30 Baffling Design Choices Found in the Wild (May 12, 2024)

JR Atkinson • Writer and Editor

May 12, 2024 1:00 PM EDT

Fails are a part of life. It's what separates us from the computers, for now. We make mistakes, we goof up, we screw the pooch. It's why they call it human error. Some mistakes are more visible than others, though. Accidentally make a right turn instead of a left? Easily rectified in most cases, and nobody has noticed. Drop a whole stack of plates at work? Heads might turn.

The level of public-ness is deeply related to how embarrassing a mistake is. You might blithely misspell a word in your diary, crossing it out when you notice… but if you were called up to spell "sergeant" in front of your whole class and start to stutter after the "s," that's when your cheeks might get a little red. The design fails contained in this list all have the dignity of anonymity. We don't know who is responsible for them, so we can laugh at them publicly and not feel bad.