Teaching an Old Dog

Just how much money does a motion -activated paper towel dispenser promise to save a company? Is it worth it in  the lost time that people spend trying to figure out how to use the equipment?

For the past three days I was attending a conference where the bathrooms had two motion -activated paper towel dispensers. One worked by waving, the other would sometimes dispense, and sometimes not.

Like Pavlov's dog, I couldn't stop myself. I had to figure out why some waves resulted in the reward of a paper towel and other times I could wave as if the queen were passing by and I couldn't get it to do a thing.

Would it dispense the paper if I waved faster or slower?  Starting from the right side and going left, or starting the wave from the left and going right? Did I need to get closer or farther away from the paper dispenser?

It was so random. Try as I would I couldn't find a pattern to get the machine to respond to me.

On the third day, after many failed attempts to get the second dispenser to dispense, I mentioned to my friend Royce that I thought the uncooperative paper towel dispenser wasn't working. As the teacher she once was, Royce said ," hold your thumb in front of the sensor."

"That's it, no waving, just thumb-it?"

I gave it the old thumbs up and the paper dispensed. I waited until the red light on the motion sensor faded, gave it another thumbs up and again, like magic, the paper appeared on cue. No waving slowly , no frantic waving, no motion at all.

Did I mention today's post was going to be a public service announcement? In fact I think the motion -activated paper towel association of America should send me a bouquet of flowers.

We are solving a major sales barrier here.The paper dispenser companies have been off message.   Their machines shouldn't be described as motion- activated but Thumbs Up activated. 

Oh, and while I'm dispensing free advice, how about a picture or a  word description of what kind of motion the motion activated equipment requires? Obviously there are different moves that work with various types of equipment, but I've never seen a user's guide for these bathroom accoutrements.

We need a user's guide.

Personally, I prefer the thumb to the wave. It's a simple, easy and power move.It's so much more civilized than waving at an inanimate object to get it to do what I want it to do. And, while I didn't try using any other digits to get the machine to work,I imagine that people who want to send the motion-activated paper towel machine a political message could do that as well. So many possibilities. It makes you want to wash your hands.