Chillin'Competition

Yes, our last post –“Breaking News: Joaquín Almunia to be EU Judge”, was a spoof, a hoax, a “poisson d’Avril” as they say in Belgium, our contribution to April Fools’ day 2015. We improvised it after reading a couple of weird news stories that morning and realizing the date in which we were. Some people, and even some news agencies, took it seriously, and after a few hours Mr. Lucky Namoodia  Joaquín Almunia himself commented about it on Twitter (@AlmuniaJoaquin), confirming that it was a hoax and stating that “It’s a pity indeed”.

If anyone felt disappointed by our misinformation, we are sorry, and we apologize, like we have done before when needed (see here for an example of deficient coverage on our part).

In any event, this has helped us realize that people who read this blog care less about substantive issues (there are indeed very good reasons why no one should give a damn of what Pablo or I think about exclusivity arrangements), than about us posting nonsense (we are better at that, and competition law is a fertile ground to find nonsensical stuff). Point taken. In that spirit, we thought of offering you this post April’s Fools Day Special, with some of the best hoaxes and law or antitrust-related jokes of recent times:

• One of our all-time favourites is one that we already covered in Chillin’Competition. A hoax published in a Belgian newspaper concerning Charleroi Airport actually fooled the European Commission, leading DG Comp to send a request for information on the basis of the pretty absurd piece (see here).
• Now that rumour has it that an SO is in the pipeline this very funny piece is particularly timely “EU Google Probe to be Based Entirely on Google Searches“.
• In the U.S. there was a tradition of very good April Fools jokes from the American Antitrust Institute here, my favorite ones being Antitrust Controlled by Jerks, Says New Evolutionary Biology Report, As US Attorney General Gonzales Confidentially Reports, There’s Nothing Funny About Antitrust, and President Bush’s proposal to merge antitrust agencies with the Department for Homeland Security.
• A more recent one was reported these days by Abovethelaw, and has to do with the April Fools’ Day email sent to all workers of a BigLaw firm concerning life-work balance that was apparently not well received by many (see here).
• Also at Chillin’Competition we have done this before. We did it, although not on the right day, when we announced that we were facing a legal challenge following the Google Spain Judgment (see here) or when we announced on-side beach inspections by DG Comp (see here) ; Nico did it when he announced we were closing this blog (see here). Then there were others which did not pretend to be serious in spite of their accuracy, such as this post on Microsoft’s Contribution to the EU Budget. Another joke worth mentioning if only for the number of absurd comments it elicited was Nicolas’ Chuck Norris Antitrust Facts.
• Then of course you never know, because some stories that seem a hoax end up being true (see here).