explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2546: Fiction vs Nonfiction

2021-11-29T08:05:34Z

108.162.249.63: Original Star Wars was a 1976 book before the 1977 film.

Doris Kearns Goodwin also mentioned in https://xkcd.com/2160/ [[Special:Contributions/172.70.174.35|172.70.174.35]] 05:51, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Why "Boba Fett's Gadgets and How He Got Them" is not described? It is clearly a mix of sort-of-facts - description of Fett's gadgets and how artists designed them, and fiction stories of how he got them.{{unsigned}}
: well, it could also be a list of what the gadgets are in-universe and the stories of how he got them, which is non-fiction in the star wars universe but fiction in real life. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.34.91|172.70.34.91]] 16:47, 25 November 2021 (UTC)Bumpf

(Edit comment) "Bobba Fett's armor is definitely Beskar, as shown in the Mandalorian season 2. However, there are conflicting official star wars publications that mention his armor being durasteel. The commonly accepted solution is that it is an alloy of both."... Or a composite laminate/overlay. Like Stormtrooper armor has a layer of Explodium on the inside, hence how Rebel gunshots are so incapacitating to them. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.155|172.70.85.155]] 09:25, 25 November 2021 (UTC)
*Nope, they're made of "implodium" otherwise someone else might get hurt. [[User:SDSpivey|SDSpivey]] ([[User talk:SDSpivey|talk]]) 16:02, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Could we call it Meta fiction or Meta nonfiction? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.178.161|172.70.178.161]]

What's the context here—a library? And has anybody asked Doris Kearns Goodwin whether she has such a work in some stage of preparation? [[User:Yngvadottir|Yngvadottir]] ([[User talk:Yngvadottir|talk]]) 22:28, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

"Fictional" is very hard word to use. Consider the phrase "fictional character". Character means a person in a novel, play, film etc. If the novel is fiction, the person is also fictional ... but it is fictional character? What's fictional on it being a character (fact) in real (fact) book? Or another example: Red Book of Westmarch. This is real book in fictional universe. Is it fictional book? But wait, its content is basically same as Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, real books in real universe. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 23:33, 25 November 2021 (UTC)
:Hadn't read this before making ''my'' edit in one spot, of using "Fictitious". Maybe that helps, maybe it doesn't. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.29|162.158.159.29]] 03:15, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

:Also, in a fictional story featuring a version of a real person, is the person in that story real or fictional? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.43|162.158.159.43]] 17:52, 26 November 2021 (UTC)

:The Explain XKCD commentary refers to "the original Star Wars" of 1977 vintage, however the first released Star Wars media item was a book, in 1976. The film came later. From Wikipedia, Star Wars page: "The novelization of the film was published as Star Wars: From the Adventures of Luke Skywalker in December 1976, six months before the film was released. The credited author was George Lucas, but the book was revealed to have been ghostwritten by Alan Dean Foster. Marketing director Charles Lippincott secured the deal with Del Rey Books to publish the novelization in November 1976. By February 1977, a half million copies had been sold.[7]" So technically the "original Star Wars" is 1976 and was not a film. Reference to 1977 original should state "original film".

1400: D.B. Cooper

2021-11-23T00:44:43Z

108.162.249.63: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1400
| date = July 28, 2014
| title = D.B. Cooper
| image = d_b_cooper.png
| titletext = 'Why on Earth would someone commit air piracy just to finance a terrible movie decades later?' 'People are very strange these days.'
}}

==Explanation==
[[File:DBCooper.jpg|thumb|150px|Cooper]]
In 1971, a man referred to by the media as {{w|D. B. Cooper}} hijacked a Boeing 727 and escaped with $200,000 in ransom money (equivalent to $900,000 in 2003 or $1,250,000 in 2020). While the FBI maintains that Cooper was most likely killed when he parachuted from the plane, they have never determined his identity, and the investigation was called off in 2016, making it the United States' only unsolved plane hijacking. (This mystery was later referenced in [[1501: Mysteries]], and then again in [[2452: Aviation Firsts]].)

[[File:Tommy Wiseau.jpg|thumb|150px|Wiseau]]
In 2003, {{w|Tommy Wiseau}} released {{w|The Room (film)|''The Room''}}, which is considered by many to be the worst film ever made, but has also earned a sizable number of fans who uphold it as a prime example of a film that is "{{w|so bad, it's good}}". In the decade since, Wiseau has become something of an icon alongside his infamous movie, of which he was the producer, writer, director, and main star. Surprisingly little, however, is known about him. The comic refers to "The Room" as "...the '{{w|Citizen Kane}}' of bad movies." This is a comparison between what is widely considered the best film of all time, which was, coincidentally the first film produced by, written by, directed by, and starring Orson Welles and what is widely considered the worst film of all time, the first film produced by, written by, directed by, and starring Tommy Wiseau.

This comic points to similarities between several details of Cooper and Wiseau's stories:

{| class="wikitable"
|-
!Cooper
!Wiseau
|-
|"Vanished mysteriously with a large amount of money":Cooper escaped with $200,000 in 1971 dollars, equivalent to around $1.3M today. $5,800 of that money was recovered in 1980 in the vicinity of where Cooper jumped from the plane, but the rest was never found. Assuming Cooper survived, he would have had decades to turn the $200k into an even larger fortune.
|"Appeared mysteriously with a large amount of money":''The Room'' cost $6 million to make, and initially grossed a mere $1,900—a loss of 99.97% of the investment. It is generally assumed that all or most of that money was Wiseau's own, which raises the question of how he obtained such wealth. Although Wiseau claims to have earned his money by selling toys to tourists, and later factory-reject jeans, his ''Room'' co-star {{w|Greg Sestero}} considers it very unlikely that he earned so many millions this way.
|-
|"Real age/name unknown":Cooper's real name remains unknown. While he was estimated to be in his mid-40s, his precise age is also unknown.
|"Colleague says he's much older than he claims":In 2010, Wiseau stated that he was 41. Sestero, however, says he was born in the 1950s.
|-
|"Ambiguous, possibly affected speaking style ('negotiable American currency')":Cooper's use of this unusual phrase has led to speculation about his origins, including as to whether he was perhaps not an American.
|"Ambiguous, possibly affected speaking style ('You are tearing me apart, Lisa!')":The most famously melodramatic line from ''The Room'', [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Plz-bhcHryc "You are tearing me apart, Lisa!"] is one of several which highlights Wiseau's unusual accent and less-than-complete command of the English language. As with Cooper's "negotiable American currency," it is phrased in a way not typical of American English.The phrase "You're tearing me apart!" originally appeared in ''{{w|Rebel Without a Cause}}'', though it appeared in a more appropriate context. Wiseau simply wanted to include the phrase because he adored James Dean, without considering how the phrase ended up feeling in his movie.
|-
|"Fate unknown":Cooper has not been seen since he jumped from the plane, though the FBI has investigated over a thousand "serious suspects." He either died trying to jump from the plane, or disappeared completely after touching down.
|"Background unknown":Despite Wiseau being a public figure for over a decade since the release of ''The Room'', little is definitively known about his background. Sestero says Wiseau was born somewhere in Eastern Europe - people who have traced his family tree found his family are likely from {{w|Poznań}}, central Poland. Wiseau has said he has moved back and forth between Europe and the U.S. throughout his life, spending significant time in France and Louisiana. His accent is hard to place.His legal name, place of birth, date of birth, and nationality are all unknown, as are most of the details of how he's spent his life.
|-
|}

The comic then compares an FBI sketch of Cooper with a photograph of Wiseau, apparently to claim that they have similar appearances. The only real similarity is that they're both wearing sunglasses.

However, these are only a few cherry-picked aspects of their lives, and do not seriously suggest that they are the same person. For example, even if we assume that Wiseau was born in 1950, and that Cooper was only 35 (probably the youngest age which can be mistaken for mid-40s) in 1971, that leaves a 14-year gap between their ages. Likewise, Cooper was said to have either an American or Canadian accent, while Wiseau's bizarre accent is certainly not North American. While [[Cueball]]'s theory in this comic is clearly a joke on [[Randall]]'s part, given Randall's [[258: Conspiracy Theories|known]] [[690: Semicontrolled Demolition|distaste]] [[966: Jet Fuel|for]] conspiracy theories, this may also be making fun of people who base theories off of minor details while ignoring contradictory ones and bigger-picture questions. The question in the title text, for instance, notes that Cooper would have gone through a huge amount of effort just to produce a movie; a similar rhetorical device is often used against convoluted conspiracy theories, where one points out a vastly simpler way for the supposed conspirators to have accomplished their goals.

The title text goes on to attribute such a weird motive for hijacking to the impression that "people are very strange these days," which is another quote from ''The Room''.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is using a baton to point towards a projector.]
:D.B. Cooper
:("Dan Cooper")

:Hijacked a plane in the 1970s.
:On landing, demanded money and
:parachutes. Jumped from plane
:mid-flight and was never found.

:*Vanished mysteriously with large amount of money
:*Real age/name unknown
:*Ambiguous, possibly affected speaking style ("negotiable American currency")
:*Fate unknown

:[Cueball has his palm out.]
:Tommy Wiseau
:("Johnny")

:Wrote, directed, and starred in
:''The Room'', a film widely hailed as
:"The ''Citizen Kane'' of bad movies."

:*Appeared mysteriously with large amount of money
:*Colleague says he's much older than he claims.
:*Ambiguous, possibly affected speaking style ("You are tearing me apart, Lisa!")
:*Background unknown

:[Two images captioned "Cooper (FBI sketch)" and "Wiseau (Flickr photo by Al Pavangkanan)".]

:Offscreen voice: This is the dumbest theory I've ever heard.
:Cueball: But it explains ''everything!!''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring D. B. Cooper]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Conspiracy theory]]

Talk:2543: Never Told Anyone

2021-11-18T03:13:11Z

108.162.249.63:

Possible alternative explanation: It's a quick one-time two-factor authentication code that is generated with an app like google auth, or sent by sms, and is only valid for a minute or too. A password would still be needed,and therefore it would be almost completely useless.
[[User:Billsmithsmithbill22|Billsmithsmithbill22]] ([[User talk:Billsmithsmithbill22|talk]]) 02:16, 18 November 2021 (UTC) Bill Smith
:That's how I interpreted it, too. Password recovery links are usually very long strings, not just 6 digits. The joke is that the email or SMS with the 2FA code usually warns not to disclose the code, even though it can't be reused. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 02:43, 18 November 2021 (UTC)

263827 is prime, is that worthy of a mention?

Talk:2536: Wirecutter

2021-11-05T00:22:09Z

108.162.249.63: Add note about inherent vs chosen nature of religion

Note: they don't say they tried out a large number of ''religions'' but a large number of '''belief systems'''. This could include things like "Libertarianism" or "Monarchists". (By CWALLENPOOLE, but not signed in.)
:But the picture of the article title says “The Best Religion” [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.233|108.162.216.233]] 20:31, 1 November 2021 (UTC)

The phrase "highly controversial" should not be used in the explanation. For the record, I am opposed to the things listed in that sentence and my objection is not based in a desire to defend them. Religion itself might be said to be "highly controversial" so the use in the last sentence is both superfluous and biased. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.82.53|172.70.82.53]] 00:34, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

I really want this article to be real. ----Dave
: Me too. I did something similar in my early 20s, and feel such an article honestly done would be a great help to many. In fact, the current description is slightly inaccurate- in that even lifelong practitioners, do usually have a wandering time in early adulthood if not given direction. Such an article would give some direction.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 15:03, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

The major problem with trying multiple religions is that to fully test a religion you need to die - and most people only die once, with the ability to die multiple times being exclusive feature of small number of religions. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 04:49, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
:I ain't mad Hkmaly, but the idea that a religion's primary purpose is to promote a vision of the afterlife is alien to a lot of religions (including my own flavor of Judaism), whose policy on the hereafter is "afterlife, shmafterlife, pass the bagels." Hence also my edits toning down the "religions are about provable belief claims" rhetoric (eyeroll). ----Ben
::Reviewers rarely fully test tech items. (e.g. they often don't cover complete lifecycle costs - what happens to the device after it dies, how easy is it to move on to a new one, etc.) Don't have to test everything to have a meaningful review.
::Many religions make claims about impacts in this life. (e.g., intercessory prayer) Such claims are eminently testable. A comparative review would be interesting. I am only aware of a few such tests, mostly comparing a single product to general average or to no intervention {{w|Efficacy of prayer}}. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.167|108.162.245.167]] 19:18, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

It doesn't look like the search bar text says "search," but I can't make out what it actually says.--[[User:KrazyKat|KrazyKat]] ([[User talk:KrazyKat|talk]]) 06:33, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
:Maybe it says Seance, since for "seach" the high stoke from the H is missing. -- [[Special:Contributions/162.158.203.10|162.158.203.10]] 07:33, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
::or Sermon maybe, that would fit the theme
:Could be Search with large S and smaller caps for the rest? Anyone subscribe to the NYT and care to visit the actual WireCutter site to see the formatting? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.147.195|172.70.147.195]] 12:40, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
:: Don't need to be a subscriber to see the site. It says "Show me the best..." [[User:Paddles|Paddles]] ([[User talk:Paddles|talk]]) 13:26, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

I don't want to sound controversial but tithing would be a refreshing change comparing to current tax systems [[User:Tkopec|Tkopec]] ([[User talk:Tkopec|talk]]) 10:31, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
: Agreed- 10% is much less than the near 50% I'm paying when I figure it all in.[[User:Seebert|Seebert]] ([[User talk:Seebert|talk]]) 15:03, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
:: You really want to pay tithes AND taxes? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.63|108.162.249.63]] 18:54, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

Last night I was writing a huge thing about religions' almost universal reluctance to be 'tried out' (lestways allowing easy unsubscription at the end)  but on reflection, after a night's sleep, I'm wondering if they just had 70+ 'mystery shoppers' tasked to report back on one assigned 'product' each, their reports aggregated so this didn't matter too much (to the overall report-writers, at least). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.175|172.70.85.175]] 14:31, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

Also, the 'religious' wars metaphor extends quite easily to different platforms, yet (say) laptop reviews might compare a set of Windows vs a Mac or two (vs Chromebook, and maybe others) as options. And when it comes to keyboards, the QWERTY-Othodoxy and the Dvorak-Reformists both have bad (and untrue) things to say about each other, when 'enough time' with any given layout should be good enough to prosper in that. (That said, I had a {{w|Casio_FX-702P|programmable calculator}} from the '80s until it gave up the ghost some time post-Millenium, and I really did not get on with its ''alphabetical''-order keyboard all that time, perhaps because I was QWERTYing almost everywhere else.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.175|172.70.85.175]] 14:31, 2 November 2021 (UTC)
:In the case of religions though, the wars are not allegorical, they are literal. Nothing else in human experience really compares to the effects of a religious war (except ''maybe'' our wars to support a certain socioeconomic idealogy). The impact of format wars don't even come close; even if you count Uranium VS Thorium. This comic doesn't really draw a ''comparison'' between reviewing religions & reviewing products; so much as it ''contrasts'' the enormous differences in how we approach the two subjects... 
:[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 17:41, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

(Also also: QWERTY with UK-layout is my own personal sub-sect, with occasional need to adapt to US-layout (physically printed keycaps and/or what the computer ''thought'' was plugged in) with " and # and ~ characters amongst the main jumbled up ones, and no easy £ access. Which wasn't actually as unnerving as being in the 'wrong' bit of Belfast, but had the same subtle note of discordant undertone to it until I shifted my mental gears or ideally corrected the situation satisfactorarily by configuration.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.175|172.70.85.175]] 14:31, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

There's a book by John S. Dunne, ''The Way of All the Earth'', that advocates essentially trying out religions while keeping one foot in one's own (Dunne describes it as "crossing the abyss and crossing back"). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.158|162.158.74.158]] 17:17, 2 November 2021 (UTC)

Surprised no-one has yet mentioned this joke was done in almost exactly the same way on the UK satirical TV show TW3 in 1963 by David Frost (of later Frost/Nixon fame). --- jg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRZWyfERiCc

I was just looking for psychological/psychiatrical papers that say something about the frequency of mental illnesses by religion. Maaaaaaaaaayyybeeeeeeeeee there is a religion that is clearly superior to other religions in that regard, and so government health officials could make a recommendation to change to a specific religion. :-P --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.57|162.158.88.57]] 10:58, 3 November 2021 (UTC)
:But then, illnesses (as well as the symptoms of the same illness) depend on the culture, so my sardonic idea was probably left unresearched...--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.106|162.158.91.106]] 12:23, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

Feels like there should be a line in there about how religion is itself often "that which determines what is valued" and therefore very hard to treat objectively. So, for example, if your religion taught that discipline was inherently good, you would think less of another religion that specifically warned against the dangers of excessive discipline. Meanwhile, a member of that religion might think YOUR religion was worse, because - according to the tenets of THEIR religion - you put TOO MUCH emphasis on discipline, while you think your emphasis is correct and THEY are wrong for not having it.
Now, granted, people might want different things from their technology - one person might want user-friendliness, another might value greater customizability - but religion is different in that it, in itself, informs our understandings of "what is valuable". It would be like if Apple users actively began extolling the benefits of user-friendliness BECAUSE they are Apple users and Apple itself is what taught them to value user-friendliness, while Linux users were originally indifferent but BECAME fans of customizability BECAUSE they used Linux. (And yes, there can be cult-like elements of both fandoms, but hopefully the distinction I'm drawing here is reasonably clear: religion tells you what is valuable, technology does not.)

(Also, why all the Judaism-specific stuff now?) --mezimm [[Special:Contributions/172.69.68.106|172.69.68.106]] 16:42, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

Rather than picking one religion - join them all. Slag-blah takes a militant agnostic approach (we don't know, and neither do you). So they believe in/practice all religions (one a day for a year, so their calendar is 7,823 days long). From [https://web.archive.org/web/20150428210028/http://www.airshipentertainment.com/buckcomic.php?date=20071222 Buck Godot Zap Gun for Hire - Learning about Slag-blah by Phil Foglio, Dec. 2007] Sadly hard to find online, but here is the relevant page from the archive. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.167|108.162.245.167]] 19:18, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

Went to graduate school (Wash U, St Louis) where one of my classmates said [of the weather!], "I don't know what religion to be." Huh? He explained his habit was to try out a different religion each season, but the weather that month had been changing so often that he didn't know which one to follow on a given day! [Think he was only half serious]

I feel like the explanation's focus on "can't easily change religion" is both inaccurate and quite missing the point. Religious freedom is not about whether belief is inherent or chosen, but rather about the fact that no one has the right to tell anyone else what to believe. The controversial part, IMO, is not "criticism of an inherent feature like race", but rather, it's the fact that Wirecutter is analysing belief systems, not by trying to judge their truthfulness, but in simple ROI terms. It's a bit like analysing whether female or male children are more cost-effective; people will get upset about the fact that you made the analysis in such mercenary terms at all.

Talk:2536: Wirecutter

2021-11-02T18:54:15Z

108.162.249.63: