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this is 99% invisible I'm Roman Mars

This is the first joke I ever really noticed as a design joke. I like an escalator man because an escalator can never break.

It can only become stairs. That's Mitch Headberg.

All right. There would never be an escalator temporarily out of order sign. Only an escalator temporarily stairs.

Sorry for the convenience.

Being designed to elegantly deal with the extreme failure case is probably an under-appreciated design element.

But it really is one of the things that makes an escalator great.

Worst case, there's stairs. See how far you get in a broken elevator.

I bet everyone on this escalator is enjoying that design aspect too.

And we're getting our cardio.

That's 99% Invisible zone Sam Greens fan walking up an escalator in a metro station in DC.

Ever since the Industrial Revolution when it became possible for products to be designed just once and then mass-produced, it has been the slight failures and imperfect, and the individual wear and tear introduced by human use

that transforms a quality mass-produced product into a thing we actually love. Your Warren and Blue Jeans, your grandmother's

iron skillet. The initial design determined its quality, but it's there

post-manufacturing imperfections that make them comfortable,

that make them lovable, that make them yours.

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