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January 20, 2011 11:30 AM

In this season of The Office, Darryl has a framed (blue and white?) sign on his office's wall reading "Nobody Talks, Everybody Walks." I'd like to cobble together a reproduction of that sign for my office but can't seem to find an image/screenshot of the sign via Google or otherwise. A long shot, but does anyone have a copy of a screenshot of the sign (or an image of the sign itself)?
posted by seventyfour to Grab Bag (17 answers total)

Do you remember what episode? or at least details from it?
The last 5 episodes are on hulu so that would be a way for you to grab a screenshot.
posted by special-k at 11:37 AM on January 20, 2011

Response by poster: Looks like it aired around March 19, 2010, which isn't on Hulu. I guess that I'm hoping that out of the mass of Ask Metafilter folks, someone else liked it and captured it. I'm surprised there's no google images result at all, I thought it was pretty darn cool.
posted by seventyfour at 11:45 AM on January 20, 2011

Here's a partial.
posted by iconomy at 11:50 AM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

Season 6 is available streaming on Netflix; Episode 20, New Leads, is the one that aired on March 18, 2010.
posted by rhapsodie at 11:55 AM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Here's a screencap via Netflix (thanks rhapsodie). If a closer one exists later in the episode, I'll post it too.
posted by lhall at 12:05 PM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: Thanks so much for your efforts, lhall and all. They're much appreciated by this Netflix-less fellow. Ihall's screen cap is big enough to get a good view (and if you find a bigger picture, I'd be thrilled).

Now I just have to figure out how to best reproduce the sign, which looks to be about 5" x 11". (I'm thinking about cheating and asking a graphic design friend to help). Thanks again!
posted by seventyfour at 12:21 PM on January 20, 2011

If you view lhall's link at full size (1,440px × 900px) you get a view that probably isn't good enough to reproduce, but easily good enough to find the right font and color to make a clone.
posted by exphysicist345 at 1:11 PM on January 20, 2011

There weren't any closer views of the sign in that episode, just corners of it. I'm willing to check other eps if you can identify ones that take place in his office!

Also, agreed that it will definitely be easier to recreate it in Illustrator by grabbing the color out of the screencap and finding the font, etc.
posted by lhall at 1:20 PM on January 20, 2011

What is the meaning of this sign? "Everybody shut up and work?"
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:35 PM on January 20, 2011

Oh, wait. "If no one cooperates with the police, we will all be released."
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:36 PM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

nobody talks, everybody walks = don't snitch. that's the only way I've ever heard that expression.

wow, I want to needlepoint that sign now.
posted by circle_b at 1:37 PM on January 20, 2011 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I had the time (and a need to procrastinate). Here's a quick mockup of your sign.

232kb PDF

It's vector, and will scale to your specifications. It's not exact, but more than servicable. (Typophiles will recognize that Akzidenz is standing in for whatever the original typeface was. Not exact, but close enough, I think.)

Grab it now, if you'd like it. No promises that it'll stay on that webspace for long, but I'll leave it for a week. Mirror/distribute/save to your heart's content
posted by jjjjjjjijjjjjjj at 1:44 PM on January 20, 2011 [7 favorites]

(And I've seen the sign many times before in various jobs I've had. It's meaning has always been "Don't talk while you're working, and our work will be done faster, and you will go home on time". If I'm right about who Darryl is, he's the guy who worked in the warehouse and then moved to the executive side, yes? I see it as him bringing along with him a commonsense credo from when he managed blue-collar folks that's made laughably poignant by the amount of empty talk and bullshitting that goes on in the executive side of things.)
posted by jjjjjjjijjjjjjj at 1:47 PM on January 20, 2011

Response by poster: Wow! That was really nice of you. I'd bet I'm not the only person who's wanted this sign, too. (Maybe Circle_b can make a needlepoint pattern out of the pdf....)
posted by seventyfour at 2:00 PM on January 20, 2011

yeah, the phrase basically means don't snitch... used in many cities... i've seen other posters of this phrase in Baltimore... not necessarily great for cops/law enforcement...
posted by fozzie33 at 4:13 AM on January 21, 2011

Best answer:

> (Maybe Circle_b can make a needlepoint pattern out of the pdf....)

Here's a needlepoint pattern courtesy of an online generator named Pic2Point.com. Never used them (never needlepointed), but the pattern idiom itself looks all kinds of cool.

150kb PDF

(same rules apply. Grab it while you can.)
posted by jjjjjjjijjjjjjj at 9:27 AM on January 21, 2011 [1 favorite]

The only way this thread can get better is if someone gets a tattoo.
posted by lhall at 12:02 PM on January 21, 2011 [1 favorite]