This thread has really brought some sticks in the mud. Why are you all against others having fun even if you personally don’t get it?
The second incident is the Google "Drop Mic" email reply button, that got accidently clicked on and caused some number of people to lose prospective business opportunities.
Now, the april fools jokes that aren't harmful are things like google maps having a pacman mode available, or when Slashdot did their "OMG Ponies" theme.
https://lineageos.org/An-April-Apology/
LineageOS added an irremovable notification saying "your software is not genuine" to Android for April fools. However, they have weekly updates, and I got this notification before April 1st. The only way to remove it was, as root, flip a setting. Needless to say, I and a lot of other users, were pissed.
When the April Fools prank is harmless, obvious, and doesn't affect users, it isn't a big deal. In the above example, has the notification had a dismiss button saying "April Fools", I would have not cared, and probably have been amused. But when your April Fool's "prank" affects other people, then it isn't so funny.
Google and Microsoft and such are the behemoths of the computing industry, and the metaphor works fairly well this time; imagine a giant trying to figure out how to "prank" all the Lilliputians around them. It's gonna end up with squashed Lilliputians, no matter how careful you are.
Leave it to smaller entities.
(Although I do want to say I'm speaking about "pranks" here, like hacking Gmail, or changing the Google homepage too much. Putting up a fresh new website with something fun and cool, something that you have to choose to go to, is fine. But that's not really an "April Fool's prank" anymore, just some new fun and cool site.)