back to article BOFH: Engage Hollywood Protocol – because nonsense always looks legit

BOFH logo telephone with devil's horns "Well, now you've done it!" the Boss fumes. "We could've got through an audit with a couple of minor notes, but now we're going to be audited by a team of auditors who specialize in corporate process methodology." "A team?" I ask. "Yes." "In that case," I say, "I'm going to insist on …

  1. Eccella
    Pint

    Superb plot twist

    One of the best. Splurted coffee over the keyboard at the end.

    1. Joe W Silver badge

      Re: Superb plot twist

      I gotta fetch me a new cuppa, thankfully it was already empty when I started reading the story. Plus by now we should know better, eh?

      Still: well played. The Hollywood Protocol. Need to remember that. I can probably do some techno-babble to confuse your boss, for a modest fee. Maybe we can build an app for getting a good team lineup? Something like... ehm... let's call it Hinder?

      1. Ochib

        Re: Superb plot twist

        I'm going to wite a GUI interface using visual basic to track the hackers IP address to a geo-location

        1. Joe W Silver badge

          Re: Superb plot twist

          HPaaS - Hollywood Protocoll as a Service?

        2. Chloe Cresswell Silver badge

          Re: Superb plot twist

          Will this GUI also respond to the keyboard, and go twice as fast if two people are typing on the same keyboard?

        3. Munchausen's proxy
          Pint

          Re: Superb plot twist

          > I'm going to wite a GUI interface using visual basic to track the hackers IP address to a geo-location

          Slide over a little, I'll help you type.

          1. herman Silver badge

            Re: Superb plot twist

            Hmm, it has to flash up a long sequence of wrong scenic geolocation pictures before finally settling on the right one, just when everyone runs out of nonsense to talk about.

    2. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

      Re: Superb plot twist

      Nobody expected the Hollywood Heist Movie Double Cross Final Twist Protocol.

      1. Fruit and Nutcase Silver badge
        Alert

        Auditors...

        Trace their lineage back to the...

        Spanish Inquisition

        1. Hazmoid
          Coat

          Re: Auditors...

          Insert Monty Python Quote

          "No-one Expects the Spanish Inquisition!"

    3. M.V. Lipvig Silver badge

      Re: Superb plot twist

      You must be new around here. We seasoned vets leave the drinks in the next room before booting the BOFH.

      1. Scott Marshall

        Re: Superb plot twist

        We seasoned vets also do not read the BOFH at the breakfast table.

        Explosively exfiltrated partially masticated breakfast cereal is an absolute bastard to clean up, as it gets into nooks and crannies easier than silastic and sets faster and harder than Quick-crete, especially if said partially masticated breakfast cereal is Weetbix/Weetabix.

  2. Pascal Monett Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Wheels within wheels

    Great story.

    Full marks.

    No carpet, though . . .

  3. AlanSh

    I didn't see that one coming

    Brilliant ending.

    1. M.V. Lipvig Silver badge

      Re: I didn't see that one coming

      What was surprising was the director knew the real deal.

  4. Michael H.F. Wilkinson Silver badge
    Pint

    Absolutely brilliant

    Great plot twist, and great start to the weekend.

    The Director seems almost disconcertingly canny, when it comes to Hollywood Protocol, I must say. I wonder if this might worry Simon.

    1. Joe W Silver badge
      Pint

      Re: Absolutely brilliant

      Isn't the Director the PFY's uncle or something along these lines? -->

      1. ttlanhil

        Re: Absolutely brilliant

        If I remember correctly... It was actually the CEO, although that's from stories pre-y2k

        Directors don't get replaced as often as managers, but also IIRC it has happened a few times since then

      2. herman Silver badge

        Re: Absolutely brilliant

        Remind me again WHY I hired you? Erm, because you are my uncle?

  5. Dave K

    A good one this week, loved the little twist at the end. Happy Friday!

  6. Rhuadh

    Hollywood Protocol?

    ROLFLMAO! Superb!

  7. big_D Silver badge

    Twister

    As the HP was going more overboard, I thought, hmm, fake audit to dump on the boss... After over 30 years reading Simon's rantings, I'm fully in the BOFH zone.

    If you don't mind, I've just finished adding this to my offline BOFH Tome, "The Complete Bastard" and I'm going to start again at the beginning...

    Genesis (Striped Irregular Bucket #1)

    I'm really bored. You know how bored you get when work's going on and on and on, and nothing interesting is happening, and you're listening to a radio that picks up ONE station on FM, and it's always the station with the least records in the city, about 5, and one of them is "You're so Vain" which wasn't too bad a song until you hear it about 3 times a day for a year, and *EVERY* time it plays, the announcer tells you it's about Warren Beatty and who he's currently poking, someone you'll never sniff the toe-jam of, let alone meet, let alone get amorous with. And EVERY time someone mentions Warren Beatty, someone says that he used to go out with Madonna too, and have you seen "In Bed With..."

  8. KarMann
    Coffee/keyboard

    "No thinking is required, it's just plagiarism. Another of the Hollywood Protocols."
    That's the one that got me. -->

    1. FeRDNYC

      And now thanks to generative AI, you don't even have to do your own plagiarizing!

      1. bemusedHorseman
        Joke

        Excuse you, "plagiarism" is such a dirty word. Around here, we prefer to call it...

        DIGITAL HALLUCINATIONS!

        (...yeesh, alternating-caps-and-italic is much easier to write in markdown instead of html...)

        1. Paul Herber Silver badge

          "alternating-caps-and-italic"

          Ooooo, isn't he bold!

        2. Hazmoid

          Plaigiarism is so 20th century. Now it is called a "Creative re-imagining of a classic"

      2. Mike007 Silver badge

        Oh dear god. The BOFH archive seems like a pretty decent dataset to experiment with.

        This is legitimately a good idea for learning about training custom models. I guess I know what my next "AI experiment" is going to be at work...

  9. cdilla
    Thumb Up

    brilliant

    absolutely brilliant.

  10. GioCiampa

    To paraphrase somewhat...

    It's Hollywood Protocols all the way down...

  11. Bebu sa Ware
    Pint

    The auditors could have been Thomas, Richard and Henry...

    and the boss still wouldn't have twigged. Still a fail since he hadn't verified the authenticity of the audit or the credentials of the auditors.

    "A deep dumpster-dive into the authenticity of reality,"

    A revelation! Simon obviously really into the epistemology and phenomenolgy of Quantum Mechanics ... or is a really talented bullshit artist (if there's a difference.)

  12. Inventor of the Marmite Laser Silver badge

    Stitched up like a kipper

  13. mrksmths

    Hollywood Terminal

    https://github.com/dustinkirkland/hollywood

  14. Charlie Clark Silver badge
    Gimp

    Reminds me a bit of the end of Toy Soldiers

    …only I'd have had them signing off the contract for reequipping the Situation Room at the White House. Complete with rubber mattress, of course!

    1. M.V. Lipvig Silver badge
      Gimp

      Re: Reminds me a bit of the end of Toy Soldiers

      Ah, yes, the Kennedy years. Icon because he was a dirty little boy before the, ahem, incident.

  15. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
    Coffee/keyboard

    You

    basts.

    Ruining a perfectly good keyboard.

    Theres me... after enduring fixing a broken gripper on a robot at 8am AND the dreaded weekly meeting at 9am (thank gawd the beancounter is still ill.. something to do with food poisoning I'm led to believe, but the PFY is'nt saying what she did) and time for a relaxing break at 10am with a full mug of coffee and read of el-reg and my prayer of 'let there be a BOFH episode this week" was duely answered.

    I had to go make a new mug of coffee afterwards (and steal the keyboard off our production engineers desk)

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: You

      Come off it, Boris. You know better than to talk or read BOFH with your moth full. Unless you need a new keyboard.

      1. Boris the Cockroach Silver badge
        Happy

        Re: You

        I keep my moth hungry at all times... also the light on so it doesn't fly off.

        And yes, the new keyboard was needed... but thats another story

  16. Sam not the Viking Silver badge
    Pint

    Movies and Shakers

    'Ealing Comedies' is our in-house reference to management investigations. We're safe since discovering the 'Brian Rix' files: Think trousers around ankles etc.... Our 'Pinewood Protocol' is actually the Roger Moore raised eyebrow. No expense will be spared --->

  17. Trubbs
    Thumb Up

    Top notch

    Excellent, well done sir

    On all levels...

  18. may_i Silver badge

    I don't know how Simon manages

    but year after year, the BOFH continues to ensure that I always have the most modern keyboard!

    1. PitBullCH

      Re: I don't know how Simon manages

      Question has to be asked: does Simon have shares in one or more keyboard companies ?

  19. tezboyes

    Sorry, but at this point I realised that the BOFH has truly jumped the shark

    "trumps just running us down at the road crossing between the pub and the kebab shop any Friday night."

    as nothing is better than that.

  20. The Dogs Meevonks Silver badge
    Happy

    Ya got me

    I should have seen it coming... I really should have...

    But you got me good with the ending.

    So I have to applaud you for that... but I also have to say... well... fuck you.... you glorious bastard.

  21. TRT Silver badge

    What a pay off!

    Genius.

  22. IceC0ld

    OH FFS, right till the very end, and even then it took a minute

    absolutely brilliant

  23. My other car WAS an IAV Stryker

    For we ole "User Friendly" fans

    Reminds me of Miranda's "MovieOS":

    - Password = password

    - 20-column screen; easy enough to read on camera.

    - Excellent security until you type "override".

    (Probably can also play a mean game of Global Thermonuclear War.)

  24. Joel 1

    Hollywood protocol

    Isn't the Hollywood protocol the one when the final transaction is sealed with a Hollywood handshake?

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