The road to April Fools' Day is paved with not-so-good intentions and it's even worse when the prank you've planned backfires in a big way.
But what happens when you're a worldwide corporation like Google?
The company can quickly get a black eye.
Internet giant Google introduced a Minion mic drop feature to its popular Gmail service. The normal email send button was accompanied by a "send mic drop" option that would add a Gif of a Minion from the "Despicable Me" movies literally dropping a mic, The Guardian reported.
The feature also apparently blocked responses from getting to users inboxs, according to Google's announcement.
The problem is that the new button allowed many people to mistakenly add the animation to serious emails like prayer request replies and job application correspondence.
Some users said that the Gif was sent when they used the normal button, Mashable reported.
Google had so many complaints that it quickly pulled the option Friday morning, writing: "Well, it looks like we pranked ourselves this year. Due to a bug, the Mic Drop feature inadvertently caused more headaches than laughs. We're truly sorry. The feature has been turned off. If you are still seeing it, please reload your Gmail page."
Changing sent email like that without confirmation is an incredible betrayal of trust. The damage from this prank is just getting started.
— Andy Baio (@waxpancake) April 1, 2016
Hate this stupid "Send and Drop Mic" #AprilFools gimmick in @Gmail. Accidentally sent mid-draft in professional message. #NOTCOOL @Google
— Adam S. Brooks (@adambrooks) March 31, 2016
Google's "Send + Mic Drop" April Fool's joke is already causing unemployment to go up in the US. pic.twitter.com/GQembqs06T
— MicahGoulart (@micahgoulart) April 1, 2016
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DO NOT PRESS THE "SEND AND DROP MIC" BUTTON ON GOOGLE
— ◢ M I K E D I V A ◣ (@Mikediva) April 1, 2016
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That gmail mic drop animated gif is sent as a URL, which means google can change it to read "sorry this was a bad idea" on existing emails.
— Ryan C. Gordon (@icculus) April 1, 2016
April fools jokes are all fun and good until someone puts a minion gif in a business email. Hehe... https://t.co/oSqDedXJ08
— Troy Hunt (@troyhunt) April 1, 2016
I nearly sent email including Gmail’s stupid April Fool prank, so I’m glad to hear it’s causing them chaos and pain: https://t.co/QS0Dfa8C3n
— Pinboard (@Pinboard) April 1, 2016
Can you imagine what a great prank it would be if @Google just completely ignored April Fools'? People would spend all day looking, waiting.
— Marc Hedlund (@marcprecipice) April 1, 2016
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