Reading Breitbart.com's story this morning about the top ten April Fool's Day hoaxes, I was reminded of what I to this day think was one of the best -- ever.

Like the hip kids say, Vancouver got punk'd.

I remember in 1986, Rock 101.1, a Vancouver radio station, announced that Howard Hughes’ plane, the Spruce Goose, was flying to Vancouver, and would land in English Bay, as part of Expo 86. Being, like, twelve at the time, I had only a vague idea what the Spruce Goose was -- I never really got into aviation. I recall getting up in the morning, and hearing my parents talking about it, and then hearing the announcement on the radio -- I vaguely recall that there were other stations that got in on the hoax.

It was brilliant. They had eyewitnesses phoning in from down the US coast, excitedly proclaiming that they'd seen this monstrosity overhead, as it got closer and closer to Vancouver. The response in the city was insane. Thousands of people were down in English Bay, awaiting the arrival of the Goose.

And....it never showed, of course. But what a brilliant piece of work. Were it even ten years later, I would have thought it an awesome bit of guerrilla marketing by the Expo 86 organizers, because it left an indelible mark on the populace as to the theme of Expo 86 – Transportation Through Time.

Either way, it was far better than a few of those referenced by Breitbart.com -- spaghetti trees? Come on...

I love this idea.

Bum Rush the Charts is an effort to use social networks to influence the positioning of a music artist on the charts, without the 'assistance' of media monsters and record labels. From their site:

We can match and exceed the reach of big media, corporate media, labels, and the entrenched interests. On March 22nd, we are going to take an indie podsafe music artist to number one on the iTunes singles charts as a demonstration of our reach to Main Street and our purchasing power to Wall Street.

The track we've chosen is "Mine Again" by the band Black Lab. A band that was dropped from not just one, but two major record labels (Geffen and Sony/Epic) and in the process forced them to fight to get their own music back. We picked them because making them number one, even for just one day, will remind the RIAA record labels of what they turned their backs on - and who they ignore at their peril.

So, if you read this, go buy the track -- it's actually not bad. Besides, it's a buck -- it's worth that to me just to see what the experiment results in.

An aside: should I be offended by the use of Bum Rush? I'm equivocal on that.

Courtesy of Tyler G, hilarity from Video Dog @ Salon.com. By the way, Video Dog -- your embed code is a nightmare.