Editing Talk:1628: Magnus

Attempted to write the transcript. Hope I did an okay job... {{unsigned ip|‎198.41.235.41}}
:It was great. I just added some descriptions of the panels. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:01, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Actually it is an election against JFK, not an eating contest (panel 3)[[Special:Contributions/108.162.249.162|108.162.249.162]] 18:46, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Might Ronda Rousey being knocked unconsious be a reference to her recent loss to Holly Holm, where Rousey indeed was knocked unconcious? --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.202.141|162.158.202.141]] 10:27, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
:The word reference means "a thing you say or write that mentions somebody/something else; the act of mentioning somebody/something". Since the comic doesn't mention Holly Holm, there is no reference. I think there isn't even an allusion (something that is said or written that refers to or mentions another person or subject in an indirect way). [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.17|108.162.221.17]] 13:46, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
:Besides, the phrasing is "knocked out".  That needn't be a combat/contact-sport 'KO' in which Rousey was rendered actually unconscious in an intentional/explicable manner, according to the activity, but could just be telling us which of the two passed through to the next round of a bracketed competition of some other kind.  (Either of a form that remains unspecified or, as the most recently mentioned competition, in an earlier iteration the hot-dog-eating contest. Either way, 11yo Stewart wasn't highly ''expected'' to win, whatever the match conditions, but the outcome needn't be so against form as it might have in a pugilistic match.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.152.227|162.158.152.227]] 15:13, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
::Since nothing is mentioned about which sport and Rousey is mentioned for the first time and it is a surprise she looses (on a KO) it is obvious to me that it refers to her fighting skill and a real KO. And if it was one of her first KO in that match is could easily be a reference especially if it was not expected. These two last things I do not know anything about though... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:41, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
:::Rousey was undefeated before her loss to Holm, and it was considered quite an upset since Rousey had won most of her bouts quickly (average bout 3 minutes). I'm not a big Mixed Martial Arts fan, but I thought the title text was an allusion to the Rousey-Holm fight. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.238.74|108.162.238.74]] 15:40, 18 January 2016 (UTC)

Magnus' App is available here: http://www.playmagnus.com/. There are also numerous youtube videos of him playing against himself at various ages. --[[Special:Contributions/198.41.242.240|198.41.242.240]] 10:33, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

JFK was not 10 in 1961 as that is when he became President and you have to be at least 35 to do that. [[User:Momerath|Momerath]] ([[User talk:Momerath|talk]]) 15:26, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
:Whops. That went to fast, thanks for correcting it. ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:39, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Maybe I misunderstood some special reference or way to put it here, because as it links to the correct wiki page, it seems the author knew what he was talking about but:
" Michael Phelps who is the most decorated Olympian competitor of all time, with a total of 22 medals in three Olympiads." is still a very strange formulation imo. As correctly linked an Olympiad is the time span between two Olympic Games (aka 4 years). First of all Phelbs won the Medals from 2004 to 2012 so if one really would want to write that in olympiads it would be closer to two. Even so I think it very strange to ever talk about the olympic medals over the course of such a timespan as they were won at three distinct events, while countless other medals were won in the time span. I would rather change it to "olympic games" or something. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.91.139|141.101.91.139]] 15:51, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Does anyone else actually kind of want this to exist? I mean, it would certainly settle a lot of playground discussions. :P [[User:Hammy2211|Hammy2211]] ([[User talk:Hammy2211|talk]]) 15:55, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Ronda Rousey is a former Judo Olympian and current MMA fighter, not a boxer. Holly Holmes (who she lost to) is an ex-boxing champion. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.236.19|108.162.236.19]] 16:32, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Ok, changed Rousey from "boxer" to "fighter". [[User:Jimmbo|Jimmbo]] ([[User talk:Jimmbo|talk]]) 16:38, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

Does Randall Munroe know of a world outside of his own little country? Or is this comic ironic? It's very much one person from not-USA (aka “the world”) versus a lot of people from the USA. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.49.27|173.245.49.27]] 18:46, 11 January 2016 (UTC)
:First: The United States is not a little country. Second: All Americans know little about the world. Probably Randall knows a little more about the world than the average American. [[850: World According to Americans|Or at least he believes so]]. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.17|108.162.221.17]] 13:34, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

Hmm. It appears somebody really wants to use this page to detail Ms. Rousey's recent triumphs. I don't want an editing war, so I'll leave it be, but I don't believe that's the purpose of our undertaking here.[[User:Jimmbo|Jimmbo]] ([[User talk:Jimmbo|talk]]) 20:01, 11 January 2016 (UTC)

I believe the current explanation misunderstands parts of the comic. It says: “But it claims to do so with an unlikely precision which Randall is mocking; e.g. that Cueball could have beaten Magnus when he was 8½-year-old, but not a half-year later.” The age is probably referring to the virtual Magnus' age, not Cueball's age; you can set the app's skill level in half-year increments (at least for the earlier years). So this is not Randall mocking the app, it's merely setup for the rest of the joke. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.91.160|162.158.91.160]] 01:32, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

"But it claims to do so with an unlikely precision which Randall is mocking": the '''precision''' of the app '''is in fact credible'''. Carlsen was gaining 100 Elo points every six months until he was 15, and a chess-playing program can emulate, roughly, a human Elo performance. --[[User:Chvsanchez|Chvsanchez]] ([[User talk:Chvsanchez|talk]]) 01:48, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Hey, who took out my citation needed joke?[[User:Untothebreach|Untothebreach]] ([[User talk:Untothebreach|talk]]) 08:17, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

The current explanation describes that Serena Williams is a tennis player but only describes Michael Phelps as "the most decorated Olympian competitor", not that he was/is a swimmer. The explanation also claims that it is obvious that Martha Stewart learned cooking later than at age 11, which I don't think is so obvious. But I don't know Martha Stewart, so perhaps it is obvious. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.80.77|141.101.80.77]] 10:29, 13 January 2016 (UTC)