STORY UPDATED: check for updates below.
Prank website React365 was used by some joker to post an article titled "Dollar Tree to close all stores Oct 1,2017". The full text of the prank simply read:
This is a corporate decision,all employees will be paid their wages until Dec.24th. Spokesman said "we are just losing money too fast by selling so cheap. Read more by clicking the link
Of course there was no actual link to click on, just a huge "Share on Facebook" button. It seems many people mistook that button for a "read more" link and shared the story anyway after realizing their mistake.
React365 is a prank website where users can submit their own headline, description and photo to create realistic looking prank news articles.
Users don't even need to upload their own image, there is a built-in search function that will pull an appropriate image from Google image search.
So if you encounter anyone sharing this 'news' as true on social media, you can safely value their opinion at $0 or less.
Updates:
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2017-09-20T13:47:40Z 2017-09-20T13:47:40Z The site that published this prank is the same one that made hundreds of thousands of people believe child support was ending at the end of 2017.
