Talk:2485: Nightmare Code

As I feared, I got into an Edit Conflict after doing (significantly more than I intended) editing of my own 'starter' explanation. Now resolved - thank you for your patience... 141.101.98.124 20:24, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Is the Alphabet gag in the Title Text related to Alphabet, the company that owns Google? Kev (talk) 17:32, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

It would be more expected that Alphabet would change their name if Alpha and Beta become associated with nightmare codes. OTOH, many thought that the Corona beer brand would suffer marketing problems during the pandemic, but it wasn't impacted very much. Barmar (talk) 20:21, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

@Kev Well, the speaker is wearing Google Glass. Lightcaller (talk) 20:22, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

The speaker specifically mentions "Earth Language" and wears something that might well be some kind of life support. I don't think they are addressing earth-based humans, but rather some more diverse audience that is mostly not from earth. Many of them obviously don't know old earth languages too well. But the usage of the nightmare code seems to have spread beyond earth. Therefore, there's no implication that (earth-based) humans have forgotten the Greek language, the speaker may simply be giving a talk about their culture. -> I think the first paragraph is making wrong assumptions. @Abd are you sure? Chichak (talk) 22:37, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Wait, what? The future's character sets? Our character sets (or at least some of them) are known as alphabets! Or have we already forgotten the term "alphabet"? ^unsigned

How far off is "the (far) future"? Based on the retro-future styled headwear & relatively minor language drift, I was picturing 20-to-60 years, tops.

Heck, which objects count as "drones" has already changed twice the last 20 years, & YouTube still thinks Steam® is related to an ironing press. If we're looking more than 60 years out, I have to assume that "nightmare" could be common parlance for 'great', "scary" means 'informative', "negative" means 'removing', & "die" means equalize.

It's a joke about language drift, featuring a floaty person referring to ancient "Earth" languages: Sounds like someone teaching a 1st-grade class at Luna L2 circa 2051, ten years after 'the Oopsie'. I really didn't get a feeling of "oh wow lots of time has passed". I got the impression we were supposed to recognize the elements of the scene so that the grammatic drift stated in the comic would be highlighted as hyperbolic change.

Hovering & silly headgear are kinda the bare minimum to represent "the future" unambiguously, these days. The presumption of extraterrestrial habitation is the most futuristic reference I see. I'd be a bit surprised if that took us more than another decade or two, if ever.

Is this comic really about the far future, or is part of the joke that language changes faster than our perceptions of what is futuristic? ProphetZarquon (talk) 01:12, 6 July 2021 (UTC)