The British Don't Understand 'Prank War'

Ah, the prank war - what better way to waste time at work than come up with elaborate schemes to make a friend look stupid and / or embarrassed? You and your designated opponent spend countless hours and energy trying to out-prank the other - sending stripper grams, changing the desktop picture on his computer, sending anonymous e-mails strongly recommending a battery of STD tests. The possibilities are endless. And thanks to the Internet, there's always a good idea floating out there.

If there's one thing you don't do during a prank war, you involve the authorities. If you can't come up with an appropriate response to the latest prank, then you are bound by the International Prank War Convention to admit defeat and request a truce. Depending on the circumstances, your defeat may involve purchasing many rounds of beer.

This may seem like common sense to you and me, but to a British man who was obviously in the midst of a prank war, he opted to drop the equivalent of a thermonuclear weapon in the middle of a prank war - he sued his buddy and got the legal system involved. In official prank war terminology, this is called "being a dick."

Here's a brief synopsis of what happened - someone signed Matthew Firsht up for Facebook and changed a couple details - like his sexual orientation. Instead of responding with another prank, Matthew opted to sue the guy. Thanks to the show Friends, we have a textbook example of what the appropriate response should have been in this case (the clip is 9 minutes long):