In Torts, we were talking about product warning defects and, particularly, the warnings found on most plastic bags. These are warnings to adults to keep plastic bags away from babies, cribs, etc. because they present a suffication hazard. Using various bags as examples, we talked about the efficacy of such warnings in terms of size, placement and whether they needed to be in multiple languages. (We also discussed whether the risk is obvious, in which case there would be no duty to warn of it.)

This week a student brought me a plastic bag that attempted to solve the efficacy problems by omitting written warnings and relying solely on pictorial warnings. Did they succeed?  You be the judge.

First, we have this one. Here’s your test.

Question. This pictorial warning is intended to convey the following risk information:

(a) Keep plastic bags away from babies to prevent suffocation.

(b) Impressions of Edvard Munch’s The Scream are prohibited.

(c) Do not place large adult mitts around babies’ throats.

(d) This haz-mat suit does not work properly.

A is the correct answer.

This next one was on the same bag.

Question. This pictorial warning is intended to convey the following risk information:

(a) Keep plastic bags away from babies to prevent suffocation.

(b) Diapers required.

(c) Do not press pieces of toast against baby’s head.

(d) No balloon animals.

A is the correct answer.

When you were a kid, or maybe still, did you ever wonder why, no matter how hard you tried, you couldn’t reproduce the product results with your toys similar to those represented in the advertising? These failures caused massive wounds to self-esteem to millions of children. The examples are too many too count. Legos, Erector Sets, Lincoln Logs. How were we supposed to build that 10,000-piece castle on the box with fifty pieces?

At least one modern manufacturer is paying attention to protecting the egos of today’s youth via product warnings. Play-Doh warns kids, at least the ones who read product warnings, to not get their artistic hopes up because:

Reading this made me feel much better about myself because I recently attempted to replicate this delightful bug on the same packaging:

But ended up with this:

Can you interpret this pictorial warning?

The entertainment lawyer who sent it along thought maybe her landlord was warning tenants not to practice their parcours on the trash dumpster. “That stick figure is having far too much fun,” she wrote. “Look at his exuberant arms!

He definitely does appear to be celebrating a “Ta-Da!” kind of moment.

Remember: In evaluating a pictorial warning, you have to imagine you can’t read the textual warnings, either because you can’t read at all or can’t read English or other language the verbal warning is printed in.

This one rates only a 1.0 on Lawhaha.com’s proprietary 4.0 “Pictorial Warning Clarity” scale.

For more pictorical warning fun, see here here, here and here.

–Thanks to Nicole Jurkowski.

Hmm, maybe kids really are getting bigger. First, we had the titan-tyke falling from the diaper-changing station and now we have,  courtesy of a first-year law student at the University of Memphis, this sign cautioning that children are at play. Very large children. Children who, judging by the picture, could contend in the decathlon at the Olympics.

–Thanks to Rob Clapper.

It’s always fun, fun, and more fun deciphering pictorial warnings.

Here’s a warning, along with a request, from a restaurant restroom in Naples, Florida: be careful not to let your baby fall off of the changing station, and also, don’t forget to throw away the dirty diaper! A good warning and reasonable request.

Remember, to interpret pictorial warnings, you have to imagine you can’t read the textual warnings below the symbols, either because you can’t read at all or can’t read English or other language the verbal warning is printed in. That’s the purpose of a pictorial warning: to convey a danger or instruction to persons for whom verbal warnings are inadequate.

The first picture–the falling baby–does a pretty good job of communicating the risk, although that is one huge baby. His feet are way above the changing table while his head is already touching the floor. Recommended height for a wall-mounted baby changing station is 45.5 inches. At that height, this baby would be approximately six-feet tall judging by the picture.

Because the child is portrayed as a giant, the flecks flying up around his head look like they could be pieces of floor tile. Maybe the intended warning is: “Do Not Damage Floor with Falling  Objects.” Or: “No Sumo Wrestlers on Changing Table.”

But the poor “little guy” is resilient. The second picture shows him cleaning up afterwards, and good news! He looks fit as a fiddle.

These accidents do happen and are terrible to imagine. The risk is obvious, but maybe a picture serves a useful reminding function.

On the 4.0 point “Pictorial Product Symbol Clarity” rating system recently developed at secret Lawhaha.com laboratories, I would give these pictorial symbols a 3.5. What do you think?