okay babies let's fix the scare floor

February 18, 2019 3:24 PM

“first, to introduce the work conducted in the Monsters, Inc power plant: a two-person scare team consists of a scarer and an assistant. the scarer walks through a door portal to the human world, scares the child inside, and walks out..” [Threadreader version]
posted by Sokka shot first (30 comments total)

Yes yes yes. This could be a case study from my industrial engineering classes.
posted by beandip at 3:44 PM on February 18, 2019 [9 favorites]

I'm not smart enough to comprehend this :(
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:57 PM on February 18, 2019

I saw this on Twitter yesterday and can attest to its greatness. I didn't post it, however, because busy. Sigh.
posted by JHarris at 4:01 PM on February 18, 2019

For the movie, I expect they were at some level designing to make it look like very busy, hectic work. So it makes sense that they ended up doing some things that are the opposite of what you'd do if you were designing it to be efficient.
posted by RobotHero at 4:14 PM on February 18, 2019 [7 favorites]

The author is Katie Tiedrich, most famous for her gaming webcomic Awkward Zombie.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 4:20 PM on February 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

We see the "23-19" decon procedure on the unfortunate George Sanderson, that needs reworking as well. I'm supposed to believe that after entering and exiting HazMat areas all day the workers just stroll out in their fur, unless someone visually verifies contamination?

Decon should be comfortable and not embarrassing, otherwise there will be compliance issues.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:30 PM on February 18, 2019 [4 favorites]

Easter Egg? 23 = W, 19 = S. White Sock.
posted by Mitheral at 4:36 PM on February 18, 2019 [8 favorites]

I agree. I have a background in contamination control and if they were really treating children's bedrooms as a hazmat area then the way they have it the entire scare floor should be a controlled-access zone with everyone and everything having to be tested for contamination prior to exiting, and routine contamination surveys in the area conducted. Katie's layout where each scarer stays in a specific lane and doesn't cross paths with anyone else makes good sense from a hazmat control perspective.

Although honestly fact the guys in rubber suits only show up when there's been a blatantly obvious hazmat spill is an early hint that the whole thing is based on politics rather than reality.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 4:38 PM on February 18, 2019 [21 favorites]

Turns out there were compliance issues.
posted by meinvt at 4:38 PM on February 18, 2019 [10 favorites]

the man of twists and turns: "Decon should be comfortable and not embarrassing, otherwise there will be compliance issues."

Which is featured in the movie when George stuffs the sock into Charlie's mouth and throws Charlie into the kid's door and walks away happily while whistling after his third contamination event.
posted by Mitheral at 4:41 PM on February 18, 2019 [2 favorites]

OK so I get the efficiency and OHS stuff, but "huge pointless dividers" and "I have no idea why these huge, pointless dividers are here" just highlight the reduction of monsters from professionals doing a job down to interchangeable scaring units. Open-plan workspaces are garbage, but *some* kind of division between your space and everyone else's at least makes them a little more tolerable.
posted by russm at 4:43 PM on February 18, 2019 [12 favorites]

There's a big difference between open plan offices and a factory floor. In an industrial environment it's key to be aware of what's going on around you to the maximum extent possible, because it's a noisy high-energy environment and conditions can change rapidly. I agree open plan is pretty awful for concentration when working on detailed individual tasks, but the last thing you want is an unpleasant surprise because you weren't paying attention to your surroundings on a shop floor. Even though those dividers look like not-entirely-pointless structural elements to me, I'm with Katie that they're a bad choice for an industrial environment.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 4:50 PM on February 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

Now the monsters are just going to slip over on all the beans. OH&S nightmare, I tell you....
posted by pompomtom at 5:21 PM on February 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

MetaFilter: should be comfortable and not embarrassing, otherwise there will be compliance issues.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 5:31 PM on February 18, 2019 [11 favorites]

Isn't there a dangerous childbreach on to the factory floor at some point? You'd think there would be a corral around each door to contain this sort of catastrophe.
posted by user92371 at 6:00 PM on February 18, 2019 [1 favorite]

Metafilter: Turns out there were compliance issues.
posted by the agents of KAOS at 6:03 PM on February 18, 2019 [7 favorites]

I'm not an engineer, but thinking about the Decon procedures... they aren't based on any research, in-universe, at all. They can't be. Because the need for decontamination after contacting children is shown to be bogus. What's more, unless I'm misremembering something, Waternoose and Randall aren't even aware that it's bogus, so it's not like they're passing down falsified data (again, unless I'm wrong there. I watched it again recently but don't remember every detail.)

So not only is George being repeatedly subjected to these inhumane and painful procedures, but those procedures are based on what basically has to be rumors tossed around in the three generations of the Waternoose legacy, absent any actual contamination incidents, ever. Imagine creating HazMat protocols without having any data as to the nature of what a suspected contaminate could do or cause. Wouldn't you demand to do some research?
posted by Navelgazer at 7:36 PM on February 18, 2019 [2 favorites]

I don't know, am I working for a privately owned utility experiencing essentially zero over sight?
posted by Mitheral at 7:54 PM on February 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

Y'all talk about how the contamination procedure is bogus and couldn't happen as if you never go to the airport and deal with TSA security theater.
posted by evilDoug at 5:40 AM on February 19, 2019 [4 favorites]

honestly there's a lot I would change about the door rail system goddamn

This! I mean, yeah, the scare floor is poorly laid out, hazmat issues, blah blah blah, but the door rail system? And the door storage racks? There's a major source of inefficiency.

I mean, if we're going to plate these beans, let's plate all the fucking beans.
posted by nubs at 6:10 AM on February 19, 2019

And the door storage racks? There's a major source of inefficiency.

Okay now you're attracting the attention of the CS geeks.

Cache Eviction: When are Randomized Algorithms Better than LRU (Least Recently Used)?
posted by JoeZydeco at 6:18 AM on February 19, 2019

Oh hell yeah. Nerds gotta nerd the fuck out. OVERTHINKING FOR FUN!
posted by rmd1023 at 6:47 AM on February 19, 2019 [1 favorite]

Y'all talk about how the contamination procedure is bogus and couldn't happen as if you never go to the airport and deal with TSA security theater.

I thought about this, but even the TSA security theatre is like, "Well a guy tried to sneak in a bomb in his shoes one time. Didn't work, but now you all have to take off your shoes." The Monsteropolis decon team doesn't even have that much to go on.
posted by Navelgazer at 6:47 AM on February 19, 2019

Wait, what? "Plate these beans" or is it "Bean these plates"??!

I propose an exploratory comittee...
posted by pompomtom at 6:49 AM on February 19, 2019

Wait, what? "Plate these beans" or is it "Bean these plates"??!

I propose an exploratory comittee...

I would suggest it is both.

Bean these plates = let's put this topic up for intense overthinking and discussion

Plate these beans = if we're doing this, let's make sure we have everything on the plate.

Or maybe it's vice versa. I'm confusing myself now.
posted by nubs at 8:30 AM on February 19, 2019 [2 favorites]

A friend of mine is an in-house lawyer at an insurance firm, and she once wrote a fascinating post about how commercial property coverage would work in the Marvel Cinematic Universe

I married a man who watches Iron Man, and his reaction to the villian revealing to Tony Stark that he was the one who filed the injunction was to yell, LOOK, THE MOTION FOR AN INJUNCTION HAD TO HAVE BEEN SIGNED BY THE CLIENT AUTHORIZING THE FILING AND ATTESTING TO THE FACTUAL ACCURACY, SO IF THIS IS A SURPRISE TO TONY, HE NEITHER READ THE MOTION NOR HEARD HIS COUNSEL (BECAUSE I ASSUME HE IS REPRESENTED PERSONALLY) TELLING HIM THAT THE CFO HAD FUCKING SIGNED IT, AND THEREFORE TONY DESERVES TO BE ENJOINED FROM BEING THE FUCKING CHAIRMAN AND CEO

When I watched the first season of Empire, I could not follow the soap opera drama because I was so distracted by the question of what the proposed equity structure for Empire was going to be post-IPO.

So yes, this is right up my alley, brb, sending this to all the bean-platers that I know.
posted by joyceanmachine at 10:04 AM on February 19, 2019 [6 favorites]

Scare floor footage if you need reference. Plus the door warehouse.

So, two things. They make a big deal of how different scarers are faster or slower, so obviously each station needs to be fed doors at a different rate. But the scare assistants also have the file for the door before it arrives, which indicates they can't just grab the next available door. (I suppose they pick assignments based on the strengths and weaknesses of individual scarers.)

Really, a rack of doors should be delivered to a spot next to a scare station, and the scare team should process the doors and move them to an empty rack, which is then picked up and replaced with a new full rack. Less time overall waiting for doors to be delivered. These racks could be delivered by fork lift drivers, who can note which scare teams are close to finishing their rack.
posted by RobotHero at 2:32 PM on February 19, 2019 [3 favorites]

The door delivery system is obviously inefficient and dangerous but neutering it eliminates the thru the doors chase scene. Where as implementing many of the identified changes to the scare floor wouldn't have much impact on the film.
posted by Mitheral at 11:06 PM on February 19, 2019

I want a video game like this, but it's probably factorio?
posted by ikea_femme at 10:12 AM on February 20, 2019

This woman has a future in the cinema industry!!
Or not.

MetaFilter: If we're going to plate these beans, let's plate all the fucking beans.
posted by BlueHorse at 8:37 PM on February 20, 2019