The Setup

This was a very successful April Fool's joke. Hypn0tik, owner of Tribes Universe, posted this item on April 1, 2002:

A Goodbye from TU

Well normally goodbye's are a sad thing. Especially when you have been working with someone for years already! Most of you know NuclearToast from his weekly "Nuclear News" posts. He has been making these for a long time now.
Well times change, and we are happy to announce that Charles "NuclearToast" Davids has revieved an offer from NBC to be a head writter for the show "Will & Grace". Although we will miss him, we offer him great success in his future career! He had this to say:

It happened! The producers offered me the job on Will and Grace. I'm so excited to be joining such a talented team of writers on such a high-profile show. My "Nuclear News" at TU definitely helped get me the job. I'm sorry to leave like this, but I'll be real busy moving and getting up to speed on the show. I hope to pop in to TU from time to time. And, of course, I'll still be playing T2. Watch for my name in the credits!

Best of luck Charles! (and remember us when you are making the big bucks!)

The Revelation

A week later, this Nuclear News article exposed the truth:

NBC Denies Tribes 2 in "Will & Grace"

Officials at NBC, facing an onslaught of viewer email, are denying rumors that their Emmy Award-winning show "Will & Grace" would start containing references to the popular online computer game Tribes 2. Fans of both the game and the show have been bombarding the studio with questions and suggestions.

"This was some kind of April Fool's joke that spun out of control," said executive producer and co-creator David Kohan. "The rumor got started on the Internet, and we all know how quickly things snowball on the Internet, whether they're true or not.

"Normally, this sort of thing wouldn't be such a problem," Kohan continued, "but these computer gamers are really 'techie'. They sent us so many messages that our email post office server, or whatever it is, crashed. We were getting hundreds of emails an hour.

"Our tech guys tell me that these computer games can create a cult of fans. The emails had all sorts of dialog suggestions for the actors, which are apparently references to this game Tribes 2. I don't know what 'shazbot' or 'VVT' mean, but rest assured that none of the characters on the show will be using any such code words," said Kohan.

"We're informing the public of the truth so these gamers will stop flooding us with suggestions. And we're also trying to get to the bottom of this rumor. But our tech guys say that will be difficult," explained Kohan. "As we all know, these gamers and hackers hide behind weird online names. The only thing we have to go on is some guy named 'hypnotic toast'."