No Refills?

Maker Faire Austin

On our way to Maker Faire Austin, we grabbed a bite to eat at the San Jose airport, where we saw this rather confusing sign on a soda machine:
“NO REFILLS–Refills Available For .59¢”
So which is it, refills or no refills? And do they really make change for a penny?

13 thoughts on “No Refills?

  1. Um, actually that is a perfectly acceptable way to write 59 cents. The rest of the sign, however….

    1. I think actually "$0.59" or "59c" would be acceptable. ".59c" (With the leading decimal point) implies the presence of the leading 0, making it 0.59c ($0.0059), or almost 2/3rds of a cent.

    2. actually $.59 would be a perfectly acceptable way to write 59 cents. By putting the cent symbol after the .59, it would equal $.0059, or about 6/10 of a penny. Sorry to go into detail. I’m kinda anal about such things. I see this all the time, and it’s just not right. If you’re going to use a cent symbol, don’t put a decimal before the number.

  2. I’m always amazed at how much time I waste thinking about these kinds of conundrums. Thank you for hurting my brain, you <i>evil</i> mad scientist.

    Holy-crap, your captcha did it to me again momentarily!

    Maybe it’s a test to see if your human? :)

  3. On the one hand, it is amazing that humans know what this sign means without the benefit of logic or proper punctuation.

    On the other hand, if they expect people to serve themselves, good luck making them do it in a certain way. If they want to charge 59 cents for a refill that costs them maybe a penny at the most, they should pour it for the customer.

  4. The machine is actually an invention that dispenses quantum-sized refills. However, the human eye can’t see those refills- and to avoid long and painful litigation (laywers are everythere) the manufacturer added the warning "no refills". In case you are still willing to try to fill your quantum-sized glass, well, you can have a refill for 59 cents. But don’t complain!

  5. Does noone actually realize that refills are not 59 cents? Apparently not. Therefore, the sign must be correct as everyone seems to believe it is so.

    It’s this kind of discriminating processing that’ll get Bush voted to a third term on Tuesday.


    1. I think the anomalies in prices and numbers catch peoples attention. Like one time, I saw a speed limit sign that read, "Speed Limit 14.7 MPH"
      Weird huh?

  6. Yeah, well this is just a small taste of what San Jose has to dispense. You want to see stupid, feel free to make a 4-mile excursion and come downtown. Here stupidity is a competition sport, performed 24/7.

    1. It seems to me the sign clearly states both “no refills” AND a refill costs 0.59 cents or fifty nine hundredths of a cent. Windell’s question still stands, “How do they make change”. I see cr@p like this all over Southern California. Usually in Asian owned venues. They have bed transrations. (sic)

      Likely what the sign was MEANT to say is

      “REFILLS COST $0.59”


Comments are closed.