
Placebo buttons: 'door-close' buttons, others, don't do anything - roadnottaken
http://idle.slashdot.org/story/10/11/08/1521226/The-Placebo-Effect-Not-Just-On-Drugs
======
jamesbritt
" 'In most elevators installed since the early 1990s, the 'close door' button
has no effect. Otis Elevator engineers confirmed the fact to the Wall Street
Journal in 2003. "

Interesting. In a previous career I worked at a hotel and had, as part of my
job, a "fireman's service" key. Very handy thing.

Elevator banks in NYC offices and hotels have a key slot that, when activated,
pulls all the elevators to the lobby. You're supposed to only do this in an
emergency, such as a fire.

While the elevators are set to fireman's service, the same key (well, a
duplicate, if yours is the one that was used to pull the elevators) is used
inside an elevator to control it.

While on fireman's service the doors will not open unless you press the "open"
button. If you take the car to a fire floor you really don't want the doors
opening on their own.

You have to press and hold the "open" button until they are fully open; also
handy in case you start to open the doors and start inhaling smoke.

Likewise, once open, the doors don't close unless you press and hold the
"close" button.

I'm pretty sure that once you closed the doors the car automatically returned
to the lobby.

Bottom line is, not every control you see on some equipment or machine is
meant for everyone to use.

~~~
wlesieutre
One of the huge reasons for manual door control in fires is that the IR sensor
to detect if something is blocking the door can't tell the difference between
a person and smoke. Door opens up on a burning floor, smoke pours in, door
refuses to shut, everyone gets stuck and dies.

To the non-firefighters, this is why there are so many signs telling you do
take the stairs. Power failures too.

------
teilo
"In 2004 the New York Times reported that more than 2,500 of the 3,250 "walk"
buttons in New York intersections do nothing. "The city deactivated most of
the pedestrian buttons long ago with the emergence of computer-controlled
traffic signals, even as an unwitting public continued to push on."

And what do you expect them to do? Since only 2/3rds do nothing, how is the
pedestrian to know which 2/3rds that is? They have no choice but to always
push the button.

~~~
roadnottaken
Why don't they remove the inactive buttons?

~~~
alexgartrell
It's probably more expensive than just snipping the wires.

~~~
kgermino
Why would they even bother to do that? Just deactivate the buttons in
software.

~~~
eli
I don't think those buttons were driven by anything we would consider
"software."

~~~
kgermino
Do you mind explaining? I can't tell if this is meant as a joke or a serious
counter-argument. At any rate I assume there is some sort of firmware
controlling the lights [edit: guess not, read juson's comment below],
monitoring the buttons/ induction loops, etc. and the easiest way (to my mind)
to disable to buttons would be to disable them in this software and have the
system stop monitoring them. However if you have any insight into how the
lights work that would be great.

~~~
Judson
hey kgermino,

Sorry to butt into the convo, but I was a summer intern at a major "traffic
light" operation (for lack of a better term) in the southeast (aka, they did
all of the traffic lights and systems for the southeast USA). It will seem
almost shocking to many here on HN, but the traffic control industry is
lagging behind drastically.

I believe the newer systems started going IP based just a few years ago, and
(gasp) wireless networking of traffic lights is a __really __new thing. It has
to do with the environment the system must handle and how "tamper-proof" it
must be, which leads to hardware and software being waaayy behind the curve.

The main point though, is that it would be very reasonable to think that some
hardware, especially if installed before the 90s, wouldn't have "software" to
just "turn off monitoring". Even the newer boxes aren't completely controlled
by software, they have physical circuitry that operates as a "fall-back" to
make sure that things like two green lights on adjacent roads can't be green
at the same time, even if the software was hacked, had a bug, etc.

~~~
gecko
Even moreso than that, many of the lights in New York still run on genuine
relays. You can easily hear them at many street corners in Manhattan, happily
thunking away. (The New York Subway is also still powered almost exclusively
by relays, even to do complex things like monitor train speed. It's both
impressive and disturbing to see what they were able to accomplish a hundred
years ago without modern computing hardware.)

~~~
lepht
Any recommended links on where one could read more on the NY Subway systems
you mention? I'm fascinated by pre-electronic computing, and this sounds like
a particularly interesting example.

------
jrockway
Incidentally, the door close button does work in Japan. And you can cancel
erroneous floor selections.

(The funny part is that the elevators are made by the same companies that make
them for the US market. But they seem to be "updated technology" rather than
the 1930s-holdovers that we have today.)

The most modern elevator system I've used is the one at the new Bank of
America Tower. You type the number of the floor you want to go to on a keypad,
then the display tells you which elevator to take. You go in, and there are no
buttons at all. It seems cumbersome, but it really does seem to reduce waiting
time. (And annoying people that hold the elevator for all their friends. These
elevators just smash the offender, solving the problem for good.)

~~~
xenophanes
In my building the elevator doesn't even know to return to the lobby when idle
:(

Returning to the lobby means you're in the right place half the time (roughly
-- I for one use the elevator to go up more than to go down). Anywhere else
has much worse odds.

~~~
daten
Many buildings with multiple evelators are programmed to return to a stagger
position, so all of the idle elevators are at least one floor apart if not
evenly distributed across the whole height of the building. The closest idle
elevator responds to a call button.

This is easiest to observe in builds with glass elevators.

~~~
Splines
SimTower was a great elevator simulator. If you spend any amount of time with
the game you realize that a staggered approach is more efficient.

It's too bad there aren't more games in the genre. It might be fun to
experiment with more types of traffic flow and programmable elevators.

------
tzs
Many close-door buttons that appear to do nothing only do nothing if the
natural cycle has not been interrupted. I've seen ones where if you press the
open-door button to interrupt a door closing, then the close-door button
becomes functional and causes an immediate door close.

~~~
daten
I agree, I've also noticed the elevators in my office building are on a
schedule and behave differently during business hours than evening and early
morning hours.

Maybe it's for the convenience of the after-hours cleaning staff, but after
7PM the close door button can even make the door close before it finishes
opening upon arriving at a floor.

------
mcknz
This reminds me why I don't slashdot anymore. By the fourth comment there's an
extensive argument over universal health care.

EDIT: irony noted.

~~~
daten
I don't read Slashdot comments because of the repetitive or off topic jokes
that add nothing productive to the conversation.

~~~
pluies
Interestingly enough, I enjoy Slashdot for exactly that reason (and the
occasional insightful comment). I haven't found any other place on the net
(yet?) with such witty geek humor.

~~~
prawn
I gave up Slashdot after a long time because of the predictable jokes, but do
miss the genuinely clever ones. If the funny filter could somehow determine
the difference between the clever stuff and the memes (or if there were two
moderation options to separate them), it might be more useful.

------
JustinSeriously
A key word missing from the HN title is "most." _Most_ door-close buttons
don't work, _most_ pedestrian walkways buttons don't work, but _some_ do, and
it's very easy to test which ones do.

They aren't all placebos.

~~~
roadnottaken
What's an easy way to test if a pedestrian-walk button works? I think this
would actually take a lot of work to chart time-to-walk with/without button
presses. Elevator door-close buttons would be easier, assuming that the doors
is supposed to close immediately after pressing the button.

~~~
jat850
At least where I live, the non-placebo buttons have an immediate effect -
press, and the walk light will change to a blinking don't-walk hand, which
then turns to solid as the corresponding traffic light turns yellow/red.

~~~
roadnottaken
Interesting. Based on your anecdote, I'm pretty sure I've never encountered a
functional push-to-walk button...

------
lotharbot
I know of one example of this from the Lyndon B. Johnson vice presidency
(1961-63):

His Air Force Two aircraft, SAM 970 [0], has a fake temperature switch in the
presidential stateroom. The staff had it installed after they got sick of him
coming up to the cockpit and fiddling with the temperature controls.

[0] [http://www.museumofflight.org/aircraft/boeing-
vc-137b-707-12...](http://www.museumofflight.org/aircraft/boeing-
vc-137b-707-120sam-970-air-force-one)

------
adolph
Isn't the interface there for "Fireman mode?"

 _In most elevators, at least in any built or installed since the early
nineties, the door-close button doesn’t work. It is there mainly to make you
think it works. (It does work if, say, a fireman needs to take control. But
you need a key, and a fire, to do that.)_

From:
[http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/04/21/080421fa_fact_...](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/04/21/080421fa_fact_paumgarten?printable=true#ixzz14jGwM2z9)

See also Design With Intent:
[http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/2008/10/01/placebo-
but...](http://architectures.danlockton.co.uk/2008/10/01/placebo-buttons-
false-affordances-and-habit-forming/)

~~~
JshWright
You don't even need a fire... just a key...

I'm a firefighter/EMT in upstate New York. We use an elevator key from time to
time to hold an elevator if we know we're going to need that elevator to move
a patient in a few minutes (in addition to other "fire related" uses like
actual fires, fire alarms, and elevator mechanical issues).

------
kleiba
It's not such a big secret that most elevator close buttons don't work: if you
push them, nothing happens. That's not too hard to figure out on your own. And
which, by the way, annoys me greatly and causes quite the opposite of a
"feeling of control" in me, as it rather demonstrates my _lack of control_!
(Also, in the back of my head I hear the elevator company laughing at me in a
Nelson kind of "Ha! Ha!".)

What is it about those three to five seconds between chosing your floor and
the door closing that makes them feel like three to five hours? I suppose it's
because we use elevators so frequently that all these seconds start adding up
to some actual time wasted without any reason.

~~~
helmut_hed
I too feel a lack of control and frustration from the fact that walk signals
(such as across 3rd St in SF) and elevator "close" buttons obviously do
nothing. Perhaps it's my Aspergers/geek thing, but I feel patronized by the
fake buttons.

On of my favorite things about traveling to places like Singapore, Japan, Hong
Kong, etc. is that the close door buttons _work_. It's ridiculous, I know, but
I feel like it points to some sort of cultural difference.

------
Sindrome
I recently finished developing a simple news app for the iPhone. I wanted to
reduce the overhead of the app as much as possible and I wanted a refresh
feature but I didn't want the user to have the ability to receive news updates
from my service at his will. So I made the cache only expire after 15 minutes.
When the user clicks the refresh button within 15 minutes of a previous click
it actually does nothing, but display an activity indicator for 2 hard coded
seconds. This isn't for critical news updates. Just very slow niche news
updates. It's my most recent version of a placebo button.

------
jim_dot
The door close button in my previous apartment worked. Then again the door
stayed open for an unreasonably (for a guy in his 20's) long time because of
the number of elderly people in the building.

~~~
bonzoesc
My previous building in Miami had it connected, but possibly to allow more
capacity per elevator. Four elevators is not enough for 21 floors of ten units
each.

------
vilya
James Gleick explores this theme in his very enjoyable book Faster, as part of
a broader look at the accelerating pace of modern life.

For the interested, the book's website is at <http://fasterbook.com/> and the
chapter about door close buttons is here: <http://fasterbook.com/cgi-
bin/faster/fchapter.pl?3>

------
pmjordan
I heard somewhere that in the UK, the buttons for crossing the road react
faster if you mash them, the idea being that it's most likely a child. I've
never tested it, it's always seemed rather rude to give the cars a shorter
phase. (god, that's such a British way of thinking)

------
albahk
In Hong Kong the 'close' buttons really do work in the majority of elevators
and they show at least 50 times more wear and tear than any other button.

It shows how damn impatient we are in HK.

------
carlcoryell
In Singapore, most elevator door close buttons work. It's very civilized and
one of the small delights of living here.

------
grandalf
In my previous apartment there was a strange, doorbell-like button in the
middle of one of the walls. I pressed it once in a while, but it never seemed
to do anything.

It also seemed very unlikely that the floorplan of the building had ever put a
door near it, so I'm guessing it was a placebo button for some previous
resident.

~~~
mhb
_I have a switch in my apartment... it doesn't do anything.... Every once in a
while, I turn it on and off.... One day I got a call... it was from a woman in
France.... She said "Cut it out"...._

\-- Stephen Wright

------
seldo
I've heard that this is also true of all of the pedestrian buttons at traffic
lights in central London, though I've never seen an official confirmation.

------
PixelRobot
People like to feel in control, but not the responsibility that comes with the
power. This looks like a (dishonest) way to combine both tendencies.

------
bnycum
The door close button not working annoys me less than not being able to
deselect selected floors. We've all had that idiot "friend".

