The Book of Mistakes

For some reason I get a kick out of collecting mistakes. Probably just from that massive chip on my shoulder from all the times that people insisted something was right when it was wrong… or that I heard something like “computers don’t make mistakes” or bullshit like that. This sort of talk goes by various names… conventional wisdom, status quo, and so on. Let’s call it wrong-headed righteousness.

Mistake examples are easiest to capture in newspapers, especially with the help of all the computer-assisted mistakes. But I think it’s the spirit of the thing… the idea that no matter what the context, don’t ever let someone tell you “that must be right.” No… no realm is immune to mistakes, from trivial to multimillion-dollar, life-and-death mistakes.

How do we make mistakes? Let me count the ways.

1 Mothers, don’t let your kids grow up to be editiors

From the State of Pennsylvania 2009 jobs booklet, this mistake has a poetic irony, or ironic poetry to it, that’s hard to top.

2 “Desinging Effectuve Presentations

Desing away, all you desingers.

3 Now THAT’S a Cryptogram

Of all puzzles, perhaps the one that you’d expect the most slip-ups in would be the cryptogram, because you can’t even read it when it’s right.

Here’s a great one, a cryptogram that shows the placeholder text that is present before the actual puzzle is entered. Notice it shows the placeholder text in both the puzzle and the solution:

4 And That’s NOT A Cryptogram

Nothing too peculiar about this cryptogram, a rather blah little ditty by some Darrow guy… until you notice “Last Sunday’s Quote Cryptogram.”

Do you see what happened? They printed the answer for today’s cryptogram right below the puzzle itself.

5 Some cryptograms are more cryptic than others:

OK, that’s more like it, a cryptogram with a puzzle that’s actually cryptic. Uh-oh, not so fast… in this one just the answer is placeholder text. And looks like not everyone uses the same ‘greeking.’

6 Some mistakes are more serious than others

When this clipped from the paper, possibly in the early 2000’s, this was novel. Now, as I edit this in 2023, DNA exoneration is routine.

7 No way the IRS makes mistakes!

8 No way teachers make mistakes!

Hey, it’s not like they expelled him, they just kicked him out. And of course we can just blame it on the computers.

9 Even the principal (principle?) makes a capitol (capital?) misteak.

If their weren’t all these confusing options in Inglische, maybe weed be able to spell them the write weigh.

10 And teachers aren’t the only ones misgrading tests

11 Some mistakes cost money and lives

This was long, long before the Boeing 737 Max disasters.

12 And some just wasted newsprint

Notice the bold heading at the top of the page.

13 Ouch, seeing the wrong photo of your dearly departed

14 I hate when that happens

Was it Billy Crystal in a Saturday Night Live role that originated that expression? I’m pretty sure this is the ultimate “oh shit” moment.

15 “This is a test, this is only a test”

16 Has anyone seen the “Z drive” lately?

You don’t need a million-dollar publishing system to have broken file links, you can do this at home, too. Cloud computing will make this a thing-of-the-past… and replace it with much worse problems, trust me. Oh, that’s right, you don’t have to trust me, you just have to keep reading.

17 The ‘George Costanza’ Mistake?

Yes, machines do make mistakes. No, my camera hand is not that fast and I didn’t extract this from a video. For those who don’t know, I think George, in the Seinfeld TV show, had a bit of an ordeal dealing with this classic dilemma.

18 Checkmate

No section of the newspaper is immune. Don’t trust those chess puzzles.

19 Retro Comic

I don’t think this first comic is supposed to be black-and-white. Everything else is full color.

20 Wrong Caption

Looks like Dennis the Menace said the same thing on two consecutive days. Always making trouble, that one!

21 Crosswords

Nein, nein, nien. Das crosswort puzzle ist nicht richtig.

22 Ultimate Crossword

Carefully examine the pattern of the black squares on the first puzzle, and its solution. I thought I was going crazy when I was solving it. This is probably one of the best newspaper mistakes and maybe my favorite of all time.

23 Nooooooo, not the Word Game, Too?!

Is nothing sacrosanct? Is no one immune to this scourge of mistakes?

Make, Mask, Mast, Miss, Same, Sate, Seam, Seat, Steak, Stake, Teas, Take

24 With the Sudoku does it really matter if the answer is wrong?

25 Really, really, stainless

26 Really puzzling

Do the math yourself and see if this is right. They’re right, this mensa stuff is hard.

27 Feel a tickle in your throat? “This doctor’s” (me) advice is just ignore it.

28 Tick, Tockk

For about 200 years this clock has had 61 seconds on its 3-foot face. From the Times of London, March 26, 2018.

29 Now that’s a vacation

This was the actual employment contract that I received at a major company. I think they meant 10 “days” of vacation (even though I actually had negotiated for more, but not quite 10 weeks.

30 “I’m Outa Here, Y’all”

I see that I have a note that this fun sentiment might have been explained the next day by the Philadelphia Inquirer editors… or “editiors” (if you read the Mistake #1, at the top of this page).

31 Going All the Way

Here’s one from the New York Times Magazine, July 1, 2019. They’ve expanded way beyond their mere crossword puzzle and now have several puzzles that also change from week to week. So it’s not too easy for the editor to quickly judge whether you’re looking at a puzzle or its solution. In this case, they published the solution(!) instead of the empty puzzle. Notice how similar it looks to the example solution.

32 Easiest — or Hardest ?— Sudoku Ever

From the August 27, Philadelphia Inquirer (as you can see), try to solve this Sudoku. I double dare you. I solved it in 3 seconds but I’m sure you can do better.

And finally, the biggest, most expensive mistake ever…

Quite seriously, no I’m not being facetious nor am I …

• sending you to an ecommerce page to re-purchase your privacy from the spammers who stole it from you,
• nor to a page to re-purchase your credit rating from the very bureaus who themselves post false addresses in your credit history,
• nor to a Nigerian grandma looking for a savior,
• nor to my own page where you’ll sign up for a newsletter that will stick to you like the worst virus from the deepest bat-guano-coated cave in the forest…

… it’s honestly a story explaining how the iPhone is the biggest failure in business history.

And if you like computer screwups, you’ll find a few in my Medium story, subtitled “Where are my flying cars?”

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