History Main / AcquiredErrorAtThePrinter

[[caption-width-right:350:[AssShove Ouch]].]]

[[caption-width-right:350:Oops.]]

* The famous "Sinner's Bible" in which the "not" was left out of "Thou shalt not commit adultery." As mentioned above, it even got a ShoutOut in ''Literature/GoodOmens''.

* The first paperback edition of ''Literature/GoodOmens'' (which as mentioned above, ironically refers to Biblical misprints) describes Sable Black's real name ([[spoiler:Famine]]) as "one word, seven letters. Sounds like examine." According to Creator/TerryPratchett:

Before the advent of desktop publishing, traditional printing techniques required text to be laid out by hand on a metal plate. Documents, such as books, can contain thousands of characters, so one can understand how mistakes can slip through unnoticed. There's less excuse for these mistakes in signs, posters, or the like, as these contain significantly less text which makes it much more clear when a mistakes is made.

* In an episode of ''Series/TheNanny'', Maxwell and C.C.'s company Sheffield-Babcock Productions is putting on a musical. They put an ad in the newspaper, which announces it was produced "by Maxwell Sheffield and C.C. Boobcock". However, it ended up being subverted when C.C. remembers she gave the ad copy to [[ScrewySquirrel Niles]] to give to the messenger.

* In an episode of ''Series/TheNanny'', Maxwell and C.C.'s company Sheffield-Babcock Productions is putting on a musical. They put an ad in the newspaper, which announces it was produced "by Maxwell Sheffield and C.C. Boobcock". However, it ended up being subverted when C.C. remembers she gave the ad copy to [[SitcomArchNemesis Niles]] to give to the messenger.

Can result in a TypoOnTheCover.

* ''Series/MrD'': When Mr. D coaches the school's basketball team, their team name is spelled wrong on the jerseys. Mr. D tells the team that the printer made a mistake and will provide a refund, but the assistant coach points out that the invoice states they have already accepted the jerseys and that no refunds will be given.

* In the Scottish soap ''Series/RiverCity'' a character standing for the local council found that her claim on her election posters to represent "THE WHOLE COMMUNITY" had been misprinted with an R in place of the L...
* ''Series/SchoolOfRock'': After Summer and Tomika have a falling out in "Don't Know What You Got ('Til It's Gone)", Tomika attempts to patch things up with a grand gesture, including a banner reading 'Tomika and Summer'. Unfortunately, when she unfurls it, it actually reads 'Tomika and '''B'''ummer'.

* A Talmud urban legend (or how you might call it) says that a bible copier botched up an aleph for an ayin, turning "Fear thy Lord" into "Frag thy Lord" (or even worse), resulting in a nonplussed God ripped him an eye (ayin) out, in good ole "An eye for an eye" tradition. But given this was rather a harmless punishment considering Gods penchant for DisproportionateRetribution, the story probably was made up JustForPun.

* A death notice that Larry put in the paper on ''Series/CurbYourEnthusiasm'' as "beloved aunt" came out as... [[CountryMatters something else]]. Naturally, his in-laws blame him rather than the newspaper.
* In an episode of ''Series/DadsArmy'', a printer mixes up photos of Corporal Jones (intended for a recruiting poster) and an enemy agent (intended for a WantedPoster).

[[folder:Radio]]
* ''Radio/ImSorryIHaventAClue'': Any round of "Historical Headlines" will feature someone (probably Barry) citing a misprinted headline from ''The Guardian'' (which has a reputation for this kind of thing). For example, Barry claimed that ''The Guardian'''s headline for the Great Fire of London would have been "London's Burping!".
%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample * ''Radio/TheNewsQuiz'': The cuttings at the starts of rounds and the end of the program are often victims of this.
[[/folder]]

* Happens surprisingly often at cake shops when they are asked to hand-pipe a message on a cake, as frequently documented by the Blog/CakeWrecks blog. [[http://www.cakewrecks.com/home/2009/5/4/happy-falker-satherhood.html For example.]]
* [[http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2016/05/20/anti-gay-republicans-accidentally-pass-policy-that-says-most-texans-have-gay-sex/?utm_source=ET&utm_medium=ETFB&utm_campaign=portal&utm_content=inf_10_60_2&tse_id=INF_14ceb910242911e6b4d0110a784531ce Texas Republicans accidentally pass a policy that says most Texans have gay sex]], because of a typo.
* At some point in its history, the [[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/34/Marlbororough_Arms%2C_Chester_%282%29.JPG Marlborough Arms pub in Chester, England]] was having its sign re-painted, and the painter either had too much to drink or, according to local folklore, heard the ghost of a former landlord in the ale cellar and so rushed to finish the job, but whatever the reason, the finished sign read "MARLBOROROUGH ARMS". The then-current landlord decided to embrace the mistake, and the pub's name has officially been the Marlbororough Arms ever since.

* In Dutch "Ve'''rr'''as uw kind met een ijsje" is quite innocuous, "surprise your child with some ice cream". It gets morbid when you make the typo "Ve'''r'''as uw kind met een ijsje", inviting people to incinerate their children using ice cream.

* ''Radio/TheNewsQuiz'': The cuttings at the starts of rounds and the end of the program are often victims of this.

* There have been several others, including "The Printer's Bible" of circa 1702, in which Psalm 119:161 reads "... printers have persecuted me without a cause..." (It should have said "princes" instead.)
* Swedes like to attribute these mistakes to the fictional "Tryckfelsnisse" (printing error elf) entity.
** Similarly, in Finland, there is "Painovirhepaholainen" (printing error devil).

* Two English football teams have fallen foul of this:
** One of the teams that were promoted to the Premier League, according to their new shirts, were "Chrystal Palace".
** The tickets for the Championship Play-off Final in 2015 referred to one of the teams as "Middlesb'''o'''rough", accidentally adding a letter.
* In April 2009, Adam Dunn and Ryan Zimmerman of baseball's Washington Nationals spent the first three innings of a loss to the Florida Marlins wearing jerseys that read "NATINALS" thanks to a goof at Majestic Athletic, the company that made their uniforms.
* Two (possibly apocryphal) stories about unfortunate printing errors for funeral floral tributes:
** One well-wisher was asked what message she would like to include with her tribute. She answered, "I guess, 'I'll miss you.'" On the day of the funeral, she was horrified to discover her tribute was accompanied by the message "I guess I'll miss you."
** At another funeral, the director noticed that the tribute from the deceased's sister had no message on it, so he ran to the printers to have a ribbon made up with "Beloved brother" written on it. The deceased's sister was fortunately more amused than upset to discover that the ribbon instead said "Beloved bother", and only wished her brother could be there to share the joke.

* [[https://twitter.com/cathaypacific/status/1042252802917953536 Cathay Pacific had this happen to them when one their planes was repainted with a new livery. Note the missing F...]]
* English cricketer Ashley Giles (spin bowler and useful late-order bat) obtained an unlikely nickname in this manner when he ordered a batch of souvenir mugs for his benefit year that were meant to proclaim "Ashley Giles, the King of Spin". When the mugs arrived from the manufacturer they instead proclaimed him "The King of Spain". His fans embraced this, singing Viva España and [[http://deepbackwardpoint.blogspot.com/2008/08/ waving the Spanish flag]] for him.
* Music/TaylorSwift had a typo occur on official t-shirts: Part of the text was meant to read "you're the only one of you, baby that's the fun of you", but some of the shirts had a misplaced apostrophe ("your'e"). This was a lyric from her single "ME!", which ironically also included the lyric "spelling is fun".
* In the early 1980s, Marvel submitted a comicbook that guest-starred Comicbook/{{Daredevil}} wearing red, which somebody at the printing company helpfully "corrected" to blue.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5mmkBXscLM A commercial for the restaurant "Yummy Buffet"]] features the word "WELGOME" written on one of the walls of the eponymous restaurant.

Fictional print shops are the most unreliable businesses ever. Any poster, sign, flyer, T-shirt, or other item which contains text they produce for their clients is going to have a mistake on it of some sort. You never know what the mistake will be, but it'll be embarrassing, or at least awkward.

Fictional print shops are the most unreliable businesses ever. Any poster, sign, brochure, leaflet, bumper sticker, T-shirt, fridge magnet, or other item which contains text they produce for their clients is going to have a mistake on it of some sort. You never know what the mistake will be, but it'll be embarrassing, or at least awkward.

Before the advent of digital imaging and editing, traditional printing techniques required text to be laid out by hand on a metal plate. Imagine laying out the contents of an entire novel, which may contain hundreds of thousands of characters, and you can understand how mistakes can slip through. There's less excuse for these mistakes in signs, posters, or the other items listed in the previous paragraph, as these contain significantly less text which makes it much more clear when a mistakes is made.

The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linotype_machine Linotype machine]], invented in the late nineteenth century, sped up the process of turning manuscripts into hot metal type, but provided no way to correct a typographical error short of removing an entire slug line after it was completed. Thus, when Linotype operators realized they had made a typographical error, they would quickly fill out the rest of the line with gibberish text, so a proofreader could easily spot the defect. This was known as a ''pi line'', and was typically produced by simply running a finger down the rows of the Linotype keyboard, which arranged the letters of the alphabet by decreasing frequency of use in English. However, pi lines often made it into print anyway, and thus mysterious references to "Etaoin Shrdlu" appeared in all sorts of publications until computers made hot type obsolete.

The digital printing techniques used today are much like printing a document off on your computer. Modern printers are sent a digital file and, assuming the artist or author followed the specifications required by the printing service, all that's left for the operator to do is set up the printer and press print. Nearly all print errors today are made on the part of the author or artist, so it is advised to carefully scrutinize any materials before they are sent for printing as printers will not refund mistakes made on the part of the customer. Mistakes can still occur with classified newspaper ads though, since these are usually dictated over the phone or scribbled on a form and faxed to be manually typed.

See also: TypoOnTheCover, RougeAnglesOfSatin, GrammarNazi.

* ''Discworld/TheTruth'':

Fictional print shops might well be the most unreliable businesses ever. Any poster, sign, brochure, leaflet, bumper sticker, T-shirt, fridge magnet, or other item which contains text they produce for their clients is going to have a mistake on it of some sort. You never know what the mistake will be, but it'll be embarrassing, or at least awkward.

TruthInTelevision, of course, as the page image demonstrates. Before the advent of digital imaging and editing, traditional printing techniques required text to be laid out by hand on a metal plate. Imagine laying out the contents of an entire novel, which may contain hundreds of thousands of characters, and you can understand how mistakes can slip through. There's less excuse for these mistakes in signs, posters, or the other items listed in the previous paragraph, as these contain significantly less text and mistakes '''should''' be easily spotted. [[Main/MurphysLaw Of course, Murphy being how he is...]]

* There have been several others, including "The Printer's Bible" of circa 1702, in which Psalm 119:161 reads "... printers have persecuted me without a cause..."

* In one episode of ''Series/MrD'', the title character coaches a basketball team. The team name is spelled wrong on their jerseys, and Mr. D tells the team that the printer made a mistake and will provide a refund. The assistant coach points out that the invoice states they have already accepted the jerseys and that no refunds will be given.