This has been annoying me since last night on the subway, where I snapped it. Either I'm an idiot, or somewhere there's a stoopid copywriter.
Anyone who swipes a credit card, or a Metrocard, knows there's a magnetic strip on the back, usually at the bottom. And orienting it correctly before you swipe is the key to getting it accepted.
So - assuming that you are a moron and even try and swipe a card's short edge.... there's two short edges with two sides, so that's four ways. Holding the card upside down is another two ways. Holding it right way up but reversed is seven..... so what the hell are the other two ways that are the wrong way to swipe?
Maybe swiping a card while thinking too much about crappy subway ads can count as a wrong way.
Stumble This
Reddit!
You can pull it out before the end of the swipe, or you could stop halfway through, or wiggle it forward and back.
All those sound dirty, don't they?
I believe that the other two ways to "swipe" a card are sliding the faces of the card against the strip reader...as stupid as that sounds since that's not a swipe at all, just an amazing display of stupidity.
well, there are 4 edges, 2 sides, that's 8 ways to swipe, then total idiots could try to run the flat side of the card over the scanner, that's 2 more, one of them works so thats 9 wrong ways. but i think we are all over thinking this one. it's a stupid ad anyways- was it next to a point of sale or something?? odd no matter how you slice it.
Maybe there are nine ways after you drank a few Jamesons?
I've gotten both a "Swiped Too Fast" and "Swiped Too Slow" message before.
Swiping a card is so simple, a caveman could...erm, nevermind...
Howard - good answer. Clearly I was only thinking in three dimensions rather than four. Add to the seven spatial ways to fuck it up, there's also too slow and too fast.
Now, does that mean the copywriter was actually ver smart? or just a coincidence?
You could swipe the card in the opposite direction, making the wrong number of ways doubled. But I guess you'd have to be really stupid to do that.