History of "Tree Swing" drawings about business communication

When I was a young naive engineer, I saw this tacked to the beige fabric cubicle wall of an old embittered engineer. It made me like him. Here's a history of this great cartoon.

The tree swing or tire swing funny diagrams - for training, presentations, etc

(Via Bits & Pieces)

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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Michael A

oh my god.. as a white goods appliance engineer this hits a little too close to home.. but made me literally LOL at my desk. thank you for posting this, this is totally going on my cube wall.
haineux

Sometimes the Dragon Wins is one of several of such compendia/histories. I enjoy this book a lot.

http://www.amazon.com/Sometimes-Dragon-Wins-Folklore-Paperwork/dp/0815603711
- Mark_Frauenfelder
  
  Thanks for letting me know about this. I just bought a used copy on Amazon!
Nadreck

I recall a version where there was a “As presented by Sales” which had a half-naked babe on the swing surrounded by an army of cute dancing cartoon animals and flowers.
blearghhh

There was a variation of this passed around via fax machines and photocopiers for the pro sound industry back when I worked in it.

Wildly different pictures of sound systems with “what the rider specified” “What the local rental company supplied” “what the band thought was cool”. That kind of thing. Funny at the time. I wish I could find it now.
- Lupus_Yonderboy
  
  I work in Pro AV and I’d like to see it too – I believe that I’ve seen a version of this with different statements (relating to Pro Audio but maybe Video) but it was the same basic diagram.
  - blearghhh
    
    Found it. Well, one of my Facebook friends found it.
    
    I wonder how many industry specific versions there are floating around out there.
    - Lupus_Yonderboy
      
      Haha, awesome. I’ll pass this around.
Amphigorey

The field service one looks remarkably like the swing that Death installed for his granddaughter.
Jorpho

The first version I saw was related to patent applications, with the tire swing bearing the caption “as circumvented”.
http://www.facebook.com/clesoine Charlie Lesoine

Maybe that’s how you THINK engineering designed it. That is because you are an idiot. I assure you, that is NOT how engineering designed it.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=8834925 Chauncey Scott

It’s ridiculously depressing how well I can relate to this. Ughhhh
http://www.matthewpetty.com/ Matthew Petty

Yep, I’ve used this when trying to get projects to apply Systems Engineering and Requirements Management. Next up, the history of the “Vee Diagram”
treacle

It made you similar to him? Or it made you appreciate him?
Did you turn into an embittered old engineer? :)
dnebdal

Huh, I saw a version of this in the 90s – translated to Swedish. I was ~12 at the time, reading “System design in BASIC for the ABC80″ or somesuch (I got a hand-down Z80/BASIC computer from my grandfather). It’s the only thing I concretely remember from that book. :)
http://reynardo.livejournal.com/ Gillian B

I have a copy that I just put up on my wall – genuine 1985 Australian Public Service vintage! (I know – it was inside an application I’d written then)