Recently, Reddit user u/Boring-Plastic-4667 asked the people of r/AskReddit, "What industry “secret” do you know that most people don’t?" So, we thought we'd share some of the most-upvoted responses:
FYI, these are unverified accounts from Reddit users.
1. "The New York Times bestseller list has a lot of people on it who buy massive numbers of their own books."
"Apparently, there is a symbol that indicates that while it did make best seller status, there was a bulk buy.
A footnote, if you will, or similar to an asterisk."
Note: it's a dagger symbol that was first used on the list in 1995.
2. "Worked with a lot of banks and their IT systems.You wouldn’t believe how old and fragile they are. It’s a wonder it’s not all coming crashing down."
3. "That guy you pay to come out and fix your computer, most of the time, just Google searches your problem to find the solution."
"Can confirm. But you’re not paying us to look it up. You’re paying us to know what to look up."
4. "If you find an extra nugget in your order, it wasn't a mistake. You got a cool employee."
5. "I worked in online community management and social media for years. Admins CAN read all of your PMs. 'Private' only means private from the masses, not from administration. We had to be able to read them to check reports of abuse, grooming, illegal activity etc."
"I can't tell you how much cringeworthy shit I had to read through, especially from guys trying to hook up."
6. "I worked in politics. There are A LOT of people who write to a politician like they're a celebrity. They receive love letters and all kinds of weird stuff. There's also quite a sizeable part of their mail that is comprised of people asking for a photo with an autograph. Way more than you think!"
"Some because they're admirers, others because they collect them... and then some other cases you don't really want to know about (I've worked for a female politician, trust me, you don't wanna know).
The dirty little secret within the secret is that the politicians I knew didn't sign anything. They had a machine that did all the signing for them. So technically the autographs were not even real."
7. "I'm a casino manager. It is definitely possible (more likely than you think) to win money in the short term. For example, if you walk in, bet on red/black on roulette, it’s reasonably close to 50/50 (not quite because of 0). You might do this once, double your money and leave. Congratulations.You will always lose in the long term. Always."
"Anyone that thinks they have some kind of system is a sucker. A game would not make it into the casino floor if the maths have not been rigorously checked and long term simulations run to confirm.
The one exception to this is poker. The casino will always have a rake or time charge to make their money but there is no reason you cannot consistently win money if you are skilled enough."
8. "Some appetizers are the most labour-intensive items on the menu to make. For example, dumplings take one worker about an hour to make 12-15 orders. If you want to know where I'm getting at, if a restaurant offers a plethora of appetizers options then there's a high chance a lot of them are store bought and resold because there's no feasible way to prepare several orders for each item on the menu."
9. "I'm an academic researcher and I can speak for a huge number in my field when I say: if you want access to our studies and they're behind a paywall, you can email us and we will send you the study. We are genuinely delighted to share and if you want further context for the results or what have you, I'll always try my best to oblige."
"The only limiters on that last bit is that:
the original data for the study might have reached the end of our right to keep it, in which case it will have been destroyed.
I might have forgotten details or I might have written that paper during a particularly hectic time and my file system might be total shit.
Also a lot of us are on ResearchGate and various social media things so you can contact us through there. If you can't contact us directly or we're being slow, one of the other authors on the paper might be contactable."
10. "In Australia, additional warranties are a rip-off. If a device or product can be reasonably expected to last five years without defect, then it can be held to that under warranty. Companies are f*cked."
11. "If your baby goes to a nursery/daycare, chances are those weren't their 'first' steps/words etc. that you witnessed. The industry standard is to not tell parents when these things happen as it makes them feel bad. I've seen kids up and walking about the room for weeks, even months before their parents proudly announced at drop-off that they 'took their first steps last night.'"
12. "NEVER buy a car that is completely new on the market! They always, always come with a tonne of bugs that need fixing and it takes about two years of serial production to get rid of most of them. If you must buy a new car, be sure the model has been in the market for at least two years."
"Also, don't buy models that were in development during years of crisis. Example: during the 2008 financial crisis we let a huge number of people go (to fix the numbers in the books; it didn't actually save the company money because they all got a big payout on their way out), so we were understaffed and under immense pressure to reduce cost. The models that came on the market after that time were shit. Like, seriously shit quality we have never seen before."
13. "Health and safety standards are not followed in most restaurants on a day-to-day basis."
14. "All those 'practical effects' that people love in movies are heavily touched by VFX. We fix/enhance/replace everything digitally, and the on-set artists get the credit. My last movie had $350k in wig tape fixes. Fury Road, which was applauded for its practical effects, had 2100 VFX shots in it. The first Avatar had ~2500. My slogan for VFX is 'we make the rest of the movie.'"
15. "Teachers gossip about the kids, and each other, and everything. There is always so much drama going on at any given moment."
16. "94% of consulting is making shit up that people want to hear. However, I think it’s unethical to not present good data and systematic research before providing recommendations. You can couch honest conclusions in your findings but ultimately, other than out of legal or financial obligation, they’re gonna do what they want to do."
17. "Just because a store-brand product and a name-brand product are made in the same factory doesn't mean they're the same. People believe that there are no differences between the recipes and that the same stuff is just put into a different box. That it's the same ingredients on the same production line. That's not true."
"Each brand asks the factory to make the product at a particular price point. A luxury brand might want the product to cost $4 a unit but the store brand might want it for $2. The factory will tailor the recipe to the price point, substituting expensive ingredients for cheaper ones, eliminating an ingredient, altering the manufacturing process to require fewer people or equipment, or eliminating intermediate quality control steps.
Sure, there might not be a detectable difference between some products, and other products might actually be identical to the point that spending more for a better brand isn't worth it. But a lot of products are noticeably different even if they are made on the same production line by the same people."
18. "If you want to remain sane never look up how much insect and rodent debris is allowed by the food safety authorities in your area. It’s always a lot more than you would imagine and can never be stopped completely."
19. "Don't ever order mushrooms as a pizza topping. If you want mushrooms on your pizza, buy them fresh and add them yourself. 9 times out of 10 the mushrooms they're putting on your pizza should have been thrown out yesterday. Mushrooms are in relatively high demand but have an absolutely terrible shelf life that outweighs their demand."
"They really should get tossed at the end of the day after being in that little tray for however many hours they're in there for, but managers will put them back in storage because there's enough demand to justify not just tossing them as you would with leftover anchovies or something... and its not against the rules to re-store them. Usually corporate will tell you they have three days' shelf life, even though they arrived at the store already withering and partially slimey... just don't do it. Buy your mushrooms fresh and eat them the same day. Gives me shudders just thinking about it."
Shout out to u/Boring-Plastic-4667 and r/AskReddit for having this discussion.
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.