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You guys came through again, acting like real gumshoes and digging up some great facts about detectives. The most amazing fact came to us from Jenni, who says that, “After [Arthur Conan] Doyle killed off the popular Sherlock Holmes in the mid 1890’s, over 20,000 readers of The Strand (the magazine the stories were published in) canceled their subscriptions. Later, a reluctant Doyle brought the character back to life for a series of further adventures.”
Jenni will have a copy of The Nancy Drew Handbook headed her way soon, and a bunch of the other amazing facts will be put in The Generator.
Today, I’ve got a copy of Cube Chic - Take Your Office Space From Drab to Fab! to give away, so I’m looking for amazing facts about cubicles.
Leave a comment here with an amazing fact, your name and location. If it’s true, as well as amazing, we’ll feed it to the Generator and credit it to you. The commenter who has the most amazing fact wins themselves the book.
The rules haven’t changed. You can submit up to five facts and if you go to another trivia site and copy/paste a fact, claiming it as your own, we will find out, disqualify you and probably laugh at you a little.
Now gimme some facts! If you don’t know what kind of things tickle our brains, look to The Generator for guidance.
According to the beliefs of feng shui, your desk should always face the opening of your office, place a nice rug in the opening, and decorate so that the eyes move upward… though how you are going to do all of this in a space barely big enough for a person is beyond me.
posted by Sarah on 4-1-2008 at 12:13 pm
When Bob Propst invented the “Action Office” for Herman Miller in 1965, he never thought it would turn into the cubicle. In fact, cube farms and cubicles go against the entire philosophy of his office, which was to increase space and productivity, not, as they’re now used, to cram employees into small spaces.
posted by Jenny on 4-1-2008 at 12:22 pm
ok, not totally about cubes, but about Office Space…which is about life in a cube farm:
The infamous red Swingline stapler in the movie Office Space hadn’t been produced for decades prior to the release of the movie. The props simply painted a regular stapler red. The stapler because so popular with disenchanted cube farm workers that Swingline released a limited edition of the red stapler in 2004.
posted by Jenny on 4-1-2008 at 12:29 pm
Bob Propst’s original design for the first “cubicles” included modular workspaces with varying desk heights to encourage employees to work part of the time standing up.
posted by Anne on 4-1-2008 at 12:34 pm
Not cubicle trivia, but an observation. Too many (supposedly educated) people spell it “cubical.” I see it all the time, and it drives me crazy!
posted by bre on 4-1-2008 at 12:40 pm
Okay…now for an actual cubicle fact.
Before Robert Propst died in 2000, he attributed the transformation of his Action Office design into modern-day cube farms to “monolithic insanity.”
posted by bre on 4-1-2008 at 1:17 pm
Fact: popping up to look over the top of your cubicle is called prarie dogging, as it resembles the way prarie dogs pop out of their holes.
posted by qt314159265 on 4-1-2008 at 1:29 pm
An estimated 14% of suicides are related to depression linked to working within a cubicle. This phenomenon, once thought to be anecdotal, is now widely recognized in medical field and referred to by the moniker “Cube Blues”.
Okay…I made that up.
posted by rexology on 4-1-2008 at 5:36 pm
Ironically, the origin of the term cubicle comes from the word cubiculum, which was used in the ancient Roman world to mean “bed chamber” or “burial chamber.”
posted by Bethany on 4-2-2008 at 8:48 am
The cubicle factors in many versions of an Urban Legend where an employee dies at his cubicle, but his fate is not realized for a long time due to his work habits.
posted by Amy on 4-3-2008 at 4:27 pm
You can only get two anagrams out of Cubicle :
Cub Lice
and
Club Ice
posted by Amy on 4-3-2008 at 4:34 pm
It’s made from dead skin and forms a seal for the nail growing under it.
posted by Jameson on 4-3-2008 at 5:43 pm
The hollow conduits used for snaking cords and cables between cubicle walls are called “raceways.”
posted by Troy Wood on 4-3-2008 at 7:02 pm
The Ministry of Labour in Japan keeps and publishes statistics on the number of deaths in cubicles in Japan. The phenomenon is known as Karoshi, and translated literally means ”death from overwork.” It stems from a culture where 60-hour weeks are common, and you will be frowned upon if you leave the office before your boss. And older workers are willing to work longer hours to ‘outlast’ the younger folks who are unwilling to tough it out.
Well if you don’t die from working, you might be plague with a variety of work related illnesses. Depression, sucidal thoughts, heart problems… but if you die, your grieving family can file for compensation from the company, and these death-by-work lawsuits are rising.
posted by Grace on 4-3-2008 at 9:37 pm
During the “dot.com” craze at the turn of the century, booming internet companies were adding employees faster than they could make room for them. As a result, the standard cubicle size reached an all-time low at 5-by-6, or 30 sq. feet. That’s smaller than the enclosures provided for veal calves being prepared for market.
posted by Amy S. on 4-4-2008 at 12:31 am
The cube farm as led to a vidoe game. Cubefarm: Vol.1 Attack of the HypnoSys is a game for the PC in which the player tries to stop a computer virus from taking over the world. From his cubicle, I assume.
posted by chas on 4-4-2008 at 9:24 am
Okay, so here are a couple tidbits, each on their own is depressing, but when put together, they make me cringe.
Here is the general factoid: Prison cells have more space than cubicles.
Now how about some detail on that, plus a rant…
According to Steelcase (cubicle manufacturer), the average size of a cubicle in 2006 was 190 Sq Ft (implying dimensions of nearly 14′ x 14′). This is down from 250 sq/ft in 2000. Not only that, but office planners think they can reduce it by another 21% without affecting productivity.
Now I don’t know where they get their stats from, because I have never seen a cublicle that big, this includes cubes built in the Mid `80s to today. My “supervisor” cubicle here is about 8′2″ x 8′2″ giving me about 66.7 sq/ft. Much of that space is not usable since it is taken up by filing cabinets, the desktop, trash cans, etc. (By the way, I have had much smaller cubes in the past, but I’ll use this larger one for comparison). I figure, I have a 4×6 area I can move around in. Since I often work 11 hour days, then go home and go to bed from exhaustion, I am doomed to cubicle hell.
For fun comparison, the average prison cell size is at least 70 sq/ft. Plus, unless prisoners are at Max security facilites, they often get to move about quite a bit rather than site in one spot all day.
So, the way I figure it, if it weren’t for the rapes and beatings, prison just might involve more freedom than working in an office.
posted by It's good to be the King on 4-4-2008 at 11:26 am
Camels have 3 eyelids. The third eyelid is like a windshield wiper on a car, wiping the sand away. It is thin and translucent, allowing camels to see in sandstorms.
posted by jenny on 4-4-2008 at 11:54 am
Oh lord, I totally didn’t read the post. I’m am such an idiot.
I’m sorry.
That’ll teach me to go off half cocked.
posted by Jenny on 4-4-2008 at 11:55 am
King,
Similar thought to an “Office” episode called “The Convict”. The staff decides that prison would be better than Dunder-Mifflin, so Michael locks them in the conference room. Among other hijinks. Good point, and the folks at D-M don’t even have cubicles!
posted by kate on 4-4-2008 at 12:01 pm
MI5 published a report saying cube farms put employees at greater risk from bombs. A suggestion to reduce the risk was to fill the cubicle dividers with water.
posted by Chas on 4-4-2008 at 6:59 pm