Who, Me? You can fool some of the people some of the time, but The Register tries to entertain all of its readers most of the time and especially early on Monday mornings, when we present a new installment of "Who, Me?" – the reader-contributed column that shares your stories of workplace mayhem and mischief.
This week, meet a reader we'll Regomize as "Fred" who told us that in the 1990s he worked in tech support for a government agency.
"The work was pretty routine, but being in that particular environment was never dull... at least not for me," he told The Register.
To prove his point, Fred told us that one day a user he said we should refer to as "Emily" complained that her word processor had lost the ability to print on the resident HP LaserJet. Fred diagnosed this as a driver drama and had it fixed in minutes.
As he left, Emily complained that her monitor's screen was a little fuzzy.
The monitor used a cathode ray tube, a technology that sometimes produced weirdly distorted and/or discolored images when excess magnetic energy built up inside a monitor. Displays of the era therefore included a degauss button that dispelled the energy and brought clarity to the screen.
Emily told Fred she was a little frustrated at the need to press that button, and asked if she could take any preemptive action to prevent the problem.
"I was thinking, 'I should just tell her to press the button,'" Fred told Who, Me?
Instead he offered some advice.
"If you make a paperclip chain and drape it over the monitor, that will prevent the electromagnetic interference from causing the screen to look like that."
That advice was complete nonsense, but Emily took it seriously and immediately started work on a paperclip chain. Fred walked away chuckling to himself about his little joke.
A few days later, Fred was called to the same office to fix another problem for a different user whom he suggested we call "Sharon," and found a paperclip chain draped over her monitor.
"Emily said you told her to do this, so everyone has one now," Sharon told Fred, who doubled down on the prank.
"The summer solstice is coming up and that should remove the electrical interference," he told Sharon. "So you can take the paperclips down now."
Sharon promised to let everyone in the office know about Fred's latest advice.
Fred solved Sharon's problem, then took a quick tour around the office.
"Almost all the monitors had a paperclip chain draped over them," he admitted. "Even the lawyers had made one."
Fred is not a malicious chap, but knew he had been naughty and feared consequences.
"I waited for days to be called into HR," he said, "but it never happened."
Have you led users astray to amuse yourself? Did you get away with it? In either case, share your story by clicking here to send email to Who, Me? We would love the chance to tell your tale on a future Monday – and that's the honest truth. ®
Source: The register