 |
|
| FORUM | REGISTER | LOGIN | HOAXIPEDIA | TOP 100 APRIL FOOLS | COLLEGE PRANKS | CONTACT |
| A HISTORY OF HOAXES | HOAX WEBSITES | HOAX PHOTOS | HOAX PHOTO TESTS | GULLIBILITY TESTS | TALL-TALE CREATURES |
About the Museum
The Museum of Hoaxes, founded by Alex Boese in 1997, is dedicated to promoting knowledge about the phenomenon of hoaxes. On our blog (to the left) we post about dubious-sounding claims — and whatever else strikes our fancy. But there's more to the museum than the blog. Check out our historical wing, which contains hundreds of articles about famous hoaxes, arranged chronologically from the Middle Ages right up to the present. Our Gallery of the Top 100 April Fool's Day Hoaxes Ever celebrates that one day of the year devoted to pranks and practical jokes. In our forum, you can chat with other MoH members. And there's much, much more.
The Museum of Hoaxes, founded by Alex Boese in 1997, is dedicated to promoting knowledge about the phenomenon of hoaxes. On our blog (to the left) we post about dubious-sounding claims — and whatever else strikes our fancy. But there's more to the museum than the blog. Check out our historical wing, which contains hundreds of articles about famous hoaxes, arranged chronologically from the Middle Ages right up to the present. Our Gallery of the Top 100 April Fool's Day Hoaxes Ever celebrates that one day of the year devoted to pranks and practical jokes. In our forum, you can chat with other MoH members. And there's much, much more.
| BOOKS BY THE CURATOR | ||
|
Category: Law/Police/Crime
Rescue Dummy, Get Robbed
What you get for trying to be a hero nowadays:A man was attacked and robbed after he jumped into a lake believing a boy was drowning, only to find it was a dummy.
The dog walker was approached by a "distressed" couple in Foxes Forest, Portsmouth, who said their son had been attacked by a swan in nearby water.
When the 48-year-old jumped into the lake and discovered the dummy he saw the man going through his coat pockets.
The dog walker was approached by a "distressed" couple in Foxes Forest, Portsmouth, who said their son had been attacked by a swan in nearby water.
When the 48-year-old jumped into the lake and discovered the dummy he saw the man going through his coat pockets.
Link: BBC
Man Sues Over Lack of Axe Effect
A news story is circulating claiming that an Indian man, 26-year-old Vaibhav Bedi, has sued Axe deodorant (aka Lynx in Europe) because he failed to land a single girlfriend after using their product for seven years. It's in The Australian and the Daily Record, among other news sources. This is an example of satire being mistaken as news. According to Asylum.com:
Axe spokesperson Heather Mitchell sent Asylum this statement:
"We've been following the news reports from India where a man was allegedly planning to take legal action for the Axe Effect not working for him personally. We can confirm this is a hoax. In fact the story originated from TheFakingNews.com. While the story is not true, we have to admit that it's pretty funny and the joke itself is very much in line with our brand tone -- playful, with a wink and a nudge. While Axe grooming products can help guys look, smell and feel great, there is only so much we can do; the rest is up to guys themselves."
"We've been following the news reports from India where a man was allegedly planning to take legal action for the Axe Effect not working for him personally. We can confirm this is a hoax. In fact the story originated from TheFakingNews.com. While the story is not true, we have to admit that it's pretty funny and the joke itself is very much in line with our brand tone -- playful, with a wink and a nudge. While Axe grooming products can help guys look, smell and feel great, there is only so much we can do; the rest is up to guys themselves."
Posted By: Alex | Date: Mon Nov 02, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (2)
Category: Journalism, Law/Police/Crime
Category: Journalism, Law/Police/Crime
Perverted Big Brother
Nine Turkish women thought they had signed up to participate in a reality show. Instead, they had fallen into the clutches of a pornographer, who kept them imprisoned for two months while selling naked photos of them on the internet. "The women were not abused or harassed sexually. They were told however, to fight each other, to wear bikinis and dance by villa's pool." Turkish police finally realized what was going on and freed them. [msnbc.com]Posted By: Alex | Date: Thu Sep 10, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (1)
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Sex/Romance
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Sex/Romance
Thieves steal fake phones
Not the brightest thieves in the world:Employees at a Telefonica Movistar cell-phone store in Morelia, Mexico say they arrived Tuesday morning to find that the store had been broken into.
An examination of the shop revealed the only items missing were hollow replica phones for display that are completely useless for making calls.
Employees say the clueless thieves overlooked real cell phones and cash in another part of the shop.
[Associated Press]An examination of the shop revealed the only items missing were hollow replica phones for display that are completely useless for making calls.
Employees say the clueless thieves overlooked real cell phones and cash in another part of the shop.
Hello Kitty Taser
Status: Fake
The Hello Kitty Taser raised the ire of Justin Yu at CNET who wrote:The existence of this Hello Kitty taser gun makes me want to open it up and point it at my head. You have to question the intentions of these designers...is the gun supposed to make little girls less fearful about attacking their in-store competition? Maybe it's meant to fool criminals into thinking their victims are unarmed, only to be met with 50,000 volts of adorable electricity.
Only subsequently did he realize that it was simply "a Photoshopped picture of Taser's "Metallic Pink" version of the C2 gun."
Hello Kitty guns seem to be a popular meme.
Posted By: Alex | Date: Tue Jul 07, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (8)
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Military
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Military
Fake Chinese ‘Made in India’ Garments sold in Nigeria
The commerce department of India is considering filing a formal diplomatic complaint against China because of Chinese garments being sold in Nigeria with fake "Made in India" tags. I'm sure it's a serious diplomatic matter, but if you could just somehow add a Russian gangster and a Spanish prisoner into the mix, you'd have a perfect storm of scam artists. [Economic Times]Posted By: Alex | Date: Wed Jun 24, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (4)
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Scams
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Scams
The Jiffy Prank
Apparently there's a tradition of past employees of Jiffy Lube breaking into the store and stealing the bleeder valve on the compressor, thus rendering the machine useless. It's called the "Jiffy prank." At least, that's the excuse Paul Marvella is giving to explain why he took the valve. He later returned it, but nevertheless the store is charging him with felony commercial burglary. [Hernando Today]Posted By: Alex | Date: Wed Jun 24, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (2)
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Pranks
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Pranks
Honesty Cafes
As part of an ongoing effort to battle a culture of corruption, the Indonesian government is opening Honesty Cafes, designed to teach people the value of honesty. Snacks and drinks are available, and you pay on the honor system, putting your money into a clear plastic box. From the NY Times:The attorney general’s office says the honesty cafes will nip in the bud corrupt tendencies among the young and straighten out those known for indulging in corrupt practices, starting with civil servants. By shifting the responsibility of paying correctly to the patrons themselves, the cafes are meant to force people to think constantly about whether they are being honest and, presumably, make them feel guilty if they are not.
It's a cute idea, but I think the reasoning behind it is flawed, because even if people behave honestly in the cafes, that doesn't mean the behavior is going to transfer to other contexts.
Posted By: Alex | Date: Thu Jun 18, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (5)
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Psychology
Category: Law/Police/Crime, Psychology
Barbecued Cats?
After receiving a complaint that some residents of a Houston apartment complex were barbecuing stray cats, the Bureau of Animal Regulation and Control investigated but determined the complaint was a hoax. But their conclusion isn't that reassuring, because after analyzing bone fragments from nearby dumpsters, the bureau did find that "There are animals that have been consumed that are similar to the size and structure of a cat."So, if not cats, what were these animals that were consumed? Small dogs? Giant rats? Chupacabras?
Also, this is news to me. According to Texas Penal Code 49.02, it's legal to cook and eat cats "as long as it's a wild or stray cat and was not killed in a cruel manner." But you're not allowed to cook your pet cat.
Posted By: Alex | Date: Thu Jun 18, 2009 |
Permalink |
Comments (11)
Category: Animals, Law/Police/Crime
Category: Animals, Law/Police/Crime
Burglar chews through steel bars
Status: Undetermined
A news story (credited to the Chongqing Business Daily) is circulating about a recently apprehended burglar whose method of operation was to gain access to homes by chewing through steel window bars. From Ananova:Detectives in Nanjimen region, Chongqing, were puzzled by continuous reports of break-ins through caged windows.
"Through our investigations, we found the grids had been cut but with deep tooth prints," a local police spokesman told the Chongqing Business Daily.
Eventually, their inquiries led them to interview a man who revealed he was sharing a hotel room with a man who could crack walnuts with his teeth.
Police brought in the man, Xiong, 23, for questioning and he confessed that he was behind the burglaries.
He revealed that he had turned to crime after failing to find a job and could not even remember how many houses he had broken into over the last two years.
Xiong told police he had grown up in a mountain town and had developed strong, sharp teeth by using them to open the walnuts which grew there in abundance.
He had found that he could chew open any steel bars up to 1cm in thickness, by prising open welding spots with his teeth.
"I only failed once in the past two years. Once I bit on a 2cm thick steel grid, and the first bite nearly dislocated my jaw," he said.
"I never take other tools with me when breaking in. That's why I never got stopped by patrolling officers at night."
"Through our investigations, we found the grids had been cut but with deep tooth prints," a local police spokesman told the Chongqing Business Daily.
Eventually, their inquiries led them to interview a man who revealed he was sharing a hotel room with a man who could crack walnuts with his teeth.
Police brought in the man, Xiong, 23, for questioning and he confessed that he was behind the burglaries.
He revealed that he had turned to crime after failing to find a job and could not even remember how many houses he had broken into over the last two years.
Xiong told police he had grown up in a mountain town and had developed strong, sharp teeth by using them to open the walnuts which grew there in abundance.
He had found that he could chew open any steel bars up to 1cm in thickness, by prising open welding spots with his teeth.
"I only failed once in the past two years. Once I bit on a 2cm thick steel grid, and the first bite nearly dislocated my jaw," he said.
"I never take other tools with me when breaking in. That's why I never got stopped by patrolling officers at night."
Biting through steel bars was a stunt performed by strongmen back in the 1920s. Shorpy.com has a picture of Siegmund Breitbart, who claimed he could bite through steel chains. And steelworker Gust Lessis (pictured) claimed to be able to break a railroad spike with his teeth.Still, Xiong's claim sounds pretty farfetched. I'm going to list it as undetermined.
Thanks, Ferret!