--- title: BBC Fooled By Brexit Emoji April Fools Prank On Air description: BBC Breakfast's hosts realizing they got totally pranked on air is the new best live BBC clip. canonical: https://time.com/5224433/bbc-april-fools-emoji-prank-blooper/ author: Ashley Hoffman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2018-04-02T13:26:51.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:51:46.260Z og:title: BBC Hosts Realize They Got Totally Pranked on Air og:description: The story was about "brexit emoji" og:url: https://time.com/5224433/bbc-april-fools-emoji-prank-blooper/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: BBC Hosts Realize They Got Totally Pranked on Air twitter:description: The story was about "brexit emoji" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Broadcasters Realizing They Got Pranked By a Joke Article On Air Is the New Best BBC Clip by [Ashley Hoffman](/author/ashley-hoffman/) ## Ashley Hoffman Apr 2, 2018 1:26 PM CUT by [Ashley Hoffman](/author/ashley-hoffman/) ## Ashley Hoffman Apr 2, 2018 1:26 PM CUT Even the [BBC](http://time.com/4709020/internet-on-bbc-dad-kids/ "undefined") can get pranked on April Fool’s Day. A pair of [BBC’s Breakfast](http://time.com/money/4697929/kids-interrupt-live-skype-interview-bbc-funny/ "undefined") presenters on Sunday fell hard for an April Fool’s story in the [_Observer_](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/apr/01/nger-at-firms-bid-to-cash-in-on-rexit-discord-with-emojis "undefined") about some new Brexit-themed emojis. The cheery, unsuspecting morning hosts, Roger Johnson and Babita Sharma, were happy to chat about the news that a Gibraltar, Italy tech firm was capitalizing on political discourse on social media with a pair of emoji. As the story goes, the firm created the “Brexit Bulldog” and “Starry Blue” emoji for users to have a colorful way to share their political leanings on social media. These hosts loved it. They even talked about the possibility of a totally fake “post-Brexit tariff” on emojis too. But of course, it turned out that the _Observer_ was getting into the spirit of April Fool’s Day 2018\. Call the joke lost in translation, until people started calling out the gag. In nearly ten minutes, Johnson revealed the meaning behind the byline written in Italian “Scherzo Primavera.” Translation: “Joke of spring.” He then congratulated the newspaper on a job well done. “Well done the _Observer_,” he said. So everyone wins. When it comes to on-air hilarity, the BBC is the gift that keeps on giving. Watch it all go down below. > [](https://twitter.com/BBCNews/status/980436830377205761) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5224433/bbc-april-fools-emoji-prank-blooper/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5224433/bbc-april-fools-emoji-prank-blooper/"},"headline":"Broadcasters Realizing They Got Pranked By a Joke Article On Air Is the New Best BBC Clip","datePublished":"2018-04-02T13:26:51.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:51:46.260Z","description":"BBC Breakfast's hosts realizing they got totally pranked on air is the new best live BBC clip.","url":"https://time.com/5224433/bbc-april-fools-emoji-prank-blooper/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Tech","viral","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ashley Hoffman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/ashley-hoffman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5224433/bbc-april-fools-emoji-prank-blooper/","name":"Broadcasters Realizing They Got Pranked By a Joke Article On Air Is the New Best BBC Clip"}}]}] ```