I sympathize with the heart stoppage feeling; I had about 1/4 second where my chest got tight, I didn't draw or release a breath, my hands started going numb, it was a total physical reaction. The emotions that ran through my head; 'oh man I finally found the linux distro that fit me perfectly now they're gonna *#?! it all up' all nonverbal of course then I realized it had to be an april fool's joke, you can't throw out the project's cornerstone then I read the whole paragraph and felt much better. then saw the 'note this is a joke' part.
It certainly made for some drama. I definitely think it was a good idea to add the last line, a lot of readers might know nothing about April Fool's day. Gentoo is in a precarious position, lots of new users and attention. I felt the little notice at the bottom was a nice touch, that way we got the big emotions from the joke, but we also knew right away all was still well in portage-land.
