History Main / CutAndPasteNote

* On ''MyNameIsEarl'', several years before making [[ListOfTransgressions The List]], Earl and the gang stole a box of silverware from the library. Said silverware was very old and (somewhat) valuable, and everyone in the group wanted it for themselves. Earl excuses himself to the bathroom, and takes magazines to make one of these, saying that he has the silverware, and unless the librarian gives him ransom money at a particular time and place, he's going to [[ExactWords kill the silverware.]] [[IdiotHero (Earl never was the brightest crayon in the box...)]]

->''"Susie, if you want to see your doll again, leave $100 in this envelope by the tree out front. You cannot trace us. You cannot find us. [[WhatAnIdiot ...Sincerely, Calvin"]]''

->'''Harry Crumb''': “You gonna have your lab inspect this note as much as you want but they may never discover what I already know.”
->'''Detective Casey''': “And what is that, Mr Crumb?”
->'''Harry Crumb''': “You find that crazy Typewriter and you’ll have your Kidnappers."

* The villain in ''[[LordPeterWimsey Gaudy Night]]'' by DorothyLSayers does this.

* The lads at ''WebComic/PennyArcade'' once sent Game Developers [[http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2001/07/16 a ransom note]] like this. "[[strike:We have our cat]] We have your cat not our cat."

** Also a slight subversion, in that one of the words of the message was rare enough that the author had to handwrite it. No explanation is given for why they didn't just cut out the individual letters required instead.

* The term "ransom note effect" is used to describe the result of using too many fonts (particularly if they clash with each other or are just plain ugly in their own right) in a document.

->'''Harry Crumb''': “You find that crazy Typewriter and you’ll have your Kidnappers

We don't negotiate with criminals. Looks like it's time for a new Image Pickin' thread.

"We don't negotiate with criminals. Looks like it's time for a new Image Pickin' thread."

->''"You cannot trace us. You cannot find us. [[WhatAnIdiot ...Sincerely, Calvin"]]''

* In ''[[{{Film/Inspector Gadget}} Inspector Gadget 2]]'', Dr. Claw sends Gadget such a letter to lead him into a trap, signed A Concerned Citizen. Gadget concludes that [[TooDumbToLive the citizen must have terrible handwriting.]]

* In ''FantasticMrFox'', the farmers and the animals each send the other a cut-and-paste note. Neither side understands why, because they already know each other's identities. Fox even signs his name.

* The WesternAnimation/SpongebobSquarepants episode "Blackjack" had the character the episode is named after send Spongebob notes in this style, in the form of making it sound like Blackjack was out to get Spongebob. [[spoiler: Of course, this was all misconstrued for figurative when it was all literal, and the episode's ending just makes it all the more laughable.]]

** Even seemingly identical [[UsefulNotes/{{Fonts}} typefaces]] -Times New Roman and Nimbus Roman, for example- can be distinguished under a powerful enough magnifying glass. Back in the early days of home computing when there were multiple competing word-processor packages for several competing system architectures, this could go a long way to narrowing down the list of people who could have printed a particular document.

* In an episode of ''Series/{{House}}'', Wilson is seen "clipping coupons." When House's beloved guitar is "kidnapped" and the Cut And Paste Note shows up demanding ransom, it's not exactly a mystery who dun it.

** House later comes across Wilson nonchalantly reading a newspaper with big, cut holes in it.

* In ''Series/{{Monk}}'', Adrian solves the murder case thanks to a charred letter in the fireplace. [[spoiler: After that he flips through the magazines belonging to the murdered butler and he notices the gaps in the pages.]]

* One of the funniest real life uses of the CutAndPasteNote is probably [[http://gawker.com/5980342/thief-who-stole-iconic-golden-cookie-releases-amazing-ransom-note-demanding-cookies-for-all-the-sick-kids-in-town the one made by the thief of a giant golden cookie in Germany]]. With a photo of them dressed as [[TheMuppets Cookie Monster]]. Gotta pity the people who had to read the news on this [[{{Corpsing}} with a straight face]].

* The original example was from the ''Literature/SherlockHolmes'' novel ''Literature/TheHoundOfTheBaskervilles'', where it wasn't a ransom note, but a warning. Hence this is OlderThanRadio. Holmes was clever enough to identify the newspapers that had been chopped up, by the font, and the type of scissors used to do it.