explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:2634: Red Line Through HTTPS

2022-06-18T08:30:27Z

172.69.69.250:

HTTPS was standardized in 2000 or so, so 2015 is quite a stretch for a site to not use it because the site was last updated before HTTPS was widely available.
With pretty much any browser now, a red line through HTTPS means that the site _is using HTTPS_, but it is _not trusted by the browser_ (due to e.g. the certificate being self-signed or expired).
[[User:Darrylnoakes|Darrylnoakes]] ([[User talk:Darrylnoakes|talk]]) 04:28, 18 June 2022 (UTC)

:I think the intended joke is that the site's certificate expired in 2015, instead of the site is not using HTTPS. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.101|108.162.221.101]] 06:29, 18 June 2022 (UTC)

:2015 is when the first Let's Encrypt certs were issued, and 2016 is when LE became generally available to the public and thus when free SSL/TLS became very very easy for just about anyone setting up a web server, hence the comic citing 2015. However even with a valid cert you might have a number of issues, like [https://www.mixedcontentexamples.com/ mixed content]. At least in Firefox, an expired cert gives a big warning screen that gives you an option to add a security exception; I don't care enough to install Chrom{e,ium} to test its UI. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.250|172.69.69.250]] 08:30, 18 June 2022 (UTC)

Talk:753: Southern Half

2022-05-31T15:36:33Z

172.69.69.250:

OF COURSE! A Penis-Shaped Obelisk on Mars! And it's got to be big enough to been seen with an ordinary backyard telescope.--[[Special:Contributions/138.163.128.41|138.163.128.41]] 00:31, 20 March 2013 (UTC)
: And, yes, I imagine it ''would'' be hard. [[Special:Contributions/178.98.192.132|178.98.192.132]] 23:17, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
::"Hard" .... *facepalm*. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.168|173.245.54.168]] 14:37, 9 October 2014 (UTC)
Woah, woah, no cloned velociraptors in spaaace. Not on my watch. [[User:BruceJohnJennerLawso|BruceJohnJennerLawso]] ([[User talk:BruceJohnJennerLawso|talk]]) 05:25, 13 November 2013 (UTC)
:However, leave off Latin America and the rest seem to be pretty much in the hemisphere centered at the Persian Ocean.--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.9|108.162.215.9]] 07:14, 27 May 2014 (UTC)
I was under the impression that latin America did not include south America, just the part of north America south of the USA. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.7|108.162.219.7]] 02:20, 19 June 2014 (UTC)
:That's called Mexico. Seriously, that's the only country south of the U.S. in North America. Beyond that is central America, although some people do, in fact, define Central America as part of North America. Weirdly, it seems people only think of Central America as part of North America when specifically talking about Central America, and when discussing North America, Central America is not part of it. This is also reflected in search results. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.76.207|141.101.76.207]] 13:58, 30 March 2022 (UTC)
Randall lacks to take in account the USA-centric view of the USA. If you define "south" as "more south than the USA", the speech sounds legit (especially if you subtract the Soviet Union from Asia - surely the enemy but not the "battlefield" Kennedy talked about). [[Special:Contributions/108.162.230.89|108.162.230.89]] 12:12, 20 October 2014 (UTC)
:Ah I see, so the USA-centric view puts the equator as the southern border of USA to Mexico... So pretty much everything is the southern Hemisphere then! Makes sense! Lol. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.224|108.162.221.224]] 00:46, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
:The thing is, JFK did say 'southern half' and not 'southern area'. I understand your argument, but half is half, no matter your perspective. In Australia, 'southern half of the globe' doesn't mean 'Antarctica'. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.160|108.162.250.160]] 09:23, 13 December 2015 (UTC)
:But since he was talking about land, what if you look at the southern 50% of land mass only - a line that would be much higher north, as most of the land on earth is above the equator. And then if you generously interpret his statement as meaning "only those parts of those continents that are below that line", it actually kind of works. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.250|172.69.69.250]] 15:36, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

The title text in the first illustration for http://what-if.xkcd.com/124/ also references the Kennedy Rice speech. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.177|173.245.52.177]] 10:34, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Look. Kennedy was zoned out on painkillers most of the time. He didn't know what he was saying and probably didn't care. The praise lavished on his Presidency is mostly hype. [[User:Jakee308|Jakee308]] ([[User talk:Jakee308|talk]]) 02:50, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Is it possible that the dash in Kennedy's quote should be a comma? In which case he was saying the battlefield is everywhere except US, Canada, and Europe? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.17|108.162.221.17]] 07:52, 6 August 2015 (UTC)

See xkcdsw. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.150|108.162.221.150]] 06:14, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Also: Asia, Africa AND the middle east? I always was under the impression, that the middle east is located on these continents. This can only mean, that he explicitely wants to include western Turkey to the list. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 07:01, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

I just always thought JFK played a lot of a certain game which came out in 1959: https://imgur.com/xaywAVB. As you can see, in the "southern half" - below the fold - are (1) a good bit of Asia, including Vietnam, (2) almost all of Latin America, (3) ALL of Africa, and (4) the Middle East. (Also, Spain and Portugal, southern France, and most of Italy and Greece.) [[User:Mathmannix|Mathmannix]] ([[User talk:Mathmannix|talk]]) 17:51, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

1079: United Shapes

2022-05-26T17:22:43Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 278471 by Donald Trump (talk)

{{comic
| number = 1079
| date = July 9, 2012
| title = United Shapes
| image = united_shapes.png
| imagesize = 800px
| titletext = That eggplant is in something of a flaccid state.
}}
A large version is [http://xkcd.com/1079/large/ here].
==Explanation==
In this comic, each state of the United States of America has been filled-in with an object of similar shape. Several years later Randall made a new map of the US mainland [[1653: United States Map]], where he shuffled the positions of the states but filled out the outline. Also in this map Michigan has been split into two separate parts. (Here it is the mitten and the eagle). This comic could also be a reference to {{w|Giuseppe Arcimboldo}}'s portraits, which were comprised of objects such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, books, and fish.

Very few, if any, of the shapes used are stereotypes of the state; they are merely objects that look like the state. Some of the objects are those which the states are widely known to resemble. For example, Michigan is represented by a mitten and an Eagle, and a pot with handle takes the place of Oklahoma (with the panhandle region of the state filled with a literal handle). Others, however, are more creative. Few would have likely pictured Texas as a dog or Alaska as a bear with a jet pack and laser gun. There are several incredibly simple objects filling some states. Kentucky is filled by a cloud, which conceivably could have been used for any state, and Wyoming, one of the nearly rectangular states, is simply an envelope. There are three pairs of states that are related. Georgia and Missouri each contain an image of the other, drawing attention to their similar shapes, North and South Dakota are the top and bottom halves of a {{w|guitar amplifier}} {{w|speaker cabinet}}, and Alabama and Mississippi are {{w|moai}} facing in opposite directions.

Colorado contains what looks like a Wikipedia article. [http://xkcd.com/1079/colorado/ A close-up of the fake article is provided.] The following references are made in the Colorado article:

*The pronunciation is not that for Colorado, but for {{w|Eyjafjallajökull}}, a volcano in Iceland that erupted in April 2010.
*The way it has a demilitarized zone towards Wyoming resembles {{W|North Korea}} and {{W|South Korea}}.
*Eleven dimensions refers to {{w|string theory}}.
*A {{w|wormhole}} is a theoretical relative of the {{w|black hole}}. This is a reference to the television series {{w|Stargate SG-1}} where a device capable of creating wormholes is located in the {{w|Cheyenne Mountain nuclear bunker}} in Colorado.
*A {{w|Horcrux}} is a type of magical object in the world of {{W|Harry Potter}} that prevents the creator of it from passing on. They may die, but their soul remains to be resurrected by another wizard
*The radiation zones around Longmont are caused by {{w|Radioactive contamination from the Rocky Flats Plant|radioactive contamination from the Rocky Flats Plant}}.
*The fake motto ''Si parare possis, vivere septem'' can be roughly translated as "With preparation, survival is possible for over a week."

New Mexico according to [https://xkcd.com/1079/info.0.json official transcript] is "A liquid container labeled for something of unusual and silly danger". The labeling is upside down and it refers to the nuclear testing facility White Sands Missile Range located in New Mexico for the nuclear bomb. The joke is that it presents the white sand itself as extremely hazardous. The phrase "contains chemicals known only to the state of Nevada" may be a reference to the nuclear weapons testing that occurred in Nevada (although in that case, it's not really the ''state'' of Nevada that knows those chemicals, but rather the {{w|Nevada Test Site}}, home of Area 51 ''et al''.), and is also a reference to California's {{w|1986 California Proposition 65|Proposition 65}} warning label, "WARNING: This product contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm."
:This end up
:Property of White Sands Missile Range
:??? [Followed by a {{w|NFPA 704}} Diamond with all divisions at severe risk, and a radiation symbol in the special notice division]
:Contains White Sand
:FLAMMABLE
:Warning:
:This product contains chemicals known
:only to the state of Nevada.
:Contents under pressure from parents
:If swallowed, induce labor
:56 fluid ounces
:and 14 other ounces

The title text makes fun of Florida which is sometimes called "The penis of America". Obviously, this penis is somewhat flaccid (not erect). The use of the word "state" is a pun, as it means some particular condition (flaccid state) as well as a political entity (The State of Florida).

==Objects==
{|class=wikitable
!State!!Contained Picture!!Comments
|-
|Alabama ||A moai head facing east.||{{w|Moai}} are Easter Island stone statues.
|-
|Alaska ||A bear with a jet pack and a ray gun.||The ray gun and {{w|jet pack}} are fixtures of science fiction during the Cold War era, and the Russian Bear is an often-used personification of the country Russia in political cartoonage; the "teddy bear" image may be related to Alaska's former Russian heritage. The USA acquired Alaska from Russia in the Alaska Purchase of 1867 and it became a state in 1959, during the Cold War. The Cold War often featured baseless worries of a potential Russian invasion of Alaska due to their geographical proximity across the Bering Sea and Bering Strait, which persisted through the 1980s; Alaska was the location of a large number of interceptor missiles as part of Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars Defense Initiative" intended to shoot down missiles that might be launched from the USSR. The ray gun is pointed across the Bering Strait at Russia, consistent with Alaska's often being described as the "first line of defense" against Russian aggression. The teddy bear is similar in appearance to {{w|Winnie the Pooh}}.||
|-
|Arizona ||A refrigerated shelf containing milk, bread, and pastries.||
|-
|Arkansas ||A measuring cup.||
|-
|California ||A vacuum.||An old-fashioned upright vacuum cleaner (lying down to the right), green with a yellow bag.
|-
|Colorado ||The Wikipedia article on Colorado.||A fake Wikipedia article on Colorado. Below the text as seen in the provided close up:
:[web address:]
::en.wikipedia.org/wiki/colorado
:[Headers]
::Wikipedia
::Article Talk
::Colorado
:[Main article {note that Randall forgot the closing parentheses ')' after the pronunciation}]
::Colorado (Pronounced [ˈeːijaˌfjatlaˌjœːkʏtl̥] is a US State encompassing portions of the Rocky
::Mountains and the Great Plains. The region has been inhabited since at least 11,000 BCE, and
::some archaeological evidence suggest the state – with roughly its current borders – has literally
::always existed. Colorado is separated from Wyoming by a 28-mile demilitarized zone, and
::has at times exercised substantial regional
::power via the installation of puppet governments
::in neighboring states
::Geographically, Colorado is eleven-dimensional,
::though seven of those dimensions are tightly
::compacted and difficult to detect in most areas
::of the state. Colorado is home to the nation's
::oldest continually-operated wormhole and two
::of President Lincoln's horcruxes.
::The wildlife in Colorado is commonly characterized
::as "erratic", particularly in the radiation zones
::around Longmont. The State's timber wolf
::population is largely bipedal; the Park Service
::has expressed "concern" at their attempts to enroll in
:[Fact box with correct (though black instead of blue) State flag and emblem and fake motto:]
::State of Colorado
::Motto:
::"Si parare possis, vivere septem."
::(With preparation, survival is
::possible for over a week.)
|-
|Connecticut ||A train conductor's hat.||
|-
|Delaware ||A meerkat.||
|-
|Florida ||An eggplant.||The title text mentions the eggplant being in a flaccid state, which might be a reference to the sexual use of the eggplant emoji.
|-
|Georgia ||Missouri.||The outline of the state of Missouri, with the {{w|Gateway Arch}} in St. Louis.
|-
|Hawaii ||The island of Hawaii is a snowball. The smaller islands are small bits of snow.||
|-
|Idaho ||A garden gnome, sitting down.||
|-
|Illinois ||A gangster with a guitar case, upside down.||
|-
|Indiana ||The brush of a paintbrush.||
|-
|Iowa ||A tomato, lettuce, cold cut and cheese sandwich.||
|-
|Kansas ||A {{w|spinet}} piano.||
|-
|Kentucky ||A cloud.||
|-
|Louisiana ||A boot with some gum stuck to the bottom of it.||
|-
|Maine ||A Vulcan salute.||Maine's camp sunshine has had Star Trek related events in the past, including the opportunity to appear in a film.
|-
|Maryland ||A wolf howling to the moon, upside down.||
|-
|Massachusetts ||An elephant, being ridden by a man, carrying tea.||Might be a reference to the Boston Tea Party, which occurred in Massachusetts, and the Republican political party. The man seems to be wearing a tricorn hat.
|-
|Michigan ||A mitten for the lower portion, an eagle for the {{w|Upper Peninsula of Michigan}}.||
|-
|Minnesota ||$160 in $20 USD bills, tied together.||
|-
|Mississippi ||A moai head facing west.||
|-
|Missouri ||Georgia.||The outline of the state of Georgia, with a pair of {{w|Georgia Peach|Georgia peaches}}.
|-
|Montana ||One half of a muffin, sideways.||
|-
|Nebraska ||A blue VW type 2 with mattresses sticking out the back.||
|-
|Nevada ||A clothes iron.||
|-
|New Hampshire ||A tall brick factory building.|| Could be in reference to the many brick mill buildings in Manchester, one of the larger cities in the state.
|-
|New Jersey ||A bent-over old person. He is carrying a cane.||
|-
|New Mexico ||A liquid container labeled for something of unusual and silly danger.||A yellow liquid container with upside-down labeling.
::This end up!!
::Property of White Sands Missile Range
::Contains White Sand
:[Written inside a hazardous-materials {{w|NFPA 704|NFPA diamond}} with the ? very large, and the three '4' in the three top part of a diamond shape divided in four these three sections being blue(health), red(flammability), and yellow(instability). The lower part has a radioactive sign on the same grey background as the large rectangle.]
::??? 4 4 4
::Flammable
::Warning
::This product contains chemicals known
::Only to the State of Nevada.
::Contents under pressure from parents
::If swallowed, induce labor
::56 fluid ounces
::and 14 other ounces
::NB - There are several chemicals such as {{w|Pentaborane(9)}} and {{w|tert-Butyl hydroperoxide|''tert''-Butyl hydroperoxide}} which have a 4-4-4 rating, however, no known substance is both 4-4-4 and radioactive
|-
|New York ||A hybrid transmission with standard manual-style gears and a torque converter sliced in half.||
|-
|North Carolina ||A bouquet of flowers. They appear similar to {{w|Galium Palustre|marsh bedstraws}}.||
|-
|North Dakota ||The top half of a guitar amplifier speaker cabinet.|| Possibly a {{w|Randall Amplifiers|Randall}} [https://cdn11.bigcommerce.com/s-49c12/images/stencil/1280x1280/products/12694/26126/apihqruad__00850.1479879391.jpg RD412A] angled 4x12" cabinet, which is similar in appearance and bears [[Randall]]'s name.
|-
|Ohio ||Underwear (Briefs).||Possibly a reference to ''{{w|Captain Underpants}}'', which takes place in Ohio.||
|-
|Oklahoma ||A covered pot, dripping with boil-over.||Western Oklahoma is often called "{{w|Oklahoma Panhandle|the panhandle}}"; sure enough, this is where the boiling pot's handle fits.||
|-
|Oregon ||A locomotive.||
|-
|Pennsylvania ||A very thick book with a bookmark.||
|-
|Rhode Island ||The bow half of a boat's hull.||
|-
|South Carolina ||A slice of pizza.||
|-
|South Dakota ||The bottom half of guitar amplifier speaker cabinet.|| Possibly a {{w|Randall Amplifiers|Randall}} [https://cdn11.bigcommerce.com/s-49c12/images/stencil/1280x1280/products/12694/26126/apihqruad__00850.1479879391.jpg RD412A] angled 4x12" cabinet, which is similar in appearance and bears [[Randall]]'s name.
|-
|Tennessee ||A number of children's books, placed in a slightly askew pile.|| Possibly a reference to Dolly Parton's Imagination Library. The books are {{w|Where's Waldo?}}, {{w|The Wreck of the Zephyr}}, {{w|The Way Things Work}}, Free Fall, {{w|Paddle-to-the-Sea}}, What It Feels Like to Be a Building, and {{w|The Crab with the Golden Claws}}.
|-
|Texas ||A dog sitting in a bowl.||
|-
|Utah ||An oven.||
|-
|Vermont ||A microscope, upside down.||
|-
|Virginia ||A {{w|stegosaurus}}.||
|-
|Washington ||A whale.|| The Puget Sound is well known for whale watching
|-
|Washington DC ||A star.||On most maps, capitals are shown as stars. Washington DC is the capital of the United States.
|-
|West Virginia ||A {{w|frog}}.||
|-
|Wisconsin ||A skull.||
|-
|Wyoming ||An envelope.||The back side of a white envelope, sealed with red wax, with a black heart next to a signature (lower left corner).
|}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|tables are not welcome here}}
:The '''United Shapes'''
:A map of things states are shaped like
:[Each state has some item wedged to stay inside its borders]

{| class=wikitable
! State
! Official Transcript
! Text
|-
|WA
|whale
|
|-
|MT
|half muffin
|
|-
|ND and SD
|top and bottom halves of an amp
|
|-
|MN
|$160 in $20 USD bills
|
|-
|WI
|skull
|
|-
|MI
|mitten for the lower portion, eagle for the {{w|Upper Peninsula of Michigan}}
|
|-
|NY
|hybrid transmission with standard manual-style gears and a torque converter sliced in half
|
|-
|VT
|microscope, upside down
|
|-
|NH
|tall brick factory building
|
|-
|ME
|Vulcan salute
|
|-
|MA
|elephant, being ridden by a man, carrying tea
|
|-
|CT
|train conductor's hat
|
|-
|RI
|bow half of a boat's hull
|
|-
|OR
|locomotive
|
|-
|ID
|garden gnome, sitting down
|
|-
|WY
|envelope.
|The envelope is marked with a signature, possibly Randall's
|-
|NE
|blue VW type 2 with mattresses sticking out the back
|
|-
|IA
|tomato, lettuce, cold cut and cheese sandwich
|
|-
|IL
|gangster with a guitar case, upside down
|
|-
|IN
|brush of a paintbrush
|
|-
|OH
|underwear (Briefs)
|
|-
|PA
|very thick book with a bookmark
|
|-
|NJ
|bent-over old person
|
|-
|NV
|clothes iron
|
|-
|UT
|oven
|
|-
|CO
|Wikipedia article on Colorado
|See Link Above
|-
|KS
|stand-up piano
|
|-
|MO
|Georgia
|Georgia
|-
|KY
|cloud
|
|-
|WV
|{{w|frog}}
|
|-
|VA
|{{w|stegosaurus}}
|
|-
|DC
|star.
|
|-
|MD
|wolf howling to the moon, upside down
|
|-
|DE
|meerkat
|
|-
|CA
|vacuum cleaner
|
|-
|AZ
|refrigerated shelf containing milk, bread, and pastries
|
|-
|NM
|liquid container with warning label
|This end up!!
Property of White Sands Missile Range

Contains White Sand

???

FLAMMABLE

Warning: This product contains chemicals known Only to the state of Nevada.

Contents under pressure from parents.

If swallowed, induce labor.

56 Fluid Ounces and 14 other ounces.
|-
|OK
|covered pot, dripping with boil-over
|
|-
|AR
|measuring cup
|
|-
|TN
|children's books, placed in a slightly askew pile
|Handford / WHERE'S WALDO / or wally

The Wreck of the Zephyr / Chris Van Allsburg

The Way Things Work / DAVID MACAULRY

Weisner / FREE FALL

PADDLE-TO-THE-SEA / HCH(?)

WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO BE A BUILDING / Wilson

TINTIN / The Crab with the Golden Claws / Hergé
|-
|NC
|flower bouquet
|
|-
|AK
|teddy bear with a jet pack and a ray gun
|
|-
|HI
|snowball
|
|-
|TX
|dog sitting in a bowl
|
|-
|LA
|boot with some gum stuck to the bottom
|
|-
|MS
|moai head facing west
|
|-
|AL
|moai head facing east
|
|-
|GA
|Missouri.
|Missouri
|-
|SC
|pizza slice
|
|-
|FL
|eggplant
|
|}

==Trivia==
*A print version of this comic is available in the [https://store.xkcd.com/products/united-shapes-poster xkcd store].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Large drawings]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:US maps]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Dogs]]
[[Category:Dinosaurs]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]
[[Category:Star Trek]]
[[Category:Harry Potter]] 
[[Category:Volcanoes]] 
[[Category:Comics with xkcd store products]]

1035: Cadbury Eggs

2022-05-20T21:54:25Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 271162 by Explain xkcd server admin (talk)

{{comic
| number = 1035
| date = March 28, 2012
| title = Cadbury Eggs
| image = cadbury_eggs.png
| titletext = When they moved production from New Zealand to the UK and switched from the runny white centers to the thick, frosting-like filling, it got way harder to cook them scrambled.
}}

==Explanation==
{{w|Cadbury Creme Egg|Cadbury Eggs}} are a chocolate egg-shaped candy with a filling. They are supposed to replicate a real egg with a hard exterior and soft interior. However, unlike real eggs, the exterior is edible.{{Citation needed}}

In this comic, [[Cueball]] is trying to say that sodas have way too much sugar to even be appealing as beverages, because they contain as much sugar as 2 or 3 Cadbury Eggs, and one Cadbury Egg alone makes him feel gross. (A 12 oz can equals 355 mL, while a 20 oz bottle is about 590 mL.)

However, [[Megan]] interprets this in precisely the opposite way to what Cueball intended. Instead of comparing soda to Cadbury Eggs, she compares Cadbury Eggs to soda. If a [[1070|few]] Cadbury Eggs have the same amount of sugar as soda, Megan can eat as many as she wants year-round in place of soda, with no additional guilt. Cadbury Eggs are usually consumed around {{w|Easter}} — which is anywhere between March 22nd and May 7th, depending on whether one is consulting the Catholic or Orthodox calendar.

The title text mentions the closure of the {{w|Cadbury Creme Egg#Manufacture in New Zealand|manufacture in New Zealand}} in 2009 and the change of the filling from runny to thick as a consequence. The joke here is the comparison to real eggs, which can be cooked {{w|Scrambled_eggs|scrambled}}, the new thick filling is not liquid enough to be cooked in a pan, as was the old runny filling.

==Transcript==
:[Two Cadbury eggs, one in the foil, the other out of the foil and broken open to reveal the gooey center.]
:A Cadbury egg has about 20g of sugar. (25g outside the US.) "One Cadbury Egg" is a nice unit of sugar content.

:[A can of soda with an equals sign and two eggs; a bottle of soda with an equals sign and three eggs.]
:One 12oz. can of soda has about two Cadbury eggs worth of sugar. One 20oz. bottle has three.

:[Two unwrapped Cadbury eggs, with an arrow indicating they should be placed in a glass of water.]
:One Cadbury egg is enough to make me feel kinda gross. Now when I see Coke or Snapple or Nestea or whatever, I imagine drinking a couple of dissolved Cadbury eggs.

:[Megan puts her hand to her chin in thought, Cueball has his arms out in exclamation.]
:Megan: Wow. Huh. So the takeaway is... I can eat Cadbury eggs by the handful all season and feel no worse about it than I do about soda?
:Cueball: That's not really—
:Megan: This is ''awesome!''
:Cueball: *sigh*

==Trivia==
*Cadbury Eggs and the high sugar content of soda are referenced again in [[1793: Soda Sugar Comparisons]].
*The Cadbury egg/soda comparison is also mentioned in the what if? {{what if|74|Soda Planet}}.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Food]]

1034: Share Buttons

2022-05-20T21:53:22Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 271349 by Explain xkcd server admin (talk)

{{comic
| number = 1034
| date = March 26, 2012
| title = Share Buttons
| image = share_buttons.png
| titletext = The only post to achieve perfect balance between the four was a hilarious joke about Mark Zuckerberg getting caught using a pseudonym to sneak past the TSA.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a commentary on what sort of articles work best on different {{w|social networking services}}. From left to right the share buttons are: {{w|Facebook}}, {{w|Twitter}}, {{w|Reddit}}, and {{w|Google plus|Google+}}.

*Twitterers are often stereotyped as constantly trying to be funny; hence, the article on stand-up comedy is shared most on Twitter.

*{{w|Conspiracy theory}} articles play well on Reddit, especially if they are against the {{w|Christian Right}} and for {{w|Wikipedia}}, as there is a large and loud atheist community on Reddit.

*"Boycott Facebook" articles are ironically popular on Facebook. Google+, being semantically akin to Facebook, also had a significant anti-Facebook community. One of the punchlines is that Google+ was struggling and not used much, before being finally closed down in 2019.

*The last article gets almost no shares at all — not many want to admit they are reading an article about a {{w|RealDoll}}, a type of sex doll. (Also mentioned in [[Game AIs]] and [[Flying Cars]].) A custom ROM is an aftermarket distribution of the {{w|Android (operating system)|Android}} operating system and are often targeted toward enthusiasts. This community exists primarily on Google+ (as Google is the main developer of Android), and was one of the few active communities on that social network. As Android is an operating system primarily aimed at {{w|smartphones}} and {{w|tablet computers}}, installing it on a RealDoll, whilst possible due to Android's {{w|open source}} nature, would be a very niche activity, and the low number of shares indicates that it only interests a small portion of the already-small (relative to other social networks) Google+ community.

The title text humorously combines appealing subjects for all four networks:

*''a hilarious joke'' – Twitter, same as above.
*''about {{w|Mark Zuckerberg}}'' – founder of Facebook.
*''using a {{w|pseudonym}}'' – referencing a [http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9218649/Google_works_to_soothe_users_over_real_name_controversyremember controversy] about real names on Google+.
*''to sneak past the {{w|Transportation Security Administration|TSA}}'' – Reddit, a conspiracy theory as above.

==Transcript==
:[A series of article titles with four share buttons underneath each: Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, and Google+]

:Breaking Into Stand-up Comedy
:FB: 3, Twitter: 1,781, Reddit: 2, G+: 0

:How the Christian Right Threatens Wikipedia
:FB: 1, Twitter: 0, Reddit: 2,241, G+: 3

:Boycott Facebook Today!
:FB: 248k, Twitter: 0, Reddit: 0, G+: 74

:DIY: Installing a Custom ROM on a Realdoll
:FB: 0, Twitter: 0, Reddit: 0, G+: 2

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Social networking]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]

1032: Networking

2022-05-20T21:52:30Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 271449 by Explain xkcd server admin (talk)

{{comic
| number = 1032
| date = March 21, 2012
| title = Networking
| image = networking.png
| titletext = Our company is agile and lean with a focus on the long tail. Ok, our company is actually a polecat I found in my backyard.
}}

==Explanation==
Networking, in business, is the act of expanding your group of contacts in order to help your career down the line. Here, in this comic, [[Beret Guy]] meets {{w|Chief Technology Officer}} (CTO, an executive-level position overseeing the development of new technologies) Connr Clark (perhaps a typo for "Connor" or perhaps a reference to common "Web 2.0" names like the businesses {{w|Flickr}}, {{w|Tumblr}}, etc.). Beret Guy is as strange as he usually is: he introduces himself as a "business professional" rather than as someone with any kind of specific job, and then goes on to mention that he photocopied a burrito, which he presumably believes is the sort of thing business professionals do. He also has a business card; usually, this would contain contact information, but his only says "This is my business card". He calls his briefcase, or suitcase, a "handlebox", and it is full of a quarter of a million dollars in cash. (The source of this money is not discussed in this comic, but in [[1493: Meeting]], Ponytail says it "keeps appearing, but we have no idea how or why.") Then Beret Guy proceeds to eat Connr's business card. Business cards are again mentioned in the title text of [[2277: Business Greetings]], also about one of Beret Guy's businesses. All of these things are not common behavior. {{Citation needed}}

"Networking" is often an over-hyped, empty affair. There are many networking meetings of every description going on every day everywhere, and most people trade cards and continue to not make money. So that's the joke – Beret Guy does the networking {{w|schtick}}, badly, and yet is somehow making huge amounts of money at it.

The comic is also likely a joke on the idea that many people are excited about becoming a "business professional" who carries a briefcase, hands out business cards, and makes tons of money, without having an adequate plan for how to make those things happen, or possibly even knowing what their actual job would be. Beret Guy never says what he does, simply introducing himself as a "business professional," and explains his piles of cash with "I am a business grown-up who makes business profits!" In this world —and in people's dreams— when you "grow up" and start a business, money magically appears. Obviously, that's not how it works.{{Citation needed}}

The "Eusocial" in "Eusocial Media Ventures" is a reference to {{w|eusociality}}, the highest level of social cooperation found in the animal kingdom. Eusocial animals (termites being a common example) cooperate together to raise their young, have different generations living in the same colony, and have specialized individuals for reproductive and non-reproductive tasks.

The title text is a pun on three common business buzzwords: agile, lean, and long-tail. An agile business is one that can change course quickly based on customer demands and the business environment. A lean business is one with minimal inventory or assets; nothing is idle or warehoused, so everything is in active use or on the move. Long-tail describes the strategy of offering a large number of unique items with relatively small quantities sold of each – usually in addition to selling fewer popular items in large quantities. Netflix is a popular example of long-tail because they have (almost) every movie imaginable, including rare titles that only a few people would be interested in.

And of course, the pun here is one animal that is agile and lean with a long ''tail'' is a {{w|polecat}}.

Furthermore, although "agile" and "lean" do mean a quick, nimble, and efficient business, they also refer to specific practices, as in {{w|agile software development}}, {{w|lean manufacturing}} and {{w|lean Six Sigma}}. Many people think these terms have devolved to overused jargon. While agile development is supposed to be a highly-structured method to get programmers to produce more working code quickly, when someone from the marketing department says "''agile''" it often means "''We don't know what we're supposed to be producing, so we'll just chuck some stuff together, and keep those bits that the customer says he likes. We'll then do it all over again until we've got something that he'll pay for.''" "''Lean''" is supposed to mean that a business keeps its costs as low as possible, employing one person to do marketing and PR, not really having a Human Resources department, etc. But, in practice, it often becomes "''Keep as little stock as possible so that we don't have a lot of money tied up in it, and don't need a big warehouse; make stuff just before it is supposed to ship so that we don't have to store it either; make frequent prayers and virgin sacrifices to whatever gods we can find to ensure that nothing slips up anywhere along the line that our lawyers can't get us out of.''"

Obviously, Beret Guy's business plan, [[1021: Business Plan]], worked. See also [[1117: My Sky]].

==Transcript==
:[A man approaches Beret Guy at a party and they extend arms to shake hands. Beret Guy is holding a metal briefcase. Ponytail is a waitress in the background, carrying a tray with a wine glass on it.]
:Connr: I'm Connr Clark, CTO at Eusocial Media Ventures.
:Beret Guy: I'm a business professional! Earlier I photocopied a burrito!

:[Connr hands Beret Guy a business card. Beret Guy takes it and hands Connr another business card. Beret Guy has put his suitcase on the floor.]
:Connr: You should check us out! Here's my card.
:Beret Guy: Here's mine!
:Beret Guy: Networking!

:[Connr takes a closer look at the card, and Beret Guy holds up his case.]
:Connr: ...this just says "This is my business card!"
:Beret Guy: Do you like it? I have more in my handlebox.

:[Beret Guy puts his case on a table and opens it to reveal it is full of cash. Connr looks on in shock.]
:Connr: Uh, that's ok, I think I'll—
:Beret Guy: Here, have ten of them!
:Connr: —holy shit that thing is full of ''cash!''

:[Connr raises his arms in excitement. Beret Guy turns to face him and chews on Connr's business card.]
:Connr: Where did you ''get'' that?
:Beret Guy: I am a business grown-up who makes business profits!
:Connr: That's like a quarter of a million dollars!
:Beret Guy: Yay! Business is fun!
:Beret Guy: Do you have more of your cards? They're ''delicious!''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairy]]
[[Category:Beret Guy's Business]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]

2619: Crêpe

2022-05-16T21:59:03Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 269119 by 162.158.107.84 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 2619
| date = May 13, 2022
| title = Crêpe
| image = crepe.png
| titletext = A medicine that makes you put two dots over your letters more often is a diäretic.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a ÇRÊPË - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
[[File:crêpe.png|thumb|The word "crêpe" in the comic]]
[[Cueball]] has made a {{w|crêpe}}, a thin pancake known for its legendary status in French cuisine, which he proudly announces. However, the {{w|circumflex}} (the accent above the e) is written strangely. Instead of the usual simple angle (^), it looks more like the outline of a flattened arrowhead (⮝). [[Megan]], who can apparently {{tvtropes|PsmithPsyndrome|hear the orthography}} of spoken text, comments on the odd shape with an appropriate pun.

Megan's response, "Weird circumflex but okay" is a play on the recent expression [https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Weird%20flex%20but%20ok Weird flex, but ok]. A "flex" is bragging about something. A "weird flex" is used when the speaker acknowledges (perhaps ironically) that the first person is attempting to brag about something, but doesn't recognise the thing as brag-worthy.

Her answer could also be applied to the shape of the crêpe, as circumflex means "bent around".

In some dialects of English (e.g. British English), and in the original French pronunciation, "crêpe" is said so that the ê is pronounced as in "get", i.e. "cr-eh-p", but American English speakers pronounce it like an "A", i.e. "cr-ay-p".

The title text continues the wordplay by saying that "A medicine that makes you put two dots over your letters more often is a diäretic".

The word diäretic is a pun on {{w|diuretic}} (a substance promoting increased urine production), {{w|Diaeresis (diacritic)|diaeresis}} (a symbol in the form of two dots placed above a vowel, as the ä in the made up word diäretic; the adjective form of diaeresis can be spelled "[https://www.thefreedictionary.com/Diaresis dieretic]") and {{w|diacritic}} (a glyph added to a letter to distinguish its sound from the normal version, what both the circumflex and the diaeresis are). See also the comic [[1647: Diacritics]] about the use of these. Taking a diäretic medicine would supposedly cause you to use diaeresis (also known as umlaut) över möre lëtters thän wöuld üsuallÿ bë thë cäse.

Diacritics are rarely used in English, potentially because of the diverse set of origin languages it developed from, or the wide variation of pronunciations within a same nation, but are a common feature of other languages. In English, they are normally only seen in specific loanwords (such as crêpe) or used for emphasis or decoration (for example the {{w|metal umlaut}} seen in rock bands like {{w|Motörhead}}, {{w|Mötley Crüe}}, {{w|Queensrÿche}}, or {{w|Spın̈al Tap}}). The exception to this is the diaresis, which when it is used at all, is placed over the second vowel in a double-vowel word to indicate a morphological break between them as opposed to a dipthong, e.g. naïve or coöperation. The diaresis is optional, and, especially with words beginning with the co- prefix (e.g. cooperation, coevolution, or coincidence), rarely used. The New Yorker magazine is a famous outlier, advising consistent use of the diaresis in [https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-curse-of-the-diaeresis its style guide].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is holding a plate up in both hand, showing Megan the crepe lying on the plate. His word for crêpe has a different diacritic over the "e" than the normal circumflex (^). Instead it looks more like an open arrow head.]
:Cueball: Check out this crêpe I made!
:Megan: Weird circumflex, but okay.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Language]]
[[Category:Puns]]
[[Category:Food]]

2619: Crêpe

2022-05-16T21:57:28Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 269116 by 162.158.107.84 (talk)

2619: Crêpe

2022-05-16T21:54:31Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 269114 by 108.162.245.69 (talk) vandalism

2619: Crêpe

2022-05-16T21:50:05Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 269112 by 108.162.245.31 (talk) due to vandalism

Talk:2618: Selection Bias

2022-05-13T13:35:02Z

172.69.69.250:

Why is the site giving errors so much? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.121|172.70.130.121]] 21:19, 11 May 2022 (UTC)
:It just went down for about ten minutes. Once in a while I was able to get pages to load, but it was rare (probably 3-5 times). Most of the pages that did load had no CSS. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.161|172.70.130.161]] 22:03, 11 May 2022 (UTC)
:I blame a secret global infiltration by brain-eating extraterrestrials bent on steadily eroding our infrastructure while we kill each other in stimulated warfare. Do you agree with this common hypothesis? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.241|172.70.114.241]] 01:00, 12 May 2022 (UTC)

I love the [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2618%3A_Selection_Bias&type=revision&diff=268675&oldid=268673 current explanation] of the title text, thanks [[User:Kev|Kev]] ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 06:38, 12 May 2022 (UTC)
:: I am the individual on mobile who revised the referenced text so as to mention engineers. This above comment by Kynde was added after my revision, but links to the previous version which was not current at the time of their post. I do not know why they call it current. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.62.123|162.158.62.123]] 07:07, 13 May 2022 (UTC)
:Hear, hear! A true gem! [[Special:Contributions/172.69.134.17|172.69.134.17]] 07:37, 12 May 2022 (UTC)
:Thank you kindly, meanwhile I return to find a much improved BALLPIT APPARTMENT and have come to say ''I got that reference'' and heartilly approve''''Italic text''''[[User:Kev|Kev]] ([[User talk:Kev|talk]]) 22:27, 12 May 2022 (UTC)
::I agree wholeheartedly, but what does it have to do with selection bias??? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.114.241|172.70.114.241]] 01:06, 13 May 2022 (UTC)Bumpf
::I don't get it at all, which kind of defeats the point of Explain XKCD when people are adding inside jokes. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.121|172.70.130.121]] 05:06, 13 May 2022 (UTC)
::: it's a reference to [[150: Grownups]] and [[162: Angular Momentum]], two very well known xkcd comics (so much so they are the footer comics!)[[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.250|172.69.69.250]] 13:35, 13 May 2022 (UTC)Bumpf

Acquiescence bias is often used in sales to try to induce a bigger sale. Asking, "Will there be anything else?" instead of "Is that all?" can make a significant difference in the amount of a sale, even though you are still leaving the decision up to the customer. [[User:Nutster|Nutster]] ([[User talk:Nutster|talk]]) 06:30, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

2519: Sloped Border

2022-05-12T14:32:00Z

172.69.69.250: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2519
| date = September 22, 2021
| title = Sloped Border
| image = sloped_border.png
| titletext = "The slope will be 74° at ground level." "Okay, I think we can hack together a ... wait, why did they specify ground level? It's 74° everywhere, right? ... Oh no, there's a whole section in the treaty labeled 'curvature.'"
}}

==Explanation==

Every country has land and sea {{w|international borders}} that demarcate the extent of their territory and their legal jurisdiction. These borders are established through law, treaty, or consensus. Establishing an international border is maintained by present-day customs, immigration, and security checks. Some countries (like {{w|Cyprus}}) have established a {{w|buffer zone}} outside of their international border in order to gain additional protection during a conflict, and most countries have an offshore {{w|Exclusive Economic Zone}} in order to preserve exclusive proprietorship of marine resources such as oilfields and fishing grounds.

In this comic, Cueball and Blondie have established a "sloped" international border through a treaty. Usually borders are perpendicular to the ground{{citation needed}} so that all the air(space) above the ground belongs to the same country. This is called {{w|Air sovereignty}}. Thus it suffices to define the border on the earth surface, as 1D lines across the curved 2D surface. The precise definition is that a line from the center of the Earth through the point of the border is drawn. Sloped terrain is immaterial to the border of the air sovereignty which is still vertical, even if not perpendicular to the terrain.

If the borders were sloped (with respect to the horizontal ground level) an airplane would need to know its precise height to decide if another country's jurisdiction currently applies. With the help of the {{w|Global Positioning System}} this would be in principle possible, although the height information of GPS is less reliable. (It might be possible to program a computer to use altitude data from the airplane's altimeter along with latitude and longitude data from the GPS and a relevant ground relief database to make an accurate determination.)

Most countries would not agree to a border that cuts into their airspace and shrinks their territory as the altitude increases; most cases of countries losing area have come about as a result of trying to avert, or losing, an armed conflict. It is entirely possible that Cueball's country has compelled Blondie's country to accept its demands, of which the redrawn border is one. Alternatively, Cueball's country may be deliberately reducing its own airspace purely because it will cause problems.

There is at least one famous case of a border being affected by elevation: the Franco-Swiss border bisects the staircase of the {{w|Hotel Arbez}}. Hence, although part of the upper floor is geographically in France, the entire floor is Swiss territory, because it is only accessible through Switzerland.

The mathematical computation for an angled air sovereignty seems relatively straight-forward at low level and could be expressed with a single line of code or a single equation, although the people acting on the information are likely unfamiliar with code and equations and likely use tools with completely no support for sloped borders. The mention of curvatures in the title text may reveal some emergent problems that need accounting for.

A totally straight line drawn far enough upwards at an angle will find the surface of the Earth curving away beneath it (not even considering terrain undulations) and the angle to the local vertical will reduce as it continues, tending towards vertical as you head towards infinite altitude.

Alternately (although it seems this is not the case) the profile of the sloped border may be assumed to remain at a constant angle to the shifting vertical, in which case it describes a certain {{w|Logarithmic spiral|form of spiral}} (which will eventually loop around the earth).

A third option is that it gains altitude at a constant rate, with respect to the passage of land measured on its surface track, to form a {{w|Archimedean spiral|different spiral}}, in which case it will still loop around the Earth but at an angle that increasingly tends towards horizontal.

While the comic doesn't mention this, such a boundary should probably also extend underground, in the opposite direction. (The straight-line version, if implemented, will eventually reach a depth at which it is tangential to the radius and then rise back through the surface an equal distance further around the planet.) This would then impact, at practical depths for such things, planning rights for property foundations and, at deeper levels, mining rights for minerals.

Practically an upper-limit to a nation's claim (somewhat below satellites, e.g. the Karman Line) and a lower limit (well before reaching the Earth's mantle) will prevent many of these complications, together with intersections with other (probably vertical) 'territorial volume' borders that will supercede in any compound claims to ownership. - However, it is still ''very important'' to specify exactly which curve (i.e. with respect to what) the boundary is designed to respecting.

"GIS" refers to {{w|geographic information system}}, a set of tools and methods for capturing, analyzing and presenting spatial and geographic data. While altitude is already an (optional) element in the blocks of information, people developing these systems would be inconvenienced by the additional requirements demanded by the border described in the comic.

It is possible this comic is inspired by such boundary disputes as the {{w|Beaufort_Sea#Border_dispute|Beaufort Sea 'wedge'}} which, while in this case perpendicular to the surface, suffers from alternative interpretations of how to extend it from the shoreline out towards international waters.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Blondie are standing on a podium. They are holding a document together between them, filled with unreadable text. On either side of the podium are two informational graphics each on a stand. They are placed a bit behind the back side of the podium. The graphic to the left shows a cross-sectional view of a non-vertical border, shown as a dotted line going up between Cueball and Blondie, who both are standing on the ground. The angle is indicated and noted, and the line tilts towards Blondie's side. The graphic on the right shows a skewed perspective of a similar setup of the non vertical border, shaded so what is behind it becomes gray. There are also some lines on this plane to indicate where it is. It almost looks like a window, but people can move through it. There are also two more persons than on the left, Megan, who is on the same side of the border as Cueball, and another Cueball-like guy standing next to Blondie. Megan is entirely on Cueball's side of the plane, but the other three are positioned so they are intersected by the 'shaded plane' of the border, with the effect that some or most of their bodies are beyond the sloped boundary, in the gray area, but not all. Cueball and Blondie are postureed in a mutual greeting across this border, as the others look on.]
:Cueball: With this treaty, we are proud to announce the creation of the world's first '''''sloped''''' international border!
:Angle: 74°

:[Caption below frame:]
:If I'm ever put in charge of a country, I'm going to spend all my time trying to think of new ways to make life a nightmare for GIS people.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category: Geography]]

498: Secretary: Part 5

2022-05-11T18:08:34Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 266646 by 👖🔥 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 498
| date = October 31, 2008
| title = Secretary: Part 5
| image = secretary part 5.png
| titletext = And they choose Al Gore as Internet Secretary.
}}

==Explanation==
This is the fifth and final comic in the Secretary story-arc. The culmination has [[Black Hat]] up to his usual shenanigans in the {{w|United States Senate chamber|US Senate chamber room}}.

The hearings have ended, with the chairman deciding to sentence him to death, instead of confirming his position of Internet Secretary. Black Hat replies that he was "never interested in taking the position." This would be quite weird, as Senate confirmation meetings take a long time. The committee members are obviously surprised, and they question Black Hat, trying to get him to reveal his motives. He then cryptically replies that "It was taking us a while to move the pumps into the maintenance tunnels." The confused committee members then look at each other.

A red playpen ball bursts out of the panel and rolls towards the committee chairman, before being followed by a geyser of red, white, and blue balls, which begin to engulf the room and the Senate rotunda. Of course, Black Hat has already escaped by grabbing Tron Paul's lightcycle and using it to smash his way out of the rotunda.

Outside the Senate, Cory Doctorow offers Black Hat a lift and asks if he's a fugitive now, and Black Hat replies that they never had his name, which is odd, considering that they know he's stolen a nuclear submarine, along with everything else mentioned in [[496: Secretary: Part 3]]

Back at Congress, they seem to have forgotten about Black Hat's "gleeful mayhem" and are jumping off the balcony into the ball pit below.

The title text refers to {{w|Al Gore}}. Al Gore was the {{w|Vice President of the United States|Vice President}} under President {{w|Bill Clinton}} and ran as the Democratic nominee for President in 2000. Al Gore has had {{w|Al Gore and information technology|quite a history with the Internet}}, including one oft-misquoted (rather, quoted out of context) interview with CNN in which he told {{w|Wolf Blitzer}}, "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet." Many spun this to mean he claimed to have actually invented the Internet himself, although some of its {{w|List of Internet pioneers|pioneers}} clarified what Gore actually meant (that "his initiatives led directly to the commercialization of the Internet") and agreed with this assessment.<ref>[https://www.theregister.co.uk/2000/10/02/net_builders_kahn_cerf_recognise/ "Net builders Kahn, Cerf recognise Al Gore"]. ''The Register''. October 2, 2000. [https://web.archive.org/web/20191215233809/https://www.theregister.co.uk/2000/10/02/net_builders_kahn_cerf_recognise/ Archived] from the original on December 15, 2019. Retrieved January 31, 2020. "No one in public life has been more intellectually engaged in helping to create the climate for a thriving Internet than the Vice President."</ref><ref>[https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/interviews/a4451/vint-cerf-0508/ "Vint Cerf Interview — Quotes from the Father of the Internet"]. ''Esquire''. April 24, 2008. [https://web.archive.org/web/20190904220345/https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/interviews/a4451/vint-cerf-0508/ Archived] from the original on September 4, 2019. Retrieved January 31, 2020. "His initiatives led directly to the commercialization of the Internet. So he really does deserve credit."</ref>

The Senate or a Senate committee, in reality, cannot sentence a person to death, as that would be a {{w|Bill of attainder|bill of attainder}}, which Congress is prohibited from passing by Article I, Section 9, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution: "No Bill of Attainder ... shall be passed." "An unorthodox move," indeed.

{{w|Tron (video game)|Tron}} was an arcade game, based on the {{w|Tron (movie)|movie}} of the same name, and both released in 1982. The characters would play on a grid in lightcycles that left behind walls of light. The objective of the game was to force the opponent to run into the wall of light, similar to the {{w|Snake (game)|Snake game}}.

Of course, [[playpen balls]] have been the topic of many comics before, notably in [[150: Grownups]].

All comics in the [[:Category:Secretary|Secretary]] series are:
*[[494: Secretary: Part 1]]
*[[495: Secretary: Part 2]]
*[[496: Secretary: Part 3]]
*[[497: Secretary: Part 4]]
*[[498: Secretary: Part 5]]

This series was released on five consecutive days (Monday-Friday) and not over the usual Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule.

It is possible that this series is a continuation of [[493: Actuarial]], in which Black Hat demonstrates great power over even Internet trolls via his sociopathic ways. This would explain why Black Hat was nominated as Internet secretary.

==Transcript==
:[The Senate. Black Hat sits before the committee at his hearing to become Internet Secretary.]
:Chairman: We were convened here to review your nomination for the position of internet secretary.

:Chairman: However, on review of your qualifications, we've decided to sentence you to death.

:Chairman: An unorthodox move, sure. But the vote was unanimous.
:[Black Hat is leaning back in his chair.]

:[Tron Paul's lightcycle swerves wildly.]
:Meanwhile...

:Tron Paul: There's no grid! How do I steeeeer!!!!!

:[Back at the Senate. Black Hat is standing.]
:Black Hat: Well, it's been fun. But I was never actually interested in taking the position. Good lord; listening to internet arguments all day? No thank you.

:Chairman: Then why did you sit through all those hearings?

:Black Hat: It was taking us a while to move the pumps into the maintenance tunnels.

:[The committee members murmur among themselves.]

:[There is a panel in the floor between Black Hat and the committee.]
:''RUMBLE''
:''plink plink''

:[A red playpen ball bursts out of the panel and rolls towards the committee chairman.]
:''plink''

:[The room is still. Black Hat's arms are folded.]

:[A geyser of red, white, and blue playpen balls bursts through the panel in the floor. Black Hat is already gone.]
:''FOOM''

:[The committee members chase Black Hat out the door as the Senate floor floods with playpen balls.]

:[The chase continues into the rotunda, as does the flood of playpen balls.]

:[Black Hat stands in the middle of the rotunda as it fills with playpen balls, surrounded by members of the committee.]
:Committee Members: Security! Someone!
:Committee Members: Get Him!

:[Tron Paul bursts through the wall.]
:''CRASH''
:Tron Paul: Aaaaa!

:[Black Hat grabs the bottom of the lightcycle as Tron Paul goes by.]
:''snag''
:Tron Paul: Hey!

:[Black Hat swings onto the top of the light cycle.]

:[Black Hat crouches on top of the light cycle.]
:Tron Paul: Get Off!

:[Tron Paul and Black Hat crash through the far wall of the rotunda.]
:''CRASH''

:[Tron Paul hits the ground.]
:''WHAM''
:Tron Paul: Ow!

:[Black Hat runs away.]
:Tron Paul: Ughhh.

:[The lightcycle disappears.]
:Tron Paul: I feel queasy...
:Cory Doctorow, above: Hey!
:Black Hat: Hi, Cory.
:Cory Doctorow: Need a lift?
:Black Hat: Sure.

:[Black Hat and Cory Doctorow depart in Doctorow's balloon.]
:Cory Doctorow: So are you, like, a fugitive now?
:Black Hat: Well, I never did give them my name...

:[Senators play in the playpen balls.]
:But in the rotunda
:Senators: Let's jump down here from the balcony!
:Senators: Senior senators first!
:Senators: Wheeee!
:Senators: I'm a submarine!
:All is forgiven.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Secretary|05]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|Secretary]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cory Doctorow]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ron Paul]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Playpen balls]]

821: Five-Minute Comics: Part 3

2022-05-11T18:02:51Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 265800 by 👖🔥 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 821
| date = November 19, 2010
| title = Five-Minute Comics: Part 3
| image = five minute comics part 3.png
| titletext = Resulting in The Little Rock 9x + C.
}}

==Explanation==
This is the third of three "five-minute comics" Randall posted during a week in November 2010. The introduction to the comic explains everything you need to know about the circumstances behind it.

Randall obviously made more than three of these five minutes comics, and one of them was published later, for a short period of time by a mistake, but an android xkcd browser picked it up while it was on-line and saved it. Since then it has been added to explain xkcd. So here is a complete list of all four comics in the entire [[:Category:Five-minute comics|Five-minute comics]] series:
*[[819: Five-Minute Comics: Part 1]]
*[[820: Five-Minute Comics: Part 2]]
*[[821: Five-Minute Comics: Part 3]]
*[[Five-Minute Comics: Part 4]]

Here is a list with explanations for each of the small comics:
*1. {{w|Pearl Harbor}} is a US Navy base that was {{w|Attack on Pearl Harbor|attacked}} in 1941 by Japanese airplanes, which prompted the US to join World War II. The attacks were made on ''December'' 7, 1941, not November 7. Thus, Randall is correct in depicting a Navy base going about its usual business.
This may also be a joke on present-day levels of awareness of the event; as it fades out of living memory, people might indeed confuse the date with November (or October) 7, despite it being {{w|Day of Infamy speech|"a date which will live in infamy"}}.

*2. {{w|Breastfeeding in public}} is a touchy subject in parts of the world. In the US, it is considered by some to be inconsiderate to others who would prefer not to see such a display. Of course, women breastfeeding in public are generally feeding their infants, not other adults. The situation presented in the comic is an absurd exaggeration of the debate.

*3. "s" is the command in {{w|sed}} to perform a pattern search-and-replace; the syntax has also been adopted by other text-processing utilities, including {{w|Perl}} (a favorite subject of xkcd), and has entered into the geek lexicon as something that could appear in general conversation. The specific command "s/I think that/I saw a study once that said/g" means "Find all occurrences of the phrase 'I think that', and replace it with the phrase 'I saw a study once that said'." This will, indeed, improve the persuasiveness of an article, as the existence of scientific evidence will make people more likely to believe what's said, while most people won't even think to actually look up the study in question.

*4. Arson is the crime of intentionally setting fire to a structure. {{w|Billy Joel}} will no doubt claim {{w|We Didn't Start the Fire|he didn't start the fire}}. And it turned out that they believed him. This was mentioned in the title text of [[1794: Fire]], which displays another similarly folded newspaper front page, with only the headline readable. The picture shown the fire Billy was arrested for, but he was only detained briefly. The song is also mentioned in [[1775: Things You Learn]].

*5. Coca-Cola is a fizzy cola-flavored soft drink, commonly abbreviated as "coke." {{w|Pop Rocks}} are a candy that contain tiny bubbles of gas, so that as the sugary candy dissolves on your tongue, it creates a popping sensation. For a long time, it was claimed that drinking the two together would cause one's stomach to explode; this was finally put to rest as some people (the Mythbusters in particular) started actually trying it, and discovered that it's merely painful, not lethal.
:Here, it's combined with elements of other common scary urban legends (phones ringing and creepy laughter) to form something bizarre.

*6. After ''{{w|Brown v. Board of Education}}'' ruled that schools could not segregate based on race, nine African American students from Little Rock, Arkansas enrolled in the previously-segregated Little Rock Central High School. The school board could not officially deny them attendance, but members of the community (and, after Arkansas governor Orval Faubus intervened, the Arkansas National Guard) formed a blockade to physically prevent them from entering the school building. The governor claimed this was within his power even after ''Brown v. Board'', because the students were enrolled without issue, they were just physically blocked from entering the school building. After determining that the right to enroll in a school does, implicitly, include the right to actually attend classes there, president Eisenhower ordered the 101st Airborne Division to accompany the students and force the National Guard to stand down, thus integrating the school. This incident became known as the {{w|Little Rock Nine}}.
:However, {{w|Integral|integration}} also has a meaning in mathematics. This is indicated in the comic with the soldiers lifting up a giant integral sign to place beside the school, in order to (mathematically) integrate it. Normally, an integral only makes sense on functions; however, since this is the Little Rock ''Nine'', if we take the integral of the constant function ''f''(''x'') = 9, we do, in fact, get 9''x'' + ''C'', as stated in the title text. The posture of the three soldiers with the integral sign echoes the iconic {{w|Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima}} photograph.

*7. Cell phones with advanced computing capabilities, typically at least requiring fully-featured Internet browsing, multimedia capabilities, and the ability to run software applications, are called "smartphones." Most cell phones also have a "vibrate" function that allows someone in a public situation to receive calls without alerting others; the phone will discreetly vibrate rather than activate a ringtone, thus privately notifying the owner that a call is incoming. A semi-common problem with this feature is that a vibrating phone on a table that has a slight slope will slowly - or, if the slope is bad enough, rather quickly - slide down the slope, possibly falling off the table and breaking. If our smartphones ever decided to kill us, this would possibly be their only method of attack.
**Randall later [http://what-if.xkcd.com/5/ covered this] in his [[what if?]] blog.

*8. The Three Little Pigs is a children's fairy tale about three pigs who build their houses out of, respectively, straw, sticks, and bricks. A wolf comes along and eats the pigs living in the straw and stick houses, but he can't knock down the brick house, because his only method for breaking them down is to blow on them until the material falls to pieces. (In some variants, the foolish pigs seek refuge in the brick house for a happier ending.)
:The 119 Little Pigs seems to be a variant where the pigs build their houses out of the 118 {{w|chemical elements}} (and bricks, presumably). The 38th little pig builds his house out of {{w|strontium}}, which is, of course, the 38th element on the Periodic Table. One wonders what happened to the pigs who are stuck making their houses out of elements that are gaseous or liquid at room temperature, or those whose houses would react with the air and/or undergo nuclear decay.
:In his book what if?, in the first comic, it shows the 92nd little pig, who built his house out of depleted Uranium, The wolf responded, "Dude". [https://store.xkcd.com/pages/if-you-re-looking-for-the-what-if-book/]
:Although given the water content in exhaled breath, it's {{w|Alkali metal#Reaction with water (alkali metal hydroxides)|easy to see}} how the wolf would huff, puff, and blow down the houses made of {{w|lithium}}, {{w|sodium}}, {{w|potassium}}, {{w|rubidium}}, {{w|caesium}}, and {{w|francium}}. Though making a houses out of {{w|hydrogen}}, {{w|helium}}, {{w|nitrogen}}, {{w|oxygen}}, {{w|fluorine}}, {{w|neon}}, {{w|chlorine}} and {{w|krypton}} would all be very difficult as they are gases at room temperature {{Citation needed}}. Also, there would be issues such as death from the toxicity of the elements, e.g. fluorine would kill the pig and wolf. The piggies may have difficulty collecting enough metal, as they would have trouble collecting enough {{w|technetium}} (43), which only occurs in minute traces, and {{w|astatine}}, of which approximately 1 ounce exists on earth.
:It could be a coincidence, or possibly Randall's intent, that the wolf asks "What is this shit?" while referring to strontium while "stronzo" is an Italian (vulgar) word for "turd", pronounced almost the same (it is a common source of bad taste jokes) and stront is a Dutch word for shit.

*9. "Fastest gun in the West" is a boast commonly made in Western movies, where it is used to mean that a person is the fastest at drawing his gun in a duel (or, alternatively, can fire his gun the fastest). It doesn't actually describe the gun itself, and certainly doesn't describe how fast the gun can gallop across the land.

*10. "It's what separates the ''men'' from the ''boys''" is a phrase used to describe "macho" activities that, apparently, only "real men" will participate/do well in; all the other men haven't grown up yet, and are thus "boys." This strip takes a more literal approach, making a joke about how centrifuges also seperate the men from the boys because the men are heavier. {{w|Centrifuge}}s are used to rapidly separate a material from the liquid it's suspended in; this is either a pun on the word "separate", or an attempt by Randall to make the occupation of lab technician seem macho.
**In the film ''{{W|Moonraker_(film)|Moonraker}}'', {{W|James Bond}} was almost killed in a centrifuge used as a g-force training vehicle for pilots/astronauts - but he survived - and he for sure is a real man... See also [[123: Centrifugal Force]].

*11. Narnia is the mythical land in ''{{w|The Chronicles of Narnia}}''. In the books, time passes differently in Narnia, such that one can spend many years in Narnia and come out to find that almost no time at all has passed on Earth; conversely, during a short trip back to Earth, hundreds of years could pass in Narnia. {{w|Lucy Pevensie|Lucy}} is taking advantage of this by putting a computer in Narnia to perform extremely fast computation. {{w|Folding@home}} and {{w|SETI@home}} are distributed computing projects that aim to solve extremely large computational problems by pooling together computer resources of thousands of home computers who volunteer for the project; Folding@home looks at how proteins are folded, which has applications in medical science, and SETI@home analyzes EM waves from space, looking for signs of extraterrestrial intelligent life amongst the cosmic background noise. Running through all of that data in a few hours would be quite an accomplishment indeed, given that, as Peter points out, the idea has many problems Lucy has evidently overcome:
**The book was written in 1957 and it occurs even earlier than that, long predating personal computers, so Lucy shouldn't even have one.
**Even if it occurs in an alternate universe where the PC was invented before 1957, the storage that would be needed to store the entire Folding@home and SETI@home databases would be far beyond her means, since the characters in the book are evacuees who don't have any money.
**Even if she somehow pulled that much storage space together, the time needed for one computer to run through those databases is on the order of millennia. A computer would not continuously run for that long without careful treatment, which Narnia is not equipped for.
**Even if we handwave around that issue (''"Aslan, use your power to keep all dust away from this computer for the next ten thousand years, please"''), the wall socket powering the computer is on the Earth side. Mains power outlets in the UK provide alternating current with an amplitude of 230 volts and a frequency of 50 hertz. The 50 Hz part is what's important here: all devices designed to work with UK mains power expect a 50 Hz sine wave. The time difference between Earth and Narnia would substantially elongate the sine wave in a method similar to the Doppler effect, which would probably prevent the computer from functioning at all. The frequency issue can be avoided by converting the alternating current to direct current on earth and passing the direct current to Narnia. However, to have a usable amperage (coulombs per second) on Narnia, the amperage (coulombs per second) on earth would have to be absurdly high, requiring wires much larger than shown. Also, the electricity costs would be too high.
**The time differential doesn't occur while people are entering/exiting Narnia (though they do occur while the wardrobe's open) or the Pevensie children would have had had some difficulty surviving the transition. Since the cables of the computer are crossing between the worlds, it seems unlikely that the time differential is even active yet.
:See also: [[1786: Trash]]

*12. ''{{w|The Honeymooners}}'' is a classic American sitcom. The show stars Ralph and Alice Kramden, and Ralph frequently makes empty threats of the form "One of these days, Alice...," followed by a combination of onomatopoeia. For example: "One of these days, Alice... BANG! ZOOM! Straight to the moon!" (Alice inevitably replies "Ahhh, shut up.")
:Here, Randall takes the pattern to a ridiculous and not-at-all threatening place.

==Transcript==
:Because of a family illness, instead of regular comics, this week I'll be sharing some strips that I drew as part of a game I played with friends. Each comic had to be written and drawn in five minutes.

:--Randall

:;Comic #1
:Pearl Harbor. November 7th, 1941.
:[There is a beach, with some ships floating in a crescent shaped harbor.]

:[The same bay, again.]

:[The boats continue to move about the harbor.]

:[The boats do their thing. A title explains.]
:(We're going to be here a while, since the attack wasn't until December.)

:;Comic #2
:[Cueball is sitting on a bus, Megan in front of him. Another person is sitting in front of Megan and another person is sitting behind Cueball.]
:I know it's natural and all, but I really wish women on the bus wouldn't try to breastfeed me.
:Megan: C'mon, have some milk. Right here.
:Cueball: I'm ''reading''.

:;Comic #3
:s/I think that/I saw a study once that said that/g
:Instant persuasiveness multiplier!

:;Comic #4
:[A newspaper front page. Billy Joel is between two policemen.]
:Times
:Billy Joel Arrested for Arson

:;Comic #5
:[One person has a cord leaving their mouth, the other is holding a handset on the end of it to their ear.]
:Handset: Hee hee hee... *giggle*
:I hear that if you drink coke and eat pop rocks, you vomit up a corded telephone handset on which you hear creepy little girls giggling.

:;Comic #6
:[Three soldiers are holding a large integral sign, while a fourth points a gun at the Little Rock High School.]
:1957: Eisenhower orders the military to integrate Little Rock High School.

:;Comic #7
:[A smartphone is vibrating across a table, towards a person.]
:The smartphones got ''too'' smart... and developed a taste... for BLOOD!
:Fortunately, the only way they could move was by turning on their vibrate while on a sloped table.

:;Comic #8
:[Cueball is reading to his child.]
:Cueball: And the wolf went to see the 38th little pig, who had built his house out of strontium.
:Cueball: And the wolf was all, "Ok, what is ''with'' this shit?"
:The 119 Little Pigs

:;Comic #9
:[Cueball is holding up a gun.]
:Cueball: Fastest gun in the west!

:[The gun is galloping across the desert.]
:''gallop gallop''

:[There is a podium, with a gun in each position.]
:Winner!

:;Comic #10
:[A picture of a centrifuge dominates the panel.]
:Centrifuges: They're what separate the men from the boys.

:;Comic #11
:[A computer monitor is plugged in, and cables run into a wardrobe.]
:Lucy: Time passes differently in Narnia, so by putting the CPU and storage for my machine there, I was able to run through the Folding@Home and Seti@Home databases in about an hour.
:Peter: There are so many problems with that.

:;Comic #12
:[Someone is talking to Alice.]
:Person: One of these days, Alice... Wham, zoom, sploosh, fwoom, splash, gurlle, wheeeee, fwoosh, aren't waterslides fun?!

==Trivia==
*A T-shirt based on the "Centrifuges" strip is available in the [https://store.xkcd.com/products/centrifuge xkcd store].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Five-minute comics| 03]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|Five-minute comics]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Substitutions]]
[[Category:Chronicles of Narnia]]
[[Category:Puns]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Comics with xkcd store products]]
[[Category:Smartphones]]
[[Category:Analysis]]

2597: Salary Negotiation

2022-05-11T17:54:28Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 265497 by 👖🔥 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 2597
| date = March 23, 2022
| title = Salary Negotiation
| image = salary_negotiation.png
| titletext = "We can do 0.33 or 0.34, but our payroll software doesn't allow us to--" "NO DEAL."
}}

==Explanation==
[[Ponytail]]'s company would like to hire [[Cueball]] for a job, and she is telling him that their offer for his starting salary is $55,000.

When offered a new job, it is common to negotiate on aspects of the offer such as salary, and employers may offer below the market rate initially in the expectation that the final negotiated amount will be higher. Given that the bedrock of one's future income depends on the outcome of a one-time process requiring skills unrelated to the job one is hired for, it is advisable to take one's time and do as much research as possible.

Cueball has clearly done some research, but perhaps too much as he is flummoxed by this high-stakes situation and starts to ramble with decreasing coherence. First he gets completely confused about the numbers. He says he won't have a penny over $50,000, thus cutting $5000 of the initial offer, and saying he will not have more than that. He realizes this was completely wrong, and corrects to "under", but is still 5000 lower. He then fumbles his words, asking for $60, then $600, then adding "thousand" for $600,000.

Realizing that he is completely off, he asks for a "15% cut of the salary". Here, Cueball seems to confuse salary and commission. "X% cut of the salary" seems like what a recruiter/headhunter may get from their employer as a commission if they successfully make their person hired.

The next word he says is "Raise". This could make sense if he already had a job, and wished to negotiate for a pay raise. After this, he begins to think of raise as in a card game and starts rambling off mainly poker related terms, like "raise", "fold" and "pass". He throws in "double down" in between. This can also be a card game term, as in {{w|blackjack}} where double down means to double a bet after seeing one's initial cards, with the requirement that one additional card be drawn. Lastly, he randomly mentions "fill it up with regular", which could be a request to a gas station attendant to fill a vehicle with "regular" (compared to higher octane) gasoline.

Ponytail tries to ask him something, but Cueball interrupts her, saying he is sorry and that he would like to start over. At this time he takes out several sheets of paper and looks at some charts. He asks if he can borrow a calculator and then asks what's 20% of $55,000. (This would be $11,000.) He eventually settles on a number, $61,333.3 He even states that the decimals of 3 should be repeating, as in forever. This is {{w|0.999...#Algebraic_arguments|exactly}} $61,333⅓. He clearly states he will not take the job for less than that. A [https://hbr.org/2016/03/dont-use-round-numbers-in-a-negotiation 2016 Harvard Business School study] found that avoiding round numbers is a remarkably effective negotiation tactic.

Since this is not that much more than the starting offer Ponytail is ready to accept this and says "Sure, $61,333 is fine." But Cueball interrupts her because what she just offered him was 33⅓ cents less than he asked for.

In the title text it shows that this is not good enough. Cueball has now confused himself to the point he will only accept ''exactly'' what he asked for, the bizarre amount $61,333⅓. Ponytail tries to explain to him that the point 3 repeating cannot be paid in whole cents, and tries to let him know that their payroll software only can handle whole cents, and he thus can get either 0.33 or 0.34 (the latter actually being more than he asks for). Alas, Cueball, either out of panic or a love of mathematics, shouts "No deal!" and lets the job slip out of his hands, because he has completely misunderstood the concept of negotiation.

For more interview-related xkcd comics, see for instance [[:Category:Job interviews]].

This could also be taken in series with Cueball (possibly as a stand in for Randall) misunderstanding classically "adult" ideas, see for instance [[616: Lease]], [[905: Homeownership]], [[1674: Adult]] and [[1894: Real Estate]].

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail sits in an office chair at her desk, with Cueball sitting in a similar chair on the other side with his hands on his knees. Ponytails has her hands on the desk and in front of her, there is a slim thing standing up. It could be a very small screen, but there seems to be no keyboard in front of her. Maybe it is a small tablet with a support for letting is stand up. Behind that there are what appears to be two piles of papers of different sizes.]
:Ponytail: We'd like to extend an offer! The starting salary is $55,000.
:Cueball: Wow. I guess I'm inside a negotiation!
:Ponytail: I... Weird to phrase it like that, but-
:Cueball: ''I can do this.''

:[Zoom in on Cueball's upper half.]
:Cueball: I won't accept a penny over $50,000. Sorry, I mean under. Under $60. I mean, $600. Thousand. $600,000. I want a 15% cut of the salary. Raise. Double down. Fold. Pass. Fill it up with regular.

:[The same shot, except Cueball is now holding three pieces of paper, and he is looking down on them. Ponytail is talking to him from off-panel.]
:Ponytail (off-panel): Are you-
:Cueball: Sorry, sorry. Let me start over.
:Cueball: OK, my chart says...
:Cueball: ...Can I borrow a calculator? What's 20% of $55,000?

:[Back to the scene from the first panel. Ponytail has taken one hand down to her knee, with the other still on the desk. Cueball has put the papers on his lap and has raised his hand in the air holding one finger up. In his other hand he holds either a borrowed calculator or his own smartphone.]
:Ponytail: Listen, if you need to-
:Cueball: I won't take this job for less than $61,333 point 3 repeating!
:Ponytail: Sure, $61,333 is fine. That's actually-
:Cueball: '''''Point 3 repeating or I walk!'''''

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Job interviews]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

1081: Argument Victory

2022-05-11T17:54:00Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 266683 by 👖🔥 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 1081
| date = July 13, 2012
| title = Argument Victory
| image = argument victory.png
| titletext = Really, the comforting side in most conspiracy theory arguments is the one claiming that anyone who's in power has any plan at all.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] is arguing with a {{w|conspiracy theorist}} who believes in some {{rw|conspiracy}}, who is sitting in front of his computer talking back. They are probably using {{w|Skype}}, {{w|FaceTime}}, or another video calling service, as Cueball later asks him to watch closely, holding his phone up to show the other guy what he is doing.

Cueball's opponent seems to ignore all reliable sources, like {{w|Snopes}} and {{w|Wikipedia}} on top of several {{w|Academic journal|journals}}, instead preferring sources that are seemingly not credible (but that do agree with him). These conspiracy ".net" pages typically just have a black background and use several different sizes of fonts, the larger (and probably also in bright colors), the more convincing, seems to be the belief, and Cueball cannot take these kinds of sources seriously. ".net" websites can be made by anyone and have little limitations. The maker of a ".net" does not need to show sources of information or even their name. As such, ".net" websites are notoriously unreliable and often have viruses or other malware. [http://zapatopi.net/blackhelicopters/ The Truth about Black Helicopters] is a (satirical) example of one such website, supposedly explaining the truth behind government "Black Helicopters".

The conspiracy theorist insists that by trusting reliable sources, Cueball is simply buying into the cover-up, suggesting that all those journalists are somehow brainwashed. Cueball says he can win the argument, and will show him how, but then ceases to argue further in favor of going down a {{w|waterslide}} while holding up the phone to show the other guy how to have a good time. Since conspiracy theorists tend to be [[wikt:intransigent|intransigent]], Cueball sees himself as the victor after ceasing to argue with a guy who cannot be argued with, and instead decides to have some fun. This is made even more satisfying for Cueball by the fact that it makes his opponent angry. It's likely that this is also a reference to the ''[https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/your-argument-is-invalid "Your Argument is Invalid"]'' meme.

The joke here is also in the title of the comic which is ''[http://imgur.com/EKkAXgR Argument Victory]'' something that is very hard to achieve by on the web... Cueball won this victory not by arguing but by stopping this argument he was having with someone that could/would not be argued with, such as going down a waterslide.

The title text points out that belief in a conspiracy presupposes that those with the power to carry out the conspiracy actually have a plan, a situation which might be found more "comforting" than the alternative that those in power are just muddling through with no plan at all. This concept is revisited in [[1274: Open Letter]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball, looking right, is talking at his smartphone while holding it up in front of his head using both hands.]
:Cueball: I can't believe you're so wrong. I'm backed by Snopes, Wikipedia, and a half-dozen journals. You're citing .net pages with black backgrounds and like 20 fonts each.

:[A conspiracy theorist is sitting in front of this lap top at his desk looking left. He has his hair combed down. He is talking to Cueball via his laptop, probably Skyping.]
:Conspiracy theorist: It's sad how you buy into the official story so unquestioningly.
:Conspiracy theorist: Guess some people ''prefer'' to stay asleep.

:[Back to Cueball who has lowered his phone a bit. The reply from the conspiracy theorist is shown to come out of the phone with a jagged arrow and likewise speech bubble.]
:Cueball: Watch closely— I'm about to win this argument.
:Conspiracy theorist (reply from phone): How?

:[Cueball is sitting at the very top of a waterslide preparing to descend.]
:Cueball: By ''going down a waterslide''.

:[A split panel, with a close-up of the conspiracy theorist above and below Cueball is sliding down the waterslide with both hands above his head, water splashing up behind him as he holds his smartphone above the water in one hand.]
:Conspiracy theorist: So? What does that prove?
:Cueball: ''Wheee..''

:[Another split panel, this time a smaller part is used for the close-up of the conspiracy theorist above and below Cueball has more of this panels space for sliding down to the bottom of the waterslide with both hands above his head, water still splashing up behind him as he continues to keep his smartphone above the water in one hand.]
:Conspiracy theorist: You didn't win the argument!
:Cueball: ''...eeee!''
:Cueball: ''Sploosh!''

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Conspiracy theory]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]
[[Category:Internet]]

274: With Apologies to The Who

2022-05-11T17:45:24Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 265493 by 👖🔥 (talk)

{{comic
| number = 274
| date = June 8, 2007
| title = With Apologies to The Who
| image = with_apologies_to_the_who.png
| titletext = Trivia: Roger Daltry originally wrote "Don't try an' Digg what we all say" but erased the second "g" when he moved to reddit.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic refers to the song "{{w|My Generation}}" by the British rock band {{w|The Who}}, which was released in 1965. The song is about {{w|intergenerational conflict}} and has been regarded as a very decided proclamation of youthful rebellion. [[Cueball]] adapts the lyrics to describe his own generation, the {{w|Millennials}}. As people born from the 1980s onwards grew up with the internet, this generation is also nicknamed "{{w|digital natives}}." It is therefore natural that the updated lyrics should refer to {{w|blogging}} and {{w|internet slang}}. The actions performed by Cueball while typing the text relate to the original [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=594WLzzb3JI music video,] in which The Who smash their instruments in true rock star fashion. Cueball wails his keyboard like a guitar and smashes his monitor in the end.

The title text jokingly suggests that the band's lead singer {{w|Roger Daltrey}} originally meant the line
:And don't try and Digg what we all s-s-say
as a reference to the social news site {{w|Digg}}, but changed it after switching to its competitor {{w|Reddit}}.

;Explanation of Terms
An explanation of the terms in this comic:
:"noobs" is a synonym of "newbie," which is a person who is new to an online community and is thus often not familiar with the rules and norms of the community. Cueball is suggesting that old people are not competent/familiar with the online realm.
:"the tubes" is likely a reference to the saying {{w|series of tubes}}.
:"grok" is a synonym for "understand." Cueball is suggesting that people of older generations have difficulty understanding internet slang, which is often true.
:"bloggin'" (blogging) is the act of writing in a {{w|blog}}.

;Original Lyrics
The original lyrics of the song run as follows:
:People try to put us d-d-down
:Just because we get around
:Things they do look awful c-c-cold
:I hope I die before I get old
:[...]
:Why don't you all f-fade away
:And don't try and dig what we all s-s-say
:I'm not trying to cause a big s-s-sensation
:I'm just talkin' 'bout my g-g-g-generation''

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is sitting at a desk with a computer, typing.]
:Monitor: People try to shut us d-d-down
:just 'cause our music gets around
:[Cueball is standing on his chair and typing with his keyboard across his hip.]
:Monitor: Old folks act like total noobs
:get off our net; you block the tubes
:[Cueball is really wailing on the keyboard.]
:Monitor: Why don't you all just d-d-disconnect
:and don't try an' grok our d-d-dialect
:[Cueball smashes the keyboard into the monitor.]
:Monitor: I'm not tryin' to cause a big s-s-sensation
:I'm just bloggin' 'bout my generation

==Trivia==

The song was actually written by guitarist {{w|Pete Townshend}}.

Roger Daltrey's name is misspelled as "Daltry".

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Internet]]
[[Category:Music]]

49: Want

2022-05-04T18:38:38Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 241150 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 49
| date = January 14, 2006
| title = Want
| image = want.jpg
| titletext = Well, she's pretty hot.
}}

==Explanation==

Cueball is making an honest profession of his feelings. This is often held up as a valuable thing in cementing a relationship. In the first three panels, he makes the kind of cliched poetic, romantic statements that would typically be expected. In the last panel, however, he undercuts all of this by crassly revealing that he also really wants to have sex with his paramour's sister.

In the title text, he attempts to excuse his statement by reasoning that the sister is very attractive.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is standing talking in the same position in all four panels. In the second panel, Cueball seems to have hair.]
:Cueball: I want to be brave enough to tell you how I feel.

:Cueball: I want to say "I love you" before I hang up the phone for once.

:Cueball: I want to drive all night with you, listening to mix tapes, not caring where we end up.

:Cueball: Oh, and I also really want to get with your sister.
:Cueball: I mean, DAMN.

==Trivia==
*This was the 46th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[48: Found]].
**The next was [[50: Penny Arcade]].
*Original title: "Drawing - Want"
*There were no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
*This comic was one of the last 11 comics posted on LiveJournal.
**These 11 comics were [[:Category:Posted on LiveJournal after xkcd|posted both on LiveJournal and xkcd]] after the [[xkcd]] site opened on the 1st of January 2006.
**This comic was posted on the same day on both sites.
**They were not all posted on the same day though.
*During the start-up of xkcd, four of the last 11 comics were released on days that deviated from the normal Monday, Wednesday, Friday scheme.
**This one was thus '''released on a Saturday'''.
**It was the middle part of a series of three where the release day was shifted to one day later.
**This one was posted so late, 11:41 pm, that it almost became a Sunday comic.
**The next "Friday" comic [[52: Secret Worlds]] was also released on a Saturday.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 46]]
[[Category:Posted on LiveJournal after xkcd]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Romance]]
[[Category:Footer comics]]
[[Category:Your sister]]

[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

41: Old Drawing

2022-05-04T18:38:03Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240827 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 41
| date = November 23, 2005
| title = Old Drawing
| image = unspeakable_pun.jpg
| titletext = I don't want to talk about it
}}

==Explanation==

This comic plays off the pun between [http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/stumped stumped], meaning confused or at a loss, and {{w|Tree stump|a stump}}, which is the remnants of a tree that has been cut down.

Anyone snooping into his journal would be punished by such a terrible pun. The pun is so terrible that even [[Randall]] does not want to talk about it, as he mentioned in the title text.

==Transcript==
:[A tree holding a chainsaw over a recently cut-down tree. The first text is in a frame at the top of the panel.]
:I found this in one of my high-school notebooks. I think I drew it just to take revenge on people snooping through my stuff.
:Tree stump: Well, you stumped me...

==Trivia==
*This was the 36th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[33: Self-reference]].
**The next was [[35: Sheep]].
*Original title: "Wednesday's Drawing - Old Notebook".
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "I'm on vacation! At home. Fresh drawings when I return!"
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 36]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Language]]
[[Category:Puns]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

40: Light

2022-05-04T18:37:46Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240842 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 40
| date = October 21, 2005
| title = Light
| image = light.jpg
| titletext = Like a beacon
}}

==Explanation==
Lighthouses were built on coasts to give ships a point of reference where land was, so that they could find where they were going, and to know where they should avoid during a storm. [[Megan]] fills this role for [[Cueball]]. She is his lighthouse to know where he can be safe.

This also has a romantic notion, as Megan is lighting up the world for Cueball to find her.

==Transcript==
:[A crowd of figures stand around in the dark. A Megan is illuminated by a beam of light.]
:In a dark and confusing world,
:you burn brightly
:I never feel lost

==Trivia==
*This was the 22nd comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[44: Love]].
**The next was [[22: Barrel - Part 3]].
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing"
*There was no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper or graphing paper]].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 22]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Romance]]
[[Category:Footer comics]] 
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

39: Bowl

2022-05-04T18:37:19Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240853 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 39
| date = December 5, 2005
| title = Bowl
| image = bowl.jpg
| titletext = For the moment it's a standoff
}}

==Explanation==
The comic roughly parodies a situation in which two characters are seeing who can wait longer to get the result they want. However, in the comic, the model sailing ship is not alive and doesn't experience time (except perhaps if it absorbs water and falls apart, or beaches once the water in the bowl evaporates). The comic compares the patience of a boy with that of an inanimate object. Also, it could imply that the boy has too much time on his hands.

Like many of the earlier comics, some of this comic's humor comes from the surreality of the situation. The gravity of the boy's statement is juxtaposed with the insignificance of a child's toy floating in a bowl of water. On one level, the absurdity of this is funny in itself; on another level, the audience is invited to imagine what might possibly be going through the boy's mind to make him take this toy and bowl so seriously.

Alternatively, the comic can be taken to recognize the mortality and ultimate fate of death/decay for both the boat and the boy, creating a grim moral. But, if one goes deeper into meaning, one could realize that the comic itself is humorous for trying to make a fatalistic statement using a boy and a toy boat, still making the comic ultimately humorous.

In the original quote for this comic (see [[#Trivia|trivia]]), [[Randall]] states that this is not the [[:Category:Barrel|barrel boy]]. This is not only because they have a similar hairstyle. Since the Barrel Boy was floating on the water in a barrel, and this boy is looking into a bowl (not barrel) filled with water, it would be easy to draw some parallels. It was obviously important for Randall to make clear that there were no such connections.

==Transcript==
:[A boy is glaring at a model sailing ship floating in a bowl of water.]
:Boy: Sooner or later, my friend, one of us will run out of time.

==Trivia==
*This was the 41st comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[43: Red Spiders 2]].
**The next was [[45: Schrodinger]]
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing - Bowl"
**This was the last comic where the release day was part of the title on LiveJournal.
**But the extra word "Drawing" was part of four more of the next five comics.
*Original [[Randall]] quote:
::"This is not the barrel boy.
::'''Current Mood:''' ''Final Exam-y''"
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*This comic thus turned out to be '''the last''' that was '''only''' posted on LiveJournal.
**The day after this comic on December 6, 2005, the following was posted on LiveJournal:
::'''Announcement'''
::"What with winter break starting and the like, I'll probably be going off my regular update schedule. I'll try to post something here and there, and might end up doing more drawings than I expect, but won't stick to the MWF schedule.
::Thanks for the support! This has been and will continue to be a lot of fun."
:*This may also be due to his examinations coming up. But probably he was using a lot of time preparing for the release of his new xkcd site after new year.
*The next comic was first released almost a month later.
**On January 4, 2006, [[45: Schrodinger]] became the first comic posted directly on xkcd on the same day as it was posted on LiveJournal.
*This was the last of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]] that was released on LiveJournal.
**[[:Category:First day on xkcd|Three other comics]], previously not released on LiveJournal, were later released on xkcd, but with numbers below 39.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 41]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

38: Apple Jacks

2022-05-04T18:37:02Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240850 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 38
| date = November 30, 2005
| title = Apple Jacks
| image = apple_jacks.jpg
| titletext = There used to be these ads, see...
}}

==Explanation==
{{w|Apple Jacks}} is a breakfast cereal produced by {{w|Kellogg's}}. As the title text begins to explain, there was an ad campaign for the cereal in the 1990s that focused on someone (usually someone in authority like a parent) pointing out that Apple Jacks doesn't taste like apples, and one or more kids pointing out that it doesn't matter and that "we eat what we like." However, instead of laughing off his dad's comment and correcting him, as in the campaign, this son responds by simply saying "fuck off, dad."

This could be a commentary on today's youth being far less respectful, as the son is playing video games and seems annoyed at being interrupted, though this does not align with Randall’s public views. It may not be the first time the father has used the line, and the son is irritated by the repetition. It could also be saying that the response in the ads is unrealistic, and this is a much more realistic response.

The same ad campaign was referenced previously in [[27: Meat Cereals]] on a parody cereal labeled Scrapple Jacks.

Cereal advertising was again referenced in [[1470: Kix]].

The title text could be a reference to the fact that this comic requires explanation for those who don't know of the ad (the reason this webpage exists), or it is an addition to the joke. This is another of the early comics where [[Randall]] felt the need to explain the joke in the title text, see for instance [[30: Donner]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is standing holding a bowl in his hand. His son is sitting on the floor playing video games.]
:Cueball: Hey, these don't taste like apples!
:Son: Fuck off, Dad.

==Trivia==
*This was the 39th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[42: Geico]].
**The next was [[43: Red Spiders 2]].
*Original title: "Wednesday's Drawing - Apple Jacks"
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "Who else remembers those commercials?"
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 39]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

37: Hyphen

2022-05-04T18:36:36Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240831 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 37
| date = October 28, 2005
| title = Hyphen
| image = hyphen.jpg
| titletext = I do this constantly
}}

==Explanation==
This is the first "[[My Hobby]]" comic in ''[[xkcd]]''. In these comics, [[Randall]] suggests an obscure activity or pastime he enjoys that he declares as his "hobby." In the premiere "My Hobby" comic, Randall's hobby is mentally re-interpreting what people mean when they say "[adjective]-ass [noun]" by moving the hyphen to after the word "ass" instead of before.

The semi-{{Wiktionary|scatological}} suffix "-ass" is used as an intensifier in informal US English speech, usually attached to an adjective directly modifying a noun, as in "big-ass car" or "funny-ass comedian." In this comic, [[Cueball]] is exploring the increased humor aspect of changing "-ass" from a suffix modifying the adjective, to "ass-", a prefix modifying the noun, yielding a "big ass-car" or a "funny ass-comedian," the former presumably being a large car for carrying buttocks, the latter being a humorous comedian specializing in jokes about lower backs. The prefix "ass-" may also have a negative connotation, indicating that something is disliked. An "ass-car" may be a very terrible car, for example.

Another explanation would be that, since this suffix/prefix refers to an element of human anatomy, the car would be in the shape of said anatomical piece.

Outside of North America, most English speakers use "arse" to mean the buttocks, so to them, it may sound as if Randall's talking about donkeys.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball (on the left) is talking to his Cueball-like friend (on the right) about a car (left to both of them) that resembles a Volkswagen Beetle. Above the drawing is a statement:]
:My hobby: whenever anyone calls something an [adjective]-ass [noun], I mentally move the hyphen one word to the right.

:Cueball: Man, that's a sweet ass-car.

==Trivia==
*This was the 25th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[23: T-shirts]].
**The next was [[25: Barrel - Part 4]].
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing - Hyphen"
**After a series of comics with no real title, only the week day as a heading, he began again, with this one, to add titles, but only after stating the week day.
**He kept this practice with including the title after the weekday, until he began using the xkcd site - see [[45: Schrodinger#Trivia|this trivia]].
***Except for the next Barrel comic, with no added title.
***And the last Barrel comic [[31: Barrel - Part 5| Barrel - Part 5]] with the original title but not the week day.
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "Tune in Monday for the conclusion to the story of the boy and his barrel."
**The next comic on Monday really wasn't the conclusion of the [[:Category:Barrel|barrel story]] as mentioned above.
**This is the first, and probably last time, that Randall has used a quote/[[Title text|title text]] to advertise the next comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*This is one of the two comics featured in ''[[Blue Eyes]]: The Hardest Logic Puzzle in the World'', the other being [[82: Frame]].
*On an interesting note, there '''really is''' such a thing as an {{w|ASS (car)|Ass-Car}}!
*There is a bot on reddit that does this to people's comments.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 25]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:My Hobby]]
[[Category:Language]]
[[Category:Footer comics]] 
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

36: Scientists

2022-05-04T18:36:20Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240878 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 36
| date =  2006
| title = Scientists
| image = scientists.jpg
| titletext = A leading expert characterized the situation as 'retarded'
}}

==Explanation==
This comic plays on the type of statement that news reports often use: "in what [group of experts] are calling '[quote]'," to add more weight and credibility to their stories. In this case, [[Cueball]] is using the phrase to attempt to add gravitas to the (relatively mundane) fact that his shoes are missing and he thinks it's "pretty gay" by assigning this opinion to scientists (rather than it being, presumably, his friend's or his own opinion). The same joke is at play in the image text where a leading expert thinks the situation is "retarded."

There may be a second level to the joke: Randall was still working for NASA at the time the comic was posted, so his friends at that time would presumably include scientists and "leading experts." If his friends made fun of him for not being able to find his shoes, it would therefore be accurate to say that scientists had made those statements. However, since their being scientists is irrelevant to the legitimacy of their opinions about Randall's shoe problems, presenting their teasing as an expert opinion is humorously misleading; a similar joke is at play in [[1206: Einstein]].

The phrases "pretty gay" and "retarded" are homophobic and ableist slang for "foolish" or "contemptible," and so they are the opposite type of speech expected of experts on news reports. (These terms were not generally considered more than mildly offensive by most of the public at the time this comic was posted; the cultural mainstream is now typically much more critical of this type of language, and this comic would likely be heavily criticized if it were published today.)

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is staring at an empty box on the floor.]
:Cueball: In what scientists are calling "pretty gay", I can't find my shoes.

==Trivia==
*This comic was never posted on [[LiveJournal]].
**But its "comic number" was still among the 44 comics that was posted on the day the xkcd web site opened (1st of January 2006).
**41 one of these were previously posted on LiveJournal; only three were not.
**The other two are [[5: Blown apart]] and [[12: Poisson]].
*However, comic #36 was originally posted as a duplicate of comic [[10: Pi Equals]]. This was corrected sometime between [http://web.archive.org/web/20060423175703/http://www.xkcd.com/c36.html April 23, 2006] and [http://web.archive.org/web/20060705231511/http://xkcd.com/c36.html July 5, 2006], when the current version showed up in the web archive (see the links).
**The comic looks like one of Randall's old drawings. So when he realized his mistake (over three months after it was originally posted), he probably found an old drawing he never originally intended to use and posted it, to not make it stand out compared to the other comics from that time.
**This is the reason there is no date for this comic. It can be anytime between the two dates mentioned above.

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:No date]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Language]]

35: Sheep

2022-05-04T18:35:55Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240881 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 35
| date = November 26, 2005
| title = Sheep
| image = sheep.jpg
| titletext = I think it's the sheep zapping the cactus and not vice-versa
}}

==Explanation==
Due to Randall's vacation, he picked out comics from his old high-school notebooks. This is the second in a row. It was also released a day too late.

It is a very weird drawing, especially with the title text proclaiming that it may be the sheep that is zapping the cactus. The comic [[520: Cuttlefish]] may be a reference to this comic.

It may also be a {{w|Pokémon}} reference, with the sheep being the Electric-type Mareep or its evolution Flaaffy, and the cactus being Cacnea or Cacturne.

==Transcript==
:[Caption in a black frame above the image written in normal letters not all caps:]
:Another from my high-school notebooks.
:[A sheep and a green saguaro cactus in a brown pot are linked by an arcing yellow electricity bolt.]

==Trivia==
*This was the 37th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[41: Old Drawing]].
**The next was [[42: Geico]].
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing - Sheep"
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "I'm still on vacation, sorry this is a bit late. I forgot what day it was. Anyway, I'll be back Monday, possibly with new drawings about cereal!"
**This was the reason the Friday comic came out on a Saturday for the second week running.
**The one about cereal came out on Wednesday: [[38: Apple Jacks]]
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

===Poem by Scott===
In the comment to the original [[LiveJournal]] post there was a user called Scott who posted this original poem:
:I had a little cactus and I treasured it with pride,
:admiring its spines and dainty flowers.
:Until the day - oh tragic day! - when it was RAMIFIED,
:by a ram with strange psychokinetic powers.

:Baaing deep, this shaman sheep came whiffling through the brambles.
:It gazed upon my cactus and, with yellow flash and thudrous crash,
:with dashing, brash, and rash panache,
:it blew the plant to shambles.

:I was, I confess, horrified - I sat and cried my eyes out!
:Oh stupid sheep, satanic sheep, so wrong and rash and willful!
:I nursed the cactus best I could, till finally it came about.
:It grows apace now, once again, but all it blooms is steel wool!

[And then in another post beneath this posted four minutes after the poem at 4:57 UTC (AM?) he finished with:]
:Oh God I need sleep!

If this is the [[Scott]] who is a friend of Randall, it is not entirely clear....

===Other poems===
:Mary had a little lamb
:She tied it to a pylon
:Ten thousand volt went up its a**
:And turned its wool to nylon.

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 37]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Scott]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

34: Flowers

2022-05-04T18:35:37Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240776 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 34
| date = November 9, 2005
| title = Flowers
| image = flowers.jpg
| titletext = This is actually pencil on paper, just inverted and colored
}}
==Explanation==
This is a drawing of flowers that [[Randall]] made. It seems the flowers are based on his imagination, rather than being a real species - see the original quote in the [[#Trivia|trivia]] section.

The title text explains that Randall originally drew the flowers in pencil on normal paper; he did not paint them. Instead, he used the invert feature of a photo-editing program to reverse it from black-on-white to white-on-black. After that, he added color to the flowers.

==Transcript==
:[A sketch of flowers, drawn in green, red, and yellow on a black background.]

==Trivia==
[[File:flowers_inverted.jpeg|Inverted and desaturated version of the comic.]]

*As noted in the title text, the original drawing for the comic was made in pencil, then inverted and colored. The image above is a re-inverted, desaturated version of the comic, which gives a good approximation of what the original drawing might have looked like.
*This was the 30th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[30: Donner]].
**The next was [[29: Hitler]].
*Original title: "Wednesday's Drawing - Flowers"
*Original [[Randall]] quote:
::"Original drawing is pencil on {{w|graph paper}}.
::Bonus points if you can identify the flowers. 'cause I sure can't."
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 30]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics with inverted brightness]]

33: Self-reference

2022-05-04T18:35:24Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240869 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 33
| date = November 21, 2005
| title = Self-reference
| image = self-reference.jpg
| titletext = I think about self-reference a lot. Example: this comment.
}}

==Explanation==

{{w|Self-reference}} is a situation where something (a comic, a drawing, a musical work, a novel, a mathematical theorem) refers to itself in some manner. This can be a powerful technique in art, music, mathematics, and computer science (it is the basis of recursion).

In this comic, [[Cueball]] promises not to use self-reference for humor, and then realizes after a beat panel that, since this comic is referring to the series of comics he is part of, he is using self-reference, thus breaking his promise.

Without the last panel, this comic wouldn't be funny, and therefore wouldn't break the promise about using self-reference for humor. But with it, and his realization that he is breaking his promise, it does break that promise. (Do you get it?)

The title text is just another humorous self-reference.

Self-references has been used most famously later in [[688: Self-Description]], but was already used in [[6: Irony]] and also in [[:Category:Self-reference|other comics]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is standing alone.]
:Cueball: I promise to never again squeeze humor out of self-reference.

:[Beat panel.]

:[Cueball is standing alone.]
:Cueball: God dammit.

==Trivia==
*This was the 35th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[32: Pillar]].
**The next was [[41: Old Drawing]].
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing - Self-reference"
**Randall had some issues around this time. The Friday comic from the week before (and also this week) came out on a Saturday.
**And this comic is a '''Monday''' comic, released on a Monday morning.
*There was no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*The web comic Comic JK made this spoof of the comic:
**The [https://web.archive.org/web/20140323234759/http://comicjk.com/comic.php/44 xkcd self reference].
{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 35]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Self-reference]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

31: Barrel - Part 5

2022-05-04T18:35:11Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240751 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 31
| date = November 16, 2005
| title = Barrel - Part 5
| image = barrel_part_5.jpg
| titletext = Too good not to happen.
}}

==Explanation==
This gives a happy ending to the [[:Category:Barrel|Barrel series]]. The flying ferret is from [[20: Ferret]]. The humor is derived from the juxtaposition of two unlike elements - in this case, the contemplative and even dark nature of the Barrel series being resolved through the timely intervention of a comical flying mammal.

Said mammal could also be interpreted as a symbol of hope and following your dreams, seeing as in its original appearance, its powers of flight were just that: a dream. However, the dream becomes reality to save a child from an endless sea of hopelessness.

The series is probably inspired by the novella {{w|The Little Prince}} by {{w|Antoine de Saint-Exupéry}}. [[Randall]] is well known to be a fan of this book.

Somewhere between the release of the first ferret comic in October 2005 and the re-release of that comic (and all the other from [[LiveJournal]] in 2005) on New Year's Day 2006 on the new xkcd site, Randall's brother's ferret died - as given by the new RIP comment in the title text. The sad comment in the title text of [[25: Barrel - Part 4]], ":(", possibly implying harm to the boy, along with this RIP comment, may imply that the boy has died and joined the ferret (in flying to Heaven). However, this line of reasoning only makes sense if the ferret actually died before the release of both the Part 4 comic at the end of October and this comic, which was released in the middle of November 2005, 1½ months before the new title text was made public.

This is the last in a six-part series of comics whose parts were randomly published during the first several dozen strips. The series features a [[:Category:Barrel|character]] who is not consistent with what would quickly become the [[xkcd]] [[stick figure]] style. The character was in a barrel in parts 1-3.

After Randall released the full [http://liveweb.archive.org/web/20070207052159/http://www.xkcd.com/barrel.html The Boy and his Barrel] story on xkcd it has been clear that the original [[Ferret]] story should also be included as part of the barrel series.

The full series can be found [[:Category:Barrel|here]]. But below they are listed in the order Randall has put them in his collection, linked to above:
* [[1: Barrel - Part 1]]
* [[20: Ferret]]
* [[11: Barrel - Part 2]]
* [[22: Barrel - Part 3]]
* [[25: Barrel - Part 4]]
* [[31: Barrel - Part 5]]

==Transcript==
:[A boy is grasping on to a piece of driftwood in an ocean.]

:[A zoomed out view of the boy still grasping on to a piece of driftwood in the ocean.]

:[A ferret with some airplane wings and an airplane tail flies above the ocean.]

:[A shot of the ocean, now empty.]

:[The flying ferret is carrying the boy to safety.]

:[The ferret carrying the boy is now in the distance with the sun on the horizon.]

==Trivia==
*This was the 33rd comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[28: Elefino]].
**The next was [[32: Pillar]].
*This comic kept its original title: "Barrel - Part 5"
**The first since [[16: Monty Python -- Enough]] (called "Support Surreal Humor" originally) that had a title without mentioning the week day.
**Also the last until the comics began being released also on xkcd (the second of these [[46: Secrets]], nine comics later).
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "The [[Ferret|ferret]] got to fly, in the end!"
**The link took the reader to the first ferret comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 33]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Barrel|06]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|Barrel 06]]
[[Category:Ferret]]

29: Hitler

2022-05-04T18:34:46Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240741 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 29
| date = November 11, 2005
| title = Hitler
| image = hitler.jpg
| titletext = So he's saying that God thought Hitler's art was so bad that the Holocaust was an acceptable alternative. It's no secret that the hat guy is closely based on Aram, from Men in Hats.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] speaks to an early version of [[Black Hat]] (with more of a top hat than his later "boater" hat style) about the {{w|Holocaust}} and {{w|Adolf Hitler}}. Hitler was the leader of {{w|Nazi}} Germany beginning in 1933 and starting {{w|World War II}} in 1939 by attacking Poland. During that war, the Germans (under Hitler's leadership) killed millions of people; most of them were Jews, but other ethnic groups, homosexuals, and the mentally disabled were all targeted as well. This has come to be known as the Holocaust.

Black Hat's comment that Hitler wanted to be a painter, but did not get into art school, is historically accurate. He applied to the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts twice. In any event, Cueball implies in the second frame that had Hitler been accepted into art school, the course of history might have changed, and the Holocaust might never have occurred. Black Hat suggests that perhaps God intentionally prevented Hitler from becoming an artist because God is an "art lover" and {{w|Paintings_by_Adolf_Hitler|Hitler's art was terrible.}}

As with other early comics, the title text explains the comic for us: this implies that God would have preferred the Holocaust to have occurred rather than allow Hitler to make some bad paintings. Such a comment that God could be so callous would surely be offensive to many people. Cueball's reaction to this shocking statement is relatively mild and suggests that Black Hat has made such controversial statements before. He will make a similarly controversial and Nazi-related statement again in [[984: Space Launch System]].

The title text also informs the reader that Black Hat is based on a character named Aram from a now-defunct comic strip entitled [http://www.meninhats.com/ ''Men in Hats'']. In the original quote when this comic was posted on [[LiveJournal]] (see [[#Trivia|Trivia]]) [[Randall]] directed the user to a specific ''Men in Hats'' comic about [http://meninhats.com/d/20040225.html parenting]. Like Black Hat, Aram seems to have frequently made judgmental, insulting, or controversial comments in a very emotionless manner. Aram wore a grey (perhaps intended to be black) suit with a red bowtie and a black top hat with a white strip above the brim. Black Hat's hat clearly evolved from the top hat design later in xkcd.

This may be the comic where Black Hat truly comes into existence for the first time. He appears earlier in [[12: Poisson]], but that was actually first released more than a month later. Then there is also [[24: Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey]], released a good month earlier. But here Black Hat does not really resemble his later appearances.

==Transcript==
:[Black Hat and Cueball are talking together in the same position in all four panels.]
:Cueball: Learning about the Holocaust has really shaken my belief in God.

:Black Hat: You know, as a young man, Hitler was rejected from art school.
:Cueball: Yeah... shame he didn't get in.

:Black Hat: Well, have you seen any of his paintings? They're awful. Defy all rules of composition.
:Cueball: What are you suggesting?

:Black Hat: Maybe there is a god, but he's a real art lover.
:Cueball: This is why I don't go out in public with you.

==Trivia==
*This was the 31st comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[34: Flowers]].
**The next was [[28: Elefino]].
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing - Hitler"
*Original quote from [[Randall]]: "Yes, it's entirely possible that those two are [http://meninhats.com/d/20040225.html Aram and Gamal]."
**The link is to a specific comic from the comic ''Men in Hats''.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 31]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hitler]]
[[Category:Religion]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

28: Elefino

2022-05-04T18:34:30Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240784 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 28
| date = November 14, 2005
| title = Elefino
| image = elefino.jpg
| titletext = Hell if I know
}}

==Explanation==
The basis for this fairly simple xkcd comic is the subject riddle, which is properly answered, as given in the title text: "Hell if I know." When spoken, this "correct" answer sounds like "elephino" – a {{w|portmanteau}} of "'''eleph'''ant" and "rh'''ino'''." This makes it again one of the early comics where Randall explains the comic via the title text.

Instead of giving the punchline of the joke, Randall answers with the unexpected "I haven't a goddamn clue," which, while having the same meaning, ruins the joke.

==Transcript==
:Q: What do you get when you cross an Elephant with a Rhino?
:[Picture of elephant, mathematical addition symbol, picture of rhino, equals sign, large question mark.]
:A: I haven't a goddamn clue.

==Trivia==
*This was the 32nd comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[29: Hitler]].
**The next was [[31: Barrel - Part 5]].
*Original title: "Monday's Drawing - Elefino"
*There were no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*In an episode of Muppets Tonight, with Sandra Bullock as the guest star, Seymour and Pepe were telling this joke to the Muppet audience, who totally did not understand it at all. The two comedians had tried to explain the joke, but still nobody understood it.
:: Found it. Pepe and Seymour [https://youtu.be/yhN9BK56PTg Elifino] ... Totally worth the 🐇 hole. [[User:Iggynelix|Iggynelix]] ([[User talk:Iggynelix|talk]]) 15:45, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 32]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Portmanteau‏‎]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

27: Meat Cereals

2022-05-04T18:34:08Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240720 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 27
| date = November 4, 2005
| title = Meat Cereals
| image = meat_cereals.jpg
| titletext = Disgusting
}}

==Explanation==
[[Randall Munroe|Randall]] parodies several real-world breakfast cereals (which typically consist solely of grains and sweet flavorings) by creating versions that contain meat (animal products). The cereals that appear to be parodied (clockwise from top-left) include Froot Loops, Rice Krispies, Honey Bunches of Oats, Apple Jacks, Frosted Flakes, and Cheerios. There does not appear to be a deeper meaning to this comic than that.

The Scrapple Jacks parody (the only slightly obscure reference) appears to be made with {{w|scrapple}}, which, according to Wikipedia, is a mush of pork scraps and trimmings combined with cornmeal and wheat flour, often buckwheat flour, and spices. Real Apple Jacks ran an ad campaign in the 1980s and 1990s in which an adult or authority figure tasted the cereal and declared "these don't taste like apples!", thus missing the point of why kids liked the cereal. The slogan is parodied on the Scrapple Jacks box. Randall referenced this same slogan again in "[[38: Apple Jacks]]".

The title text, reading, "Disgusting.", apparently reflects Randall's opinion of his own creation.

==Transcript==
:[A collection of fictional meat based cereals in bright colors with nice pictures on them.]
:Pork Loops
:Mice Krispies
:Hammios
:Frosted Bacon Flakes
:Scrapple Jacks
::Hey, these don't taste like Scrapple!
:Honey Bunches of Goats

==Trivia==
*This was the 28th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[26: Fourier]].
**The next was [[30: Donner]].
*Original title: "Friday's Drawing - Meat Cereals"
*There was no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 28]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

26: Fourier

2022-05-04T18:33:54Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240714 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 26
| date = November 2, 2005
| title = Fourier
| image = fourier.jpg
| titletext = That cat has some serious periodic components
}}

==Explanation==
A {{w|Fourier transform}} is a mathematical function transformation often used in physics and engineering.

The theory is that any line graph can be represented as the sum of a bunch of sine waves of different frequencies and amplitudes. (The most obvious application is in analyzing a sound recording in terms of the different frequencies of sounds used.) So, for any line graph, you can produce another graph of the frequencies and their amplitudes. This can be done by evaluating an integral based on the function, which is referred to as "taking the Fourier transform" of the function. The form of the integral that needs to be taken is actually shown in the third line of the comic [[55: Useless]].

Unfortunately, Cueball has applied this "transform" to his cat. Although it seems to still be alive and possibly even unharmed, it is clearly not in its familiar shape, and it is not clear if this condition is permanent or not.

"Periodic components" in the title text refers to the spikes in the graph. Because sine waves repeat themselves as you go along, the presence of large amounts of one particular sine wave in the Fourier transform graph (each spike) shows that the overall result (the initial graph) is likely to have parts that also repeat themselves, like a {{w|periodic function}}. In other words, the cat has repeating parts.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball talks on phone. A grotesque-looking cat with many sharp vertical points looks on.]
:Cueball: Hi, Dr. Elizabeth? Yeah, uh ... I accidentally took the Fourier transform of my cat...
:Cat: Meow!

==Trivia==
*This was the 27th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[25: Barrel - Part 4]].
**The next was [[27: Meat Cereals]].
*Original title: "Wednesday's Drawing - Fourier"
*There were no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 27]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Cats]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

25: Barrel - Part 4

2022-05-04T18:33:32Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240747 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 25
| date = October 31, 2005
| title = Barrel - Part 4
| image = barrel_part_4.jpg
| titletext = :(
}}

== Explanation ==
In the first three comics of the series, the character explored the ocean in a barrel and then encountered a whirlpool, all with a reaction of innocent wonder. Here, the empty barrel floating adrift, plus the title text and a previous announcement by Randall that this would be the conclusion of barrel boy's story, imply that the character's encounter with the whirlpool separated him from the barrel, and he may have come to some harm.

This is the fifth in a six-part series of comics whose parts were randomly published during the first several dozen strips. The series features a [[:Category:Barrel|character]] who is not consistent with what would quickly become the [[xkcd]] [[stick figure]] style. The character was in the barrel in parts 1-3.

After Randall released the full [http://liveweb.archive.org/web/20070207052159/http://www.xkcd.com/barrel.html The Boy and his Barrel] story on xkcd, it has been clear that the original [[Ferret]] story should also be included as part of the barrel series.

The full series can be found [[:Category:Barrel|here]]. But below they are listed in the order Randall has put them in his collection linked to above:
* [[1: Barrel - Part 1]]
* [[20: Ferret]]
* [[11: Barrel - Part 2]]
* [[22: Barrel - Part 3]]
* [[25: Barrel - Part 4]]
* [[31: Barrel - Part 5]]

== Transcript ==
:[The barrel is shown on a grid paper background, floating sideways and empty in a choppy sea.]

==Trivia==
*This was the 26th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[37: Hyphen]].
**The next was [[26: Fourier]].
*The original title of this comic was "Monday's Drawing".
*There were no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
**However, three hours after posting the comic, he made a new post with the following statement:
:::'''''Barrel series'''''
:::By the way, here are all the barrel comics on a single (easily linked) page:
:::[https://web.archive.org/web/20070207052159/http://www.xkcd.com/barrel.html http://www.xkcd.com/barrel.html] [This is an archived version of the page. The original link is dead. This text is not included in the statement.]
:::I cheated, and went back and lightened the gridlines in #2. It was just bothering me. I'll try not to do that much. But as I'm not destroying anyone's childhood, I don't feel like I'm really pulling a George Lucas.
:::I mean, I'm not destroying more than one childhood.
:::Oops.
*Since this was not (as he stated in the [[37: Hyphen#Trivia|previous comic]]) the last in the [[:Category:Barrel|barrel series]], the last comic must later have been included.
**Since this last barrel comic [[31: Barrel - Part 5]] involved the [[:Category:Ferret|ferret]], the previous ferret story [[20: Ferret]] must also have been included then.
**Thus making the original ferret a "real" part of the barrel story.
**Randall also confesses that he changed the appearance of the 2nd Barrel comic.
***At this time, that must have referred to the one called [[11: Barrel - Part 2]], although Randall in the page above has moved this to after the first ferret comic.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explains why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 26]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Barrel|05]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|Barrel 05]]

24: Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey

2022-05-04T18:33:16Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240780 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 24
| date = September 30, 2005
| title = Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey
| before = [[#Explanation|↓ Skip to explanation ↓]]
| image = godel_escher_kurthalsey.jpg
| titletext = I love the idea here, though of course it's not a great-quality drawing or scan.
}}

==Explanation==
At the time [[xkcd]] was created, [[Randall]] was working on robotics at {{w|NASA}}'s Langley Center. This drawing was apparently made during that period, while attending a talk that he didn't like.

The name of the comic is a portmanteau-like play on the following:
* ''{{w|Gödel, Escher, Bach}}'' is a book by {{w|Douglas Hofstadter}}. He is an American author who has written several books about philosophy, mathematics, and science. This particular book is his most famous one, about "strange loops", self-reference, and recurring patterns, partially shown through the works of the three people in its title:
** {{w|Kurt Gödel}} was a 20th-century mathematician most famous for proving that in our commonly used axiomatic systems, there are true propositions that cannot be proved from the axioms. His proof used a self-referential paradox.
** {{w|M. C. Escher}} was a 20th-century artist most famous for mathematically-inspired engravings of tessellated animals, impossible scenes, [http://philosopherdeveloper.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/devilsangels.jpg fractals], and so on. The form of this strip resembles one of his [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2c/Escher,_Metamorphosis_II.jpg Metamorphosis etchings].
** {{w|Johann Sebastian Bach}} was a German composer and musician from the {{w|Baroque Period}}, famous for numerous works such as the ''{{w|Brandenburg Concertos}}.

* Kurt Halsey is a comic artist from {{w|Oregon}}. His work often contains introspective philosophical musings. At least one phrase in the letter is attributed to Halsey, "The past is just practice".

The comic is drawn in the form of a {{w|storyboard}} and is clearly intended to be visualized as an animated sequence.

In the first part of the comic, two people discuss the difficulty of comparing past and present generations, since the person making the comparison invariably belongs to one of the two groups.

It's unclear whether the behatted guy is [[Black Hat]], as Randall hadn't standardized his character designs yet, though the sarcastic comment suggests that it is. If it is, then this would be his first appearance. (He also appears in [[12: Poisson]], but that comic was released about 3 months later, but the numbering did not follow the release day on [[LiveJournal]] when the comics were transferred to xkcd - see the [[12: Poisson#Trivia|trivia]] for that comic.) Actually due to the order of release on LiveJournal, this, being number 6, was the first releases to use both stick figures, [[Cueball]], Black Hat and [[Megan]], as well as [[:Category:Multiple Cueballs|Multiple Cueballs]]! See the [[#Trivia|trivia]] below.

The assembly of text panels found in the middle of the strip is similar to [[124: Blogofractal]].

The philosophy of Kurt Gödel is also a theme in [[468: Fetishes]].

==Interpretations==

* The bubbles may illustrate ideas, memories, or subjects that one could wonder about. In the context of the boring talk, this would mean that Randall is lost in thoughts and gradually loses focus of things going on around him. He sees the talk as mundane, as a part of so many other "subject bubbles".
** Even the comic vertical lines (and therefore the strip's structure) seem to lose their sense to Randall as they collapse and become part of the scene, eventually merging three panels into one. They later reappear for the last six panels.
* The big bubble pushing the small ones further outside may demonstrate how shallow the surface bubbles are to him, or represent an infinite (or very large) number of small bubbles.
* The quote stating "There's too much. And so little feels important." tells us that he feels overwhelmed by the world, maybe by information given in the NASA talk or by events in his life. He recognizes what is important to him, and he feels that it is small compared to the size of the worries of the world (or the big bubble). He may have experienced a sort of existential crisis before turning to his feeling of love in the last panels, when asking himself, "What do you do?".
* The structure of the strip has some abstract connections with the structure of the book. The beginning, middle, and end sequences reflect back on themselves; the strip displays some symmetry. In the book, there's an interplay of contributions from the artist, the musician, and the mathematician; some of this is present in the strip [Lots of citations missing].
* The biggest bubble is expanding, and on it is a fractal arrangement of articles describing various scientific and philosophical discussions. A subjective interpretation is that the fractal nature of the excerpts is a comment on the unending attempt to rationalize and justify the unchanging nature of humanity. The largest bubble bursts, leaving the two figures on a shred of what once was. The final question is, "What do you do when the bubble bursts?" It seems that his answer is to find someone and love them; in the end, that's all that matters. The rest is just air.

==Transcript==
:Drawn during an unending NASA lecture
:[Two people are talking, one in a hat.]
:Cueball: it's just so hard to compare kids now with kids in the past. you can't help but to belong to one group or the other.

:Cueball: and of course every generation seems awful to the one before it. look at quotes from throughout history.

:Hatted: yeah, and it sure would be nice to have some historical perspective on some of this stuff. I just don't know what to make of it.
:[Circles are appearing--maybe snow?]

:Cueball: i guess you do what you can to help the people around you and hope it turns out okay.

:Cueball: in the end, what else can you do?

:Hatted: lead a crusade?

:[We can no longer see the people, just the circles.]
:it's presentism, man. the idea that historical context is irrelevant, that we understand it

:all that we need take no warnings from the follies of the past. that we're facing something new.

:socrates couldn't imagine the internet. but people don't change.
:[We can start to see a darker circle in the lower right corner.]

:(The borders between the three panels on this line are cracking.)
:have you seen those collections of historical pornography? talk about historical context.

:did you know the first porn photo was bestial in.
:[inside a circle:] nature?

:at least that stuff was out of the mainstream
:[each word in one circle:]
:no
:just
:in
:history

:(the three panels have merged into one on each row.)

:i don't know about you, but
:[circled] I
:[uncircled] never

:even once seen

:[The circles are highly variable in size now, and pressed up against a larger one on the right side.]

:[There is mass of circles of different sizes, with some dark fissures in between, against the side of a large circle which we can see part of in the right half of the panel. They look like cells. There's a tiny square in the center of the giant cell.]

:[We see only the tiny square, centered. It has a few marks inside it.]

:[Closer, the square is divided into rectangles of different sizes, each of which has text in it.]

:[Much closer, we can see fragments of the text. Some are sideways, some are cut off, some are too small to read.]
:machine language translated by principles of isomorphism it is a consequence of the Church-Turing thesis that ...
:but how do you select the channel you wish to se-
:thou ... shou ... palin ... stri ... it is a ... crab ...
:be obvious to one-s ... your great intellectual achievements ... Tortise. Why ... you give this old Tortise ...

:[Closer still, we can just see a huge sideways s and h.]

:[Those letters are faded and mixed with a faded version of the next panel.]

:girls take boys away ...
:never be further than a phone call and a goosebumped shiver away ...
:drove all night listening to mix tapes ...
:the past is just practice
:[There is a heart at the bottom and, in the lower left, the name Kurt.]

:[The same as the previous panel, but with the words blurred out to scribbles.]

:[Jagged, shaded shapes and strands start to fall. Faint panel borders appear again. There is a person on the far right.]

:(Back to three panels per row.)
:[Cueball and Megan are standing amid the fragments.]

:Cueball: There's too much. And so little feels important.

:[The jagged edge of the shaded area is encroaching on the sides of the panel.]

:What do you do?

:[We see them from farther away through a rough hole in the shaded area. Bits continue to fall around them.]

:[They are holding hands.]

==Trivia==
*This was the 6th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[1: Barrel - Part 1]].
**The next was [[13: Canyon]].
*Original title: "Strip series"
*Original [[Randall]] quote:
::"One of a series of strips I drew during a long and boring NASA lecture. It careens wildly from intellectual to chaotic to Godel, Escher, Bach to Kurt Halsey to chaotic and sappy.
::
::The whole series is here. "
*The last word "here" is a now broken link: <nowiki>http://www.xkcd.com/comic/comic.html</nowiki>
**It was the first time Randall posted a link to the xkcd.com site (so the xkcd page was already active when he posted his first comics to LiveJournal).
**The link indicates that the image posted on LiveJournal was only part of this strip.
**Unfortunately, both the image of this strip and the link posted on LiveJournal are broken (also in the archive).
**So it is not known if there is even more to this strip than now posted on xkcd or if the original post only covered a small part of this very long strip. In that case, the link would take the user to the full comic, the one here, which was later posted on xkcd.
**If anyone knows which of the above is true, please make a comment here. (Do edit, but make sure to indicate that this is a fact then).
*This was one of the [[:Category:First day on LiveJournal|thirteen first comics]] posted to LiveJournal within 12 minutes on Friday, September 30, 2005.
**Since it was at that time number 6 (not 24) and the current number 6, [[6: Irony]], was number 9, then this comic is actually the first Randall posted that used [[Cueball]]. So in principle this comic was the first to use stick figures as well as Cueball!
***It is also the first with [[Megan]], whose first now is [[16: Monty Python --_Enough]], number 16 on LiveJournal.
***First with [[Black Hat]], whose first now is [[12: Poisson]], not even released on LiveJournal.
***As well as the first with [[:Category:Multiple Cueballs|Multiple Cueballs]].
***See also these trivia on the [[6:_Irony#Trivia|Irony]], [[16:_Monty_Python_--_Enough#Trivia|Monty Python]] and [[12:_Poisson#Trivia|Poisson]] pages.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explains why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 06]]
[[Category:First day on LiveJournal| 06]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Large drawings]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Romance]]
[[Category:Philosophy]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

23: T-shirts

2022-05-04T18:32:56Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240717 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk) (uncraped page)

{{comic
| number = 23
| date = October 26, 2005
| title = T-shirts
| image = t-shirts.jpg
| titletext = It's depressing how many of these are real shirts
}}

==Explanation==

This comic satirizes the plethora of "snarky" phrase T-shirts that exist today. In the top-left, the character wears a typical (and real) snark shirt, "I see dumb people" (suggesting that the wearer thinks everyone else is dumb, while being a parody of the phrase "I see dead people" from the movie ''{{w|The Sixth Sense}}''). Other shirts shown also suggest that the wearer is better than everyone else, and perhaps the shirts increasingly suggest that the wearer is anti-social moving from top to bottom. Near the bottom of the screen, the T-shirts no longer attempt to be witty and simply have straightforward phrases like "go away" and "die". These are exaggerations of the message that the other more-realistic shirts broadcast.

The final three shirts are also exaggerated shirts that suggest [[Randall]]'s view that people who wear snarky shirts are overcompensating for the fact that they are already alone or perhaps putting up a tough exterior to conceal their sadness that no one would talk to them anyway. Most notably "maybe if this T-shirt is witty enough, someone will finally love me" sums up what Randall thinks snarky shirts really say. There are shirts with this or a similar message, although it is unclear whether they were created before this comic or as a tribute to this comic.

In the title text, Randall says that it's depressing how many of the shirts in the comic actually exist in real life, further underlining the point that these shirts are overly arrogant, to the point where one might believe that Randall made them up. This highlights the inadequacy of substance within these T-shirts and the terror they invoke in Randall's mind.

==Transcript==
:[A collection of phrases on T-shirts. The first and the last on actual black T-shirts worn by the same person, whose facial expression is more sad on the last one.]
:I see dumb people
:As a matter of fact the world <big>does</big> revolve around me
:I can only please one person per day / today is not your day.
:You know what your problem is? You're stupid.
:Get a clue
:Do I look like a people person?
:Your village called / they want their idiot back
:Go away
:I hate you all
:Die.
:Help.
:Maybe if this T-shirt is witty enough, someone will finally love me.
:Oh God I'm so alone.

==Trivia==
*This was the 24th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[22: Barrel - Part 3]].
**The next was [[37: Hyphen]].
*Original title: "Wednesday's Drawing"
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "I saw the 'problem' t-shirt (upper right) on campus a few days ago and suddenly felt so sad."
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*This is one of the few, early comics that contains a non-[[stick figure]] character.
*The last phrase of the comic was made into an actual T-shirt called "[https://store.xkcd.com/products/witty Witty]" sold at the xkcd store (as "maybe if this shirt is witty enough, someone will finally love me").
*Real shirts are: 'I see dumb people', 'As a matter of fact, the world '''does''' revolve around me', 'You know what your problem is? You're stupid.', 'I can only please one person per day//This is not your day.', 'Do I LOOK like a people person?', 'Get a clue', 'Your village called//They want their idiot back', 'Go away', 'Die.', 'Help', and 'Maybe if this t-shirt was witty enough, someone will finally love me.'
*'I hate you all' doesn't exist, but 'Hate you all' and 'I hate you' does. 'Oh god//I'm so alone' also doesn't exist, but 'Oh god I'm gonna die alone' and 'Oh god I am so alone in my world' does.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 24]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Sarcasm]]
[[Category:Comics with xkcd store products]]

18: Snapple

2022-05-04T18:25:50Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240723 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 18
| date = October 10, 2005
| title = Snapple
| image = snapple.jpg
| titletext = Sn = tin
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] hands another Cueball-like guy an apple calling it a ''snapple.'' When the guy bites into it, his teeth go ''clink'' against the apple's metal surface; Cueball has infused the apple with tin.

The fourth panel is a silent wide shot, perhaps suggesting {{w|Anti-humor|the joke was met with silence as a weak joke}}. As a meta-joke, the final panel might jokingly suggest that the silence is because those unfamiliar with the periodic table of elements don't get the joke.

The joke in this comic is pretty self-explanatory, especially given that the title text continues the trend in early [[xkcd]] comics of explaining the joke. {{w|Tin}} is a metallic element whose abbreviation on the periodic table is "Sn" (as the Latin word for tin is "stannum"). Thus, the apple is a "Sn-apple."

{{w|Snapple}} is a brand of beverages -- mostly bottled juices and teas -- whose name is based on a carbonated apple juice they once produced ("snappy apple").

[[James]] (in the caption) presumably once made a joke to [[Randall]] about tin or Snapple or both.

==Transcript==
:[Above the frame:]
:This one is entirely James' fault.

:[Two Cueball-like guys are standing and talking.]
:Cueball: Here, take a bite of this Snapple.
:Friend: food!

:[Cueball's friend takes a bite.]
:Friend: Ow! What is this?
:''Clink''

:[The panel switches to Cueball.]
:Cueball: It's an apple infused with tin.

:[Beat panel. A wide shot of the two.]

:[Same scene, except the panel is lightly shaded and the is a box above saying:]
:Those of you who know your periodic table should be laughing right about now.

==Trivia==
*This was the 17th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[17: What If]].
**The next was [[19: George Clinton]].
*Original title: "Monday's drawing: Snapple"
*There was no original [[Randall]] quote for this comic.
**It could be argued that the caption of the comic ''This one is entirely James' fault'' was the quote. But it is part of the comic picture.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*One of the original drawings drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*This is another early xkcd comic in which [[Cueball]] characters are drawn in some panels with faces.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 17]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Checkered paper]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring James]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

15: Just Alerting You

2022-05-04T18:24:58Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 240872 by Ex Kay Cee Dee (talk)

{{comic
| number = 15
| date = October 2, 2005
| title = Just Alerting You
| image = just_alerting_you.jpg
| titletext = Just thought you should know
}}

==Explanation==
Here, a man is seen riding on a {{w|Brontosaurus}}? (This is according to the [https://xkcd.com/15/info.0.json official transcript] on xkcd, including the questionmark.) Later Randall would probably have called it an {{w|Apatosaurus}}, see the [[:Category:Apatosaurus]].

The joke here is that this person feels the need to point out that they are "kind of strange," even though one might think that that would be clear from the fact that they are riding an extinct and potentially dangerous creature.

In the title text the man continues by saying ''Just thought you should know''. Just a service notice.

In [[650: Nowhere]] [[Megan]] is seen imagining herself riding an Apatosaurus.

==Transcript==
:[A man is standing on top of a green dinosaur and holding reins to the dinosaur's head.]
:Man: Before you talk to me, I should warn you: I am kind of strange

==Trivia==
*This was the 14th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous was [[11: Barrel - Part 2]].
**The next was [[16: Monty Python -- Enough]].
*Original title: "Just Alerting You (Monday's drawing)"
*Original [[Randall]] quote:
::"I bet she's cool. I mean, she has a dinosaur!
::I'm gonna update this MWF for a while and see how that works. "
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*This was the first comic posted to LiveJournal after the [[:Category:First day on LiveJournal|thirteen first comics]] were released simultaneously.
**He even mentions in his quote that he from now on will release the comic MWF for a while. (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday).
**This comic was, ironically enough, the first comic to be [[:Category:Sunday comics|released on a Sunday]].
**But it was really supposed to be a Monday comic, and it was only released 17 minutes before midnight at 11:43 pm.
**Randall even made a [http://liveweb.archive.org/web/20070927001941/http://xkcd-drawings.livejournal.com/?skip=40 mention of this] in the comic's original title on LiveJournal:
***"Just Alerting You (Monday's drawing)".
***Two comics later, the original title is simply ''[[17: What If#Trivia|Friday drawing!]]''.
***So from now he did begin to put the date into most, but not all, comic titles on LiveJournal until he also began posting on xkcd.
*[[Megan]] later rides an Apatosaurus in [[650: Nowhere]]. This may have made people think that this was Megan but as stated above Randall says this is a man in the transcript. This is thus not the first comic on xkcd with Megan. That goes to the next comic.
**This dinosaur genus is also mentioned in [[460: Paleontology]] and [[636: Brontosaurus]].
**This was the first comic with {{w|dinosaurs}}, but since then, there have been numerous [[:Category:Dinosaurs|dinosaur related comics]] on xkcd, especially involving [[:Category:Velociraptors|comics with Velociraptors]], a dinosaur genus that [[Randall]] is particularly concerned about.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 14]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Apatosaurus]]
[[Category:Social interactions]]
[[Category:Comics with lowercase text]]

319: Engineering Hubris

2022-05-04T02:06:44Z

172.69.69.250: Undo revision 234510 by X. K. C. D. (talk) vandalism(?)

{{comic
| number = 319
| date = September 21, 2007
| title = Engineering Hubris
| image = engineering hubris.png
| titletext = Chuck Jones is a vengeful god.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic starts with a philosophical musing about {{w|engineering}}. The last panel reveals a joke about {{w|Wile E. Coyote and The Road Runner}}, a cartoon series created by {{w|Chuck Jones}}. In the cartoon, the Coyote is constantly building odd contraptions (with parts ordered from the {{w|Acme Corporation}}) to catch the Road Runner. The Coyote never succeeds, often because his devices don't work as intended.

The word {{w|Hubris}} from the comic title means extreme pride or arrogance. It is a theme from the classic Greek plays, and is usually severely punished by the gods. The title text is implying that Chuck Jones would not let hubris go unpunished; the engineer might be able to construct 'better' traps than Wile E, but they would still be doomed to fail.

From the second panel, [http://catb.org/jargon/html/M/Murphys-Law.html| Murphy's Law] can be simplified to "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong." It was originally developed as a guideline for accident prevention starting at the design level. In the common vernacular today, it is interpreted more liberally: "If there is even the slightest chance of an unfortunate accident occurring, despite all your attempts to prevent it, the accident will happen anyway, purely out of spite." The namesake {{w|Edward A. Murphy Jr.}} has since evolved to mythic proportions, being cast as a vengeful god of misfortune and ruin.

==Transcript==
:[Landscape in the background, canyon with a winding road.]
:Maybe engineering is the pursuit of an unattainable perfection.
:Maybe it's impossible to create something bug-free.
:Maybe I'm a fool
:Maybe the tyranny of Murphy is the penalty for hubris.
:But I just can't shake the feeling
:[Cueball standing on boxes labeled "ACME."]
:With all those supplies
:I could have caught that roadrunner.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Philosophy]]
[[Category:Engineering]]

Talk:1335: Now

2022-05-03T02:40:06Z

172.69.69.250: /* Timed Links Fix */

[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now.png| Link to comic] Link has been fixed. Was pointing to an incorrect url. 14:21, 5 October 2014 (UTC)
This doesn't work. Maybe if we added *.xkcd.com/* to the (external) image whitelist or something? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.231.121|108.162.231.121]] 07:27, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
:A fine suggestion. I'm probably going to shoot for full archival like we did with [[time]], but this is an ample good solution in the meantime. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 07:30, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
:Hold on, having wee issues, will resolve soon. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 07:37, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Here is a scaled animation of every image. The full size version was too big for me to upload.
[[User:Ti84p|Ti84p]] ([[User talk:Ti84p|talk]]) 07:47, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
:(Removed the broken link mentioned here above --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 21:43, 17 May 2015 (UTC))

For Australia and New Zealand, at least, the clock shows local time with summer time factored in. I bet that it undergoes some changes in March and April as various jurisdictions go on or off daylight saving. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.224|108.162.249.224]] 09:20, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

: Good point! I added this to the explanation. —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 13:15, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

:: There's also British Summer Time and all the ''other'' national seasonal adjustments(1)... could you perhaps de-specify the "move the list of North American cities and regions for Daylight-Saving Time (which is the same thing as Summer Time)" statement to remove the inadvertent US-centrism? Maybe "...of northern-latitudes cities for Daylight-Saving Time or equivalent Summer Time designation"..? (Definitely could be better phrased than I just put, though.)
:: (1) Note, they don't even all switch at the same time, necessarily. If Randall is going to change the basic map template (pre-rotation) for any Summer/non-Summer transition, he's probably going to have to do it multiple times each spring/autumn, as various regions jiggle about. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.41|141.101.99.41]] 13:52, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

::: Exactly, they don't all switch at the same time. North America isn't mentioned to be US-centric, it's mentioned because the change happens there first. Sure, we could bring up BST and all the rest, but there's no need to make the discussion longer than necessary. (The original wording also was not US-centric, privileging the non-US term "Summer Time" that's used where it's currently being observed, but somebody changed that.) —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 18:14, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
::::I made that change just to use the same title as the Wikipedia page to which we are linking. I don't feel strongly about it. --[[User:BlueMoonlet|BlueMoonlet]] ([[User talk:BlueMoonlet|talk]]) 18:46, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

As for the map itself, I think the title text should provide the exact time for the location under the cursor, by doing calculations for the mouseover event and updating the t.t. accordingly. I imagine it is doable for Randall. For accuracy's sake, the Antarctic region could be excluded. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.89.225|141.101.89.225]] 12:19, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
: Or maybe someone'll fancy doing it as a userscript. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.89.225|141.101.89.225]] 12:23, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

I made a version that the user can rotate themselves. It only loads a single image. http://c0la.s3.amazonaws.com/xkcd1335.html {{unsigned ip|173.245.53.182}}

The gif image is very good to understand this comic. However it would be very nice if it rotated a little slower. Instead of one turn every ten seconds it could be one every minute. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.84|173.245.50.84]] 14:37, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

: When I look a little off-centre, it always seems that South America is about to catch up with Antarctica, but it never does! —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 18:14, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

He used an Azimuthal equidistant projection?!?!? ;_; [[User:Swhouseworth|Swhouseworth]] ([[User talk:Swhouseworth|talk]]) 16:20, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

: Yeah, should have been equal area! —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 18:14, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

:: On the Transcript for this comic the last line erroneously describes the innermost circle as "the Earth as seen from the south pole", when as Swhouseworth correctly points out, this is an Azimuthal equidistant projection centered on the south pole. —[[User:Andrewpost|Andrewpost]] ([[User talk:Andrewpost|talk]]) 14:43, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Question: If there are 24 Hours in a day, why in the description does it go from hour 0 to hour 21? That's only 22 hours. Where are the other 2 hours? Even if it isn't listed on the comic (I think it's the time zones in the Atlantic between Eastern Brazil and the UK - basically UTC-1hr and UTC-2hr), shouldn't there be spaces in the charts showing those hours? I don't think any of the islands in that region use those time zones (opting instead to use GMT - like Iceland for example), but I think those hours should still be included since they ''are'' on the static part of the map. Also, it makes sense to me that the center of the words ''NOON'' and ''MIDNIGHT'' are edges of segments themselves, making 24 segments in total. Randall just couldn't draw those discrete segments and also easily have the words written for our convenience. --[[User:Dangerkeith3000|Dangerkeith3000]] ([[User talk:Dangerkeith3000|talk]]) 16:46, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

: Every time zone is used somewhere in international waters (well, every one that's a whole number of hours off of Universal Time), so they certainly should all be included. —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 18:14, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
: Added South Georgia as UTC-2 and Cape Verde as UTC-1. According to Wikipedia, coastal Brazil and Greenland are both UTC-2 during the summer, but Brazil just ended summer time last Sunday (Feb. 23), and Greenland won't start until late March. There are approximately no permanently inhabited places that use UTC-2 all year, so I just went with South Georgia because it's historically significant. [[User:Fryhole|Fryhole]] ([[User talk:Fryhole|talk]]) 20:20, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Randall's continent naming scheme is interesting. The most commonly taught model in the U.S. has seven continents, but the purple continent is Australia rather than Oceania. The name Oceania is common in Spanish-speaking countries, but those places generally have a six-continent model with the Americas merged. Is Randall's model standard anywhere? [[User:Fryhole|Fryhole]] ([[User talk:Fryhole|talk]]) 20:00, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

: FIBA and, before 2006, FIFA. (In 2006 FIFA moved Australia from Oceania to Asia). As a further parallel neither the sporting bodies nor the comic actually mention Antarctica. Note that the comic does not say these are continents. Oceania has some distinct characteristics, so it often shows up as a "region of the world".
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.218.59|108.162.218.59]] 19:08, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
distinoften shows up as a "region of the world". It has some distinct characteristics, which is why FIFA, FIBA and others treat it as a region.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.218.59|108.162.218.59]] 19:08, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Kamchatka is probably a reference to 850: https://xkcd.com/850/ [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.48|108.162.216.48]] 20:22, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

Hey, I'd just like to note that GIMP "Optimize for GIF" reduced the GIF size to 7.1MiB from current 9.3MiB. If I reduced the colours to 32, which still looked "good enough" in my opinion, the GIF was only 3.5MiB.
http://m8y.org/tmp/temp.gif (optimize)
http://m8y.org/tmp/temp2.gif (optimize + colour reduction)

It might be worth replacing to improve load times.
You might want to make your own since I didn't check frame times or anything, I just ran "index" and "optimize" and then exported{{unsigned ip|108.162.219.77}}
:You are right, but that picture should be less then 1MB. I will do some tests, and if it does work I will talk about this. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 23:51, 26 February 2014 (UTC)
::m'k - well. Using 20 colours and scaling it down 50% resulted in 1.1MiB... http://m8y.org/tmp/temp3.gif
:::I'm now at the time frame at "Rude to call", but nevertheless the PNG files have to be optimized to a GIF, after that an animated GIF should be much smaller. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 01:03, 27 February 2014 (UTC)
::::I'm guessing an indexed APNG could be smaller (due to more efficient compression) than a GIF, but unfortunately I don't thing apngasm is as efficient as GIMP's optimize for gif feature.

Does anybody know what clock Randall is using? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.75|199.27.128.75]]EvanJM42

Randall no doubt knows about the Time Zone Database (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tz_database) so he may well have coded this page to incorporate seasonal time changes from that database. We'll have to watch what happens.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.15|108.162.219.15]] 12:59, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Any idea of a way of using this image as a wallpaper for OSX in a way that updates every 30 minutes? Yes, n00b question, but I cannot think of an easily implemented solution. {{unsigned ip|108.162.218.77}}
::Hey. I don't know too much about how OSX does wallpapers, but under Linux, the desktop wallpaper will automatically update if the image is modified. This means you could make a simple shell script that copies (or possibly updates a symlink) to wallpaper.png based upon the current time. The file for the copy or symlink could be referenced as... H=$(date -u +%H); M=$(date -u +%M); FILE="${H}h${M}m.png" I use a similar approach for automatically rotating the image in http://m8y.org/images/sandy_1280_1024_stripped.svg in a cronjob using sed. The sed modification of the svg automatically updates the background. With any luck, you can do the same thing in OSX once you've pointed your wallpaper at a location. {{unsigned ip|173.245.54.56}}

Hello, to the guy asking for a OSX wallpaper, I didn't found a way to do it but I got something pretty close to that. You don't need any scripting skills or anything fancy, just download Geektool[http://projects.tynsoe.org/en/geektool/] from the internet and add an Image Geeklet. In the image URL use the one on the top of this comment section (http://c.xkcd.com/redirect/comic/now) and in the refresh interval select your desired time (I used 900 s roughly 15 minutes, 1800 should work for every 30 minutes). Now, there is a problem but it's beyond my control. The image is not synced with the current time in my country. Just yesterday we changed our clocks because of time savings but apparently the page has not bring forward its clock yet. I don't know who did the awesome job of setting up a page for us to access it but I hope he/she can update it accordingly so we can enjoy an awesome page or if someone else in the community could help. {{unsigned ip|108.162.221.91}}

Hi, I'm the same guy of the above comment. I just checked and it turns out that the page http://c.xkcd.com/redirect/comic/now is synced with xkcd.com/now. so apparently Randall does not change his clock during daylight saving time (he's a well now hater of it isn't he?). So the clock is going to be 1 hour behind until the next daylight saving time change. As a last note regarding the OSX implementation, it's a online version, I'm not really skilled in programming and I haven't tried an offline version yet but if I manage to get an offline version I'll post it here as well. In other comment I have the implementation for windows and it's also 1 hour behind just FYI. {{unsigned ip|108.162.221.67}}

;Implementations
Hi, I'm new and a tad confused by how this discussion page editing works, but: I made a time zone converter based on this XKCD comic, over here: http://www.xkcdnow.com - I think it could be fitting to add a link to it somewhere to this article, but I don't wanna come across as spammy, and couldn't find any other explainxkcd articles with an external links section (wikipedia style)... Any thoughts? - wauter
: This is a great site! Maybe we could insert an "Implementations" category into the article. If we do so, I could provide another cool one: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.phillab.xkcd_now which is a widget for Android - including tribute to explainxkcd -- [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.146|173.245.53.146]] 16:20, 5 March 2014 (UTC)
:That sounds good to me. The latest release for my version can be found at https://github.com/BruceJohnJennerLawso/xkcd-Now/releases/tag/1.02 on my Github page. By the way, I like your timezones idea, would you mind if I tried to implement that in mine at some point? [[User:BruceJohnJennerLawso|BruceJohnJennerLawso]] ([[User talk:BruceJohnJennerLawso|talk]]) 15:29, 6 March 2014 (UTC)
: I would also like the implementation section. If you use a Windows PC, you can use the script found at http://github.com/leipert/xkcd-now-clock to automatically set your Wallpaper to the current status of xkcd now. It also gives you the possibility to add some an digital clock, an analog clock or fix the image to your time zone. [http://github.com/leipert leipert] 18:02, 6 March 2014 (UTC){{unsigned ip|108.162.254.68}}
: I would love to see an implementation that updates more than once every 15 minutes. I've been trying to find an application that can take two images, and automatically generate the in-between images, i.e. generate 15 images between 00h00m.png and 00h15m.png [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.154|162.158.78.154]] 14:01, 21 September 2017 (UTC) Henry151
:: Spruced up the Implementations section a bit. A quick tip: if you want to make your link work by clicking on the blue text, add a space after the link in the square brackets, & type in the text, ie [link.com This takes you to link.com!!!] {{unsigned|BruceJohnJennerLawso}}
:: Hi there, I'm Henry151 who made the Linux implementation, I want to make an iPhone app for family and friends, does anybody have any experience with that and want to help me out?

As the US has now hit Daylight Savings, I think we can assume the comic won't be updating for it. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.90|173.245.50.90]] 02:54, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

;WEB links
*Who the hell does register an entire domain [http://xkcdnow.com/] for only this comic?
*The JavaScript at the other link doesn't work well for me — but who needs this?
My 0.2 cents. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:57, 10 March 2014 (UTC)

Moscow time has been wrong on the map for years now. For 2011-2014, including when this comic was published, Russia had essentially permanent DST and Moscow was at 2014 UTC+4. But on 26 October 2014, they ended that and have since been permanently at UTC+3. Moscow should be at the same spot as Iraq, slightly ahead of Iran, instead of behind it. Something to add to the technical notes section, perhaps? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.183.197|162.158.183.197]] 15:01, 10 September 2020 (UTC)

Who made it spin so much faster?! [[User:Beanie|Beanie]] ([[User talk:Beanie|talk]]) 10:23, 17 December 2020 (UTC)

== Timed Links Fix ==

I've just condensed the raw link dump into a table, each hour gets its own two cells with a label cell and another cell with the four image links related to that hour inside it. (unable to sign properly, ISP is using IPv4 proxy.)[[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.250|172.69.69.250]] 02:40, 3 May 2022 (UTC)

Talk:1335: Now

2022-05-03T02:39:51Z

172.69.69.250: /* Timed Links Fix */ new section

1335: Now

2022-05-03T02:37:33Z

172.69.69.250: /* Timed Links */ first I make this amazing table then I forgot to delete the links it replaces. oops.

<div class="plainlinks">
{{comic
| number = 1335
| before = ''Explainxkcd note: The image below is accelerated to show a full day's spin in approximately 10 seconds. The actual comic completes one revolution per day. For the current state, see [http://xkcd.com/now/ xkcd.com/now]''
| date = February 26, 2014
| title = Now
| image = now.gif
| titletext = This image stays roughly in sync with the day (assuming the Earth continues spinning). Shortcut: xkcd.com/now
}}
</div>

==Explanation==
The picture is divided in 24 segments representing the 24 hours of the day. At noon and at midnight the break between segments is indicated by the tip of a dark grey triangle.

The picture rotates by 3.75 {{w|degree (angle)|degrees}} every 15 minutes, as does the Earth, so that it is constantly up to date in showing which regions are currently at which times of day. The picture change seems to happen half-way through a 15-minute time increment (that is, at 7½, 22½, 37½, and 52½ minutes after each hour), so that the picture is always correct for the nearest multiple of 15 minutes.

The map projection of the earth in the middle of the picture shows an {{w|azimuthal equidistant projection}} with the {{w|South Pole}} in the center. This is unusual, as the projection typically puts the north pole in the center, but necessary in order for it to rotate clockwise. [[Randall]] was playing on projections before in [[977: Map Projections]].

The list of cities and countries doesn't match the map exactly - notice how the continent of Australia is shifted counterclockwise of the words "most Australian cities". This is because the map is centered relative to the {{w|time zone}}s and the local variations therein. The map shows the configuration of time zones with respect to {{w|daylight saving time}} (also known as summer time) at the time of the comic's initial release (February 2014); it was being observed in parts of Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, and other countries not named in this comic. If the map were to stay accurate through the year, the location of place names would have to move over the next few months as parts of the southern hemisphere went off DST and parts of the northern hemisphere went onto it; however, the map failed to change on the morning of March 9 as it should have (to recognize the start of DST in North America).

In many countries "{{w|business hours}}" are considered to be from 9 am to 5 pm. With some exceptions, including emergencies, it is generally considered rude to place a {{w|telephone}} call to someone's residence during the hours when most people are asleep; Randall portrays this time period as extending from 10 pm to 8 am. This may be a reference to the 10 pm "cutoff" time [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0WeQJW-H3Y discussed] in an episode of "Curb Your Enthusiasm."

"Rude to Call" was also the name used by a G-mail experimental opt-in feature in 2009 which added a crossed out phone symbol next to the sender if it was night in the sender's time zone when the reader loaded the email on their screen.

On midnight at UTC we can see this situation:
*00:00 UTC {{w|Greenwich Mean Time}}
::UK, Portugal
::West Africa
*01:00 UTC {{w|Central European Time}}
::Most of central Europe
::Nigeria, and many more countries belonging to the {{w|West Africa Time}} zone
*02:00 UTC {{w|Eastern European Time}}
::Eastern Europe, many countries like Bulgaria, Romania or Greece
::The {{w|Levant}}
::Egypt
*03:00 UTC {{w|UTC+03:00}} (East Africa Time, Eastern Europe Forward Time, and Arabia Standard Time)
::Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Somalia, and more
::Kaliningrad and Belarus
::Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and more.
::Iran is at {{w|Iran Standard Time}}, using an offset of UTC+03:30
*04:00 UTC {{w|UTC+04:00}}
::{{w|Moscow Time}}
::United Arab Emirates, Mauritius, and more
::Afghanistan is at {{w|Time in Afghanistan}}, using an offset of UTC+04:30
::Iran is at {{w|Iran Standard Time}}, using an offset of UTC+03:30
*05:00 UTC {{w|UTC+05:00}}
::Pakistan, Western Australia, Maldives and some France former colonies.
::Afghanistan is at {{w|Time in Afghanistan}}, using an offset of UTC+04:30
::India and Sri Lanka using {{w|UTC+05:30}}
::Nepal is using a much more odd offset at {{w|UTC+05:45}}
*06:00 UTC {{w|UTC+06:00}}
::Bangladesh, Bhutan...
::UK {{w|British Indian Ocean Territory}}
::Russia at {{w|Yekaterinburg Time}}, also Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan
::China only use {{w|Time in China|one time zone}} (+08:00) but Xinjiang and Tibet unofficially use +06:00
::India and Sri Lanka using {{w|UTC+05:30}}
::Nepal is using a much more odd offset at {{w|UTC+05:45}}
*07:00 UTC {{w|UTC+07:00}}
::South-east Asia like Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, and more
::Christmas Island belonging to Australia
::Russia is also using the {{w|Omsk Time}}
*08:00 UTC {{w|UTC+08:00}}
::Western Australia
::China uses only {{w|Time in China|one time zone}} while the country spans about five.
::Singapore
::Philippines
::Perth
*09:00 UTC {{w|UTC+09:00}}
::Japan
::The Koreas
*10:00 UTC {{w|UTC+10:00}}
::Brisbane and the Australian Capital Territory, New South Wales, Queensland, Tasmania and Victoria
::US: Guam and Northern Mariana Islands
*11:00 UTC {{w|UTC+11:00}}
::Micronesia, New Caledonia, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu
::Russia {{w|Vladivostok Time}}
*12:00 UTC {{w|UTC+12:00}} or {{w|UTC−12:00}}
::Kamchatka (a Russian peninsula at the east Siberia), Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Tuvalu and more
*13:00 UTC {{w|UTC+13:00}} or {{w|UTC−11:00}}
::New Zealand, Kiribati, Tonga
*14:00 UTC {{w|UTC+14:00}} or {{w|UTC−10:00}}
::Hawaii, Samoa
::French Polynesia, Cook Islands, and more
::Line Islands, belonging to Kiribati
*15:00 UTC {{w|UTC−09:00}}
::{{W|Time in Alaska|Alaska}} (some islands of Alaska is at -10:00 and a few city's are at -08:00)
::French Polynesia
*16:00 UTC {{w|UTC−08:00}} or {{w|Pacific Time Zone}}
::US West Coast
::Canada or (British Columbia and Yukon)
::Mexico (Baja California)
*17:00 UTC {{w|UTC−07:00}} or {{w|Mountain Time Zone}}
::US: Denver, and much more
::Canada: Alberta (Calgary, Edmonton), British Columbia, more
*18:00 UTC {{w|UTC−06:00}} or {{w|Central Time Zone}}
::Mexico, Chile, Ecuador, Nicaragua and more
::US: Chicago, Texas except of some most westernmost counties, and many more
*19:00 UTC {{w|UTC−05:00}} or {{w|Eastern Time Zone}}
::Eastern Canada like Ontario or Quebec
::US East Coast including New York and Florida.
::But also Cuba, Haiti, Panama and much more countries
*20:00 UTC {{w|UTC−04:00}} or {{w|Atlantic Time Zone}}
::Canadian Maritimes: New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia. (Newfoundland uses {{w|UTC-03:30}})
::Chile
::Greenland
::Most of the Caribbean Islands.
*21:00 UTC {{w|UTC−03:00}}
::Coastal Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, French Guiana, the UK Falkland Islands, and more
*22:00 UTC {{w|UTC−02:00}}
::UK: South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands
::Brazil: Fernando de Noronha
*23:00 UTC {{w|UTC−01:00}}
::Cape Verde
::Azores (part of Portugal)

==Technical notes==
When first posted, the picture was exactly 12 hours off. Somewhere around 5:10 UTC, this was fixed. The original version also included a listing for Inland Brazil; this could have created a conflict with US East Coast when Daylight-Saving Time begins in the US, and it has been removed.

The names used for the image files refer not to {{w|Universal Time|UTC (Universal Time)}} as one might expect but rather to the time exactly 12 hours off of that. The name of the image file linked from the page matched Universal Time during the first few hours, but the file-naming scheme did not change when the comic was corrected.

==Transcript==
:[The comic is a moving circle with a static outer ring.]

:[The outermost part of the static ring is divided in 22 segments representing the 24 hours of the day. The Noon (11 AM - 1 PM) and Midnight (11 PM - 1 AM) segments cover two hours which are not segmented. The ring is divided so it is yellow from 6 AM to 6 PM and dark grey on the other half.]
::Noon - 6 PM - Midnight - 6 AM

:[The innermost part of the static ring is light grey and divided in two sections that cower from 9 AM to 5 PM and from 10 PM to 8 AM respectively. They contain descriptions of the time intervals.]
::Business hours (9-5)
::Rude to call

:[The rest of the image consist of a rotating part.]

:[On the innermost part of the circle is the Earth as seen from the south pole. Each continent has a different color. The colors are
:*Europe: Red
:*Africa: Cyan
:*Asia: Green
:*Oceania: Purple
:*North America: Blue-violet
:*South America: Olive green
:*Antarctica (The south pole): Light grey

:[Two segmented rings circle the map - these give the names of the continents (not the Antactica) and the color of the ring match the color of the continent on the map. Each segment cover the part of the map with the given continent. The one with Europe is merged with the one for Asia - and the color also merges from red to green along Turkey and Russia where the transition from Europe to Asia occurs.]

:[On the inner ring are the names of the following continents (white text on a segment with the color of the continent)]
::Africa
::Oceania
::South America

:[On the second of these rings are the names of the following continents (white text on a segment with the color of the continent)]
::Europe Asia
::North America

:[On the outermost ring of the moving circle are written names of regions, countries and cities of the Earth over the part of the map in which time zone they belong. All the text is color coded to match the color of the continent they belong to as given on the central map. The text is written in four lines. Below the names are sorted by color and reading from left to right first - and only sorting top to bottom if needed.]

:[Europe - Red text:]
::UK - Most of Europe - Eastern Europe

:[Africa - Cyan text:]
::West Africa - Nigeria - Egypt - East Africa

:[Asia - Green text:]
::The Levant - Iraq - Iran - Moscow - Afghanistan - Pakistan - India - Southeast Asia - Java - China - Singapore - Philippines - Japan - The Koreas - Kamchatka

:[Oceania - Purple text:]
::Perth - Brisbane - Most Australian cities - New Zealand

:[North America - Blue-violet text:]
::Alaska - US West Coast - Denver - Mexico - Chicago - Texas - Eastern Canada - US East coast - Canadian Maritimes

:[South America - Olive green text:]
:: Coastal Brazil

==Implementations==
There are currently several implementations of the Now comic available for several different platforms:

===Windows===
A [https://github.com/leipert/xkcd-now-clock script] that automatically updates the wallpaper for the current time.

===Linux===
A [https://github.com/151henry151/randall-clock-desktop-background bash script] that automatically updates the wallpaper for the current time, written for a Debian system running i3. May work well for other linux distributions as well.

===Android===
An [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.phillab.xkcd_now Android widget] version of the comic.

===Web===
A [http://www.xkcdnow.com/ web-based implementation] which also displays time zones. (Not working on 02017-08-16)

A [http://c0la.s3.amazonaws.com/xkcd1335.html draggable] implementation (click&drag - left and right) (Not working on 02017-08-16)

===Cross-Platform===
An [https://github.com/BruceJohnJennerLawso/xkcd-Now/releases/tag/1.02 offline version of the comic] made using C++ and SFML.

==Timed Links==
{| class="wikitable"
|+ Links to each individual comic image
|-
!00h!!01h!!02h!!03h!!04h!!05h!!06h!!07h!!08h!!09h!!10h!!11h
|-
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/00h00m.png 00h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/00h15m.png 00h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/00h30m.png 00h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/00h45m.png 00h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/01h00m.png 01h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/01h15m.png 01h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/01h30m.png 01h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/01h45m.png 01h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/02h00m.png 02h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/02h15m.png 02h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/02h30m.png 02h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/02h45m.png 02h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/03h00m.png 03h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/03h15m.png 03h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/03h30m.png 03h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/03h45m.png 03h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/04h00m.png 04h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/04h15m.png 04h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/04h30m.png 04h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/04h45m.png 04h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/05h00m.png 05h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/05h15m.png 05h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/05h30m.png 05h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/05h45m.png 05h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/06h00m.png 06h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/06h15m.png 06h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/06h30m.png 06h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/06h45m.png 06h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/07h00m.png 07h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/07h15m.png 07h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/07h30m.png 07h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/07h45m.png 07h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/08h00m.png 08h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/08h15m.png 08h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/08h30m.png 08h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/08h45m.png 08h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/09h00m.png 09h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/09h15m.png 09h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/09h30m.png 09h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/09h45m.png 09h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/10h00m.png 10h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/10h15m.png 10h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/10h30m.png 10h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/10h45m.png 10h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/11h00m.png 11h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/11h15m.png 11h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/11h30m.png 11h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/11h45m.png 11h45m]
|-
!12h!!13h!!14h!!15h!!16h!!17h!!18h!!19h!!20h!!21h!!22h!!23h
|-
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/12h00m.png 12h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/12h15m.png 12h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/12h30m.png 12h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/12h45m.png 12h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/13h00m.png 13h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/13h15m.png 13h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/13h30m.png 13h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/13h45m.png 13h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/14h00m.png 14h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/14h15m.png 14h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/14h30m.png 14h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/14h45m.png 14h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/15h00m.png 15h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/15h15m.png 15h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/15h30m.png 15h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/15h45m.png 15h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/16h00m.png 16h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/16h15m.png 16h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/16h30m.png 16h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/16h45m.png 16h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/17h00m.png 17h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/17h15m.png 17h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/17h30m.png 17h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/17h45m.png 17h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/18h00m.png 18h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/18h15m.png 18h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/18h30m.png 18h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/18h45m.png 18h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/19h00m.png 19h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/19h15m.png 19h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/19h30m.png 19h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/19h45m.png 19h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/20h00m.png 20h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/20h15m.png 20h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/20h30m.png 20h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/20h45m.png 20h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/21h00m.png 21h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/21h15m.png 21h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/21h30m.png 21h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/21h45m.png 21h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/22h00m.png 22h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/22h15m.png 22h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/22h30m.png 22h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/22h45m.png 22h45m]
|[http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/23h00m.png 23h00m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/23h15m.png 23h15m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/23h30m.png 23h30m] [http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/now/23h45m.png 23h45m]
|}

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Dynamic comics]]
[[Category:Time]]

2613: Bad Map Projection: Madagascator

2022-04-29T18:56:35Z

172.69.69.250: corrected newline

{{comic
| number = 2613
| date = April 29, 2022
| title = Bad Map Projection: Madagascator
| image = bad_map_projection_madagascator.png
| titletext = The projection's north pole is in a small lake on the island of Mahé in the Seychelles, which is off the top of the map and larger than the rest of the Earth's land area combined.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a MADAGASCARIAN GIANT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This is another comic in the [[:Category:Bad Map Projections|Bad Map Projections]] series. This time, Randall used the classic {{w|Mercator projection}} but instead of placing the North Pole on top and the South Pole on the bottom it is oriented so that the top is the island of {{w|Mahé, Seychelles|Mahé}}. This is valid, as Earth is pretty much symmetrical{{citation needed}}, but the axis choice is unusual. Since the Mercator projection tends to visually distort areas near the top and bottom of the resulting map, this gives some areas, notably Madagascar, very unusual shapes.

The Mercator projection became the standard projection for world maps during the 1800s because it is conformal - the angle between two places on the map is the same as the angle between them in the real world. During the age of sail, when navigation was performed by compass - this was a very valuable feature, since once could plot a course between two locations by measuring the direction from one to another on the map and then accounting for the difference between the magnetic and actual north poles to determine what direction to sail in. In the mid-20th century this trend was {{w|Mercator_projection#Criticism|criticized}} because the distortion towards the north and south poles gave an inaccurate impression of relative sizes. The most common example given of this distortion is that on a Mercator map of the world Greenland looks to be larger than Africa, when in real life Africa is 14 times larger. Thus the reference to making Madagascar larger in this projection rather than Greenland.

[[Category:Bad Map Projections]]

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
Bad map projection #248: Madagascar

Madagascar projection but with the North Pole in the Indian Ocean so it exaggerates the size of Madagascar instead of greenland

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Bad Map Projections]]

599: Apocalypse

2022-04-27T04:43:27Z

172.69.69.250: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 599
| date = June 19, 2009
| title = Apocalypse
| image = apocalypse.png
| titletext = I wonder if I still have time to go shoot a short film with Kevin Bacon.
}}

== Explanation ==
This comic begins with the beginning of the {{w|Apocalypse}}, hence the title. It is depicted, properly, with a very dystopian color picture with several yellow burning {{w|meteors}} striking down from the blood red sky, towards a black, red, orange and yellow ground. The way the panels are drawn below makes a transition from this dark image to a normal comic, with the first normal panel being superimposed on the dark image.

In this image [[Beret Guy]] shouts out '''The apocalypse!''' And then he continues to explain what this will mean: ''The skies burn, the seas turn to blood, and the dead walk the earth!''

All three sentences are attributed to the apocalypse, but it seems that the first one about the sky burning, actually comes from a translation of one of the {{w|Nostradamus}} predictions which has, amongst others, been used to "{{w|Nostradamus_in_popular_culture#September_11.2C_2001|predict 9/11}}". In {{w|Revelation 16}} from the Bible about the {{w|Seven bowls}}, which are a set of seven plagues of God's wrath poured over the wicked towards the Apocalypse, the {{w|Seven_bowls#Second_Bowl|second bowl}} describes that ''{{w|Revelation_16#Structure|The Sea Turns to Blood}}''. The {{w|Universal resurrection|resurrection of the dead}} is from the biblical version of the Apocalypse, the {{w|Last Judgment}}.

After Beret Guy has announced this, he runs into [[Cueball]] who has heard part of this, but he is only interested in the last part and asks to check if he understood correctly that the dead will walk the earth. When this is confirmed Cueball becomes very busy.

He runs to his office and quickly writes a scientific math paper, then runs as fast as he can to the math department and get his colleagues to sign it. Then he runs to a cemetery where the dead are rising, finds the one he searched for, and asks the resurrected {{w|zombie}} if he is Erdős. When confirmed that he is indeed Erdős, Cueball asks him to sign the math paper.

{{w|Paul Erdős}} (26 March 1913 – 20 September 1996) was a Hungarian mathematician who (according to Wikipedia) published more papers than any other mathematician in history, working with hundreds of collaborators. His grave is in the Kozma Street Cemetery in Budapest.

There is an in-joke developed among mathematicians called the {{w|Erdős number}} (similar to a Bacon number for film actors, referenced in the title text, see below). By definition, Erdős has an Erdős number of 0. Everyone who has co-written a mathematical paper with Erdős has an Erdős number of 1. Everyone who collaborated with them (but not Erdős himself) is assigned an Erdős number of 2. In general, if ''k'' is the minimal Erdős number of all the people you've [https://paperell.com/ written papers] with, your Erdős number is ''k'' + 1. The Erdős number is the length of the shortest "chain" from you to Erdős.

Thanks to collaboration between mathematicians and other researchers, many people in science and medical research now have Erdős numbers. Not everyone has an Erdős number, though; people without any chain linking them to Erdős have an undefined Erdős number. For example, most people who are not mathematicians or scientists do not have Erdős numbers. Nor do mathematicians and scientists whose publications were written by themselves only with no collaborators.

By this trick Cueball thinks that he and his colleagues will now all have a an Erdős number of 1. The joke is that he would be using his last few hours in this life to write a math paper just to improve his and his friends' Erdős numbers.

There are, however, many problems with his idea, even assuming the dead will walk the earth on that day. First of all, just having your name on a piece of paper with Erdős's signature does nothing for your Erdős number. It needs to be a {{w|Scientific_literature#Scientific_article|scientifically valid paper}}, published in a {{w|peer reviewed}} {{w|scientific journal}}. And given that the apocalypse is happening, there seems no time, chance or reason to publish any more math papers.

Even if there were time, it would not count for much to have someone sign a math paper they haven't even read, let alone had anything to do with the actual writing and research. The same would be true for the other five mathematicians who signed it. But of course many papers have coauthors who did not do much more than work in the same department as the person who actually wrote the paper (a sad but true fact). Presumably Cueball's friends assume that nobody will investigate whether they, or Erdős, truly participated in the writing and research of Cueball's paper.

Furthermore, even if it did count, they will not be able to take the paper with them into the afterlife (although since nobody has ever returned from the afterlife{{Citation needed}} we can't be certain of this), and thus since no one would have had time to read the paper, no one would know they had an Erdős number of 1. In the afterlife they could all say that they had such a number, but then again everyone else with such an interest could do the same, since no one could prove otherwise. Of course if you end up in the same part ({{w|Heaven}} or {{w|Hell}}) of the {{w|afterlife}} as Erdős he could confirm or deny the claim, but that would probably not help Cueball and his friends, since he could tell the truth about their paper. (Erdős was known for using an idiosyncratic set of slang terms, in which he described people who had stopped doing mathematics as having "died", whereas people who had died had "left".)

That the whole comic is about the Erdős number, and not just Erdős signature, is made clear in the title text which refers to a similar (and less esoteric) meme called "{{w|Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon}}", or simply Bacon numbers. This time, the chain's center is actor {{w|Kevin Bacon}}, and the links are formed by two people appearing in the same movie. Unlike Erdős, Kevin Bacon is not dead, so those of you wishing to get a Bacon number of 1 still have a chance.

In the title text Cueball thus wonders if there is still time for him to make a short film with Kevin Bacon, now he has used so much time on improving his Erdős number. Again, if the film hasn't been shown to the public it would not count for anything...

One of the mathematical scribbles appearing in panel 5 shows the square root of 163, which may be a reference to {{w|Ramanujan's constant}}.

[[403: Convincing Pickup Line]] has a parody of the Erdős collaboration graph.

Zombies are a [[:Category:Zombies|recurring theme]] in xkcd, particularly zombie scientists, which has also occurred both before with {{w|Richard Feynman}} in [[397: Unscientific]] and after with {{w|Marie Curie}} in [[896: Marie Curie]].

==Transcript==
:[The first panel is very large and shows a dark scene with one large meteor in front and four smaller in the background showering the darkened earth. They are all five black with yellow fire around them and a fire trail behind them, and all are flying from the top left corner and down towards right. The sky at the top is pitch black, but then the sky turns blood red under dark clouds. Two large mountain peaks, one almost pyramid shaped, are shown to the left and to the right there are two smaller peaks towards the distant horizon. The mountains and the ground around them are mainly black, but with red, orange and yellow streaks spread all over the black area beneath the mountain peaks, maybe indicating fire or lava, or reflections in water or blood. At the bottom right corner a normal white panel is superimposed on this apocalyptic image.]

:[The smaller panel at the bottom of the first is halfway over the first panel, haflway below, and only to the right of the middle of the first panel. Beret Guy is running towards left, with his arms raised in the air.]
:Beret Guy: The apocalypse! The skies burn, the seas turn to blood, and the dead walk the earth!

:[From here a normal sequence of panels in three rows begin beneath the second panel. This leaves a gap between the apocalyptic panel and the first row of regular panels, on the left side where the 2nd panel did not reach over. In this panel Beret Guy (coming from the right) finds Cueball.]
:Cueball: The dead what?
:Beret Guy: Walk the earth!

:[Cueball running right in a thin panel.]
:Cueball: I have to go.

:[Cueball sitting on a chair at a table scribbling vigorously and noisily with a pen on a paper. Mathematical symbols appear above Cueball's head, including a summation from i=0 to n, a logarithm of n and the square root of a number.]
:<big>∑</big>ni=0ik1/i log(n)
:√163
:''Scribble''
:''Scribble''

:[Cueball running right again, in a thin panel, pen and paper in hand.]

:[Cueball opening door with label:]
:Math Dept
:Cueball: The dead return!
:Cueball: Everyone, quick, get your names on here!

:[Cueball stand on the left side of a table looking left over his shoulder. Five people are lining up to sign the paper lying on the right side of the table. The first who signs with a pen is Blondie, then in line follows Megan, a Cueball-like guy, Ponytail and another Cueball-like guy who stand with one hand to his chin looking right, away from the other.]
:Blondie: At last!
:Guy looking right: I hope there's time!

:[Cueball running right in yet a thin panel, with pen and the paper flowing behind him.]

:[Cueball walks right with the paper and pen in his hand as he arrives at at a cemetery as revealed by an old worn sign. Scary sounds appear off-panel right.]
:Sign: Cemetery
:Rising dead (off-panel): ''Hurrghhh''

:[Cueball, still going right, arrives at a grave, pen in hand and the other hand almost outside the panel, but with a corner of the paper just visible. The grave has a large gravestone to the right and in front of it there is a Cueball-like guy rising up from the ground using his arms to push up on the base of the stone and the small pile of earth towards Cueball. The guy looks very worn, with dirt on his head and scratches on his cheek.]

:[Cueball bends a little down and offers pen and paper to the raised dead man who looks up at him when he is addressed.]
:Cueball: Paul Erdős?
:Erdős: Yes?
:Cueball: We need you to sign this.

==Trivia==
*This version of [[Blondie]] seems to be employed at a mathematical department on a university. It could thus also be [[Miss Lenhart]], but there is no proof that she is a teacher...

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Zombies]]
[[Category:Comics with blood]]
[[Category: Research Papers]]

Talk:241: Battle Room

2022-04-26T22:21:11Z

172.69.69.250: Greeting

Should there be some sort of spoiler tag at the top of this explanation? [[User:NixillUmbreon|NixillUmbreon]] ([[User talk:NixillUmbreon|talk]]) 08:20, 4 February 2014 (UTC)

That's not really a spoiler {{unsigned ip|199.27.133.28}}

^ you learn those things in the first few chapters. {{unsigned ip|162.158.126.230}}

"I think Card would be unpleased with Bean's antics." [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.225|162.158.74.225]] 20:25, 19 December 2016 (UTC) Ender's Game: The Movie That Shows How Being Politically Correct Can Screw a Movie Up

Also, it's revealed in the Bean books that Bean had actually already hacked into the school's computer system, so it makes sense that he's the one that sabotaged the gate

"[...]a boy of above-average intelligence, which means he is recruited to be trained to be one of the commanders of Earth's "Defense" Fleet[...]" I never read the books, but does this mean a) that about half the boys get recruited to be commanders? or b) is the setting using a distribution of intelligence, which puts the average (arithmetic) far away from the median? Or is c) average here something else but the aritmetic middle? Or is it d) supposed to mean "far above-average"? The current explanation leaves an (average) reader who never heard of Enders game truly confused about this.--[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 14:00, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

:[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] - the correct answer is debatable. it seems that the explanation might be talking about slightly above the rest at the station, as in above average among geniuses.
if not, the correct answer is d. --[[user:naveh|naveh]] 23:17, 3 February 2021 (GMT+2)
::Thanks for the clarification :) how sure are you about it? should we put it to the explanation? --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 09:55, 4 February 2021 (UTC)
Hi guys![[Special:Contributions/172.69.69.250|172.69.69.250]] 22:21, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

2139: Email Settings

2022-04-25T01:35:19Z

172.69.69.250: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2139
| date = April 19, 2019
| title = Email Settings
| image = email_settings.png
| titletext = What are all these less-than signs? What's an HREF? Look, we know you live in a fancy futuristic tech world, but not all of us have upgraded to the latest from Sun Microsystems.
}}

==Explanation==
The comic shows some email settings with a few less-than-helpful options.

*'''Default Reply Behavior'''
*:Normal reply behavior would be to reply to the person who sent the original email. Typically in email programs, there is an option to Reply to all (reply all) other recipients of an email in addition to the sender. Depending on the email usage pattern this is a potentially useful or a potentially annoying option. "Forward to address book" takes this one step further by sending your reply to every person who is in your address book, whether they received the original email or not. This could be a reference to "{{w|Chain_letter|chain emails}}", which are popularly forwarded to many users.
*'''Vacation Autoresponder'''
*:This is a message that is automatically sent out in reply to an email to let them know that you are away and won't be replying until you return. Rather than the settings being "on" and "off", this system consists of "while on vacation" and "always". Email systems typically have no way of knowing that you're on vacation (although some email providers, such as Gmail, could figure out if you're on vacation using information gleaned from your emails, such as hotel and flight confirmations). The "reply to all emails with vacation notice, even when I'm not on vacation" is an option used by some companies (e.g. travel agencies) to let the sender of a request know the expected reply timeline and similar information. In the second case, the notice is not a "vacation notice", but applies the same functionality of the email program.
*'''Reply to all newsletters with "Thank you for the newsletter!"'''
*:This option is completely unnecessary, in that newsletters are usually automated and shotgunned out to thousands of addresses at once, often with a do-not-reply address. Clues such as those aside, this also somewhat presumes that the system can reliably identify all (and only all) the messages that are indeed newsletters.
*'''Attachment limit'''
*:These {{w|Email attachment|attachment}} limits are all pretty small, with 300 kilobytes and 1.4 megabytes being the capacity of old 5.25" and 3.5" floppy disks, and 5 megabytes, while better, is smaller than most high-resolution cell phone camera pictures. It being in beta means that it might not be as dependable. However, setting the maximum attachment size would likely not be a user setting; it would be a setting the email system enforces on the user. In the past with slow connections and very limited mailbox sizes, this option was useful to keep the message size in check. Presently, Gmail still has the same 25MB attachment limit it had in 2004.
*'''Default email format:'''
:*Plain text is self-explanatory; plain text with no special formatting options. {{w|HTML}} means that it can have markup to allow for bold text, colors, etc. {{w|CSS}} is in reference to Cascading Style Sheets, which is a styling option often combined with HTML, but useless on its own. With emails, it is typically used as inline CSS.
*'''Reply to HTML emails with "Whoa, buddy, what's all this code?"'''
*:HTML email is a format for sending email with {{w|Formatted text|rich-text}} contents, which may include images and links. If your email client isn't configured for HTML, the content may look like text interspersed with a bunch of weird code. Since HTML email is a common format, replying this way to every HTML email you receive can be an effective way to annoy people. This may be a "throwback" option: a few years ago, email systems didn't always recognize HTML emails, so if you sent an HTML email you might very well receive this kind of reply.
*'''Character set'''
*:{{w|ASCII}} is the character group containing all of the letters in the English alphabet, as well as the digits and common symbols. The Non-ASCII set contains all of the non-English alphabets and the rest of the (lesser-used) symbols. Some of those characters, such as those from Cyrillic and Greek, resemble letters from the Latin alphabet; when spammers use these resemblances to deceive users, it is called an {{w|IDN homograph attack}}, but now that this email client is set to exclude ASCII characters, the user must use the same technique to communicate with speakers of most European languages. Older computer programs often only allowed ASCII characters or a much more limited set of characters than the full amount of recognized {{w|Unicode}} characters, and the email protocol itself requires a form of encoding (often MIME, these days) to send 8-or-more-bit characters via systems designed for the 7-bit transportation that covers the ASCII set and allowed non-printable characters. It would be unusual today for an email program to default to only allow for ASCII characters to be read or written, although someone might want to deliberately set things that way. The second option is nonsense because, while you would likely want to allow other characters, you would definitely not want to allow '''only''' those and exclude the ASCII characters (so people couldn't use regular letters or numbers or the most common punctuation, although most East Asian users can use the {{w|Fullwidth}} form of Latin letters instead).
*'''Smart autocomplete'''
*:Some email platforms, including Gmail, have the ability to use machine learning to suggest possible, usually short reply options for you to choose from. If the original email asks if you want to go to dinner, the auto-complete replies might be, "Yes", "No", "How about Friday?" and then you could choose one, or type your own reply. The third option to automatically respond to ''all'' emails with suggested replies is putting a lot of faith in the computer and is likely to backfire quickly, even more so if your recipients also have activated this option.
*'''Important emails'''
*:Showing important emails is the expected behavior, and hiding only them would be a very strange thing to want to do. If it is set to hide only certain emails, a program would definitely do the opposite, and hide emails judged to be most likely unimportant "spam" emails.
*'''Show unread email count...'''
*:Seeing your unread email count is normal behavior, and a good way to see how much you're getting spammed by useless emails from people you never asked for. A projected unread email count based on when the system expects you to die, and how well you do at reading your email on a day to day basis is probably going to be depressing or in the extreme could be so overwhelming to be the actual cause of death on the projected date. Showing the unread email count on the user's projected day of death could also be a reference to a feature in many video games where the player's score is shown when they die. In this case, the "score" would be the user's unread email count.
*'''Signature'''
*:An {{w|Signature block|email signature}} is a bit of canned text that gets added to the end of an email, often containing your name, and sometimes a bit of other information like a title and other contact information. Having the choices being None and "That's my email. Hope you liked it!" is less useful. Less useful signatures somewhat came into vogue after Apple used it for cheap iPhone advertisement ("Sent from my iPhone") and Apple as well as non-Apple users made fun by using quite creative signatures themselves ([https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/mobile-device-email-signatures-more-than-you-ever-wanted-to-know/277950/ here is a breakdown with examples]). For many, the actual purpose of email signatures got lost.
*'''Title text'''
*:The title text also references HTML email, in which angle brackets (i.e, less-than and greater-than symbols) are used to show the opening and closing tags of elements. "href" is a common attribute in HTML elements denoting the location a hyperlink will take you to upon being clicked. This is likely another "throwback" reference as Sun Microsystems was a maker of Unix workstations popular in the late 1980s through 2000s (now part of Oracle Corporation). The message could also be written by someone receiving an HTML email that is not recognized as one and directly shown on the screen.

==Transcript==

:'''Email Settings'''
:[A list of controls with radio buttons and checkboxes]
:Default reply behavior
::( ) Reply
::( ) Reply All
::(*) Forward to address book

:Vacation autoresponder
::(*) While on vacation
::( ) Always

:[x] Reply to all newsletters with "Thank you for the newsletter!"

:Attachment limit
::( ) 300 KB
::(*) 1.4 MB
::( ) 5 MB (Beta)

:Default email format
::(*) Plain text
::( ) HTML
::( ) CSS

:[x] Reply to HTML emails with "Whoa, buddy, what's all this code?"

:Character set
::( ) ASCII (Unicode 0-127 only)
::(*) Non-ASCII (Unicode 128+ only)

:Smart autocomplete
::( ) Do not suggest replies
::( ) Suggest replies
::(*) Automatically respond to all emails with suggested reply

:Important emails
::(*) Show
::( ) Hide

:Show unread email count...
::(*) Now
::( ) On my projected day of death

:Signature
::(*) "That's my email. Hope you liked it!"
::( ) None

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Email]]

Talk:2157: Diploma Legal Notes

2019-05-31T12:04:03Z

172.69.69.250:

Can I please live on this universe?

2152: Westerns

2019-05-20T11:23:33Z

172.69.69.250:

{{comic
| number = 2152
| date = May 20, 2019
| title = Westerns
| image = westerns.png
| titletext = Sitting here idly trying to figure out how the population of the Old West in the late 1800s compares to the number of Red Dead Redemption 2 players.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2 PLAYER IN THE 1800s. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

For the most part, genres of film, games and the like based on historical time periods frequently take hold after the time period is over. Over time, the time period will remain the same size while the "genre"'s lifespan will grow, eventually leading to the genre being as long as it's origin. In this case, the Western genre is not equal to nor double but TRIPLE the size of the time period it is based off of. While this might be taken to suggest that we have used up everything good in Westerns, it probably is more Randall looking at time passing.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
A horizontal timeline spanning between the years 1840 and 2020. Every decade is indicated by a tick below the line, and labeled every 50 years. Two ranges are highlighted by brackets and labeled:

1862-1898: The “Wild West” era

1902-2019: Western films, books, video games, etc

Below the timeline:

It's weird to realize that the Western genre has now existed for three times longer than the period it's based on.

{{comic discussion}}

1938: Meltdown and Spectre

2018-01-05T22:52:56Z

172.69.69.250: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1938
| date = January 5, 2018
| title = Meltdown and Spectre
| image = meltdown_and_spectre.png
| titletext = New zero-day vulnerability: In addition to rowhammer, it turns out lots of servers are vulnerable to regular hammers, too.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by an unpatched computer - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic was inspired by the {{w|Meltdown (security vulnerability)|Meltdown}} and {{w|Spectre (security vulnerability)|Spectre}} bugs in certain processors. These vulnerabilites were disclosed to the public the week of this comic. The bugs made big news because they broke the "walls" between programs, in some circumstances allowing malware to steal secrets from normal, bug-free programs.

The {{w|Trolley Problem}} is a thought experiment where an out-of-control trolley is heading to a junction which you have control over. Leaving the trolley as-is will cause it to kill multiple people stuck on the tracks, but switching the track will cause it to kill another person. It creates the ethical dilemma of passively causing multiple deaths versus actively causing one, and it has become widely known. Speculative execution in most CPU chips is where the processor, not knowing what the results of an operation will be, begins processing an instruction or instructions before the logic on whether or not it should execute is finished. Once a decision is made, it proceeds and discards unnecessary processing. This allows it to keep doing useful work while some slower decision is made. The "quantum" aspect of this is that in some versions of quantum theory, quantum-level particles take every possible path at once and the result is the sum of all of them.

[[Ponytail]] describes the two vulnerabilities as abusing the computer's solution to its trolley problem. The computer creates "phantom trolleys" down each of the tracks, and malware can take advantage of the quantum-esque prediction method to figure out the data the phantom trolleys are using by testing the speed in which results are produced.

Contrary to what the comic implies, in many cases both paths are not simultaneously taken during speculative execution. A {{w|Branch predictor}} may be used to select the most likely path, and the effects should be completely erased if the predicted path is incorrect. Both branch prediction and taking both paths, also known as eager evaluation, are considered speculative execution and are affected by these bugs.

The {{w|Row Hammer}} problem is something entirely different. Computer memories are organized as a two-dimensional grid of rows and columns—and are physically constructed from tiny capacitors. By applying a pattern of memory access that rapidly changes a row of capacitors, you can cause charge to overflow to nearby rows and incorrectly change their states.

Cueball misunderstood her explanation, and came to the conclusion that the cloud "is full of phantom trolleys armed with hammers". Instead of correcting him, Ponytail decides to accept his interpretation.
(perhaps because she found this idea to be kinda cool)

Ponytail mentions that we suck at building "shared computers" because Rowhammer, Spectre, and Meltdown all break down the security divisions built between programs and between users. A hacker running a separate program in a separate account shouldn't be able to access your secrets, but these bugs allow them to. This is particularly dangerous for servers and the cloud, where different programs, websites, or even companies can be sharing the same hardware.

The title text humorously states that as well as row hammer, computer servers also can be "hacked" by regular hammers, which would destroy them. A zero-day vulnerability is an attack that takes advantage of a vulnerability that was discovered that day, and hasn't been patched. This would imply that the Rowhammer vulnerability is what inspired someone to try taking a hammer to a server.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Ponytail are walking.]
:Cueball: The Meltdown and Spectre exploits use "speculative execution?" What's that?
:Ponytail: You know the trolley problem? Well, for a while now, CPUs have basically been sending trolleys down '''''both''''' paths, quantum-style, while awaiting your choice. Then the unneeded "phantom" trolley disappears.

:[Ponytail framed alone, facing left. They have stopped walking.]
:Ponytail: The phantom trolley isn't supposed to touch anyone. But it turns out you can still use it to do stuff.
:Ponytail: And it can drive through walls.

:[Cueball and Ponytail are standing, facing each other.]
:Cueball: That sounds bad.
:Ponytail: Honestly, I've been assuming we were doomed ever since I learned about Rowhammer.

:Cueball: What's ''that''?
:Ponytail: If you toggle a row of memory cells on and off really fast, you can use electrical interference to flip nearby bits and—
:Cueball: Do we just suck at ... computers?
:Ponytail: Yup. Especially shared ones.

:[They resume walking to the right.]
:Cueball: So you're saying the cloud is full of phantom trolleys armed with hammers.
:Ponytail: ...Yes, that is exactly right.
:Cueball: Okay. I'll, uh... install updates?
:Ponytail: Good idea.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Computers]]

1938: Meltdown and Spectre

2018-01-05T22:52:32Z

172.69.69.250: /* Explanation */ about phantom trolleys armed with hammers

1934: Phone Security

2017-12-27T22:27:53Z

172.69.69.250: /* Explanation */ The problem with detonation is not the possibility of manslaughter against the thief, but the risk of having a mortal accident of the owner.

{{comic
| number = 1934
| date = December 27, 2017
| title = Phone Security
| image = phone_security.png
| titletext = ...wait until they type in payment information, then use it to order yourself a replacement phone.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic pokes fun at various phone security measures. At first, it covers some real measures, and then continues on to measures that are clearly somewhat overzealous or otherwise humorous. It is worth noting that all of the options are turned ON in the screen shown, so apparently the owner must be very afraid that their phone is going to be stolen, or just wants to see what will happen.
These may be options that would appear on the [[:Category:xkcd Phones|XKCD Phone]], but that is not mentioned specifically, and this comic does not appear to be directly linked.

The first two options: Set '''Passcode to Unlock''', and '''Erase phone after 10 failed unlock attempts''' are both real security measures found on most phones.
The additional options:

If phone is stolen it may be:
* '''Tracked''': That would allow the police to catch the perpetrator and return your phone.
* '''Erased''': That would prevent any sensitive data from being taken by a thief.
* '''Detonated''': That would likely harm the thief, possibly severely depending on how the phone was detonated. The main problem with this approach (ignoring the possibility of manslaughter), is that if the phone has the required chemical substances to detonate, is not impossible that, by accident or glitch, the phone could detonate on its own, possibly hurting or killing the rightful owner.

'''If the phone is stolen, play an earsplitting siren until the battery dies or is removed''': This would be to draw attention to the thief, and discourage them from stealing future phones.

'''If the phone is stolen, do a fake factory reset. Then, in the background...''' :This series of options is all humorous, indicating that the phone would allow the thief to think that it had factory reset, but the phone would, in fact, not do so, and would instead foil the thief by doing various horrible things to them.

* '''Constantly Request Dozens of Simultaneous Rideshares to the Phone's Location''': This would cause tons of "rides" to show up at the stolen phone, leaving a lot of annoyed ridesharers, and possibly alerting the police to the thief's location.
* '''Automatically order food to the Phone's location from every delivery place within 20 miles''': This would be similar to the ridesharing issue, except it would be implied that the thief would be on the hook to pay for all of that delivered food. This could also lead the police to the thief.
* '''If the thief logs into Facebook, send hostile messages to all their family members''': This has now deviated from things that could even possibly be useful, and is now just getting revenge on the thief, or potentially the person that the thief sells the phone to.
* '''Automatically direct self driving car to drive toward the phone's location at 5mph''': This would cause a self driving car to slowly follow the thief. This could absolutely catch the thief, but would also just be really, really creepy. This is similar to the plot of the movie "{{w|It Follows}}".
* '''Take photos of random objects at the thief's address and post them as "Free" on Craigslist or NextDoor''': Craigslist and NextDoor are sites that allow people to post advertisements for various things. Posting a large number of things for free would cause a lot of people to show up at the thief's residence (though it is not noted how the phone would know where the thief resides) requesting the free things, or, more humorously, if the thief was not home, people may just come by and take things, causing them to steal from the thief. This would be a humorous form of poetic justice.

The title text extends the last category with: Wait until they type in payment information, then use it to order yourself a new phone. This would be the ultimate in poetic justice, as it would basically say that the user does not care if their phone gets stolen, because the thief will end up unintentionally buying them a new one. If the thief were to complain about this, they would have to admit that they had stolen the first phone in order to do so, which they would be disinclined to do.

Note that all of these security measures, except for the remote detonation, could theoretically be done by a security app on a typical smartphone, although the fake factory reset and most (if not all) of what follows would probably be rather difficult to program.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|We need green switches. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[The content of a configuration screen on a smartphone is shown. All items listed are activated as indicated by green switches.]
:Security Options
:* Passcode to unlock (Set Code)
:* Erase phone after ten failed unlock attempts

:If stolen, phone can be remotely
:* Tracked
:* Erased
:* Detonated

:* If phone is stolen, erase data and play an earsplitting siren until the battery dies or is removed

:If phone is stolen, do a fake factory reset. Then, in the background...

:* ...constantly request dozens of simultaneous rideshares to the phone's location
:* ...automatically order food to phone's location from every delivery place within 20 miles
:* ...if thief logs in to Facebook, send hostile messages to all their family members
:* ...automatically direct self-driving car to drive toward phone's location at 5 mph
:* ...take photos of random objects at the thief's address and post them as "free" on Craigslist and Nextdoor

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Smartphones]]