Customers make stupid mistakes. Management totally screws up… but prepress folk also have occasional ‘weak moments’. Here are some of those less memorable events. If you have an interesting anecdote or joke about silly designers, clueless managers or overworked printers, add it using the Comments function.

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I typeset a multilingual brochure for my employer in 6 languages, using Autologic equipment. After every language was proofread, we got a new set of Arabic fonts. I was asked to change the font for the name of our establishment, globally, using the new font - off it went to press. It so happened that the new Modern Arabic fonts were missing a Hard G (the traditional Arabic (which I don’t speak) doesn’t have a hard G) and Alif was substituted, rendering the meaning of my company’s name to “ugly press”. My employer accused me of doing this intentionally.

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In 1995 our ad agency installed Macs throughout. I was passing the Creative Director’s office where I heard him shouting ‘OPEN FILE, OPEN FILE DAMNIT!’. He was holding the mouse like a microphone and shouting into it.

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Remember the Mac II? It had room for two disk drives. One night, the cleaning lady accidently pushed on the plate covering the second unused drive bay. The cover plate fell on the motherboard inside the computer. A couple of weeks later, an operator decided to format some diskettes and accidently inserts the disk in the empty hole. The disk simply fell on the motherboard as well. The operator waited for a while and then decided to insert another disk and another one and another one…. Finally he decided to call us. He claimed his Mac had ‘eaten’ an entire box of disks!

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We used to get pressroom new hires coming up asking for dots. We’d ask “hilite or shadow?” and so on back and forth until we’d finally hand them a sealed can with plate punch waste in it. We’d say “Don’t open it in the light!”

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Looking for more fun stories? Check out this thread.