Google claims its G-Mail service is real. If it turns out to be a
hoax, it won't have been the first time a technology company has
deliberately pulled the wool over the media's eyes.

Microsoft last year claimed it had invented an Internet-access toilet. 

I'm looking for two more examples of technology companies which have
deliberately misled the media, even for just a few hours, to pull an
April Fools prank.

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Clarification of Question by jhabley-ga on 02 Apr 2004 09:02 PST

I am trying to close this question. It's been open for 21 hours now
without an answer and my deadline for getting this info has passed.

jhabley-ga:

Sorry that we weren't able to get an Answer to you in time. However,
this might come in useful for you in 364 days:

 http://go.hotwired.com/news/culture/0,1284,62901,00.html/wn_ascii

Incidentally, some industry pundits are now applauding Google for
pulling a double-whammy with the GMail announcement; it received about
as much press coverage on its own merits (ie. an industry-shaking new
player in the webmail sector) as for the possibility that it was an
April Fool's Day joke!

Hope we can help you next time!

Regards,

aht-ga
Google Answers Researcher

These are just free comments at this point.  I had wanted to post
these as the start of an answer, however, the question was locked.

One of my favorites was in 1999 when Red Herring magazine created a
hoax article in their magazine, and a corresponding web site for the
mythical company.
The hoax "thinkyourmail.com" web site is available from the archive:
http://web.archive.org/web/20000511150528/http://www.thinkyourmail.com/

and the story that originally ran in Red Herring is here:
http://www.redherring.com/ArticlePreview.aspx?url=%2fArticle.aspx%3f&a=6286


More recently, Google offered a job in their office on the moon:
://www.google.com/jobs/lunar_job.html