explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2162: Literary Opinions

2019-06-18T23:10:26Z

141.101.69.81:

let's see WS Burroughs = Tarzan, E.R. Burroughs = Naked Lunch.
CS Lewis Carol
Bruce Stirlling / SM Stirling

Is it just me, or was this comic released earlier than usual? Released just after midnight, EDT. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 08:30, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

:It's just you.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.100|162.158.214.100]] 10:33, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

::Yes, it's unusally early. It happened before, but most of the time the new comics arrived in the late afternoon (central european time). This one was already up when I turned on my computer ~8am. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 11:54, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
::: As a night-owl in Randall's own time zone, who used to often catch up on Tuesday and Thursday nights (i.e. Before Wednesday and Friday comics, respectively), I can tell you that yes, the comic is released at midnight EST/EDT sometimes. Not that rarely, but not that commonly either. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 03:50, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Is there any value in adding info about the authors mentioned? [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 13:17, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

: I wanted to add "Elements of Style" to show T.H., er, E.B. (whichever ;-) was more than just a "children's book author". Probably not worth it.[[User:Afbach|Afbach]] ([[User talk:Afbach|talk]])

I don't think this relates to the "Fregoli Delusion"(sp) - they think the same person is using more than one name. [[User:Afbach|Afbach]] ([[User talk:Afbach|talk]])
: Yeah, this feels more like pseudonyms than Frengoli to me.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.22|172.68.206.22]] 18:42, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
:: IDK, is it different, really? Even if you accept a writing pseudonym as being different than actually using different names, this could be seen as their writer side is using multiple names. :) [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 03:50, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Shouldn't we discuss authors with multiple pseudonyms? Like JK Rowling and Robert Galbraith, or Nora Roberts and JD Robb, etc... [[Special:Contributions/172.68.143.144|172.68.143.144]] 16:44, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Glad I'm not the only one who confuses former US vice president Gore Vidal with Vidal Sassoon the war poet. [[User:ColinHogben|ColinHogben]] ([[User talk:ColinHogben|talk]]) 16:49, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
: That's where I heard that name before! [[User:Afbach|Afbach]] ([[User talk:Afbach|talk]])

Why would Megan pick those 4 authors to be the same person? What do they or their works have in common? It would be nice to cover that. (Not knowing anything about any of them, any theory I might advance would be about as valid as one of Megan's.)
Bit of a long-shot, but I wonder if the link has anything to do with Randall's book tour competition. (He invites people to Write the best story using nothing but book covers.)[https://blog.xkcd.com/2019/06/10/book-tour-announcement/] Any good story/sentence made up with works by those 4 authors? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.107.55|162.158.107.55]] 22:13, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
: Did a search on all those author names together. Seems Wallace, Thompson, and Burroughs wrote books that have been tagged as dealing with drugs. (Hardly a unique characteristic, but might suggest some common thead.)
: Literature map - searching for Hunter S Thompson, lists the other 3 in fairly close proximity. (i.e., people who indicated reading one of these are likely to have read works by others of these authors. For whatever reason.)
: Anybody writing here actually read these authors? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.144|162.158.106.144]] 18:01, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

These authors have all been identified as "favorite author for young, mostly white males who wants to be cool and also exude toxic masculinity and won't stop talking about them to be seen as smart/edgy with their books about graphic content and drug abuse". While they are in fact popular with those readers and that kinda sucks, they don't deserve to be criticized without reading them (and, in my opinion, see that those readers skip completly the point on generational malaise these authors make). Cueball dubitative reaction and proposition to see what are the differences inside the books, plus the phrase about "a book club for the books you refuse to read", seems to be a rejection of the fact that some people are amalgaming this toxic readership with the books/authors themselves, and in reaction refuse to read them and see them as having the same content or ideology (they don't).

How about the theory that Mary Pearson, Andre Norton, Andrew North, Allen Weston, and M. D. Herter are the same person. ;-) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.144|162.158.106.144]] 22:31, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Should trivia link it to [[923: Strunk and White]] which also mentions E.B. white.? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:32, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
: Done! [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 11:54, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
::Thanks :) I had to note this down somewhere to not forget it, when the though struck me, but didn't have time for a proper edit... --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 12:17, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
:::I got your back, Jack...er, Lupo! ;-) [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 12:42, 13 June 2019 (UTC)
:::I also back-linked from that comic to this one in a Trivia entry as well. [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 12:43, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

I think this has to be viewed from one step back, i.e., it is not necessarily about books or writers, but rather a take on people who form and voice opinions without proper knowledge of the facts, even if the facts are very easily researchable.
This happens A LOT in forum postings, e.g., when there is an article about some scientific dicovery on a popular news site, and then people start discussing (and fighting) about that discovery in the forums for this article. These discussions are more often than not based purely on speculation, without anyone bothering to check the original publication on which the article was based, or even without any specialist knowledge about the subject matter at hand. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.89.19|162.158.89.19]] 09:54, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

E.B. and T.H. are distinguishable as one wrote a children's book ("Chitty Chitty Bang Bang") and the other wrote James Bond novels. Oh wait, that was Ian Fleming. James Bond was the author of "Birds of the West Indies." I think the explanation of various audiences and subject matter does not disambiguate authors. See "Ambrose, Gardner and Doyle" by Raymond Smullyan.
[[http://www.linkedin.com/in/Comet Comet]] 06:00, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

Similar ideas to comics 1970 and the title text on 1277. Should definitely be mentioned in the explanation. [[User:Probably not Douglas Hofstadter|Probably not Douglas Hofstadter]] ([[User talk:Probably not Douglas Hofstadter|talk]]) 04:06, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Talk:1895: Worrying Scientist Interviews

2017-09-28T06:35:20Z

141.101.69.81:

Why not use Heliologist? :~) [[User:DarkJMKnight|DarkJMKnight]] ([[User talk:DarkJMKnight|talk]]) 14:49, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

If the sun is local breaking news, could be an impending dark age (solar activity destroying all technology) or a dark age (solar implosion/explosion/death). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.5|162.158.79.5]] 15:42, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

P

Why not use Heliologist? :~) [[User:DarkJMKnight|DarkJMKnight]] ([[User talk:DarkJMKnight|talk]]) 14:49, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

If the sun is local breaking news, could be an impending dark age (solar activity destroying all technology) or a dark age (solar implosion/explosion/death). [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.5|162.158.79.5]] 15:42, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

: Destroying *''all''* technology would require something on the scale of a solar expansion (hydrogen exhaustion) Solar flares (even those strong enough to burn all life from the face of the Earth) still would not be sufficient to destroy subterranean shelters like NORAD. Only a total extinction event would be capable of destroying all technology. Even if 99.9% of all humans on Earth were killed off, there are very well secured (& insanely well funded) facilities which will survive any event short of total crust-upheaval, at least for a generation or so. Reverting to primitive lifestyle may possibly happen for a *''majority''* of humans, but modern military systems are such that some humans with tech are almost guaranteed to remain, no matter what terrible events occur. In other words, the wealthiest technocratic elite aren't going to die off any time soon. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.125|172.68.58.125]] 00:59, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

: Which makes me wonder why only a local reporter is covering the story. Sounds like a media beat-up. The joke appears to depend more on someone's imagination than on the actual news story. [[Special:Contributions/198.41.238.34|198.41.238.34]] 23:10, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Everyone else is dead except for the reporter who happens to be beret guy

Marine biologist is probably about oil spills or coral reefs/fish dying etc, rather than invasive species --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.209|141.101.99.209]] 16:18, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

The explanation for "ornithologist" uses "avian dinosaurs" instead of "birds." There's a link to the wikipedia page for birds, but it's still a potentially confusing inside joke. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.106|172.68.54.106]] 19:01, 27 September 2017 (UTC)
: The reference to "ornithologist" is almost certainly a reference to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Birds_(film) Hitchcock's "The Birds"] [[Special:Contributions/172.68.253.209|172.68.253.209]] 01:52, 28 September 2017 (UTC)
:: Definitely, rather than the obscure Birdemic movie --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.69.81|141.101.69.81]] 06:32, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

So, wait: worried about what the hell is so wrong with interviewers for them to actually want to talk to these kinds of researchers; or about what is happening to the world are we all going to die is it the end times? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.71|162.158.79.71]] 19:54, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

The solar physicist would most likely be talking about an incoming solar flare, which could shut down the electric grid, satellites, and a bunch of other stuff, potentially within minutes, making it the most pressing of the issues. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.75.112|162.158.75.112]] 01:11, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

I think economists and nutritionists are at the lower end for being notoriously wrong in their predictions --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.69.81|141.101.69.81]] 06:35, 28 September 2017 (UTC)

Talk:1895: Worrying Scientist Interviews

2017-09-28T06:32:50Z

141.101.69.81:

Talk:1884: Ringer Volume/Media Volume

2017-09-01T16:24:45Z

141.101.69.81:

So, is this about the volume buttons controlling all aspects of volume on the phone, and it being difficult to control sometimes (a lot!)? ~Chris {{unsigned ip|108.162.245.220}}
:Yes, but it's strange because the default action of the volume control should be the ''main volume'' and NOT the ''ring tone volume''. Nevertheless a video advertisement is often much louder than the movie where it is embedded. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 14:50, 1 September 2017 (UTC)
Protip: on Android when loading a youtube video, lock your phone and then unlock it. The video will then start paused, allowing you to adjust volume and then press play.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.4|172.68.206.4]] 15:06, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

On my Android phone, pressing either volume key results in the ringer volume slider appearing at the top of the screen. To its right is a downward-pointing caret. Pressing that caret adds sliders for media and alarm volumes. These can be moved using the touchscreen or the user can tap to select one to adjust and use the volume keys. [[User:D5xtgr|D5xtgr]] ([[User talk:D5xtgr|talk]]) 16:23, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Don't understand this comic at all... why would you frantically turn your volume up and down like that in the seconds before a video starts? Do other people do this?? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.69.81|141.101.69.81]] 16:24, 1 September 2017 (UTC)