3250: Flag Design

Flag Design

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Title text: Every place has a local cryptid; more places need a local Pictish Beast, a creature in historical art that's drawn so weirdly that no one can tell what animal it's supposed to be.

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Explanation

This is one of 45 incomplete explanations: This page was created by a recursive flag. Don't remove this notice too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page!

This comic is a parody of normal flag designs. For example, animals are commonly used on flags, and stars are also occasionally on flags. However regular flags don't have themselves on it, and don't have tributes or references to science.^{[citation needed]} It is designed similarly to the xkcdphone series, with a number of improbable features indicated with labels.

Transcript

This is one of 38 incomplete transcripts: Don't remove this notice too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page!

[A flag with many things on it.]

[Caption below flag:]

I think our flag design committee really knocked it out of the park

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Discussion

Could there possibly be a reference to New Zealand’s laser kiwi flag? 2A02:6B6F:E226:B00:2D7E:D360:EEA6:2104 22:01, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Oooh, I like a good Flag comic. Not been one for a while, and I used to use one of them as my xkcd fora avatar. 81.179.199.253 22:09, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

what is that animal Mathmaster (talk) 22:22, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

The inner flag doesn't have its own inner flag... AoPS is superior (talk) 22:43, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Which suggests to me is that this flag is of one nation/entity that incorporates the national flag of another nation (often done... see Hawaii's flag). It only says "National flag" (which, as it happens, has many identical features, just not all), rather than "this' nation's national flag", so it needn's necessarily be "The People's Republic of Drosteland" being totally self-referential through infinite recursion. 81.179.199.253 23:38, 25 May 2026 (UTC)

Isn't the "tribute to topology" a half-turn to make the flag one-sided (Möbius strip)? 130.216.50.126 00:54, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Wifi transmitter? it looks liek the contactless icon for cards so i was thinking it'd at least work in that NFC-adjacent way, which needs no power source. 193.61.208.1 00:56, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

The state flags of Costa Rica, Colombia, and Haiti, and the national flags of El Salvador and Ecuador have themselves on the flag, via the state seals 104.58.95.236 01:27, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

I think the customize option doesn't refer to customizing the flag itself, but customizing privacy options for the data it collects. It is similar to the options shown on a website when it asks about using cookies. An Architect (talk) 02:24, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Is 'beige background' a reference to the 'color of the universe' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_latte ? That struck me especially given the mention of stars 202.80.150.54 02:56, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

Why is one of the little tear off tabs missing the full phone number? 2401:D005:D402:7A00:A657:9BBB:CD:EF55 03:57, 26 May 2026 (UTC)

"Customize" does not mean "changing the colour/design of the flag". It is one of the two most common buttons in GDPR (supposedly-) compliant cookie warnings, which allows you to access a very long list of uses to manually give consent to, as well as a link to access a very long list of data vendors to also tweak who you do not mind getting your data. --94.73.49.13

Could the rounded corners be a reference to this? https://www.androidpolice.com/2012/05/04/the-samsung-galaxy-s-iii-the-first-smartphone-designed-entirely-by-lawyers/
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