Ambiguous Visual Controls: KEEP RED OFF LINE
Who is Red and why is it important to keep him off line? This Monday I realized that for the past 13 years I have been stepping on or over these letters on the floor in SeaTac International Airport...
View ArticleAmbiguous Visual Controls: Too Much Information
Among the side benefits of international travel are meeting interesting new people, learning about the local culture and running into ambiguous visual controls. Jet lag slows the brain and renders it...
View ArticleThe Ambiguity Deepens…
This was found in Frankfurt airport, hanging every 100m or so in the hallway of the terminal. It’s a long narrow hallway. These signs are positioned such that if you are walking down the hall, the...
View ArticleSomething to Lighten Your Day
Many advertising images are designed to make people subconsciously want to consume a product. How effective do you think this vending machine is towards that end? There is an implied lesson here...
View ArticleAmbiguous Visual Controls in the Park
Walking through a park near Frankfurt, Germany I saw this sign. Checking first to make sure I had not slipped back in time to the 1880s, I snapped this photo. What does it mean? Not reading German,...
View ArticleAmbiguous Visual Controls: Airport Hotel Edition
Airports are full of signs. Standing in queue gives ample time to reflect on their meaning and appreciate their ambiguity. This visual control at the check-in counter made me wonder why it was...
View ArticleAmbiguous Visual Controls: Ignage
Imagine my disappointment, upon hauling my gardening implements across town after a long and difficult season of tilling the soil, to be informed by the store proprietor that they could not in fact...
View ArticleLean Retail Exercise: “Not My Job” Edition
The retail industry has a poor image when it comes to the motivation level of its employees. They are often portrayed in popular culture as neither well-trained nor well-paid, not always inspired to...
View ArticleAmbiguous Visual Controls: Prehistoric Shark Attack Evacuation Plan
This may be the most unhelpful emergency evacuation visual control in the United States of America. The evacuation plan resembles a journey through a shark’s intestines. Should one need to actually...
View ArticleAmbiguous Visual Controls: Caution! Possible Scalding
Labeling and signage alone are about as effective in preventing accidents as fences are in preventing birds from flying over them. It sometimes seems that warning labels are only there to minimize...
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