Hope is Stronger Than Plugophobia

A plug should only go one way, and it should be obvious what that way is, even if you are nearly blind, trapped in a cave with no light, and the earwigs took a wrong turn and ate your eyeballs.

And yes, by this definition, most plugs fail. Headphone plugs don't. You can plug those in anywhere, under any conditions save those requiring gloves so thick you can't really feel anything or use your fingers' fine motor control. But lots of others fail, including AC power plugs. If you try to plug those in under adverse conditions, you could easily become a short circuit across the exposed prongs. Or worse, from the hot prong through your body to the rock you sat on.

But apart from safety considerations, some of the worst around are, in the words of Randy Kirchhof, "USB plugs. Specifically engineered to make sure that you try to put them in the wrong way, on the first time, every time." I had to disagree, because I'm pretty sure I get it right at first at least 1% of the time. Then again, they may do that just to get my hopes up so they can mock me more.