Kinko’s is like the bane of my academic existence. I have a professor who requires us to print presentation outlines and images onto overhead clear sheets, so naturally the place I would go is Kinko’s. Despite the company’s dominance in the corporate world of xerography, Kinko’s is a horrible place to get things printed. I have gone to Kinko’s three times and all three times I ended up leaving in discontent. On my first visit, the clerk refused to print a required outline from the class onto a clear sheet because the outline was copyrighted by my professor. Despite this, I optimistically pulled out my class syllabus and showed the clerk the exact sentence where the professor instructs us to get his outline printed for the presentation. The clerk still refused. On my second visit, the clerk who helped me acted like I’m making his life miserable. How dare I make him work? Especially since he was relaxing and enjoying his coffee. The clerk greeted me with a, «yeah?» rather than a hello. He also never said«thank you.» It felt like he was telling me with his mannerisms to «F*** off.» On my third visit, I encountered yet another copyright problem. I had some images I pulled from Flickr that needed printing. I have been told by graphic designers that images on Flickr that looks like they’ve been taken by personal cameras do not have any copyright affiliation and should be fair game. Well, this didn’t matter to Kinko’s. They didn’t want to take any chances. How does this company stay in business? Perhaps it is a «Wal-Mart-like effect.» Being a corporate giant, Kinko’s runs smaller printing companies out of town. Now we’re all stuck with this miserable company. I truly believe Kinko’s is ran and employed by sadists.