You’re in a store search­ing for that per­fect pic­ture frame. You pick one up that looks good—a sim­ple wood frame with just enough detail to com­ple­ment your pho­to.

And then you see the sam­ple pho­to … with its typo­graph­ic train wreck.

What’s strange about this type dis­as­ter is that the mis­take is usu­al­ly made in reverse. A com­mon slip is to use straight quo­ta­tion marks (dumb quotes), or even prime marks in place of typo­graph­ic quo­ta­tion marks. While that may be over­looked in texts and e‑mails, it’s a no-no for pro­fes­sion­al work.

In the pho­to frame, the oppo­site occurred. We see typo­graph­ic quo­ta­tion marks in place of prime marks. An uncom­mon error, but one that should be avoid­ed as well.

Unfor­tu­nate­ly, dis­as­ters can cause mul­ti­ple casu­al­ties. This is no excep­tion. The let­ter “x” should be a dimen­sion sign, “×.” This slip is more sub­tle, to be sure. But these blun­ders are enough to make the savvy shop­per won­der about the qual­i­ty of the prod­uct.

Hope­ful­ly the price is right.