The paper towel dispenser in my office is the kind with a bit of towel hanging down for you to pull. Pulling it dispenses one sheet, and gets another started for the next person. When there’s no towel hanging down to pull, one refers to the helpful knob on the side labeled:
FOR EMERGENCY FEED, TURN KNOB
Aren’t we being a little dramatic? What emergency, exactly, do the manufacturers envision? Moreover, what if I need a towel in a non-emergency situation? There is no knob for “non-emergency manual feed” nor any instruction for emergency towel acquisition if the towel is already hanging there properly.
Did someone really consider the simple phrase “MANUAL FEED” insufficient instruction for that knob?
January 18th, 2009 at 8:58 am
You scoff and yet you are in well-ploughed internet territory.
Consider: http://seeingisaverb.wordpress.com/2006/09/05/emergency-feed/
Or: http://rhetoricalletters.blogspot.com/2006/01/dear-paper-towel-machine-company.html
Or the redesign proposed in http://www.charlesyiu.com/iid/p1/poster_finalone.pdf
I believe the designers were being ironic, similar to the way I wrote a pop-up dialog which said “DOH!” for a situation I (incorrectly) assumed would never occur. The engineers were similarly convinced the mechanism would never need a manual feed, but the Marketing Department insisted they add that knob, duly labeled “Emergency”, just as the marketeers requested:
“The dispenser is GREAT. You guys have done a TERRIFIC job. Just one thing and it’ll be PERFECT. Can you add a knob that will manually feed the towel in an EMERGENCY?”