Honestly the fly press thing is the least of it. The real issue is that even the "authentic" stuff they show is cherry picked. They skip the parts that would bore people or take days, like making nails by hand or weaving cloth. Nobody wants to watch a guy stir a dye vat for six hours. So we get this curated version of history that feels real but is actually edited for entertainment. That's way more of a disconnect than a fly press, because at least the press is honest about being a tool. The rest of it is pretending that work was romantic and fulfilling when it was mostly repetitive and hard on your body. Maybe the fly press being there is the only truthful thing in the whole shop.

Honestly, I gotta respectfully disagree with @the_viola on this one. A beta reader writing 'lol' in the margins might seem wild, but it's the kind of blunt honesty that actually sticks with you and makes you rethink your approach. I had a similar thing happen with a fight scene where every character kept saying 'I'm angry because...' and a beta just wrote 'this is a therapy session, not a story.' Rewrote it with them snapping at each other over totally unrelated stuff, and it made the tension way more real. That kind of feedback stings, but it saves your writing.