Talk:3030: Lasering Incidents

Opportunity missed: Could have said "Santa's sleigh and other aircraft....". At least the laser beam is green. 172.68.27.100 22:41, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

that would have been dumb and late 172.71.135.85 22:52, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

Why is everyone here interested only in commenting, and not being helpful? RadiantRainwing (talk) 23:37, 27 December 2024 (UTC)

Some people like to just comment, or are insecure about their explaining skills. Some people like to mainly focus on transcripts, other like to clean up grammatical mistakes, and some just enjoy to lurk and watch as the explanation slowly builds up. Don’t judge other people on something as frivolous as this. Besides, only two other people have commented and there have been 4 people who have edited the explanation and transcript, including me and you. 42.book.addict^{Talk to me!} 00:10, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

Sorry. I was pretty annoyed, although it is cool to do the first draft. Besides, if you don't think you're good at explaining, it doesn't matter, because if the next editor thinks you did a bad job, then they'll fix it. RadiantRainwing (talk) 04:28, 29 December 2024 (UTC)

Also there has been talk about why there was no x-mas comic. Given the Parker probes record, there could have been a later x-mas reference here on 3rd x-mas day... But that was not to be. First time in 20 years without a Christmas comic in the holiday. There was a comic about Advent Calendars, but that was at the very start of December. So makes sense to comment on this, and that it woul dbe dumb just because it is late is a personel view. I would have welcomed a late x-mas reference... Now I'm awaiting to see if the 1st of January will be with a New Year comic. That has failed in 2021. So it would not be a first. --Kynde (talk) 15:27, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

Consider the Christian pastor - or musician - who, year after year, has to come up with some new wrinkle on the s.o.s., that fits within the seasonal tropes or else. Randall's well might simply have run dry, and, don't haveta, not gonna. 172.68.22.223 18:01, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

In both cases I would say stop what you are doing, if you cannot make a funny comic including Christmas or make a speech for one of the important events of the year, then stop doing comic or being a priest. I personally think he decided that Parkers record was more important, and also likely that he has a hard time seeing anything to be joyful about here on Earth at the moment. Last time Trump was elected he posted several sad comics. Like Sad and 2017 --Kynde (talk) 12:08, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

I think it's simpler. He wanted to mark Parker's achievement (ongoing, at that point, note that it was before we were even sure it survived...) and had an idea that just had no Christmas linking factor, so went with the important thing rather than miss it and do something Christmas-y that he could do almost any year. No reason that (however disappointed) he "cancelled Christmas" due to his mood, just found it less notable/less shoehornable. You can create downbeat Christmas satire (think like the Santa's sleigh victim to the rocket range safeguards, etc, but moreso) if your actual aim is to 'mark a depressing Christmas', but even that was defered in favour of "hey, look at Parker!" as a theme.

We have a couple of comics (todays and then NYD's) that might easily 'celebrate' the tirning of the (Gregorian) year in up-beat/down-beat/odd-beat manner, or might not do any of that (would be unusual to have neither being that, but doubtful they'd both be non-topical in all respects).

Anyway, still some few more days to go before the close of the festive season brooks no further 'topical for the holidays' comics (we had the Advent Calendar Advent Calendar to mark the season's start, so it's not out of the question that the Twelfth Day Of Christmas also gets directly marked (or whatever day fits with a comic publication date) as a bookend, to add to (and maybe flip) the Advent one having already side-referenced the Twelve Days one. Or not. Entirely up to him.

So, yeah, probably simpler (though expanding it into words means using a lot of them). Ultimately: Randall's choice, what thrice-weekly 'face' he puts on the world. And, however full of information they can be, they can't actually all contain a full fMRI of his heart fully displayed on his sleeve. 172.68.186.42 15:32, 30 December 2024 (UTC)

you wouldn't actually see a green glowing line; that's not how lasers work 172.68.70.67 (talk) 00:33, 28 December 2024 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

That would depend upon the conditions. It would need ultra low humidity (or entirely the wrong temperature to show it) and also a pretty dust-free environment to have no visible track of the laser, across the kind of distance where you're disrupting an aircraft (from on the ground on the sightline of a pilot) and with the laser of sufficient power to cause any mischief. And Rayleigh scattering applies to some degree even in clean+dry air, in conditions of at least reasonable darkness. 162.158.74.49 01:45, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

I've seen someone at an astronomy demo use a laser pointer to point at stars, exactly because of this effect. It worked pretty well, even without high humidity or dust. -- Phyzome (talk) 02:04, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

Seconded. 42.book.addict^{Talk to me!} 04:13, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

I dunno, they never seem to catch these people who irritate soccer goalies with laser pointers... And i myself was once targeted with a laser pointer, some guy in the apartment house 200 meters away thought it funny to shine one through my living room window, and I had no idea where it was coming from... :--172.71.172.172 10:56, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

Well if it is in a stadium it is hard to say who did it, if they put it away after. But near an airfield, when you are putting many lives at risk there may be a higher interest in catching these. But inttersting to know how many got arrested or fines for this kind of stupidity? --Kynde (talk) 15:27, 28 December 2024 (UTC)

Blimp airfields are illegal in the US? Kapten-N (talk) 08:22, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

Randall uses “covert”, which indicates that the blimp airfield probably isn’t following most of the regulations that the FAA sets out, nor zoning laws. 42.book.addict^{Talk to me!} 08:28, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

Indeed. Just as you can run a warehouse with or without the proper paperwork, or especially an explosives-testing facility. Not sure why one would question just the airfield? 172.70.91.30 13:10, 8 January 2025 (UTC)