Has the Guardian been caught out by a BBC April fool?
At least I’m assuming it’s an April fool.. The Guardian has put online, without much commentary, a BBC video from this site – Last Chance to See – purporting to show the first images of a shark-whale, “a half shark, half whale creature that has never been photographed”. That would be not just a cross-species, but a cross-class pairing – half-fish and half-mammal. Stephen Fry lends it an air of authority. Which was apparently enough for the Guardian.. If they’d checked the BBC Science and Environment News section they’d have noticed the absence of the story. Yep, as I was preparing this post, the BBC website confirmed the hoax. Adds To be fair, the Guardian’s Jemima Kiss did spot the hoax. But did she tell her colleagues? And It’s worth noting the date stamp on the Guardian’s video link – March 31. Which presumably means it was posted late last night..
Adds Here’s a screen grab of the Guardian page
Brilliant one was completely taken by it
More subtle, and more effective, than last year’s flying penguins.
Nothing can beat the flying penguins. I wonder how many hours it took to create it.
This is not the first attempt to provide entertainment with the concept of a creature that is half-shark, half-mammal as fans of Robert Rodriguez’s film The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D (2005) will know.
The sharkwhale is nevertheless an interesting concept and one that might perhaps be usefully adapted by Stormont as the official logo of the curious hybrid that is the NI government.
Like yesterday’s use of the concept this form of government only requires that it be good enough to fool enough of the people for enough of the time in order for it to be regarded as a success.
One must travel hopefully after all.
…and of course who could ever forget Billy Thompson, legendary half fish-half boy goalkeeper for Fulchester United F.C. (apart from addled, memory challenged old goats like me, that is)?
…and then there is this….thank God! there is always this, which fantastic creatures have ever brought delight to men when they are “old and grey and nodding by the fire”.
http://imagecache5.art.com/p/LRG/8/848/IAUY000Z/tim-ashkar-mermaids-of-the-canary-islands.jpg