke mostly works because Google went through the trouble of making a slick video.
MS-DOS is coming to a smartphone near year
MS-DOS is still functional enough that George R.R. Martin writes the Game of Thrones books in it (that bit's not a joke. That's real.) So why not port it to devices that modern people actually use?
Deep Ellum Brewing Co.
The local brewing company has a new ale with a secret ingredient: Concrete. "We didn't really do any research, but we're pretty sure that aging a beer in concrete will make it better." For more local D-FW-based pranks, check out our list of those.
Find love in World of Warcraft with T.I.N.D.R.
It can be hard for a single sorcerer or sorceress in Azeroth these days. Fortunately, Blizzard wants to help with the new T.I.N.D.R. Box.
Hulu for pets
Your lovable animals love TV too, right? (No? Well forget you, then.) Hulu is creating all new original programming for them like Clawed City, Wheel of Furtune and The Real Pugs of Portland.
PlayStation Flow
Forget VR. Apparently the next big thing in wearable video game technology involves submerging yourself in water, because water sections of games aren't already bad enough.
