January 31, 2005 09:46 AM

Broken: Canadian sports helmet

Check out the warning label on this "helmet of certain death".

Thanks to Xeni.

Broken: Diversity logo

Reader M. sends in this gem:

The attached logo and slogan represent my employer's diversity initiatives (equal employment opportunities, etc).  Ironically they have chosen to place the (awfully clichéd) slogan "Walk the Talk" right above an icon of a wheelchair-bound person.  Very clever.

Names have been smudged to protect the guilty. :-)

January 28, 2005 09:46 AM

Broken: Denigrating advertising

In today's New York Times: Men Are Becoming the Ad Target of the Gender Sneer. Said one Richard Smaglick, "We're trying to wake up the industry to get business leaders to recognize that this isn't the way to build relationships with their customers."

My two reactions:

1. This is definitely broken. Though granted, this is just the latest stereotype to be hammered on in advertising... there have been many over the years.

2. Who's watching commercials, anyway? TiVo is so much better (and not broken at all)!

Broken: Padlocked safety valve

TIB reader "ima cow" points out a problem at the school's science lab: the the natural gas shutoff is padlocked in the 'on' position. From the look of the dust on the handle, it's been that way for some time.

January 27, 2005 04:51 PM

Broken: Arrest for using lynx Web browser

In this Boing Boing post today, Cory Doctorow writes:

A Londonder made a tsnuami-relief donation using lynx -- a text-based browser used by the blind, Unix-users and others -- on Sun's Solaris operating system. The site-operator decided that this "unusual" event in the system log indicated a hack-attempt, and the police broke down the donor's door and arrested him.

Broken: Shopping.com image

Gerald says: a purse is not computer speakers.

Broken: PBS online store merchandising

The PBS.org website shows an unfortunate error in merchandising in its online store: the product graphic of a stuffed animal leads visually right into the promo for the program "Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State." See the live site at shoppbs.org.

Thanks to James Schmill for the pointer.

Broken: Math in ad banner

Julian Smith writes:

I found this ad on a website I was on. Obviously the creators of this ad dropped high school math.  "Forty-two percent less" is more than half.

January 26, 2005 01:05 AM

Broken: Amex payment line

Paul Schreiber writes:

Amex payment requires me to type "1000.00" instead of "1000".

Because some programmer was too lazy to code a regex, tens of thousand of users have to suffer.

January 25, 2005 10:39 AM

Broken: "No feet on wall" sign

Seth Godin, originator of the idea for this site, writes:

This is from an office building in New York.

Apparently, smokers lean against the wall and put their foot up in a sort of Marlboro man way. All I know is that after seeing the sign, I desperately wanted to put my foot up!

Broken: Paranormal error message

This error message says that a "possible rogue application... is attempting to access the unknown."

Also unknown what happened next.

January 24, 2005 12:31 AM

Broken: Citibank card application

Howard Seibel writes:

I visited www.citibank.com to register my spanking new Citi AAdvantange Business Card. I selected "Credit Cards" from the pulldown menu, arrived at the card home page, and clicked "Register".

After several unsuccessful attempts to register, a phone agent with a convincing American accent told me I could not register my card there because, silly me, it's business card, not a consumer card. Seems that www.business.citicards.com is the place I had to go.

What lousy design! There should be only a single registration process, but if you're going to have two -- at least tell people!

The customer should be able register any card anywhere. Presumably Citi has separate consumer and business card departments, so the systems were built in silos and can't cooperate. The phone agent said he gets calls on this all the time.

January 23, 2005 12:20 PM

Broken: (Fun) Custom error messages

You can fake up an error message with Atom Smasher's Error Message Generator.

Thanks to Boing Boing.

January 22, 2005 11:07 AM

Broken: Amex online access

In this post, Matt Haughey reports:

A standard green Amex card only keeps 6 months of archived purchase data online. My bank lets me go back as long as I've had an account (two years). I called amex and there was nothing they could do, though they offered to bump me up to a blue business card that apparently offers all your archived purchases online.

I still believe this is totally broken for the standard card, especially considering I switched to an online only option so that I didn't have to keep track of bills and statements, assuming they would do that for me.

Seriously... how much incremental cost would there be for Amex to hold a few more months of data?

January 21, 2005 02:46 AM

Broken: Not: Apple iPod shuffle page

Approximately 18 million This Is Broken readers have notified me that Apple's new iPod shuffle page contains the following warning: "Do not eat iPod shuffle."

I don't think this is broken - Apple is just having a bit of fun in talking about a fun product.

(P.S. Kidding about the 18 million bit. Thanks to Mike Kalajian, Benjamin Auch, and others for pointing it out.)

Broken: TrendMicro user license agreement

Patrick Malecek writes:

Note the very important first line of this agreement. Guess what I had to do in order to get this far -- yep, open the CD jacket. Hmmmm.

January 20, 2005 02:30 PM

Broken: Seattle Public Library signage

From a few weeks ago - Matt Haughey points us to the temporary signage (read full description) in the sparkling, brand new Seattle Public Library. Seems that the architects were too full of grand visions to think of the visitors' basic bodily functions.

Broken: Wireless mouse

Anyone want to buy a wireless mouse? Note that it has wires attached.

Thanks to Mario Pereira.

January 19, 2005 12:40 AM

Broken: (Just a comment...) National Theater booking

Chris Worth writes:

For an arts organisation funded by Tony Blair's egalitarian government, the honorifics pulldown for Britain's National Theatre bookings site displays a remarkable tendency towards the upper classes. (The attached GIF is edited only to show the full menu.)

I think the third one from the top describes me best.

[Not necessarily broken, but worth a "hmmmmmm"...   -mh]

January 18, 2005 12:01 AM

Broken: Deleting folders in Windows XP

Livia Labate writes:

While performing a simple task - deleting an empty folder - Windows XP provides me with the most puzzling and least helpful dialog box. It gives me four options to a yes or no question... "Yes to all?" ... but it's one folder, with nothing inside it!

Better than that, I clicked "Yes" to permanently remove it and it told me that it couldn't do it... and only gave me an "OK" button this time! I'm puzzled and trapped by the non-sequitur dialog box.

January 17, 2005 12:27 AM

Broken: Magazine subscription rates

Paul Schreiber points out that, for Performing Songwriter magazine, subscriptions are $25.95.

But gift subscriptions are only $19.95. He concludes: "Good thing I bought myself a 'present.'"

January 14, 2005 09:13 AM

Broken: GTC customer service

Mark Frauenfelder sends an e-mail to telecom company GTC and it bounces... from the customer service address. Read his story.

Broken: Permitted trucks sign

Roy Pittman sends in this bizarre sign from near the Tennessee state line.

January 13, 2005 12:21 AM

Broken: Kiddie ride

Daniel Drucker points out this computer screen error on a kiddie ride.

Since when do kiddie rides seize up with computer errors? When I was a kid, we were given a piece of string to play with, and we liked it! There weren't any fancy computer errors! And we walked uphill in the snow, and we liked it!

OK, not really.

January 12, 2005 10:55 AM

Broken: Yahoo Travel form

Online travel pioneer Terry Jones sends us this Yahoo Travel form and writes: "I never saw any travel program in history that listed TO as the first entry... it's like having the gas pedal on the left."

Broken: Government cookie recipe

Leave it to the government bureaucracy to publish a 26-page recipe for oatmeal cookies and chocolate brownies.

January 11, 2005 12:12 AM

Broken: US Visit kiosks

Joi Ito reports: US closed for the day.
Thanks to Paul Saffo for the photograph.

January 10, 2005 06:30 PM

Broken: Blockbuster tagline

Dan Newman follows up the Comcast flyer with this:

You may be aware that Blockbuster recently ended late fees. However, their advertising tagline for this move is incredibly poorly worded... in every store, on TV, on the radio, in newspapers, etc, it says "The end of late fees, the start of more."

I know what they meant. However, at face value, the statement seems to imply that they're ending these current late fees and introducing new fees.

See live page here.

Broken: Advertising flyer

Victor Zeiser sends in a strangely-worded flyer from Comcast. The ad promises "high speed" and "higher value", then says "That was then. This is Comcast."

January 7, 2005 12:05 AM

Broken: PC ad

An anonymous reader writes:

This came from a local PC shop. I thought it was pretty funny that they chose to use a very old Macintosh in the graphic. Brings new meaning to the old saying, "Windows 98 is like Macintosh 84."

January 6, 2005 08:39 AM

Broken: Paying traffic tickets in Los Angeles

Mark Frauenfelder writes this story about his wife's difficulties in paying a simple traffic ticket in Los Angeles.

Broken: CERN laundry

Jeremy Paul Birnholtz writes:

Check out the extremely broken system for doing laundry in the hostels at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) in Geneva, the world's frontier particle physics research facility and birthplace of the HTTP protocol: read about it here, all the way down to the "intuitive dryer controls."

January 5, 2005 01:23 PM

Broken: Vegas hotel TV

Harry McCracken, in Las Vegas for CES, writes from his hotel room: Hey, My TV Just Crashed!

P.S. On a separate note, notice the new search function on This Is Broken - see the left-hand column on this page. -mh

Broken: Hairdryer sign

Alex B writes:

This is one of those built-in hair dryers that was in the bathroom of our hotel room. The tag says "unplug it", but since it's built in you can't, and chances are the hotel wouldn't be pleased if you tried.

January 4, 2005 12:01 AM

Broken: Airport laptop terminal

Philip J. Hollenback writes:

Attached is a picture of a laptop data port at LaGuardia Airport, NYC. Picture was taken in the Northwest terminal.  Someone decided to replace one of the pay phones with some sort of laptop data port.  However, they didn't install any sort of desk or ledge.  In the hour I was waiting at the airport, I observed three people forced to sit on the floor while using this data port.

January 3, 2005 12:01 AM

Broken: Utility pole

Bob Sifniades wrote awhile back:

This utility pole, at the intersection of Routes 206 and 518 in Skillman, New Jersey, has been broken for about a month. For the first couple of weeks, it was still holding all the wires that are now carried by the new pole to the left. That was pretty scary, seeing a nearly-severed, lashed-up pole with all that gear on top, at a major intersection. But even in its current state, that old broken pole is a little worrisome.