Midimusic.org.uk Computer Humour, Hardware
2.11 Faxes
Faxes are often perceived as magical devices in the eyes of the general public. Most people understand that faxes use phone lines, if not necessarily how, but others equate faxes to black magic and mysticism.
One guy went to a bank to make a transaction. The clerk said that some data should be sent by fax to the central bank. So he put the sheet into the fax machine and pressed the send button. It appeared that the transfer was performed successfully, but the clerk thought otherwise. So he sent the sheet again. Frustrated, he gives up.
- Him: "We can't send it -- they have no paper."
- Me: "How can you tell?"
- Him: "See here, this little reading blinking 'no paper'?"
At the Microsoft web site, when I tried to register for some freebies without giving away too much about myself, I received the following error:
- "We need your fax number in order to respect your wishes not to receive unsolicited faxes."
A customer called to say he couldn't get his computer to fax anything. After forty minutes, the tech discovered the man was trying to fax a piece of paper by holding it in front of the monitor screen and hitting the "send" key.
The Met office is now using fax machines to give local authorities early warning of severe weather. The Hampshire emergency planning office said, "Rather than having to rely on telephones, for instance, where lines are at risk in bad weather, we are encouraging the wider use of fax machines."
I work on the help desk for a certain credit card verification software package. The main problem that we have with it is getting modems to connect at 1200 and 2400 baud. Anyway, looking through the fax queue the other day, I came across a two page fax addressed to one of the techs. The cover page says, "Jim -- Here is the modem information you requested." Figuring I'd help Jim out, I decide to take a look. It took me a minute to figure it out, but I finally was able to determine what the large, mostly black page was. The customer had pulled his internal modem out of his machine, photocopied it, and sent it in. The worst part of this call though was Jim trying to explain to the customer why this wasn't helpful and that it wasn't really necessary to fax a copy of the other side.
One of our new hires recently walked around the print room, milling about, looking somewhat puzzled.
- Technical Trainer: "Can I help you with anything?"
- New Hire: "I'm waiting for a fax, but there's nothing coming through."
- Technical Trainer: "Carol probably switched it off when she left, as she doesn't want any confidential faxes coming through when she's not here."
- New Hire: "But the green light is on, and it says, 'Ready' on the display."
- Technical Trainer: "That's the printer."
Overheard at the office:
- First Person: "Do you know anything about this fax machine?"
- Second Person: "A little. What's wrong?"
- First Person: "Well, I sent a fax, and the recipient called back to say all she received was a cover sheet and a blank page. I tried it again, and the same thing happened."
- Second Person: "How did you load the sheet?"
- First Person: "It's a pretty sensitive memo, and I didn't want anyone else to read it by accident, so I folded it in half."
Once I needed to send a fax to someone. I had the following conversation with his secretary.
- Me: "Please receive the fax message for Mr. [name]."
- Secretary: "Ok!"
Pause.
- Me: "Could you start, please?"
- Secretary: (pause) "What do you want me to do?"
- Me: "Start receiving the fax message."
- Secretary: "Oh, I'm sorry, I'm fresher now. Please, tell me what to do."
- Me: "Do you have a fax machine on this number?"
- Secretary: "Yes."
- Me: "Ok, just press the biggest green button on it."
- Secretary: (pause) "I can't find it. Just a moment I'll ask somebody to find it." (long pause) "Nobody in the office can find that button. There are too many buttons here, but none are green. There are white and gray buttons with letters and digits on them."
- Me: "Hmmm. What kind of fax do you have?"
- Secretary: "Fax-modem."
A tech asked a customer for a "screen shot." He also requested she fax him the result. Lo and behold, through the fax came a photocopy of a Polaroid picture of her screen.
A customer once asked me if I could fax him a copy of a disk instead of sending it through the mail. If I didn't need my job I would have told him that I would, but he'd have to wait a bit because Domino's was faxing me a pizza.
I once received a fax with a note on the bottom to fax the document back to the sender when I was finished with it, because he needed to keep it.