Minecraft wiki entry for Halloween_Update, associated text: The "poster" was located at minecraft.net/boo, which no longer exists. An archive of it is available at archive.org
The poster said that pumpkins were "useless", while now, they provide a shield against provoking endermen.
The poster said "Portal in, move 10 meters, portal out, and you're hundreds of meters away." Since portals move the player by a factor of 8, 10 meters away in the Nether is 80 meters away in the Overworld, not hundreds. Also, moving less than 16 meters before building a new portal will most likely take the player back to the original portal in the Overworld (provided it has not been destroyed beforehand), so 0 meters away.