I have a confession – I’ve never gotten the appeal of “April Fool’s” jokes.

Prankster:  “Ha! Ha!  You believed me!   I lied and you believed me.  YOU ARE SUCH AN IDIOT!”

One upon whom the joke was perpetrated: “Yep!  You got me.  You’re right.  I WAS an idiot to believe what you said.  Fool me once – shame on you.  Fool me twice – shame on me.   Don’t worry – I won’t trust you again.”

While I don’t get the whole “I’ve lied to you.  I’ve abused your trust-  now laugh and forget about it,” behind the traditional April Fool’s pranks,  I especially don’t get WHY anyone would try to pull an “April Fool’s” joke on their blog.   If there’s one message everyone with a blog, Facebook or Twitter account needs to hear it’s this:

WHAT YOU WRITE ONLINE TODAY MAY LIVE ON THE INTERNET FOREVER!

In past generations, newspaper editors could “play” April Fool’s pranks because of the ephemeral nature of the media. However, the rules have changed since the days when the daily newspaper was the standard for mass communication – much to the chagrin of traditional media moguls.

The Internet has take Transparency from Transient to Permanent in less than a decade!

I understand why people are having trouble making the transition from a world where transparency was an option to be exercised into a world where transparency is no longer transitory and now permanent.

For thousands of years, mankind has sought to create an element of permanency in written communication.  Instead of scrawling images in the dirt or sand, cave men put pictures on the walls of the cave because they lasted longer.  Years later, men carved words in stone in order to preserve them for eternity.  It was labor intensive – but when the message was important – it was worth the effort.

The point is – that in order to create a lasting message – one that could withstand the elements and the ravages of time, man had to take extra ordinary precautions to preserve early forms of communication.

The very nature of the Internet has removed the elements of  “time, effort, care and caution” from the preservation of the electronic communications.

People are learning the lessons of the “new world” the HARD way every day.  The tales are rampant of how Facebook can get you fired.  Heck, there’s even a term for getting fired because of your blog – it’s called getting “Dooced.”  Daniel Terdiman wisely asked himself the question, Is there such as thing as being fired for Twittering? He writes:

Well, today I was thinking about Twittering something and I began to wonder if maybe doing so might get me in trouble at work. And that got me to thinking about whether there’d been any cases yet of someone getting Dooced for Twittering. Call it being “Twooced.”

The answer of course is a resounding “Yes!”  – Twitter can get you fired – as evidenced by the now infamous Cisco Fatty.  What I find AMAZING is that Connor Riley is working on a masters degree in information technology yet she writes on her blog,

Unfortunately, a Cisco employee (actually, I’m not sure if he’s an employee or enthusiast or what) happened to be browsing public mentions of the company on Twitter and immediately called me out on what seemed like a hugely callous and rude thing to say

Um – sweetie – that was not an unfortunate oopsie – that is what is called REPUTATION MANAGEMENT!  While Cisco may be cutting edge in employing this – it will soon become the NORM and not the EXCEPTION.

The reason reputation management is becoming big business is simple….

The Internet is NOT ephemeral.  Your blog is NOT ephemeral.  Even Twitter is not ephemeral.

Barbara Ling has left comments on this blog sharing her own “Golden Rule” of business communication:

“I live by the creed, my kids will find EVERYTHING I write online…”

Whether it’s your kids, your potential employer or your potential customers – communicating like everything you write online will live forever is an EXCELLENT mind set to adopt.

Which brings me back to my original bashing of April Fool’s posts on this day.  What happens when your April Fool’s post enters the Web Archive?  Will it be immediately evident that it is truly an April Fool’s prank post?

With that thought in mind, the biggest April Fools story is the Conflicker Internet Worm story . This “prank” is one I can actually endorse because in the end, it got the media talking about internet security.  If those stories get people to install antivirus software and keep it updated – well, now THAT is a prank with the greater good in mind!