Happy April Fools day
Apr 1, 06:12 am PST
We celebrated April Fools Day with a little prank: views on your presentations have an extra two zeros on them. We hope you find this funny. Your views will be rolled back to normal in a few hours.
You can see tweets about this prank on twitter … we asked people to mark their tweets with #bestofslideshare in an email we sent out.
We sincerely apologize if we annoyed you … we notice from the reactions on twitter that some people are not amused.
Update: We’ve always loved our users and will continue to do so in future, the joke notwithstanding. If our prank upset you, we’re sorry.
Update Again: Actual view counts have now been restored. Its all over and back to normal!
Please check out SlideShare CEO’s follow-up post : Lessons learned from an April Fool’s prank
Apr 1, 6:32 am
Ok, two extra zeros, fine. It was cute.
So who the heck viewed my presentation eight *hundred* times?
Apr 1, 6:33 am
Your joke was so stupid that I’ll put it on page 100 of my “TOP 99 most annoying april jokes” presentation!!1
Apr 1, 6:37 am
[...] Slideshare view counts [...]
Apr 1, 6:46 am
Playing a prank on your website; fine, whatever.
Spamming me: not fine.
What’s the point of offering email preferences if you’re just going to ignore them?
Apr 1, 6:47 am
Well, I just wrote a great post talking about how awesome you are and how you get it.
I’m a fan with a sense of humor. And PMS. Ask me next week.
Apr 1, 6:48 am
You need to learn about timezones. Your email arrived at 12:05pm - so the joke is on you
Did you go “to” (sic) far? Yes, I think so.
Apr 1, 6:49 am
Was awesome! LOL
ceo
Apr 1, 6:52 am
@JeremyKeith, we are looking into problems with email preferences right now. Our apologies regarding this. We will fix it.
@DaveCross, you are right. We did send out some on day before.
@thomas r koll: Apologies if we annoyed you. It was meant as a silly prank, but we understand why you don’t like it.
Apr 1, 6:56 am
I said:
“You need to learn about timezones. Your email arrived at 12:05pm - so the joke is on you :-)”
Rashmi repied:
“@DaveCross, you are right. We did send out some on day before.”
Er, no. Sounds like you still don’t understand timezones. I received your mail after noon on April 1st as I’m in Europe. It’s traditional that April Fools jokes played after noon rebound onto the joker.
Dave…
Apr 1, 6:57 am
Guys, you aren’t YouTube. People put serious stuff on here… and they’re the type of people who are connected on Twitter to lots of professionals in their industry. Getting someone to look like a fool in front of their network and then be easily discovered in a big hashtag list of #peoplewhofellforourprank isn’t really cool.
It’s one thing if you made a bunch of silly presentations and took the risk on your own site and your own network, but trying to get us excited and then let down in front of our own networks: not cool at all.
Apr 1, 7:02 am
@Jeremy Keith
We grabbed the names off of newsletter listserv, so the april fool’s notification didn’t go through the usual e-mail notification preferences, but rather the newsletter subscription preferences.
Apr 1, 7:05 am
Wow. People…
Get a life. Relax. It’s one joke…
and it was played on NATIONAL JOKE DAY.
Quit being such a sissy because you are so vain you fell for the fact that your sucktastic presentation could even anywhere approach those numbers.
Go lay down. Get some rest. When you wake up… smile. Your brain will feel better.
Sean
Apr 1, 7:05 am
@DaveCross Ah, I did not know that. (but also have not had enough coffee. Its early here :-))
@Charlie I completely understand, this messes with people. And they put serious stuff on SlideShare. We will keep this in mind in the future.
Apr 1, 7:09 am
Hi eduardo.bregaida,
We’ve noticed that your slideshow on SlideShare has been getting a LOT of views in the last 24 hours. Great job … you must be doing something right.
Why don’t you tweet or blog this? Use the hashtag #bestofslideshare so we can track the conversation.
Congratulations,
-SlideShare Team
Hauhauahuahauhauha Very Good
@bregaida
Apr 1, 7:11 am
Rashmi (we met at Web Directions) and team; I understand the intent, but it didn’t work so well. I tweeted that I got the email, and then realised I got done by a weird joke, and now just feel embarrassed.
Apr 1, 7:13 am
I think it was funny and nothing to get all worked up about.
Apr 1, 7:14 am
[...] It’s April Fool’s Day and SlideShare played a prank on it’s users. Read about it here and watch the Twitter reactions [...]
Apr 1, 7:14 am
@Miles I understand, and honestly, I wish we had better anticipated how this would make people feel. Sorry, and we will keep this in mind in the future.
Apr 1, 7:16 am
You’ve lost a user. I don’t like being made to look stupid.
Apr 1, 7:18 am
@Ira Socol Sorry to hear that. Our apologies. If there is anything we can do to make it upto you, let us know.
Apr 1, 7:19 am
You got me! Nice work and brilliantly executed. Goes to show that not everyone is thinking about being “fooled” today.
Apr 1, 7:20 am
I fell for it and am smiling. Life needs laughter and joy.
Apr 1, 7:20 am
Just adding my say and letting you know: Well played!
Apr 1, 7:21 am
LOL! My first reaction was shock! Wondering what could I have possibly done right to get those kind of views. Did CNN.com do a piece on our site? By the time I saw the numbers were back down in the hundreds…very strangely I was relieved…so there are no shortcuts to tens of thousands of views
Good one!
Apr 1, 7:25 am
@Mark Goren, @Nancy White and @Bruno Amaral Glad you thought it was funny
Apr 1, 7:27 am
Well, I got got… and I tweeted it out. Oops.
My issue is this — if you’re going to do an April Fools prank, there should be a way for a skeptical reader to figure out that it was an April Fools joke. That’s the difference between funny and feeling punked.
An easy way to have done this — make a link to a fake “embed” with a ton of the new hits… most folks would have clicked to see where they were getting link-love from… and redirect that link to the “April Fools” page.
– Chris
Apr 1, 7:31 am
@Sean Nash: I AGREE!!! Everyone needs to laugh a little bit more- it’s very therapeutic! AND, if you can’t laugh @ yourself, well then, you BETTER not ever be laughing @ anyone else…..
Apr 1, 7:32 am
Chris,
Thats excellent feedback. Good idea. Thanks. We will do something about that right now.
Rashmi
Apr 1, 7:32 am
I have mixed feelings on this. I think actively soliciting us to look like n00bs in front of professional colleagues and friends may be a bit “over the line.” I don’t mind looking like an idiot in front of friends and family, but extended professional networks that include clients, prospects, analysts etc… is not quite as much fun.
The other issue for me was private material. I have some presentations set to private, non-embedded etc… and when I saw those inflated views, I nearly had a heart attack. In retrospect, this should have been my tip-off, but at the time, I was more concerned that confidential stuff had somehow been exposed more broadly.
So my take? A little too far, but not by much. I don’t think you ever want to suggest that private stuff isn’t, especially given perception of lack of privacy when using web services. As to me looking like a fool in front of my extended network? I guess that’s the point on some level - just wish it wasn’t sooo public… ; )
Apr 1, 7:35 am
@Dave, none of your stuff was exposed.
You are right. It does go a bit far. Its hard being on the other side of a social media site, sometimes you can’t quite anticipate how people will react to an idea.
Apr 1, 7:37 am
You caught me! Not expected to get fooled from Slideshare team, but it was great….
Brilliantly done! Had a good laugh on myself today.
Cheers!
Apr 1, 7:38 am
I’m glad you caught me early w/the Twitter reply, because I was going to re-post my old slide show based on the number of “views” and trumpet it a bit.
No matter what, though, I thought it was funny and a good way to promote your site. Although we are promoting a “April Fool’s-free zone” at our site, I’m glad to see others are doing it.
Apr 1, 7:50 am
@Dave, I think you are taking the joke way too seriously, it was a joke on April fools day, with no malicious intent and no harm was done, so get a life and chill..
@Rashmi, you cannot keep everyone happy with a prank. But they are fun for most of the others (and people executing them
)
Apr 1, 7:54 am
[...] Slideshare pull a whoopsie. [...]
Apr 1, 7:55 am
It was a good April Fool’s prank. I was miffed and felt used, but to be fair, this what April Fool’s day is about. I think it promoted Slideshare but at some risk to you but folks have short memories
Apr 1, 7:58 am
Nice one Rashmi!
I thought it was a cute joke as my April fools radar was on. It was a bit depressing to see seven figure visits on my slides but no comments though…
Apr 1, 7:59 am
I was sorry for the poor fool who had seen my slides 3000 times. I’m relieved to hear it was a joke! You had me
Apr 1, 8:02 am
got me for a while there until I sees lack of comments for 300,000 views, and >10K views on my private docs - SECURITY BREACH!!
nice one @jboutelle
Apr 1, 8:05 am
Nice prank! I was going to send out an email to my management about how successful my presentation was. Then I got the tweet from SlideShare and didn’t hit SEND just in time.
Apr 1, 8:08 am
Joke? I just assumed your code was screwed up. Again. So the joke was on..?
Apr 1, 8:29 am
Thought it was a bug… but admit it, fell for it, good one guys! keep up the good work!
Apr 1, 8:31 am
Hey! I thought it was an awesome joke! Turned into a great PR stunt! I liked it so much that I drew a cartoon about it: http://jonin60seconds.squarespace.com/blog/2009/4/1/april-fool.html
Apr 1, 8:40 am
I’ve grown to expect some kind of prank from slideshare
Happy April’s Fool!
Apr 1, 8:51 am
Funny, thought it was a bug. Will you track how many tweets & blogs you triggered?
Apr 1, 8:57 am
Je je, I didn’t know about this day!! Enjoy it then!!
Apr 1, 8:59 am
Hah - I got a kick out of it. Lighten up, folks
Apr 1, 9:02 am
I just hope no ones job was affected by your stupid prank
Apr 1, 9:02 am
Interesting idea for April Fools, but here’s my issue…knowing that the SlideShare team can mess with the numbers so easily makes me question credibility. I agree with an earlier post, “this is not YouTube” SlideShare has credible, useful information, changing the numbers is a questionable decision. Either way, interesting prank there will probably be a lot of conversation around this let’s just hope it’s mostly positive my thoughts lean toward the negative right now.
Apr 1, 9:06 am
…plus the ‘nice’ way of an April Fools joke is to look silly in front of the person doing the prank, whereas yours has made people look foolish infront of their employers, and in some cases where slideshows were private have probably made people panic and wasted time looking into making sure there wasn’t a security breach… good one!
Apr 1, 9:13 am
@Jess Dennis
I understand what you are saying. We just added two zeroes in a way it shows up on interface, but did not mess with any core statistics. I agree those should never be messed with.
@James Stone
There are definitely some unintended consequences of this prank. For example the privacy issue - in retrospect, it seems obvious. But we had not thought of that
Either way, lessons we will keep in mind for the future. Thanks for feedback.
Apr 1, 9:16 am
You should have done something more funny or believable. Anyways ok. I thought that there was some bug in your system.
Apr 1, 9:21 am
It was a good prank. I admit, for a “brief” moment, I fell for it. Have fully confessed on Twitter.
Thanks Slideshare. You did good today.
Apr 1, 9:25 am
Slideshare Users Beware of April 1 2010!!!
Dont know what these guys will have in mind for that day.
Apr 1, 9:36 am
* I reckon you owe me 10 for the text to Twitter.
* Your message arrived after 12 so broke the April Fool’s day rules.
*I couldn’t access Slideshare from work. Once I saw the numbers I knew that it couldn’t be right.
* I am mildly pissed off.
Apr 1, 9:37 am
I must admit: I fell for the e-mail, but when I saw the numbers I knew something was wrong. Nice prank! I can’t understand why people got so mad about it.
Cheers,
Galvao
Apr 1, 9:39 am
Not impressed, Slideshare. Very lame indeed.
Apr 1, 9:39 am
So, the purpose of this prank was to make us promote slideshare to our professional and personal networks? Awesome.
Apr 1, 9:40 am
As a customer of your service, I expect Slideshare to be a reliable, trustful and serious business tool. I looked foolish in front of my network before I realized you cheated on me by cheating numbers.
Even worst, you sent me a great CRM email to tell me that ! If it had been true, I would have prased your email and your service for being smart and funny. Instead, this email is now looking dumb and even mean. Thanks for letting me notice that I have 10 times fewer views that what I thought !
I am now taking action to find another hosting service for my presentations.
Apr 1, 9:51 am
No one ever really likes an April Fool’s joke unless it is them playing it.
I actually was in the middle of launching a whole new business based on the massive views my slides got but, OK, never mind!
I’ll say this: Slideshare is a good web product and you found an interesting way to bring it to attention today, so congrats.
Now - how are you going to get my views up to the April Fools level, huh?!
Apr 1, 9:58 am
1. This took time out of my day. I’m busy. I don’t want to waste time tracking down phantom embeds. I was about to write an email to Slideshare asking them to investigate these weird view counts. I don’t appreciate it. I can’t tell you how pissed off I would be if I had wasted any more time on this by sending emails and tweets out to colleagues and business associates. If you truly understood your audience, you’d know that “squandering time” equates to “business inefficiencies.” Hopefully you’ll learn how irritating business distractions can be as you waste YOUR time doing the backstroke over the next few days.
2. This a business site, not a “social media playground” like Facebook. This move dealt a blow to the Slideshare brand in the eyes of the professionals you serve.
3. The concept was fully self-serving. It would be one thing if Slideshare inflated numbers, sent out emails, and that was all. But Slideshare asked people to tweet it. Slideshare wanted to “generate buzz.” I don’t like being your pawn in a marketing ruse. You are here to help us build OUR brands. We’ll help you build YOUR brand as you provide a solid, reliable professional service.
A boneheaded move that backfired. Unprofessional and off-brand. Unfunny and unappreciated.
Apr 1, 10:04 am
@jeffreypilcher
Thanks for the feedback. We do understand where you are coming from. We planned this yesterday, its hard to see all the reactions / impact when you are planning something.
Your point is taken, we will keep in mind in future.
Happy April 1st!
Apr 1, 10:05 am
Well, I blogged it, so I’m guessing you guys know what I think. Bottom line - if you annoy more users than you amuse it’s not worked. If you intentionally make it hard to get access to your service because of the traffic, it’s not worked. I think something on the home page that immediately said it was a joke would have sorted the confusion, and earlier tweets would have clarified the situation. I saw a lot of confusion and anger on Twitter; you should have done as well.
However, when all is said and done, it was April 1st and people don’t always get things right. The good thing to come out of this is I hope an even greater understanding of the value that people put on your service!
Apr 1, 10:08 am
Ok, you got me alright, but not all the way! I reported the issue thinking someone had hacked the site … but … there was no way I would have beleived that a 100,000 people had viewed my slides in less than 24 hrs :>
Well done and no, as a professional, I AM NOT OFFENDED !
Apr 1, 10:08 am
I found it funny.
By the way we do need help in spreading the word about http://www.unitedprosperity.org
Using your creativity to help spread the word about United Prosperity, will go a long way to help poor entrepreneurs in the developing world who need a little hand up. If you could do that over the next few months, that would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks
@bhalchander
http://www.unitedprosperity.org
Apr 1, 10:12 am
And, here I really thought our view count increased more than 9,000% overnight, and on April Fool’s Day!
Apr 1, 10:15 am
I think your little prank worked surprisingly well because most people’s judgment fails when they’ve been given good news. Moreover, it didn’t seem like a newsletter or a generic template and was surprisingly genuine.
While I applaud your idea and the execution of the same, people seem get really annoyed when they’re given good news and told it’s false, rather than if they were given bad news for the same.
I really hope your excellent service doesn’t take a hit for this, perhaps another mass-email for damage control might be required
Good luck.
Apr 1, 10:16 am
Count me as one of the annoyed. I won’t be using your service any more. I’ll be using SlideRocket and other web2.0 services from now on. Good luck with your comic endeavors!
Apr 1, 10:18 am
Ah ah, got us, we were thinking you had SEO’d the site to the max, and suddenly got a TON of traffic - you got me and it is funny.
Thanks!
William
Apr 1, 10:30 am
[...] guessed what they were doing, because they let the cat out of the bag early this morning, with a blog post apologizing to those offended and letting users know that it was all just an April Fool’s prank. [...]
Apr 1, 10:36 am
Poking fun at people can sometimes be funny - but is always risky. When those people are your customers it goes beyond risky and becomes plain stupid.
But if you are going to do this - at least make sure the joke is funny - very funny. Where’s the joke, who is laughing? I don’t hear it.
Apr 1, 10:37 am
Good one! Except for the thud I heard when I saw Rashmi’s Presentation on your home page.Just for that I am going to keep the tweet.(The Link’s on my Blog too)Keep up the good work.
Apr 1, 10:37 am
I am a victim as well.. But i enjoyed it well.. After all it’s “fun time”
Apr 1, 10:39 am
[...] SlideShare multiplied everyone’s view count by 100 (and really pissed some people off). [...]
Apr 1, 10:55 am
Good marketing idea, but an obvious copy of the one Facebook sent this morning:-
Hi Facebook here,
We’ve analysed your friends list and noticed you don’t know half of these people, and they’ve never met you - you are banned.
And
Morning from Twitter
We’ve noticed you are talking a lot of crap and ignoring your family, from now on we’ll delete your tweets unless they are meaningful.
Mike
Apr 1, 10:57 am
I get it, but the fact I was duped into tweeting about it kind of irks me. But that is April fools right? I shouldnt have been so gullible as to think that many ppl actually viewed my silly little presentation… I am still satisfied with the service, no worries!
Apr 1, 11:01 am
Not funny. But the joke was not destructive. That is a plus. But I can not laugh about it. So that is a minus.
Apr 1, 11:01 am
Wasn’t funny to me. I wrote a blog post and some tweets about how my presentation views have grown. Now I have to go back and fix it. Feeling kinda pissed at you right now.
Apr 1, 11:09 am
ok, it was funny… li mortacci vostra!!
Apr 1, 11:19 am
I am not an active user so I had no idea what my view count was. I had one presentation uploaded in 2006 and one recent one on my profile on Linked In which I did want people to browse so I thought my profile presentation had attracted views which would have been nice. I do have 5000 + views for the 2006 presentation and around 50 for the profile one which is quite surprising even without the zeroes
I did think it may be an April Fool joke which is what I mentioned on my blog post on venturewoods.
I can see the funny side but I can also see why serious users may get offended.
Apr 1, 11:22 am
This was not amusing. Why would it be funny to waste a whole bunch of people’s time reviewing our traffic stats? Some of us actually put faith in your company for business purposes. Talk about generating negative buzz. Your marketing department should join the ranks of the unemployed.
Apr 1, 11:23 am
I think self-deprecating humor would have been fine. But poking fun at your user base is not. Sorry–I was going to give you guys a positive shout out post on my blog. That’s now delayed indefinitely. Grow up.
Apr 1, 11:52 am
Got me - LOL
I thought for sure I must have said something really dumb to get that many views. Double joke on me.
Thanks for making me smile and laugh at myself.
Cindy
http://www.websellerscircle.com
PS - thanks for reminding me I’d put it up, I tweeted the presentation - great marketing on slideshares part!
Apr 1, 12:01 pm
A little harder to figure out if it’s 2nd April when you get the email, as it is in New Zealand and Australia
Apr 1, 12:02 pm
Seriously guys,
Reading this I do get the joke but it doesn’t stop me from feeling quite sad.
Yes, it’s April Fools, but you really made me look like a fool. I put a lot of time and energy into my work and building a network and a business and it is not easy to do this while juggling a job at the same time. Being laughed at just makes me feel like all my efforts are a waste of time.
Especially hard because I’ve been recently promoting your site as a source of material.
http://kalinago.blogspot.com/2009/03/slide-over-to-slidesharenet-efl-tech.html
You could have made it clear hours ago that this was joke as soon as people started saying they were upset by it.
Please do something about this before you make more people upset at their own stupidity.
Apr 1, 12:05 pm
[...] guessed what they were doing, because they let the cat out of the bag early this morning, with a blog post apologizing to those offended and letting users know that it was all just an April Fool’s prank. [...]
Apr 1, 12:09 pm
YES. You went too far.
I thought slideshare was a good website, but i dont think so now.
You people humiliated your users in front of the world.
Do you really think that saying “we are sorry” is enough?
Thanks for ruining my day,slideshare.
You upset me more than any other ppl have done on any april fools day.
Apr 1, 12:12 pm
It would have been funny if you had added 10 zeros, but not 2. It would have been funny if you had not asked folks to let everyone know they are stupid by making a twitter post.
Apr 1, 12:17 pm
Dear Ones
Your prank was quite a good one. I thought it had got to be a prank - when I first saw it.
But then I convinced myself that 30,010 people had indeed watched a small presentation on the start of The Holocaust; one that I produced 4 months ago on Kristallnacht 70th anniversary and the burning of the synagogues in Europe(it had occurred near my birth date in 1938).
And then there was my other show, about why it is crazy that so many small business owners - in droves - try to wing it in business without inexpensive, available help from professionals… and how and why they fail.
I thought it was just conceivable that, after 8 months of horror in the financial world, somewone would actually wake up, on the same day that my new website for arts business owners was published with a show connected to it via a blog. And that, after two years’ part-time work by me, new father of two. But 20,079!! Pathetic I know.
The SEO had been done on my site and I had worked like a slave drumming up interest and responses from Twitter, over twelve long hours in the last two days. 70% of the hits on my site were from Twitter referral. Genuine ones.
I thought Slideshare had caught the virus, as it were, and my wildest dreams and hopes had been realized - all in a day. 20,0079 hits and then, only 279 of them, honestly produced! Bliss lost.
Then I checked back to Slideshare (it is evening here and I nearly went to bed overhappy). My wife is away at a work dinner somewhere. I had almost called her out on SMS in front of her CEO.
I bought champagne. The I found out. Some clown at work.
So it is all just sad.
Happily for your organization I took a medication for high blood pressure an hour ago.
What I think about the security of my Slideshare account cannot be spoken about right now. I feel sick. But it is well known here that this week the CEO of the German Rail System was obliged to resign over a similar lapse in the security of private and corporate internet records.
Maybe another Slidehare genius could produce a bells and whistles Slide Presentation to describe how this lapse was even possible and what is being done to reassure users.
Neil McPherson laughing fit to vomit.
Apr 1, 12:18 pm
As I had openly admitted on Twitter, I too fell for the “prank” hook, line and sinker.
I also indicated that some would feel that anyone who expressed disappointment are limited to those who take themselves far too seriously.
I have never been reluctant to use self-deprecating humor - after all if we cannot laugh at ourselves as the saying goes . . .
However, I truly do rely on SlideShare’s numbers to inform clients about read activity. And while 20,000 reads was an hugely “optimistic” number, one also considers the source in weighing the veracity of the information. And as a side note, meteoric increases are possible as my blog’s syndicated readership base grew from 0 when it was launched in May 2007 to reaching 300,000 syndicated subscribers each month worldwide by August 2008.
Perhaps that’s what made it a great prank was the fact that no one could see it coming. On the other hand, to arrive at that point of creditability (re being a trusted source of info) is something that is earned and maintained through an organization’s conduct or actions. Ultimately, SlideShare’s hard earned creditability is what created the degree of trust that opened the door to making one susceptible to the prank in the first place.
In hindsight, is this really the way SlideShare wanted to leverage that trust?
Once again, and as demonstrated by a couple of comments above, there will certainly be some to tell others that they have to get a life and not take the situation or themselves so seriously. In the end however, SlideShare has to ask if their little joke furthered their organization’s best interests (i.e. added to the trust that people have in the company), or as it hurt it?
That is a question that should have been asked before hand.
As for me I will take my lumps because I am a big boy, and that’s life. But I will never view SlideShare in the same light, nor will I honestly look at your statistics with the same level of confidence I had prior to this morning.
One final note: I have a number of secured documents re papers which can only be accessed through the utilization of a tightly controlled password. Unfortunately, it would appear that SlideShare deemed these documents to be a target as well as they are showing a higher level of reads than warranted by internal verification. I hope that someone from SlideShare will get back to me to let me know that it is indeed part of the prank and not a more serious security breach within their system.
Apr 1, 12:25 pm
woow, was great one
Apr 1, 12:28 pm
I received the email and half-fell for it. But had the good sense to ask a web2 expert (Walt) to confirm if it was a prank. He did. And I didn’t twitter. Momentary exhilaration was worth the good-natured ribbing from family members. My wife just shouted some more instructions: “Hey rock star, kindly roll out the garbage can as you faithfully do every week.” Keep up the good work - this is a great site. And I learned today that I can embed Youtube videos inside my slideshows. Very useful indeed.
Apr 1, 12:28 pm
We celebrate that on 28th december.
And you have fooled me because I’m not fluent in English.
I was thinking my slide was impresive.
Good April Fools day (Dia de los inocentes).
Francesc(Barcelona-Spain)
http://blocs.xtec.cat/sistemasolar/
Apr 1, 12:29 pm
Jon
Thanks for the thoughtful post.
There was no security breach. We inflated all the numbers (at the web page level itself) without regard for whether they were private or public.
We’ll be rolling back the inflated statistics shortly: will keep you posted.
I agree that the statistics are kinda sacred, and messing with them was a little wonky. We should have thought this through better.
Apr 1, 12:33 pm
Jon Hansen,
“One final note: I have a number of secured documents re papers which can only be accessed through the utilization of a tightly controlled password. Unfortunately, it would appear that SlideShare deemed these documents to be a target as well as they are showing a higher level of reads than warranted by internal verification. I hope that someone from SlideShare will get back to me to let me know that it is indeed part of the prank and not a more serious security breach within their system.”
Yes… your secured documents are absolutely fine, just like public ones. They will get their real view count in a few hours… dont worry…
Sorry if our prank upset you… we love you as a slideshare user!
Apr 1, 12:39 pm
Well thats a fantastic joke by SS team even i have received an email by SS team with subject of “You’re a SlideShare RockStar” and then i just moved on my slidespace and watch whats going on my shows but this is just a joke but really amazing
Thanks SS Team for expressing all of us
Apr 1, 12:48 pm
Thank you for clarifying re the secured documents . . . a questionable prank is still better than a true security breach.
I guess the curse of today’s Internet (i.e. Twitter, e-mail etc.) is the speed at which information is disseminated to a potentially large audience.
I have already been in contact with those clients with whom I had shared the exciting statistics from earlier today, and apologized as well as indicated that I was still trying to get my deposit on the Brooklyn Bridge back.
All-in-all, it wasn’t lethal, but maybe you could tone it down a bit next year?
Apr 1, 12:49 pm
What a stupid idea. I won’t be using this site again.
Apr 1, 1:07 pm
Hey Slideshare,
So is the fact that uploading an edited presentation resulted in my original presentation (and stats, and comments) being deleting a big April Fools Day joke, too?
Apr 1, 1:10 pm
Congrats on the prank, I won’t be using your site for anything again.
Apr 1, 1:13 pm
The SS message should have included a clue that it was an April Fool’s joke. Conveniently drives people to the SS site to check their progress.. but what is the benefit to the SS users? None. Irritating message, waste of time.
Apr 1, 1:19 pm
People, have a sense of humor. Its April 1st. You knew that every email today, every news announcement should be treated as suspect. I was taken in as well, but laughed out when I realized the joke and came to twitter.
Its a joke! On April 1st. Period
Apr 1, 1:26 pm
Its funny to see all the people getting upset. Can’t they get a joke, especially on April Fool’s day
Apr 1, 1:33 pm
[...] guessed what they were doing, because they let the cat out of the bag early this morning, with a blog post apologizing to those offended and letting users know that it was all just an April Fool’s prank. [...]
Apr 1, 1:39 pm
I get enough email. Don’t waste my time. Scrib’d seems better to me now.
Apr 1, 1:51 pm
[...] - Togliamoceli subito di mezzo per passare a cose più “serie”: oggi è il Fool Day, il pesce d’Aprile. Trovi tutte le versioni degli scherzi online su April Fools Day on Web. Tralasciando il fatto che quelli offline son davvero tristi ecco una lista di ciò che è successo oggi: il Guardian passa dal giornale a Twitter (e Wired Italia ci crede pure), le nuove feature di Internet Explorer 8.1 come il supporto alle estensioni di Firefox, Google Cadie, Autopilot e Gball, l’ora nella quale viene resettata Internet, la nuova tecnologia di riconoscimento facciale del browser Opera, un nuovo modo per guardare YouTube, le statistiche gonfiate di Slideshare. [...]
Apr 1, 1:59 pm
@angela: If your re-upload failed, you should be able to check it from this page (when logged in): http://www.slideshare.net/my-slideshows
Try re-uploading it again and it should work this time.
Your view count, comments, etc are all preserved until you choose to delete the presentation.
Apr 1, 2:58 pm
@Rashmi I found it funny, but have to join sides with people saying they put serious stuff on and weren’t amused.
Apr 1, 3:25 pm
Don’t worry for the joke…
It was funny!
http://mysocialweb.wordpress.com/2009/04/01/slideshare-numeri-gonfiati-e-il-caso-anomalo-del-tag/
Apr 1, 3:27 pm
Just my two cents.
I didn’t have time to actually check what was happening to my slideshare count during my work day, so when I got to see it, I learned it was an April fool’s joke. I was safe, but can understand how some people got annoyed by it.
Did you check Country info for this prank? As somebody else pointed out above…not everybody in the world does this kind of pranks today, so we had a lot less reasons to find it funny. Maybe next year, if you decide to play another one, just send it out to the ones who might be on April fool’s mood.
Apr 1, 3:30 pm
You asked for feedback. It’s now April 2 here, so no I was not expecting a joke. Do you want to be international or just US? And no, I don’t like spam any time.
Apr 1, 3:32 pm
That was great!!!!!!
excelent joke
you think you can leave those numbers as is?
jejejeje
excelent! keep this way.
once again thanks for a happy fool’s day.
Apr 1, 3:36 pm
[...] la risposta è fin troppo semplice: si tratta di un Pesce d’Aprile, come conferma anche il blog di Slideshare. Passi l’intera giornata a guardarti le spalle da amici, parenti… e alla fine arriva da [...]
Apr 1, 3:58 pm
You fooled me … what’s worse after only getting a few hours sleep last night due to missed airplane connections … and then giving a guest talk to a large group of CIO’s (Chief Information Officers) and using my slideshare as an example of viral adoption of web 2.0 content, you not only made me look foolish, but set back the use of these kind of tools in many organizations.
I love April fools jokes, but you crossed the line. When I saw the hit count, and found that your CEO and founder had added my presentation as a favorite, I believed your email. After all, it says in my stats that “Amit Ranjan, Co-founder at SlideShare, favorited this 1 month ago” (still does claim my presentation is a favorite) Quite frankly I not checked my stats in a while, and my research seemed to confirm a source (your founder) who might have accounted for the increase.
For anyone who is interested, my presentation is a very serious study of globalization named a “Hodge Podge World”. This was the first time I had hosted content on your site, it will more than likely be the last time.
Apr 1, 4:04 pm
Everyone needs to relax. I can only laugh at the people who took this so seriously. If your content sucks then it sucks. Get over it.
Apr 1, 4:42 pm
[...] Happy april fools day (slideshare.net) [...]
Apr 1, 4:43 pm
[...] Happy april fools day (slideshare.net) [...]
Apr 1, 5:27 pm
I got the email, which was dated March 31 if I remember correctly. I checked my stats but highly doubted that even *my* wonderful presentations could have millions of views. I assumed it was a technical glitch.
Now I’ve seen your gloating “We got you!” slideshow on the home page. You didn’t get me, but you’ll could easily lose me.
To the people saying “Get a sense of humor”: a lot of us use Slideshare to build professional credibility. I’ve gotten clients from my slides. I want my business to be associated with a professional site, but unfortunately the mindset that created the joke makes Slideshare seem more like Myspace.
Apr 1, 7:22 pm
Seriously — someone over in your company thought this was funny? thank goodness I didn’t tweet to my network embarrassing myself — I actually thought you might be a serious web site. Now I just want to take my content off and go to a competitor.
April’s Fools Jokes for some laughs in the office:
DUMB
Annoying your customers: PRICELESS because you can’t afford to buy back all the good will you just wasted.
Apr 1, 7:23 pm
A particularly ill-advised move that smacks of the teenage hormonal overdose reminiscent of MySpace.
Apr 1, 7:43 pm
[...] Happy april fools day (slideshare.net) [...]
Apr 1, 8:08 pm
Hey I thought Conficker got ya. I thought this was pretty funny. It’s nice to have some humor once in a while.
People just relax and take one day and not be so serious, it just might help your attitude and blood pressure
Apr 1, 8:31 pm
All I feel worth adding is that I think SlideShare has learned a lesson from this. Out of possible mess-ups or undesired consequences from some action, this I think others would agree would fall into the more milder categories—that is not to say that there probably are a few professionals out there that have seriously embarrassed themselves in the last 24 hours.
Thanks for apologising to those that raised complaints regarding this issue.
—Pascal
Apr 1, 8:45 pm
DUMB! DUMB! DUMB!
One of the dumbest and the most embarrassing pranks I have ever come across!
A prank is always fine but spamming me with an email, do you guys think its funny, I think its the dumbest prank ever!
Slideshare is a credible platform and well, I have second thoughts now! Playing smart pranks makes sense…but this is professional dumbness!!
Apr 1, 9:57 pm
Dumb Prank
I sent that email to my board members .. that was the dumbest April Fools Joke..
Slideshare Ive got about 15k views on my presentations anyways [totally]..next time this happens, I will pull everything out to scribd or something else
regards
Dude
Apr 1, 10:33 pm
guys
why so serious about a prank…it was april fools day and someone got at us… the community needs to realise that we ought to give it in sometimes….
but slideshare team… you did it… i think you could have picked a more burning issue and used our energies… we could have all made the worlds longest ppt deck… everyone would have contributed, you wouldhave been on guiness book of records and we all woudl have become more close… I will be wary of a friend who plays pranks without understaing my sensibilities.
you guys rock.. but for the rest of the days of april you will get enough hate mail to sulk
happy foold day to you
Apr 1, 10:41 pm
its good to have a sense of humour.. its better to know who should we target
Apr 1, 11:46 pm
Good to know u hv a sense of humor!!!! As i hv been away from ss awhile i did not get to ’see’ the prank. But one of my staff who is a memeber came up this morning and sd she has been declared a ‘rockstar’. Well she is a rock already.
So becoming a star was not far away, i thought! The after a while she came up and said it all AFD prank!
Keep up the fun!
merci/gracias/danke
Apr 1, 11:52 pm
I would have thought most would have understand the April Fools prank. I’d be interested in statistics of how many people did add the #bestofslideshare hashtag. Please let us know!
Apr 2, 12:23 am
[...] rather than revisit yesterday’s discussion on Slideshare’s blog on whether the joke was funny or not I’d like to explore the issue of reputation [...]
Apr 2, 1:25 am
Dumb, dumb, dumb,
it may come as a surprise, but the world is not within the boundaries of the continental USA.
The email was sent after 10PM on 1 April to several Australian slidesharers, including myself. Most didn’t actually receive it, for whatever reason, until 2 April. No justification for tying April Fool’s Day to that email for Australian users.
Now as for the worst part - the abuse of trust. Stupid way to get more twitter traffic. Do not abuse my trust again, or I walk. Get the bugs worked out, and I’ll be the first one to tweet about it. Promise.
Not funny. You get a nomination on Stilgherrian Live for Cnut of the Week on the strength of this - for setting back the tide of progress through abusing user trust in the shared community. It cheapens all of us.
Cheers, Andrew
Apr 2, 2:15 am
[...] wishful thinking on our part! - but many others are not seeing the funny side. Just have a look at some of the comments responding to Slideshare’s announcement on their [...]
Apr 2, 2:28 am
[...] PRESS - SlideShare played an April Fool’s prank on their users, some people were not impressed by it, prompting some to look for alternatives (scroll down to the [...]
Apr 2, 2:46 am
Looking at all those postings makes me wonder….
In this internet shrunk world we dont quite grasp that 24 hrs extends to 48 hrs actually from east of east to west of west.
Sorry if i sound to some of you pompous bcz that is not my intention…. but it is a kinda reflection on human nature that we measure our self esteem by how many view our slides!
i guess we all need to take our little egos a little less seriously…
I am prepared get trashed on my views here… you are trashing a view; not me!!!!!!!!!
Apr 2, 3:17 am
Yeah, ok, April Fools, ha ha. I think the zeros add are fine, I never even look at those things, I just put the presentations out for the curious who know me, so it’s fine with me. But did you have to send me an email too, encouraging me to blog it? I didn’t like that part of the game. Blech on you, SlideShare.
Apr 2, 3:41 am
Oh!, playing with the ego of the bloggers… you’re heartless!! X-D
Apr 2, 4:40 am
It felt good yesterday seeing all those views. Today it doesn’t feel so good. Especially after all of the bragging I’ll have to retract now.
Apr 2, 6:02 am
[...] twee nullen er bij) op de presentaties van haar bezoekers. Helaas voor de gebruikers, bleek ook dit een 1 april grap te zijn. Helaas waren veel mensen er niet van gediend en kreeg SlideShare erg veel negatieve reacties. [...]
Apr 2, 6:08 am
[...] their defence, they notified the negative response quickly and publically apologised on their company [...]
Apr 2, 6:16 am
[...] bring you all one other “Best of” piece. I was actually flagged to it as a result of an April Fool’s joke from the good folks at SlideShare — a joke that I appreciated and thought was funny, but many [...]
Apr 2, 7:29 am
@ Sean Nash
> and it was played on NATIONAL JOKE DAY.
Which nation is this?
Anyway, I’m going to stop using slideshare and I’ll be sure to tell all my friends and colleagues to not use it.
Apr 2, 7:54 am
Epilogue to a bad joke . . .
For those of you who fell for the SlideShare “prank” I thought that I would share the apology I issued to my clients (and readership) upon discovering the true nature of the view activity.
I am doing this for two reasons, the first is to show that there is no shame in being duped when dealing with what you believed was a trusted source of information.
The second is to perhaps help SlideShare to recognize the real consequences associated with their actions now that they are a bonafide Web 2.0 service provider and not a boutique platform. It will hopefully help them to also see that an unconditional apology without qualifications, in which they take full ownership for their actions, will likely go a long way to winning back the serious business user.
I am only glad that my original sharing of the false information was wrapped in my usual self-deprecating manner (i.e. with reference to being a rock star I informed my readership that the e-mail initially made me suspicious as my vocal talents are a cross between Slim Whitman and a howling coyote). I however cringe when I think about those unfortunate individuals who saw the “increased popularity” as a validation of their work.
That said here is my apology:
“I want to take this opportunity to personally apologize to you for this morning’s e-mail regarding the “tremendous” numbers relating to the recent download activity for the “Riding the Crest of a New Wave” white paper.
As it turns out SlideShare, the platform in which a great number of professionals and businesses post papers and presentations admitted to “doctoring the numbers” and then sending an e-mail to an undetermined number of users informing them of the outstanding performance.
While the actual download activity has been respectable, it has certainly not been at the 20,000 mark.
While I am obviously a little embarrassed for having fallen for the prank (I am also going to have to ask that my deposit on the Brooklyn Bridge be returned), I have always believed in facing the music so to speak rather than sweeping it under the proverbial carpet.
And while one would not expect an organization such as SlideShare, who is viewed by many as being the leader in terms of the services they provide to take such liberties, it nonetheless proves that even the most seasoned professional can be fooled some of the time.”
One final note, SlideShare has teamed-up with LinkedIn, which is a serious business network. I wonder how that organization and its members will view this in the proverbial morning?
Apr 2, 8:39 am
The #1 featured presentation on the front page of SlideShare should be a humble and contrite apology acknowledging the issues and concerns of its user-base. One look at your home page and someone might easily assume you folks are ashamed, embarrassed and hopeful that this goes away quietly. You should embrace your mistake, not try and hide from it.
Don’t fool yourselves into thinking this was a stunt with a 50/50 hit/miss ratio. It was not a “partial success with some people.” If any marketer ever does anything that annoys, frustrates or angers as many people as you have, the idea was an outright, unmitigated failure. The fact that there are some people who think others need to “lighten up” or that your prank was “a good one - haha” does not absolve you, nor does it diminish the need for you to take every step possible to express your regrets and apologies.
If this blog thread is the only place one can find an apology or explanation, SlideShare will have failed at handling a failure — a double fail.
Apr 2, 8:48 am
When I saw the email with high number of views I thought your service was broken. Now reading this post and seeing the way you’re handling this incident I am thinking your company is broken.
Apr 2, 10:41 am
I won’t using this site again (NEVER!).
Apr 2, 11:43 am
Folks, we are listening and discussing this internally and deciding on the best way to move forward. Unlike the April Fool’s prank (which we thought up in a day) we are taking time to think things through and decide how we communicate with our community our this incident which has made us think deeply about what SlideShare means to our users.
For those who are saying that we did not respond enough, many of our team members have done nothing else but respond to our users for past day and half. You can see this on Twitter (under our various team accounts), on blogs, and in many personal emails. Remember, we are a small company with two people who do community work. There is no PR / marketing agency.
Please stay tuned…
Apr 2, 12:33 pm
Thanx! I had a good laugh at myself because realized where these two zeroes popped up from only next morning… Completely forgot about this Fool’s Day. ^_^ TIt was really cute and funny
Apr 2, 12:39 pm
@Nina Krympenko
Glad you enjoyed it. Thanks for sharing
Apr 2, 4:30 pm
I found your prank offensive! I initially thought someone was storming your site, then I found out you were making fun of your customers. I went to your hashtag site where all the people were excited about being “Rockstars”, I imagined their embarrassment upon learning the truth. Not OK business practice.
This is equivalent to middle school bullying and all the HaHa’s from the commenters is like the people egging the bully on.
Apr 2, 5:11 pm
Slideshare, you’ve really abused my trust and my email address. I have a sense of humour but by the time I received your email hoax it wasn’t even April Fools day anymore “downunder” - So being excited that a work team presentation was receiving supposed rockstar status I tweeted it.
I no longer think of your product as anything I’d consider useful in a professional sense. You’ve lost my trust…big price to pay in the online world. so now I’ve tweeted what I really think of slideshare!
Apr 3, 2:50 am
It just a joke, come on, don’t be too serious!
Keep up the good work, Slideshare!
Apr 3, 6:15 am
[...] jengi alkoi virittelemään visioita rapakon taakse puhujamarkkinoille siirtymisestä, paljastui synkkä totuus. Kyseinen viesti ja katsomiskertojen lisäys olivat vain [...]
Apr 3, 8:37 am
Hi Rashmi
As I said in a blog post on “Have Slideshare Avoided Their Ratner Moment?” (http://ukwebfocus.wordpress.com/2009/04/02/have-slideshare-avoided-their-ratner-moment/) I do feel that you are aware that, for many (but not all) Slideshare users you made a mistake.
However I do appreciate the effort you have made in responding on various blog posts. And I also admire your ‘finely tuned antennae’ which helped you spot the negative feedback you have received and respond appropriately.
Apr 3, 8:46 am
cruel joke by slideshare
Apr 3, 9:12 am
[...] show-offy, you big silly show offs. As posters on Mashable, and the subsequent crawly apology on Slideshare’s blog reveal, some people did take the joke well. However, to me with my Comms hat on, it seems [...]
Apr 3, 4:50 pm
[...] a whole lot of them were embarrassed when Slideshare revealed the April Fool’s Day joke on their [...]
Apr 3, 5:18 pm
[...] guessed what they were doing, since they let the cat out of the bag early this morning, with a blog post apologizing to those annoyed and vouchsafing users know which it was all only an Apr Fool’s [...]
Apr 4, 8:02 am
Manipulating nos. is not a joke. It raises doubts in the integrity of this company. CEO should be fired.
Apr 4, 9:43 am
Thank you for the apology, this shows the integrity of the company that misteps, listens, apologizes and moves on.
I’m still going to be a slideshare user, thanks!
supportive, Jeremiah
Apr 5, 9:39 am
BOO..looking for alternates to slideshare now.
Apr 6, 2:08 pm
[...] Happy april fools day | SlideShare Blog [...]
Apr 6, 3:18 pm
[...] personal slideshows to be embeded on many blogger’s web pages, recently played a horrible April fool’s joke on users. SlideShare sent a personal sounding email to SlideShare users congratulating them for [...]
Apr 6, 4:19 pm
[...] their defence, they notified the negative response quickly and publically apologised on their company blog. Share and [...]
Apr 7, 1:24 pm
It’s cool. April fooled maybe but hey the boss was happy with the numbers! Could you fool me a few more times so I can forward the numbers. HA HA
Apr 7, 1:29 pm
Beavis and Butthead….er… Slideshare team: that’s really not much of an apology. You’ve effectively stuck to your 15 year old stance that you’re sorry that us old foggies don’t get the joke that’s ever so funny.
You know what’d be really funny?? Next year you should change my username to “stinkypants-jake”! Or change the descriptions on my presentations to say that I stole the content from someone else! Maybe next year Facebook could change my relationship status to single then auto-email my wife! April Fool’s Rulz!!
Or maybe if you’re trying to present yourselves as a site for professionals and professional content, you could keep your hands off my personal data. My personal profile data is ME. It’s my stand-in when you’re not talking to me in person.
Not cool.
Apr 7, 1:34 pm
[...] Slideshare team posted an blog post (failing to understand the concern), but they failed to send another email (you know, the channel [...]
Apr 9, 8:24 am
I wonder how many people didn’t come to this blog. I wonder how many people still don’t know why they had temporarily and artificially high view counts. I guess this is all we’re going to see in the form of an apology or explanation…
SlideShare gets a double D-, one for the lame prank, and one for taking longer than a week to figure out how to respond. The only reason it isn’t a pair of F grades is that the service is free.
I’d like to hear the rationale for why another email with an apology and explanation wasn’t sent. (Please don’t tell me it’s because you have a newfound respect for people’s spam concerns.)
What a person or organization does in trying, difficult times defines its character. How people (and organizations) react after they fuck up is a “moment of truth.” There is the simultaneous potential to either reconfirm someone’s loyalty by handling the situation well, or to alienate someone for life by compounding the problem.
Apr 9, 11:57 am
This is one BIG CHEAP publicity stunt by this “innovative” team. And after 1 week they issue an apology! Nah.
Apr 10, 8:42 am
It looks like the damage was done and everyone is moving on… if not a little worse for the wear.
Apr 10, 11:07 am
[...] instance, the presentation-sharing site SlideShare.net posted an apology after a prank in which the site added two zeros to inflate the viewer count of posted presentations [...]
Apr 15, 6:52 am
[...] hours, not only did was an apology posted on the Slideshare blog, but I received a DM to my Twitter account from Jonathan Boutelle (@ jboutelle) one of the [...]
Apr 20, 1:35 pm
Ughhh. Bad taste
Sep 12, 11:25 am
[...] la risposta è fin troppo semplice: si tratta di un Pesce d’Aprile, come conferma anche il blog di Slideshare. Passi l’intera giornata a guardarti le spalle da amici, parenti… e alla fine arriva da [...]
Oct 13, 9:18 am
Thanks for keeping updates..
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