If I ever get the opportunity to use my limited computer knowledge to make someone feel like a moron, I jump all over it. Actually I’m kidding, but I do enjoy when huge companies make obvious technology related mistakes in their advertisements, marketing materials or receipts.

The “http” mistake is my favorite. You may hear a commercial that says, “Go to our Web site at h-t-t-p-colon-slash-slash…” which means you should type in “http://” and then the rest of the Web address, such as http://www.braimee.com for example. However, many commercials today still make the error of saying “Go to our Web site at h-t-t-p-colon-backslash-backslash…” which would look like “http:\\” in your Web browser.

The problem is, if you start any Web address with “http:\\” it just ain’t gonna work! Try it yourself!

Just last week I bought a Caribou Coffee and my receipt said I could order more coffee goodies at http:\\cariboucoffee.com. Crikey, you’d think if anybody in their technology department ever bought a Caribou Coffee, this kind of error would be caught!

P.S. - this post was way more trouble than it was worth. After publishing the post, I found that the backslashes were missing. It appears that Wordpress eats backslashes, so to get one to appear in your post, it has to be represented by this: “& # 0 9 2 ;” (without the spaces or quotes)

I can’t believe that’s true, but I learned it from this site, and by gosh, it worked. Whatever.