https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=feedcontributions&user=162.158.106.221&feedformat=atomexplain xkcd - User contributions [en]2024-03-29T13:10:42ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.30.0https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2549:_Edge_Cake&diff=2217422549: Edge Cake2021-12-02T17:25:36Z<p>162.158.106.221: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2549<br />
| date = December 1, 2021<br />
| title = Edge Cake<br />
| image = edge_cake.png<br />
| titletext = Every time IERS adds or removes a leap second, they send me a birthday cake out of superstition.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by FRINGE FRUITCAKE &ndash; Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
[[Megan]] (possibly an IERS agent) wishes Emily, represented as [[Hairbun]], Happy Birthday. This prompts a confused [[Cueball]] to ask if her birthday was sometime last month. Emily explains that she was born over the North Pole in a plane, meaning that she was born in every timezone at once. Technically though this is false, as there are some timezones (such as {{w|Nepal Standard Time|UTC+5:45}}) that are not represented at the north pole. Except for the one hour before it's midnight at the International Date Line, the date in eastern time zones is one day ahead of western time zones. She also says that it was February 29th (presumably it was also February 28 or March 1 in some time zones). February 29th only happens once every four years in the Gregorian calendar, adding to the confusion - people born on February 29th often celebrate their non-leap-year birthdays on arbitrary days (or {{w|The_Pirates_of_Penzance#Synopsis|not at all}}). Normally {{w|Birth aboard aircraft and ships|one could simply use the time in the airline company's native country}}, but the airline company was changing ownership from one country to another at the time, so this option has apparently been ruled out.<br />
<br />
The punchline is that rather than try to identify the correct birthday for Emily, the {{w|BIPM}} has decided to let her have birthdays whenever she wants.<br />
<br />
Both the comic title and Cueball's final line are puns on "{{w|edge case}}", an engineering term referring to situations or conditions that are unusual in a way likely to cause problems unless specifically accounted for. Edge pieces are generally only important with sheet goods (brownies sheet cakes, etc), which are typically cut into pieces creating a difference between pieces originating on the edge and pieces originating from the center. Since the sides of a cake are often frosted, an edge piece has two faces covered in frosting and a corner piece has three, while a center piece only has one. Depending upon your relative preferences between the surface (often icing over marzipan) and core body of the cake (which can be fruitcake, or some variety of spongecake, etc, but not actually obvious which until the cake is cut), it being an edge-faced slice can be considered a bonus. Cueball certainly seems to appreciate this.<br />
<br />
The title text states that the {{w|IERS}} sends Emily a cake every time they add or remove a leap second, out of superstition (perhaps Megan is delivering that cake). The International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service is in charge of global time standards. It occasionally adds one leap-second to {{w|Coordinated Universal Time}} to adjust for changes in the rotation speed of the Earth.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Megan is walking towards Cueball and Emily (who resembles Hairbun), holding a cake.]<br />
:Megan: Happy birthday, Emily!<br />
:Cueball: Wait, wasn't that last month? When's your birthday, anyways?<br />
:Emily: It's complicated.<br />
<br />
:[A diagram of a flight path over the North Pole, with meridian lines radiating out from the center. Emily's dialogue appears above the diagram, but she herself does not appear in this panel.]<br />
:Emily: My mom went into labor on an arctic international flight that diverted directly over the North Pole.<br />
:Emily: I was born in every time zone at once.<br />
<br />
:[With Megan standing behind her, Emily holds out a plate of cake to Cueball.]<br />
:Emily: It was also February 29th, and the airline was just changing ownership between countries.<br />
:Emily: The International Bureau of Weights and Measures finally issued a declaration that it's my birthday whenever I want.<br />
:Emily: Cake?<br />
:Cueball: Nice, it's all edge pieces.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairbun]]<br />
[[Category:Time]]</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2549:_Edge_Cake&diff=221699Talk:2549: Edge Cake2021-12-02T04:22:06Z<p>162.158.106.221: </p>
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<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
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The cake being all edges is a reference to everything about her birth being an edge case.<br />
[[Special:Contributions/172.70.110.227|172.70.110.227]] 03:41, 2 December 2021 (UTC)<br />
: It seems likely that the title of the comic is a related pun: her birthday is an edge case, and so she has an edge cake.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.221|162.158.106.221]] 04:22, 2 December 2021 (UTC)</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1265:_Juicer&diff=2216921265: Juicer2021-12-02T03:41:01Z<p>162.158.106.221: /* Explanation */ Removed references to antioxidants; there is little substantive evidence that antioxidants do anything to improve help, and they are at this point little more than a marketing scheme.</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1265<br />
| date = September 16, 2013<br />
| title = Juicer<br />
| image = juicer.png<br />
| titletext = But the rind is where all the vitamins are!<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
Juicers are typically used to crush fruits and/or vegetables, thereby extracting the liquid juice and creating a tasty, refreshing and easy to consume drink. However, in this case, instead of actual fruits or vegetables, someone is making juice from {{w|Fruit Gushers}}, a chewy fruit-flavored candy, thereby extracting a nearly nutritionless artificial "juice" out of a candy casing which was formulated specifically for human consumption.<br />
<br />
This may or may not be a parody of recent "Fruit Gushers" television commercials, in which Fruit Gushers are shown to squirt out nearly limitless amounts of "juice".<br />
<br />
The title text asserts that the rind is where all the {{w|Vitamin|vitamins}} in the fruit reside. This is a common belief of actual fruits, although it is an untrue {{w|urban legend}} for many fruits; even fruits like apples do not contain most of the {{w|fiber}} in the skin itself, but rather directly below; although when you peel an apple you remove more than just the skin, losing also some high fiber content anyway. It is absolutely absurd as in this case, though, as the "rind" of a Fruit Gusher consists mainly of sugar. This text mocks the usual sentiment that the less desirable part of a food is the part that is "better" for you.<br />
<br />
It is also a parody of the notion that buying a juicer, or other things like exercise equipment, will automatically make people healthier. Here it is shown that what you do with the juicer is the relevant factor. It is a little hidden joke that there is way more red than blue, pointing out how Gushers (unfairly, because blue is the best flavor) always have more red than blue. <br />
<br />
The comic can also be interpreted as parodying the idea of fruit juices being healthy. Though this is widely believed, [http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/31/making-the-case-for-eating-fruit/ recent studies] [http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/04/some-fruits-are-better-than-others/ demonstrate otherwise.]<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[We see a shelf. On it, from left to right, are: a bag of fruit gushers; a juicer; a bottle of bright red liquid; a bottle of bright blue liquid; and another bottle of bright red liquid.]<br />
:"Oh yeah, juicers are great! I use mine all the time."<br />
<br />
==Trivia==<br />
*An alternative reading that expands on that theme is that the comic shows a juicer with three full bottles of real juice, indicating that the owner of the juice machine is making regular juice with the intention of drinking it, but not consuming juice at the rate it is produced. The comic also shows a Fruit Gusher snack, indicating the unhealthy option that the juicer owner just can't stop eating. But the color of the juices makes the first explanation more likely.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Comics with color]]<br />
[[Category:Food]]</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2536:_Wirecutter&diff=2202732536: Wirecutter2021-11-03T20:58:32Z<p>162.158.106.221: /* Explanation */ pascal's wager - there are many Gods on offer by religions, and others possible.</p>
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<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2536<br />
| date = November 1, 2021<br />
| title = Wirecutter<br />
| image = wirecutter.png<br />
| titletext = This was always going to be a controversial Wirecutter post, but what really got them in trouble were their 'budget' and 'upgrade' picks.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BUDGET SUBGENIUS- Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
''{{w|Wirecutter (website)|Wirecutter}}'' is a product review website owned by ''The New York Times''. Randall is parodying the website by having them "review" the 70 most popular [[:Category:Religion|religion]]s. Product review websites typically make posts with the "best" X, e.g. "Best smartphones," or "Best laptops." These reviews are useful for consumers trying to choose among the wide variety of products available. <br />
<br />
There are {{w|List of religions and spiritual traditions|a wide variety of religions}}. However, unlike electronic devices, a person does not usually choose their religion; they are taught one during childhood and most remain in that religion their entire life. Changing religions is ([[1102|usually]]) a significant life event. Many religions, including many variants of the three major {{w|Abrahamic religions}} promote {{w|Religious exclusivism|exclusivity}}, and do not recognize other religions as valid. They emphasize the importance of specific practices or belief in specific creeds. Members of those religions might not recognize a reviewer as having truly "tried" their religion if their intent was always to move on to another.<br />
<br />
If it was easy to change a religion, it would have major implications for {{w|freedom of religion}} and whether religious {{w|discrimination}} exists. If changing a belief would be as easy as getting car tires changed, governments could reasonably tell citizens to change their religious affiliation in order to get admitted to military service, or to a hospital for treatment. Likewise, religious minorities could simply change their allegiance to evade persecution, and change back to being Jewish, for example, when the threat is over. Then, by definition, discrimination is when somebody is treated disadvantageously because of a circumstance somebody cannot easily change, or had no control over, like skin color or {{w|congenital defect|congenital defects}}.<br />
<br />
A post "reviewing" religions is sure to stir up controversy, as many religious followers are passionate about their religious beliefs and believe their religion is best. {{w|Religious_war|Literal wars}} have been fought over the idea one religion could be superior to another, and it is not a wound most practitioners are willing to reopen any time soon. Moreover, religions are typically chosen for more fundamental reasons -- such as by comparing the likelihood that each religion makes accurate claims, or the efficacy of each religion in promoting an ethical life, or the connection a practitioner feels to the religion's rituals, metaphors, and images, or by privileging a preexisting cultural or family connection to a particular tradition -- not by comparing gimmicky features or price. <br />
<br />
The title text mentions "budget" and "upgrade" picks, which are subcategories for reviewers - cheaper options and options that are good for upgrading your current product. Neither of these categories are typical categories for religions {{Citation needed}} and could further anger their adherents. The association of religion and money could allude to various controversial topics such as {{w|tithe|tithing}}, {{w|indulgences}}, {{w|televangelism}}, or {{w|Prosperity theology}}. Budget need not be just about money, it could also refer to the amount of time or effort involved. (e.g., how much time is spent in religious activities, needing to learn a new language, etc.) Some religious followers might be offended if their religion was picked in a "budget" category. The idea of a religion "upgrade" evokes the highly divisive concept of {{w|supersessionism}} among the major Abrahamic religions, which would be guaranteed to cause further outcry no matter which one of those the article would pick for the category.<br />
<br />
In related matters, {{w|Pascal's wager}} says that it is beneficial to believe in a God, but crucially, it assumes that people actually have the power to choose a God to believe in - and somehow, the ability to choose the correct God, given that there are many Gods supported by various religions, and many others possible.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
:[A New York Times Wirecutter article. There is the NYT logo and Wirecutter logo in the top left. Also in the top of the page is a search bar, a user account icon, and 7 "header" level hyperlinks with illegible text. The article title is as follows:]<br />
:<b>The Best Religion</b><br />
:By <u>Wirecutter Staff</u><br />
<br />
:[The words "Wirecutter Staff" are followed by illegible text presumably representing the date of the article. Below are icons for Twitter, Facebook, e-mail, and save.]<br />
<br />
:[The article's image depicts Cueball shrugging in the center of the picture with many question marks floating above him. The content of the article is as follows:]<br />
<br />
:What does it all mean? Our reviewers tried out over 70 of the most popular belief systems. Here's what they found...<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Religion]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2530:_Clinical_Trials&diff=2195292530: Clinical Trials2021-10-20T16:46:28Z<p>162.158.106.221: Trepanition, at least, conferred several benefits that were otherwise unobtainable, especially in prehistoric times.</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2530<br />
| date = October 18, 2021<br />
| title = Clinical Trials<br />
| image = clinical_trials.png<br />
| titletext = We don't need to do a clinical trial of this change because the standard of care is to adopt new ideas without doing clinical trials.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by MEDICAL PROCEDURE STEP DERF - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
The comic begins with a simple process for adopting a new idea just by convincing people that it is a good idea. The joke is that this skips the important step of checking whether it actually ''is'' a good idea. That correction presumably comes about after ideas are adopted which sounded good but turn out to be harmful. The comic captions the addition of this checking step as "the invention of clinical trials".<br />
<br />
The purpose of clinical trials in medicine is to make sure that a new medicine works and doesn't have serious side-effects. One example of the dangers of failing to make sure that it doesn't have serious side effects is {{w|thalidomide}}, which caused a lot of birth defects. In a clinical trial, the effect of a treatment is compared to the effect of a placebo, or an existing treatment, to make sure it has actually has a beneficial effect. (Earlier trials establish that it is even a viable candidate for testing and establishing possible dosages/regimens that can then be carried forward to a treatment (Phase III) trial.)<br />
<br />
Before the invention of clinical trials, people generally didn't know, or at least had no way of confirming, whether medicines actually worked. Although many herbs and medicines were effective, others were no better than a placebo, and some medical treatments such as {{w|trepanation}} and {{w|bloodletting}} not only had no benefit {{Citation needed}} but were very likely to be harmful. Those treatments that did work at all were mostly those that had been tried (for {{w|doctrine of signatures|whatever reason}}) and had just happened to be useful, but many others that were tried had neutral or even adverse effects, but had still managed to not be so entirely deadly such that recoveries regardless of (or despite!) such treatments were taken as common-knowledge 'proof' of their efficacy.<br />
<br />
Some may, like some of today's treatments, have been gradually discovered to help a particular condition only by noticing beneficial side-effects when consumed for sustenance or for unrelated medical 'guesses'. However, they also remained without the full scientific rigour so long as it remained a 'traditional remedy' with at best an oral tradition across many disparate practitioners, and no consistent effort to formalise or test the falsifiability of any findings.<br />
<br />
At the time that this comic was published, the world was in the middle of the {{w|COVID-19 pandemic}}, which made the existence of clinical trials more relevant to the public, who waited eagerly for what sounded like good ideas to get through clinical trials and available to the general public… or fail clinical trials and not do that. During this frustrating wait, many unscientific claims have been made that various drugs or non-drug treatments are cures for COVID-19, making it difficult to convince believers to get real treatments. On the other hand, many people were skeptical about COVID-19 vaccines which were made available to the public for emergency use before the clinical trials were finished.<br />
<br />
The title text is a nice bit of Munroean humor. "Standard of care" refers to the previously accepted practice which a new medicine needs to be compared against. Because the original 3-step "standard of care" in this comic didn't include clinical trials before their adoption, we didn't need to do any testing in order to decide to start using them. If we ''had'' had them as the standard of care, then we would have had to perform tests before we added a step and it would have taken longer. This assumes that the process itself is subject to the same scientific rigor as medical treatment; in practice that would be more of a political change that is still not tested.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
:1. Come up with new idea<br />
:2. Convince people it's good<br />
<br />
:[Scrawled in red as an afterthought, an arrow inserting it between item 2 and the original item 3] <br />
:3. Check whether it works<br />
<br />
:3. [Now scribbled over and amended to "4."]<br />
:New idea is adopted<br />
<br />
:[Caption below the panel]<br />
:The invention of clinical trials<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category: Science]]<br />
[[Category: Comics with color]]</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2529:_Unsolved_Math_Problems&diff=219370Talk:2529: Unsolved Math Problems2021-10-16T21:29:08Z<p>162.158.106.221: </p>
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<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
<br />
Center panel possibly related to "The drunkards walk" and theories on randomised motion. <br />
https://www.quantamagazine.org/random-walk-puzzle-solution-20160907/ <br />
More references https://mathworld.wolfram.com/RandomWalk.html<br />
<br />
Someone's gotta point out that "walking randomly on a grid, never visiting the same square twice" would rapidly trap you in a corner (even the example has a 50/50 chance of that happening on the next move) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.125|172.70.130.125]] 04:29, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
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Not if it's an infinite grid.<br />
<br />
I think there's two different ways to interpret the question - as a uniform random element of the set of all non-self-intersection NxK length paths, in which case it's fine, or as a path defined by a random walk in which moves onto your own path are not allowed, which doesn't seem well defined, since you might end up in a situation where you are surrounded by your own path and cannot continue for all NxK steps.<br />
<br />
An early example of a cursed problem is the Cantor Function. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantor_function<br />
<br />
I admire whoever wrote the description of the curve in the "cursed" panel. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 05:36, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
<br />
"Algebreic" is a misspelling of "algebraic". Could Randall really have made this mistake, or is it another malamanteu? What does "breic" come from? [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 06:10, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I wonder if Randall was actually referring to that quote about "Into the Woods", or he just thought "Sondheim calculus" sounded cool and it was a total coincidence. I found it when I googled "sondheim calculus" to make sure it wasn't a real thing. [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 06:29, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
<br />
In panel 2, what would 'k' be? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.35.108|172.69.35.108]] 08:00, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
<br />
'k' would represent the number of marbles placed on the ground. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.88.127|162.158.88.127]] 08:09, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
<br />
To me, the cursed curve looks a bit like a crosier https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Crosiere_of_arcbishop_Heinrich_of_Finstingen.jpg<br />
<br />
--> I had the same impression and added it. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.94.219|162.158.94.219]] 11:40, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
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No explanation of the "Euler Field Manifold Hypergroup (Isomorphic to a)..." part?<br />
<br />
The cursed curve looks almost like someone took a graph of the Binet formula in the complex plane, stretched it out a bit, and rotated it onto the i axis.<br />
: This was my first thought too when I saw it. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.34.87|172.69.34.87]] 17:16, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
: It looks like Vulcan script to me. [[User:LtPowers|LtPowers]] ([[User talk:LtPowers|talk]]) 13:51, 16 October 2021 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Could the cursed curve be a reference to the logistic map?<br />
<br />
Is someone going to mention the title text?<br />
<br />
I swear I've seen that third plot, I thought it was in XKCD, but a quick run through tagged entries didn't find anything... unfortunately I consume a lot of math media so I can't place it. It's bugging me so I hope this note will serve as encourgement to someone that DOES remember [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.221|162.158.106.221]] 21:29, 16 October 2021 (UTC)</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=749:_Study&diff=218863749: Study2021-10-05T19:11:46Z<p>162.158.106.221: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 749<br />
| date = June 4, 2010<br />
| title = Study<br />
| image = study.png<br />
| titletext = Volunteers needed for a study on transmission of urushiol from digital contact with thin strips of fibrous cellulose pulp.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
This comic is about the ubiquitous study fliers that are placed around cities and especially college campuses.<br />
<br />
This one obviously takes it to the absurd because it is a thinly-veiled attempt to get volunteers so that their kidneys can be "harvested" or stolen. Type O is a {{w|ABO blood group system|blood type}} that omits both A and B antigens so it won't cause reaction in blood types having anti-A or anti-B antibodies and thus people having this blood type are the most valuable for transplants (there are still other antigens that can cause reactions but these two are the most important).<br />
<br />
{{w|Urushiol}} is an oily toxic irritant present in poison ivy and some related plants, digital contact means touching something with fingers and fibrous cellulose pulp is a scientific description of paper. This together suggests that the person who put up the flier soaked the strips with urushiol and is trying to see if it will cause irritation in anyone who will touch the strips with their fingers (and it will within ten minutes){{Citation needed}}.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[A posted flier with nine tear-off strips at the bottom reads: "Volunteers Needed for a scientific study investigating whether people can distinguish between scientific studies and kidney-harvesting scams. (Healthy Type-O Adults Only) TAKE ONE" Five of the nine strips are torn off.]<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Psychology]]<br />
[[Category:Science]]</div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=591:_Troll_Slayer&diff=218174591: Troll Slayer2021-09-18T05:01:19Z<p>162.158.106.221: /* Explanation */ removed un-needed words</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 591<br />
| date = June 1, 2009<br />
| title = Troll Slayer<br />
| image = troll slayer.png<br />
| titletext = We have met the enemy and he is us.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
== Explanation ==<br />
{{w|Stephenie Meyer}} is the author of the {{w|Twilight (novel series)|Twilight novels}}, a series of {{w|vampire}} novels popular with young teens. It is a love it or hate it type of novel, with a large following and a large portion of haters as well.<br />
<br />
In the comic, {{w|4chan}}, an {{w|imageboard}}, is featured. Imageboards such as 4chan have the feature to post anonymously. The users of 4chan launch an attack on a Twilight board and Stephenie Meyer asks them to stop. When they refuse, Meyer writes 4chan into her next novel, thereby drawing in a large number of fans of her novel as a counter-attack to what 4chan ran on the Twilight forum. This results in what the original 4chan users consider a ruined imageboard.<br />
<br />
The title of the comic is drawn from the internet slang term {{w|troll (internet)|troll}}, which refers to actively attempting to get a rise out of a forum. In this instance, 4chan attempted to troll a Twilight board and Meyer acted against the troll, making her a "slayer" of them. Obviously the pimpled boy she chats with is very dismayed by this result, as there are now so many more vampire-book-fans than computer geeks on 4chan, and they cannot get through with any of their funny/evil plans anymore. There may also be a reference to the famous {{w|vampire slayer}} known as {{w|Buffy the Vampire Slayer|Buffy}}, seeing that Stephenie's main character vampires do not need to be slain, but she then turns on those who tries to do so in real life on the message board.<br />
<br />
The pictures used on the two panels showing the 4chan imageboard tells a lot about their users. It is unclear what the text page refers to. And also what it is that [[Cueball]] is standing next to. But a black hat, as shown in the third picture is typical for an internet troll (see the xkcd version of [[Black Hat]]), and also the guy saying {{w|LOL}} is already laughing out loud at you before you read his text. He also LOL's in his comment about the angsty teens that reads the books, and whom he looks forward to trolling.<br />
<br />
In the second 4chan panel all four images relate to ''Twilight''. The first picture most likely depicts {{w|Edward Cullen}} and {{w|Bella Swan}} (from the movies) standing with their backs against each other. This person enjoys being anonymous.<br />
The second picture with the text ''Dawnz'' refers, in "plural" form, to the last book ''{{w|Breaking Dawn}}'' which was split into two films {{w|The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1|part 1}} and {{w|The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2|part 2}}. This person wish to know about peoples favorite vampire, exactly the kind of questions the trolls would have mocked on the Twilight board, now infesting their own site. The third picture is of a person who has tried to dress up like a {{w|goth}} vampire, even commenting on the darkness of the picture. The last picture depicts the cover of the last book ''Breaking Dawn'' with the two chess pieces. This fan seems to be searching for a date around Dallas...<br />
<br />
The title text refers to {{w|Walt Kelly}}'s famous {{w|Pogo_(comic_strip)#.22We_have_met_the_enemy_and_he_is_us..22|saying}}. Kelly used it to refer to all of mankind, whereas here it refers to the users of 4chan, by bringing on the enemy of their forum themselves.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[A list of post comments alongside pictures on a website. The first picture shows a page from a book/website with a small black picture with a white feature in the upper left corner and text to the right and below it. The second picture shows Cueball in front of three people, with a unclear drawing to the right (is it a canon?). The third picture shows a man with a black hat holding up a sword to the left and a trumpet to the right. The fourth and last picture is cut off in the middle at the bottom of the frame. The visible top part shows a drawing of a mans face from the nose/ears and up. The man has black hair and says LOL].<br />
:Text picture: Hey, let's troll the fuck out of the Twilight boards<br />
:Cueball picture: I'm in. Should be fun<br />
:Man with sword picture: Me too. Signing on now.<br />
:LOL face picture: Lol angsty teens.<br />
<br />
:[Stephenie Meyer is shown sitting facing right and chatting at her computer. She get's a reply from the screen. It looks like she actually speaks the lines of text to someone, but she only types it in via the keyboard. This becomes clear in in the next panel where the pimpled boy she talks to obviously types his reply on the keyboard. Across the top border of the frame is a smaller frame with a caption:]<br />
:Hours Later:<br />
<br />
:Stephenie Meyer (typing): Hi, it's Stephenie Meyer. Fine, you don't like my books. But please leave us alone.<br />
:Pimpled boy (from computer): Show us your tits.<br />
:Stephenie Meyer (typing): I asked politely. Don't make me get tough.<br />
<br />
:[A boy with lots of pimples and black hair is sitting at his computer typing (facing the other way towards Stephenie in the previous panel). He writes his reply on the keyboard and receives a reply from Stephenie coming out of the computer.]<br />
:Pimpled boy (typing): And what, call the internet police? You don't get it, do you? We've been trolling for years. We're all anonymous. There's nothing you can do to hurt us. We're the net's hate machine.<br />
:Stephenie Meyer (from computer): Okay. Just remember, I gave you a chance. <code>*Disconnected*</code>.<br />
<br />
:[A page from a book is shown lying slanted across the panel. Some of the text is thus cut off at the edges of the frame. The first eight lines can be read clearly, even though the last letter in both the 2nd and sixth line is partly cut-off. Below that there are four incomplete lines, where only the visible part will be transcribed, but a good guess at the missing text is written in square brackets. Across the top border of the frame is a smaller frame with a caption:]<br />
:Six Months Later:<br />
<br />
:Vampires! Book VI<br />
<br />
:Edward ran a pale hand <br />
:through his perfect golden-<br />
:bronze hair, then signed <br />
:on to 4chan.org, the darkest<br />
:place on the internet, where<br />
:all his vampire compatriots <br />
:spent their time.<br />
:Suddenly, there was [a]<br />
:[sha]rp knock at the d[oor]<br />
:[?] swept in [?]<br />
:[?r?]ing [?]<br />
<br />
:[Another list of post comments alongside pictures on the same website as in the first panel. The first picture shows a man with black hair and a woman with long hair standing with their backs against each other (probably Edward and Bella from the books). The second picture is just a white frame with the text Dawnz. The third picture shows a person from the chest and up. The person has black hair and black clothes, with some kind of collar. The fourth and last picture shows two chess piece a large one in front of the other. The picture is shown completely but the text message seems to be more than two lines long, but only the top two lines are shown. Across the top border of the frame is a smaller frame with a caption:]<br />
:Shortly thereafter:<br />
<br />
:Two people picture: OMG I love this place it's so edgy being anonymous<br />
:Dawnz picture: Whos your favorite vampire<br />
:Collared person picture: Check out my pic Im so dark just like this site<br />
:Chess piece picture: Any Twilight fans in Dallas want to meet a lonely<br />
<br />
:[Back to the boy with lots of pimples now sitting resigned at his computer without typing.]<br />
:Hairy: Oh... Oh God.<br />
<br />
{{Comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]] <!-- the second picture in the first panel shows Cueball --><br />
[[Category:Twilight]]<br />
[[Category:Internet]]<br />
<!-- not a comics featuring Hairy - this is a computer geek boy with pimples, and thus clearly not the hairy every-man that is named Hairy --></div>162.158.106.221https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2382:_Ballot_Tracker_Tracker&diff=2013892382: Ballot Tracker Tracker2020-11-07T14:50:07Z<p>162.158.106.221: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2382<br />
| date = November 6, 2020<br />
| title = Ballot Tracker Tracker<br />
| image = ballot_tracker_tracker.png<br />
| titletext = Good luck to Democrats in the upcoming Georgia runoff elections, and to the Google Sheets SREs in the current run-on elections.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BALLOT TRACKER TRACKER TRACKER. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
This comic was posted 3 days after the 2020 election day in the United States (November 3, 2020). As of the date of posting, the {{w|2020 United States presidential election}} still had not been "called" for either candidate, President {{w|Donald Trump}}, or the challenger, former Vice President {{w|Joe Biden}} by most news outlets. (Decision Desk HQ did project the election for Biden that day, and analyst Nate Silver had stated on Twitter that Trump had no path to victory.) This is atypical for most US presidential elections, which were "called" either on election day or on the morning following.<br />
<br />
A major reason for the slowness in deciding the results of the election is the use of {{w|mail-in ballot}}s, caused by social distancing concerns due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Mail-in ballots in some states were counted after the in-person voting, which has caused delays in the vote-counting. <br />
<br />
As of the date of posting, the electoral vote counts were 253-214 in favor of Biden, with 270 electoral votes needed to win the election. Six states were considered "too close to call", with no determined winner until more ballots were counted.<br />
<br />
Cueball in this comic has created an app or a website that tracks in real-time how fast "ballot trackers" update. A ballot tracker is a government site that lets individuals check whether their mail-in ballot has been received and accepted or rejected. Voters who mailed their ballot on or shortly before election day are anxiously waiting to see whether it arrived on time, but ballot tracking sites do not update very frequently. The date this comic was posted was the deadline in some states for ballots to be received or for rejected ballots to be corrected.<br />
<br />
Randall may instead have meant to refer to news organizations, which are constantly updating reported vote counts as they are published by the states. Some news organizations also have [https://web.archive.org/web/20201107022852/https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/upshot/network-race-call-tracker.html "ballot tracker trackers"] which are tracking how other news organizations are tracking ballots. Cueball (representing Randall) is anxiously waiting for a resolution to this long election season and is constantly checking to see if the race has been decided yet. <br />
<br />
The last line of dialogue in the comic, where Cueball says, "I will breathe when they call it" may refer to the idea that many people hold their breaths when waiting for an important result, so people may hold their breaths until the president (or state result?) is called. However, since this time around the announcement could take days if not weeks, holding one's breath until the winner is announced is a bad idea.<br />
<br />
In the title text, Randall wishes good luck to the Democrats in the state of Georgia who are running in later run-off elections. Two Senate seats were being voted on in the state of Georgia in 2020, but no candidate achieved over 50% of the vote in either race. It is highly likely that these runoffs will determine control of the Senate. By law in the state of Georgia, these two races will be decided in "runoff" elections, where the top two candidates from each of the races run against only each other, on January 5, 2021. Randall also wishes good luck to the SREs (probably {{w|Site Reliability Engineer}}s) of Google Sheets, an online spreadsheet program, who are in charge of maintaining the Google infrastructure while people like him are constantly refreshing their sheets and pulling data. Randall is comparing Georgia's upcoming "runoff" election to the current election, calling it a "run-on" for how long it is taking.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Cueball is sitting behind a desk, pointing at a laptop. White Hat is standing behind him. Crumpled up papers are strewn across the ground. ]<br />
:Cueball: And this tab is my ballot tracker tracker, which tracks how quickly other ballot trackers update.<br />
:White Hat: You should add a tracker for how often you breathe so you don't forget.<br />
:Cueball: '''''I will breathe when they call it.'''''<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
[[Category:Elections]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]</div>162.158.106.221