The 50 Worst Inventions

From the zany to the dangerous to the just plain dumb, here is TIME's list (in no particular order) of some of the world's bright ideas that just didn't work out

Smile Checks

Worst Inventions

Tim Tadder / Corbis

Be happy, or else. In 2009, employees of Japan's Keihin Electric Express Railway started facing morning smile checks, in which they were subjected to software that analyzed their facial expression to produce a rating of their smile on a scale of zero to 100. Not dumb enough? They also had to carry around images of their "ideal smile," as something to aspire to throughout the course of the day. :(

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