There are some much nicer and more fun, also arguably less destructive, pranking options:
- text-to-speech output based on a definitive history of elevators
- same for an exhaustive safety lecture that'll probably horrify some guests
- BBC programming interspersed with random bits of Arabic speech
- sound of iPhone ringing using the most common ringtone
- toilet flushing noises
- JFK's "we choose to go to the moon" speech
- "thank you for using the elevator - achievement unlocked! Please visit the hotel's reception desk to collect your prize. Your raffle code is: ID-10T"
- "dear guests: a gentle reminder that floors in our hotel are zero-indexed"
Or given lots of hotels are likely setup the same, write an app that lets people take advantage of this / broadcast their own tunes to these services, so they can choose their own lift music in a Sonos-like way.
If this were an officially endorsed thing, hotels could even stick a Physical Web Beacon (https://g.co/beacons) in the lift, pointing customers to your app.
All that said, I guess my above scenario, headphones may be a simpler option ;).
... I've suddenly realised that if someone were to improvise a two-hour lecture similar to _The Art of Boxing_ from Frog Fractions and upload it somewhere, then I would probably find a way to use it. Somehow.
In many countries, the floors are 0 indexed. I live in Argentina an the usual name for the floor that is at the street level is "Plata Baja" (something like "low floor") and the elevator has usually a button that says "PB". Now it's increasingly common to see a "0" in that button :) . (This makes me slightly happy as a mathematician.)
Moreover, in some places the first underground floor "primer subsuelo" is "-1".
(I've never seen a "1/2" for "entrepisos" :( . I don't know the translation, with autotranslation I get "mezzanine" and "intermediate floor".)
Look at how many elevators have the ground floor as G, and then the second floor is 1. It already happens a lot in lots of places in the world. Of course, it levels out if the building excludes unlucky numbers, like 13 in North America or 4 in China.
Some people are terrified of anything Arabic sounding, especially people speaking Arabic. It is not racism to say that. It would be racism to say that all white or black or whatever people are terrified of anything Arabic sounding.
But there is nothing even remotely racist about saying some people are scared of something that has to do with an ethnic group.
> It would be racism to say that all white or black or whatever people are terrified of anything Arabic sounding.
Exactly! Isn't that what he implied? He didn't say "Here are some pranking options that would work on some people" he made a general assertion "Here are some pranking options" meaning they would work on all people meaning all people are terrified of anything Arabic sounding.
If I throw a banana peel on the ground like the prankster I am, my expectation isn't that everyone is going to slip on it. Most people won't, but I might prank someone if I'm lucky.
More like "there are people who think Arabic speech is scary", he doesn't have to think that himself to know that there are people who think that way and he wants to prank those people therefore I wouldn't say it's racist.
To me it was like "I'd play Arabic speech to scare people" rather than "I'd play Arabic speech to scare some people". I am addressing the statement of course not OP's person.
- text-to-speech output based on a definitive history of elevators
- same for an exhaustive safety lecture that'll probably horrify some guests
- BBC programming interspersed with random bits of Arabic speech
- sound of iPhone ringing using the most common ringtone
- toilet flushing noises
- JFK's "we choose to go to the moon" speech
- "thank you for using the elevator - achievement unlocked! Please visit the hotel's reception desk to collect your prize. Your raffle code is: ID-10T"
- "dear guests: a gentle reminder that floors in our hotel are zero-indexed"
- mouse scratching sounds on full blast
- Soviet anthem on repeat
...
I can do this all day.