Difference between revisions of "1817: Incognito Mode"

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
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(I tried to add a very basic explanation until someone writes a better one)
(OMG!!!)
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Animorphs can get stuck if they stay in another form for too long, and this comics seems to poke fun at this idea. The joke is that Animorph would then think that spending too much time in any "other form" would get you stuck in it, in this situation the "other form" is the incognito mode of a web browser. This would be terrible tech support since the information is not only false, but also disruptive to the user and very vague.
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==Transcript==
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...But Remember-If you browse in incognito mode for more than two hours, you'll be trapped there ''forever!''
 
...But Remember-If you browse in incognito mode for more than two hours, you'll be trapped there ''forever!''
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Below: Animorphs Tech Tips
 
Below: Animorphs Tech Tips
  
Title Text: They're really the worst tech support team. And their solutions are always the same. "This OS X update broke something." "LET'S INFILTRATE APPLE BY MORPHING APPLES!"
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{{comic discussion}}

Revision as of 14:35, 29 March 2017

Incognito Mode
They're really the worst tech support team. And their solutions are always the same. "This OS X update broke something." "LET'S INFILTRATE APPLE BY MORPHING APPLES!"
Title text: They're really the worst tech support team. And their solutions are always the same. "This OS X update broke something." "LET'S INFILTRATE APPLE BY MORPHING APPLES!"

Explanation

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Transcript

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...But Remember-If you browse in incognito mode for more than two hours, you'll be trapped there forever!

Below: Animorphs Tech Tips


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Discussion

Is this a new female character? 108.162.245.76 (talk) (please sign your comments with ~~~~)

I think it is just Blondie. She also has similar details in 495: Secretary: Part 2 and 752: Phobia. Blondie is a generic character that has long blonde hair, which fits the bill. --Kynde (talk) 16:03, 29 March 2017 (UTC)
Given that the title text references animorphs giving bad tech support, and that one of the animorphs is a young blonde woman, it's entirely possible that the female character is Rachel. GreatWyrmGold (talk) 22:32, 5 September 2019 (UTC)

This may be related to several news reports regarding an easter egg found in incognito mode (where a "wink" ;) emoticon shows in the "tab count" field if you have more than 100 tabs open - many news sites (independent, daily telegraph) are suggesting that this is google showing that they know their incognito mode is used to look at pornography (100+ tabs of it apparently!) Cprobertson1 (talk) 14:32, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Did you just find the solution of how to end a parenthetical statement with an emoticon!? 541: TED Talk 625571b7-aa66-4f98-ac5c-92464cfb4ed8 (talk) 14:48, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Am I the only one who primarily uses Incognito mode for browsing, even on my personal computer and mobile device? I just don't want other people "accidentally" logging into my accounts if they borrow my device "just to check an email." Nialpxe (talk) 14:48, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Not the only one. But one could basically say you are trapped in it forever... 15:01, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

I have a habit of checking xkcd every few minutes to see if there is something new. I found this one after spending about 2 hours reading up on superheroes on incognito mode. (Because of that, this was one of the funniest ones so far for me! :)

United States legislation

It may be fair to mention this piece of legislation that has practically passed: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/03/for-sale-your-private-browsing-history/ 162.158.246.82 19:54, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Incognito mode does not save you from that. It only affects what data remains on your machine while that bill regulates what your ISP can do with the information they extract from the data you send over the wire. With HTTPS they can at least only see which servers you communicate with but that can be bad enough. The only way around that is to use a VPN (which wraps all communication in a secure channel to the VPN provider's server) but then you have to trust the VPN provider (and possibly their ISP) not to sell your data.--162.158.89.103 11:22, 30 March 2017 (UTC)
Not "possibly". Using VPN can save you from your ISP but will give all those information to the VPN provider's ISP. -- Hkmaly (talk) 01:23, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
What I wanted to imply was a) with traffic from different VPN users using the same endpoint it's way harder to link individual connections to a specific user (especially with HTTPS when you can't rely on any request or response data) and b) you should always choose an endpoint in a country where ISPs can't legally sell that information. That way it's more important that you can trust your VPN provider than their ISP. Onion routing such as TOR can help with that but it has some disadvantages as well (especially speed and complexity). But in general you're right.--162.158.89.247 21:38, 31 March 2017 (UTC)
I got that impression too, that it's on Randall's mind, but I'm actually against adding such trivia unless the comic spells out the issue itself. (Also I'm personally just relieved that all the big ISPs came out and said "we didn't sell your data like that in the past and we're not about to do it now") 172.68.142.197 02:52, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Wonder if today's comic (2017-03-31) will be the April fools' comic of 2017, or if there will be an extra comic tomorrow - Saturday, or if today's comic won't even come out until tomorrow, to be released on April 1st, or if Randall will just skip it this year, as it is not a release day this year, after all the troubles he had with releasing Garden too late last year...? I hope there will be one, because the last three years folls' comics have been great :-) --Kynde (talk) 10:39, 31 March 2017 (UTC)

The paragraph of explanation on Google Chrome's Incognito Mode used to mention "people standing behind you", so I thought this was funny before I read the text when I had read just the title and seen the picture. Is it worth mentioning something to this effect in the explanation? There is an extra pun in the image because the speaker is standing behind the browser, I guess that could be the source of the initial ellipsis. 108.162.241.100 12:44, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

I'll use an anonymous search engine within an incognito session to view sites via proxy, so I feel pretty secure. Hang on, someone's knocking at the door. These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For (talk) 00:06, 9 April 2017 (UTC)