Editing 961: Eternal Flame

{{comic
| number    = 961
| date      = October 6, 2011
| title     = Eternal Flame
| image     = eternal_flame.gif
| titletext = There's always the hope that if you sit and watch for long enough, the beachball will vanish and the thing it interrupted will return.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Steve Jobs]] died on October 5, 2011, the day before this comic was posted. He was the {{w|CEO}} and one of the founders of {{w|Apple, Inc}}. He was the head of Apple for the introduction of {{w|OS X}}, the default operating system used on all modern {{w|Macintosh}} computers. In {{w|OS X}} when there is a significant slowdown, the Cursor becomes the symbol seen in the comic. It may appear when an application is not responding, or if the computer is busy. This symbol is infamous among {{w|OS X}} users, and is nicknamed "the beachball of death". It appears during a lag, and can take a very long time to disappear, thus seeming endless. The title and rotating cursor above a fixture in the ground seems to be referencing the {{w|John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame}}, suggesting that the rotating cursor above the fixture is, in fact, a monument to Steve Jobs. A similar [[:Category:Tribute|tribute comic]] was also dedicated to {{w|Terry Pratchett}}, the day after he died, in [[1498: Terry Pratchett]], to {{w|Gary Gygax}}, three days after he died, in [[393: Ultimate Game]], and to {{w|John Horton Conway}}, two days after he died, in [[2293: RIP John Conway]].

The title text refers to the fact that when an application is not responding on the Mac, the application sometimes recovers and the system comes back; other times, however, the damage is irrevocable, a {{w|Kernel Panic}} happens and the system needs a restart.

==Transcript==
:[Two people before a memorial with an eternally spinning wait cursor. They contemplate silently on an influential life. Goodbye, Steve.]

==Trivia==
This comic was [[:Category:Thursday comics|released on a Thursday]], the day after Steve Jobs died.

{{comic discussion}}

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[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
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[[Category:Dynamic comics]]