3170: Service Outage

2025-11-20T07:37:30Z

2001:E68:545A:57DA:2551:FFD5:22A4:B762: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 3170
| date = November 19, 2025
| title = Service Outage
| image = service_outage_2x.png
| imagesize = 376x364px
| noexpand = true
| titletext = Now, if it were the *Canon* wiki, it's possible to imagine someone with a productivity-related reason for consulting it, but no one's job requires them to read that much about Admiral Daala.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|This page was created BY SOMEONE WHOSE WORK DOESN'T RELY ON THIS WIKI. Don't remove this notice too soon.}}
In this comic, Cueball is comparing the effects that service outages for different websites can have on people's productivity. When the service (like Google) is essential to his work, his productivity will clearly go down. However, his productivity increases if the service (the Star Wars Legends wiki) is non-essential, implying that he frequently gets distracted by them.

The title-text continues the Star Wars Legends Wiki joke, mentioning the canon and non-canon wikis. A writer or editor for a forthcoming Star Wars product may have a work-related reason to review a wiki containing Star Wars canon. Star Wars Legends, on the other hand, have been considered non-canon since 2014. The character of [https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Natasi_Daala Admiral] [https://villains.fandom.com/wiki/Natasi_Daala Daala] is well documented, but a relatively niche line of interest.

This comic was posted the day after there was an outage at {{w|Cloudflare}}, a major {{w|Content Delivery Network}} whose failure affected this very site (among many others). This followed a few weeks after there were outages at {{w|Microsoft Azure}} and {{w|Amazon Web Services}}, which provide {{w|cloud computing}} services, and fifteen months since {{w|2024 CrowdStrike-related IT outages|another significant outage}}. The same day as the Cloudflare outage, there was also a Github outage. These aren't sites that most non-technical users are directly familiar with, but they provide infrastructure for many popular web sites, so their failures have wide-ranging impacts even for those who had been previously unaware of their role in their online life.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Don't remove this notice too soon.}}

:[A graph of "Productivity when a major internet service goes down" over time]
:[The productivity line starts at average. A point in time is labelled 'outage begins']
:[After that, the line splits into two lines: one labelled "People whose work relies on the service". It goes down over time.]
:[The second line is labelled "People whose work doesn't rely on the service". It jumps a little and stays roughly constant after.]
:[The second line is illustrated by Cueball seated at a desk, using a laptop computer. A thought bubble says: "Aw man, the outage took down the Star Wars Legends wiki."]

{{comic discussion}}<noinclude>

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Internet]]
[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Star Wars]]

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3170: Service Outage