Google's April Fools' Prank Turned into Reality

Google is notorious for their April Fools' Day pranks. In the spirit of the tradition last year, the company pulled a switcheroo with the town of Topeka, Kansas after the town's Mayor announced he was changing the name to Google for one month for "fun."

eWeek chronicles Google's pranks from 2000-2010 in this slideshow.

This year, the Institute of Creative Technologies took one of Google's pranks one step further.

Those who use the email service Gmail may have noticed last Thursday bright red text at the top right of the page urging customers to use the new Google Motion technology. One the use clicked to try out the new technology, they received a nice little APRIL FOOLS!

However, the ICT team put the idea into motion using a Microsoft Kinect sensor to control body motions. The technology recognizes basic body motions such as open, reply, thinking ahead and sending off the message. Check out the video on Mashable's site.

I hope Google puts this technology into use!