History SchmuckBait / RealLife

* An engineer named Mark Rober has designed a device that takes the form of an electronics box to trick package theives during the holiday season, when package thefts become rampant. The device, when opened, shoots out glitter and makes sounds. He even adds some more features and tamper protections for each iteration. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3c584TGG7jQ Version 4]] is given a feature in which it can open itself midtransit.

* In 2023, an urban legend began to spread around that in rural forested roads at night, one might find spike strips blocking the road. One might expect that they should just move the spike strips out of the way and continue on. However, in doing so, they would open themselves up to a lethal assault from someone waiting into the woods.

** The important thing to remember about magic tricks is that they use visual and audio trickery to give the impression of the impossible, with the actual execution being far safer than the trick looks. Bullet-catching involves keeping the bullet in the magician's teeth the entire time while the assistant uses a blank cartridge, the "cutting a box containing a person in half" trick sees the assistant retracting their legs into the front half of the box (often with a pair of convincing fake feet sticking out of the back half) as the box is split apart, and so on. "Magicians" as it were, do not actually refer to themselves as such. They market themselves as it, and have no problems with being referred to with that name, but personally they prefer "Illusionist."

* Police also invoke this with free services for testing whether your illegal drugs are indeed the real deal.

** The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant#Warning_messages_for_future_humans current plan]] is largely utilitarian, with a combination of straightforward basic warnings and more detailed factual information, with the priority being to ensure the nature of the danger is conveyed accurately (something that many of the more fanciful proposals seem to forget, particularly since the waste in the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is over 2,000 feet underground).

* In July 2018, Creator/HidekiKamiya imposed [[https://twitter.com/PG_kamiya/status/1016496741074399232 an embargo on any replies to him in non-Japanese languages]], including English. He states that this is because he's fed up with people who just reply to his posts without reading them or [[OpenMouthInsertFoot thinking before posting]], and he knows that there are people who are going to attempt to talk to him in English anyway and finds those people amusing to see (and block). In short, his Japanese-only rule serves as a filter for both [[FunnyForeigner idiot foreigners]] and excessively curious people.

** What happened instead was, as seen on the thread on Twitter, [[InsultBackfire people posting to get blocked on purpose]], [[BileFascination just so they can say Hideki Kamiya blocked them]].
** In truth, he just blocks people because he feels like it, including fellow developers, artists, musicians. Whether he likes them or not, he just does it because, no ulterior motive. One of the people he blocked took it positively, claiming that he did so as to prevents his tweets from distracting her.

* There's an [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGxPR3HtUw4 infamous viral video]] cataloguing an incident in which Nintendo, a company notorious for issuing copyright takedown requests, asked on Twitter, "What's your favourite piece of music from the ''Franchise/LegendOfZelda'' series?" Cue hundreds of users responding with Website/YouTube links to their favourite songs... and ''every single one of those videos'' getting taken down.

*** A recent bug in the UsefulNotes/{{Steam}} for [[UsefulNotes/{{Unix}} Linux]] package causes the package manager to ''uninstall all packages pertaining to the GUI subsystem''[[note]]Specifically, the XWindows subsystem[[/note]] when trying to install, triggering this failsafe. Linus Sebastian from WebVideo/LinusTechTips proceeds to show how much of a schmuck he is by following the instructions...

* Email scams work on this. They’ll say things like you have a recent purchase or your bank account may have been hacked or a package coming to you has a problem. The sites linked in the emails look legitimate but have been set up to spoof the real websites and get your information.

** By 2022, a new scam had popped up with someone on the user’s friend list sending a direct message to say they found incriminating stuff about the user on a Discord server. Clicking the link is harmless, but the server requests authorization via a QR code to validate the user. Scanning the code gives the scammers login data and hacks the user account, continuing the chain.

* Spoilers. In particular, browsing wikis (including Wiki/ThisVeryWiki) and discussions on a work you're going through or plan to go through. You might be tempted to learn a little bit more about, say, a character you like, and if it's this wiki you may be curious about tropes that apply to them, but then oops! Turns out they undergo a FaceHeelTurn, they die, or [[WalkingSpoiler everything about the character is a spoiler]]. Yes, there may be spoiler warnings, but surely browsing the first few tropes examples won't hurt...[[TemptingFate right?]]

* AMD, a manufacturer of PC [=CPUs=], will happily advertise a feature called Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) which allows the CPU that supports it (which is most of the Ryzen lineup) to self-overclock harder and/or longer than it normally would when paired with a CPU cooler. [[https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/hatyyq/just_a_fyi_pbo_voids_amds_warranty/ Using PBO also voids your warranty]] and to make matters worse, it tends to be ''enabled'' by default.

* The ''rm -rf /'' command-line invocation for novice Unix users. Especially don't run it as root... ''rm'' is short for "remove". The ''-r'' flag enables the "recursive" option, and ''-f'' is the "don't ask me if I'm sure" flag. The single slash denotes the entire filesystem, kinda like C:\ for a Windows machine, but even more. If you run it as a regular user, it'll delete everything you have access to. If you run it as the superuser (that is, root user, user 1, the administrative user) then it'll delete everything. Or at least try to until it deletes something system-critical, [[LogicBomb like the ''rm'' command itself]]. In any case, the system is pretty much unusable afterwards and ''at best'' will require a reformat and OS reinstall. Most modern Unix variants will prevent you from running it, since it has no legitimate use.[[note]] If you want to wipe the disk and reinstall, then you'll use ''fdisk'' or ''dd''. If you want to delete everything because the feds are knocking, then you'd use a secure deletion tool like GNU's ''shred'', rather than something that just marks blocks as dirty. There is no reason ever to use ''rm -rf /'' for anything other than quickly trashing a system. If you ''really'' must try this out, make a virtual machine and go nuts.[[/note]]

* The Voltage Switch on the back of some computer [=PSUs=]. Flicking it causes a loud bang, a lot of smoke, and a broken PSU.

** Well, maybe. The switch routes to a voltage doubler on the 115V setting. Switching it to 230V in the US, Canada, and other 100V-120V countries won't do anything[[note]]At worst, it'll just trip overzealous safety fuses found in some homes[[/note]]. Switching to 115V in 230V countries however will blow up the power supply.

** Similarly, guys should beware being asked "What's the capitol of Thailand?", as the answer[[note]]Bangkok[[/note]] leads to a GroinAttack.

* Heart Attack Grill: It's as close to ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin as it can be. It doesn't grill heart attacks, but it is themed around food which is known to cause them and other health problems. Among the delicacies are extra-large hamburgers (the smallest weigh half a pound[[note]]That's about 225 grams for metric folks[[/note]] and the largest run to two pounds[[note]]About a kilo.[[/note]], served with fries cooked in pure lard. It's themed as a hospital, with the staff being healthy "doctors" and "nurses" who serve to customers as "patients". And the food is named after health problems and surgeries (for instance, the burgers run from "Single Bypass" to "Quadruple Bypass" and the fries are called "Flatliner Fries"). And just to tempt people who are already at risk of cardiovascular diseases, customers who weigh over 350 pounds can eat for free after the staff verifies their weight. Two spokespeople have already died at ages 29 and 52, respectively. If you are still willing to eat there knowing all of this...

* The website [[https://rentahitman.com/ Rent-A-Hitman.]] No, it's not run by [[TheMafia "Guido Fanelli"]], but by Bob Innes, who originally created it in 2005 as part of a cybersecurity business that never went anywhere, the name being a {{pun}} on the double meaning of "hit" (which can also refer to attacking a computer system). He [[https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/11/22/rent-a-hitman-website/ kept the site up,]] though, partly for comedy and partly so that he can forward real inquiries directly to the police. Numerous people have actually tried contracting Rent-A-Hitman's "services" thinking they were legit, only to find out that the site's 17,985 "field operatives" are actually the approximate number of law enforcement agencies in the US.