77: Bored with the Internet

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Bored with the Internet
I used to do this all the time.
Title text: I used to do this all the time.

Explanation[edit]

A character who has hair (not to be confused with Hairy) suggests to Black Hat that he is wasting his life on the Internet, and they should go explore the world. They appear to walk a great distance, through what appears to be a swamp or perhaps a forest in winter, across a plain, and down to a river valley. Despite traveling so far and through such varied landscapes, in the last panel, the character with hair admits that all he can think about is what a great LiveJournal post their trip would make. It appears that the plan to get the Internet off their mind has failed.

LiveJournal is a website on which users can make accounts and, effectively, blog, although the site is designed around the premise that the blogs ought to be used as personal journals, with the ability to privatize the journal or only let certain friends see certain entries. LiveJournal was an early social network and an early blog platform and was a good way for people to let others know what was going on in their lives. Randall presented his comics on LiveJournal before using xkcd.com. Today, LiveJournal still exists, but its popularity has plummeted.

The title text suggests that Randall has overcome a tendency to think about how he will document what he has been doing, rather than concentrate on the thing itself.

Transcript[edit]

[Black Hat and Not-Hairy are talking in a room with a computer on.]
Not-Hairy: I feel like I'm wasting my life on the internet. Let's walk around the world.
Black Hat: Sounds good.
[The two men are shown walking through trees.]
[The two men are shown walking on flat stretch, with mountains in the distance.]
[The two men are shown in a magnificent canyon. They stand, silently looking at the scene.]
Not-Hairy: And yet all I can think is, "This will make for a great LiveJournal entry."

Trivia[edit]

  • This used to be one of the footer comics featured in the bottom segment of xkcd.com.
  • The image used in the logo of xkcd is from the first panel of this comic, showing only the characters and the desk.


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Discussion

Coming in very late, I know, but why does the article say the character is not to be confused with Hairy ... and then the transcript says it's Hairy? Nitpicking (talk) 01:48, 16 August 2021 (UTC) Fixed!User:Anonia (talk) 06:30, 16 November 2021 (EST)

Barrel Boy[edit]

Does anyone else notice how Not-Hairy looks like a stick figure version of Barrel Boy? I know its probably not, just wanted to throw it out there though. Apollo11 (talk) 9:33 March 7 2024 (CST)