The Cloud
by Jeff
Image text: There's planned downtime every night when we turn on the Roomba and it runs over the cord.
This comic is a reference to all of the companies that are rolling out "cloud" services like Google's and Amazon's music service and Apple's aptly named iCloud music service that will be announced this week.
Also, in this comic is a reference to caching and a Roomba. Caching is the way that remote sites would locally store data from the "The Cloud" to prevent from putting too much pressure on Black Hat's non-Enterprise class cable modem. The Roomba is a round vacuum that runs automatically around the house. The Roomba begins to learn the dimensions of rooms, however, apparently it has never learned not to run over the cord.
This comic makes me think of the British sitcom "The IT Crowd" in which they showcase a box that they make the rest of their non-Tech coworkers believe is "The Internet".
Guest Week: Jeffrey Rowland (Overcompensating)
by Jeff
Image text: Guest comic by Jeffrey Rowland of Overcompensating/Wigu. Jeffrey is famous as the picture on the Wikipedia article on 'Necrosis'.
Here's the link to Overcompensating. And here's the link to Necrosis wikipedia entry. I'm not putting that image up here, blech.
Pumpkin Carving
by Jeff
Image text: The Banach-Tarski theorem was actually first developed by King Solomon, but his gruesome attempts to apply it set back set theory for centuries.
This comic is a reference to the American custom of carving pumpkins to set out on porches and front steps for the American holiday of Halloween, which occurs on October the 31st. The pumpkins has the inside emptied out and a face or design carved in the side. Then a light in placed inside (usually a candle). These are called "Jack-O'-Lanterns". The Jack-O' -Lantern in the 3rd frame is the typical and standard design for a carved pumpkin.
On to the comic. In the 2nd frame, Black Hat is putting Nitroglycerin (an explosive) into his carved pumpkin in the hopes that someone will attempt to smash it and it will explode. Black Hat references chest pains because Nitroglycerin is used to open blood vessels to quickly improve blood flow when someone has chest pains.
In the 3rd frame, Cutie is our typical emotional xkcd comic. She is projecting herself onto the jack-o'-lantern as she tries to distract herself with holiday traditions that won't work to distract her.
In the 4th frame, the Banach-Tarski theorem referenced in the image text says that if you carve up a 3-dimensional ball, in this case a pumpkin, to a finite number of pieces, you can then reassemble the pieces into two different balls - identical to the original. The Banach-Tarski theorem is also called a paradox for obvious reasons. The person off-screen in that frame references the Axiom of Choice which is a mathematical axiom that says that given an infinite set of buckets or bins (each that contain more than one object) - it is possible to select only one object from each bucket. I'm not sure how it relates to the comic, but something to do with how Cueball chose to go with the Banach-Tarski paradox for the way he was going to carve his pumpkin. Anyone else have an idea?
I am not certain with the King Soloman reference means in the image text. Any biblical scholars out there want to have a go at it?
Golden Hammer
by Jeff
Image text: Took me five tries to find the right one, but I managed to salvage our night out--if not the boat--in the end.
This comic is a reference to the "Law of the Instrument" also known as the "Golden Hammer". The key is in the comic title, which is a move that is seen from xkcd, but only rarely. In either case, the law of the instrument is the over-reliance on a particular tool. In Information Technology and Computer Science it is known as, "a familiar technology or concept applied obsessively to many software problems". And in this comic, both Black Hat and Cueball are commenting on over-reliance on a certain tool, concept or technology. In Cueball's case, he is ranting about the use of Java (JVM stands for Java Virtual Machine) by this particular application or website. For Black Hat, he is the person using the "Golden Hammer", which for him is a bottle of vodka and bolt cutters.
Abraham Maslow said in Psychology of Science that "if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail" and Black Hat is using a varation of that quote in frame 3.
Also, I'm not sure what exactly Cueball is tinkering with in his hand in frame 2. (Or why his head is half-way down his arm.)
Password Reuse
by Jeff
Image text: It'll be hilarious the first few times this happens.
Our old friend, Black Hat first mentions password entropy which is password strength as Cueball is trying to set up or change a password on his computer and it tells him that the password is too short. Password entropy is the "strength" of the password which makes it more difficult to break the password using a brute force attack. Uppercase letters, numbers and symbols help make brute force attacks much more difficult.
Open Mic Night
by Jeff
Image text: Ever notice how the more successful observational comics become, the more their jokes focus on flying and hotels?
Alright, open mic night. Everyone's favorite night.
In the first frame Cutie/MC Aphasia is not a very good rapper because Aphasia is a disorder that effects the part of the brain that controls the ability of speech. So, as you can see in the comic, MC Aphasia has a very difficult time speaking let alone rapping.
In the second frame, Black Hat is reacting to a Yo Momma joke that someone in the audience possibly yelled his way and starts off a common "Yo Momma" joke - "When yo momma sits around the house, she really sits AROUND the house." But instead he goes in another direction to something that is a bit more off the beaten path.
In the third frame Cueball/MC Quine is a computer science joke. A Quine is a program that produces its source code as its output. In other words, what MC Quine puts into the rap is exactly what he gets out of it. Hence the repetition of the same line. In this case, the source code of the rap is "Yo, I'm MC Quine and I'm here to say,".
And completing the xkcd trifecta is the last comic, is a Lord of the Rings joke. I'll call him "Beret" and is riffing off a common observational comic routine in which the comic observes that men go to the bathroom alone and women go in groups.
The image text is a reference to how when comedians become more famous, they travel more to other cities to do their comedy. In the case of observational comics, the more they travel, the more they have time to observe both hotels and flying and nothing else.
Anxiety
by Jeff
Image text: Don't need any thanks. I have a backscattering fetish.
This comic is of a security line in an airport, which I got all too familiar with during my recent trip. However, this is not the airport security line you are traditionally familiar with because everyone is waiting for one of the new Backscatter x-ray machines (which is what it says in tiny print on the scanner in the comic). These machines do more than merely beep when enough of a metal object pass through them. They take "pictures" of the person inside them to see if they have any prohibited material on their person.
That is all well and good, however the x-ray machines ignore clothes and produce an outline of the person's nude body for the security personnel to analyze. Because this outline bares a lot for the picture, some men would find it beneficial to take some Viagra to increase the bulk of the area around their crotchal regions. I'm quite sure "crotchal" is not a word, but I like to use it anyway. If you are not sure what I mean, you either haven't seen a single commercial for Viagra, Cialis or any variant drugs. If you still do not understand, come back when you are older.
The image text is what the last person in line says to the Black Hat character when he sees the Viagra for sale sign. He does not need the Viagra to achieve tumescence to impress the security personnel and increase his own self confidence because he is aroused by the backscattering itself.
Backscattering is the the reflection of waves, particles or signals back to where they came from.
The security person in this comic is thinking "Oh God". There is several possible reasons for this. 1 - He could be seeing the image in the screen of the Viagra-enhanced outline of the man in the scanner. 2 - He could have noticed the Black Hat selling Viagra, check the long line of men and then back at the image and think about how long his 8 hour shift seems now.
However, for comedic effect, the comic is different than in reality because in actual airports, the person analyzing the image is in a completely separate room and cannot see the actual people going through the line. The people attending to the line only look at an LCD screen and wait for the technicians in the other room to declare the person clean.
All in all, it is a very disarming situation as they make you hold your hands over or behind your head for the scan.
Green Flash
by Jeff
Image text: The exact cause of the phenomenon is unknown, but it's thought to be linked to atmospheric refraction and you getting a really cool car.
The green flash is an atmospheric optical phenomena in which a small green spot will appear above or around the sun as it sets below the horizon. The green flash occurs because of refraction of different colors of light. Green light is higher frequency than red and orange light and so green light stays visible after the red and orange lights are blocked by the Earth. Wikipedia has a great gallery of examples of the green flash. Personally, I have been looking for the green flash my whole life and have never seen it. The name is slightly a misnomer as it is not really a flash at all, but stays for a few minutes.
The Tesla roadster is a new car from the Tesla Motors. All of the Tesla Motors cars run entirely on electricity. Check out the car here, as it is a pretty sweet little sports car. No wonder the Black Hat Character wants to smash the other character over the head with the bottle he is holding to steal the car.
Toot
by Jeff
Image text: This is also one of only five identified situations in which a vuvuzela is actually appropriate.
For our international readers, "Toot my own horn" is an expression (possibly only used in America) that means to brag about ones self.
Vuvuzela is a noise maker that is native to South Africa and is featured heavily in any World Cup game. Many vuvuzelas blown (played?) at the same time make a noise similar to that of a thousand bees.
Tensile vs. Shear Strength
by Jeff
Image text: Although really, the damage was done when the party planners took the hole punch to the elevator ribbon to hang up the sign.
The Space Elevator is an idea about how to quickly move ships, people and supplies into orbit without the
The Tower of Babel was an ancient building built so that it would be a testament to man's ability and would go so high, it would have its top among the heavens. This is why the comic is referencing a "modern Babel" because the space elevator would have its top among the stars.
Tensile Strength is the maximum load that a material can support without fracture when being stretched.
Shear strength is the maximum shear stress which a material can withstand without rupture. The comic is making a pun on this because the Black Hat character is using "shears" or scissors to cut the elevator ribbon.
This comic is also referencing how at a Grand Opening, there is a "ribbon cutting ceremony". In the comic, there is a "ribbon cutting ceremony", however, the ribbon that is cut is not the ceremonial ribbon, but the space elevator ribbon.