Gmail's "Funny" Quotes of the Day

One of those weird images of kittens supposedly saying something.

It's pretty hard to say what about something makes it funny, isn't it? Well maybe I'll make a post later about that, but now I want to point out something that's NOT funny: those gmail funny quotes of the day.

Let me give you an example: "I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by." -Douglas Adams

The first problem with all of these is that they're called the "FUNNY" quote of the day. It's not good to say that something you're about to say is funny; it just raises expectations. Also, in this case, the reader knows to expect something funny, an effect which is often achieved by something unexpected. If you know to expect something unexpected, then the expected thing isn't unexpected anymore, so it won't be funny!

This quote, about deadlines flying by, just doesn't amuse me at all. On top of it being called "funny" before I read it, it's just not very clever, ironic, insightful, anything. Plus you can tell that Douglas Adams was trying to be funny or unexpected; this doesn't always kill the humor but it raises the bar for how witty the joke/statement/whatever must be.

What do you think makes something funny? I think I'll have a more detailed post on that sometime later.

Image credit: http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/1152/chortlesnortga8.jpg