Dutch file sharing software 'Honest Thief' early April fools joke

April 2, 2003

HoLMeZ used our news submit to tell us that it seems that the Dutch file sharing service 'The Honest Thief' was nothing more than an early April fools joke. Not only did the Dutch press massively report about this new service, the international media like Wired, New York Times and Reuters also fell for it:

Only a month ago The Honest
Thief did not exist. On February 21st the Wall Street Journal reported,
'No one has ever heard of Pieter Plass," but now hundreds of news stories
later, The Honest Thief is a 'serious player in the world of
file-sharing."

Our story was concocted similar to a meal in a pressure cooker: we carefully selected our ingredients, turned on the fire, waited patiently and voilé , dinner is served.

As there is the overwhelming mass of information that is showered on society each day to compete with, you can't just tap people on the shoulder and ask them politely: 'May I have a word?" So what do you do? You become creative. Then, once you've got their attention, you need to have a message: something that will affect them.

Well, guess what April Fools! The Honest Thief
file-sharing venture was no more than a publicity stunt.

We too reported about The Honest Thief several times. However we, of course, would never pull an April fools joke ourselves... 😉

Source: The Honest Thief