Editing 202: YouTube

{{comic
| number    = 202
| date      = December 27, 2006
| title     = YouTube
| image     = youtube.png
| titletext = I pray GunPistolMan never learns the word 'sheeple'.
}}

==Explanation==

This comic is pointing out the fact that many of the comments on {{rw|YouTube}} videos are insipid and poorly informed, being pointless arguments over some minor topic or factually incorrect position ({{rw|conspiracy}}). At the time of this comic, YouTube was fairly new, and the comic's observation about the inanity of YouTube comments was novel. Since then, this observation has become a widely accepted truism about the Internet. In this case, the {{rw|Moon_landing_hoax|Moon landing hoaxers}} are at the receiving end of [[Randall]]'s pen.

* The comment by ''Rocckir'' just states that the video is obviously fake, with no evidence or explanation.

* The comment by ''BigMike133'' confuses the {{w|Space Shuttle}} (which was never capable of landing on the Moon) with the {{w|Apollo Lunar Module}}.

* The comment from ''GunPistolMan'' claims that the video is fake due to the mistaken belief that the Moon would have no {{w|Gravity|gravity}}, whereas in reality, every object in the universe that has mass has gravity, including the Moon, {{w|Comet|comets}}, {{w|Asteroid|asteroids}}, {{w|Natural satellite|moons of other planets}}, even yourself, and so on. The gravity of the Moon is approximately 1/6 the gravity of {{w|Earth}}.

* The comment by ''CrackMonkey74'' names {{w|Louis Armstrong}}, a famous jazz musician, who may have [http://lyrics.wikia.com/Louis_Armstrong:Moon_Song waxed] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5x8HnyIYHE lyrical] about the moon, but never went there. The ill-informed commenter actually means {{w|Neil Armstrong}}, who was the first person to walk on the Moon. The dare to accuse Armstrong to his face may be a reference to an incident where moon-hoax conspiracy theorist {{w|Bart Sibrel}} confronted {{w|Buzz Aldrin}} and called him "a coward, and a liar, and a thief." Aldrin responded by punching Sibrel; Sibrel's attempt to bring charges was dismissed on the grounds that he had provoked Aldrin to the point where the punch was a justified response.

* The user ''SimplePlan2009'' is likely mocking the other commenters. While the conspiracy theorists frequently claim the Apollo footage was shot on a "{{w|Sound stage|soundstage}}", the poster takes the ludicrous position that the Moon shot was faked by actors filming the scene on {{w|Mars}}, a planet that at its closest approach to Earth is over a hundred times farther away than the Moon. Landing humans on Mars (much less landing enough people and equipment to set up a soundstage) is a feat that has still not been accomplished, and if it had been possible during the Apollo era, the landing on the Moon would have been a trivial task in comparison. In other words, why go through all the trouble of faking it, if doing it for real would have been no trouble at all?

The reputation of YouTube comment threads as cesspools of abject stupidity and blatant trolling is revisited in [[301: Limerick]] and [[481: Listen to Yourself]]. 

The username CrackMonkey74 appears again in [[406: Venting]] and [[574: Swine Flu]].

The title text is the first reference to {{rw|Sheeple}}, which [[:Category:Sheeple|appeared a few more times]] in xkcd comics.

==Transcript==
:[Caption above the panel:]
:The Internet has always had loud dumb people, but I've never seen anything quite as bad as the people who comment on YouTube videos.
:[Below shows a still of a 44-second video of Moon landing. An astronaut is seen at the center of the still with an Apollo lunar lander at the background.]
:[Below the video shows a list of comments, top to bottom:]
:Comments & Responses
:[The name of the commenters and the time when the comment was posted is shown above each comment in a gray background.]
:rocckir (48 minutes ago)
:this is so obviously faked its unbilevable, why r people so gullible??? morons
:([u]reply[/u]) ([u]mark as spam[/u])
:bigmike133 (35 minutes ago)
:ive seen the space shuttle ass hole it definetly landed on the moon do some research...
:([u]reply[/u]) ([u]mark as spam[/u])
:GunPistolMan (22 minutes ago)
:if it was real why is their gravity? americans r fucken sheep
:([u]reply[/u]) ([u]mark as spam[/u])
:crackmonkey74 (17 minutes ago)
:u dont think we went to the moon why not tell louis armstrong to his face
:([u]reply[/u]) ([u]mark as spam[/u])
:simpleplan2009 (5 minutes ago)
:it was a soundstage on mars
:([u]reply[/u]) ([u]mark as spam[/u])

==Trivia==
In July 2009, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vml7pZJujF0 a restored video] showing Neil Armstrong's first moonwalk was uploaded to YouTube. User Michael Huang copied to that video's comments section all the sentences in this comic. Then, after some other users took some of his comments seriously, he later added another comment stating, "This entire comment chain is from the famous webcomic, xkcd." The comments are copied verbatim, including typos and grammar errors. The only mistake is in the first comment: Michael Huang included only one question mark when the comic has three of them.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:YouTube]]
[[Category:Sheeple]]