explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Category:Cancer

2021-08-30T18:33:49Z

108.162.215.87: biology related

[[Randall]]'s (then, fiancée) wife was diagnosed with Stage III breast cancer in October of 2010. He immediately immersed himself in research of what cancer was, what treatments were like, etc. Every once in a while, his research, and happenings with his family bubble to the surface in the form of a comic.

*[http://blog.xkcd.com/2010/11/05/submarines/ This] is the first mention of the cancer.
*[http://blog.xkcd.com/2011/06/30/family-illness/ Here] is a blag post from Randall in June 2011 with an update.

[[Category:Comics by topic|Comics by topic]]

You may also notice that the tone of these cancer-themed comics slowly gets happier. This could be due to a number of factors. We can only hope this means [[Randall Munroe]]'s wife is getting better.

[[Category:Biology]]

Talk:2507: USV-C

2021-08-25T17:01:58Z

108.162.215.87:

I just did my first edit! It'll definitely get changed, but I guess this is good enough for a start

[[Special:Contributions/162.158.89.204|162.158.89.204]] 16:30, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

that's not as absurd as it sounds. there are optical usb cables which work by converting the usb signals to and from light signals.[[Special:Contributions/162.158.92.83|162.158.92.83]] 16:48, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

I bet this is going to be an xkcd that gets recreated in real life.

[[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.87|108.162.215.87]] 17:01, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

841: Audiophiles

2021-08-25T06:21:16Z

108.162.215.87: Game music is great, the real problem is the gunfire

{{comic
| number = 841
| date = December 31, 2010
| title = Audiophiles
| image = audiophiles.png
| titletext = For years, I took the wrong lesson from that Monster Cable experiment and only listened to my music through alligator-clipped coat hangers.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] is buying some new speakers for his television, and asks [[Megan]] if they have the right cord to hook them up. Megan begins chiding him for using "crappy laptop speakers", i.e. low-powered, low-quality speakers that don't faithfully reproduce the sound.

Cueball and Megan reproduce the two extremes of the arguments: Cueball simply wants to play a first-person shooter video game (whose soundtrack will either be obscured by gunfire or completely absent during gameplay), regardless of the sound quality, whereas Megan, the audiophile, values music everywhere. Cueball seems to think that's unnecessary, and Megan snipes back that he's never heard beauty, so he wouldn't know; after all, he thinks low-bit-rate re-encodings from YouTube (at the time, notorious for dodgy sound quality) are perfectly fine music. Cueball, frustrated with Megan's perfectionism, states that he's just going to buy cheap 5-watt speakers. While 5 watts may be a lot if you're trying to fill the immediate area with sound from your MP3 player, it'd sound tiny and hollow coming out of a television across the room. An incredulous Megan protests, calling his ideas "a joke." An exasperated Cueball tells a {{w|Lightbulb joke|lightbulb joke}}, the content of which implies that the content doesn't matter to her, only the quality in which it's delivered to her ear. Megan promptly hangs up because of the bad joke (or possibly because of the bad audio quality?).

The title text is referring to a [http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/threads/speakers-when-is-good-enough-enough.2512/page-2 forum post from audioholics.com] (post #29, "We gathered up a 5 [sic] of our audio buddies...."), where a user did a blind audio test using Monster cable and coat hangers with soldered on alligator clips, and the audiophiles were unable to discern any difference. Randall instead just uses coat-hangers to connect his speakers, not getting that the point of the test was not to extol the high transmission quality of coat hanger wire but to lampoon the belief that supposedly high-quality speaker cables make an audible difference in the audio output.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball and Megan are talking over the telephone. The first two panels are split diagonally. Cueball is at a store, holding a box, and Megan is consulting with him.]
:Cueball: Do we have an RCA-to-3.5mm female-female plug? I'm getting some speakers for the new Xbox, since the monitor doesn't have any.
:Megan: Are they crappy laptop speakers? ''Ugh.''

:[Cueball is standing next to a sale rack.]
:Cueball: Does it matter? I just want to hear if I'm getting shot at, not savor every detail of a beautiful musical soundscape.
:Megan: You've never ''heard'' a beautiful musical soundscape. You listen to 96kbps flv rips from YouTube.

:[Megan is walking.]
:Cueball: Whatever. I'm just going to get these $20 speakers. Five watts will be plenty.
:Megan: Five watts for a living room sound system? Is that a joke?

:[Zoomed in panel on Cueball]:
:Cueball: No, this is a joke: How many audiophiles does it take to change a lightbulb?
:Megan: How many?
:Cueball: I'll tell you later—you wouldn't appreciate the punchline over this 12kbps cell phone codec.
:''click''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Video games]]

2506: Projecting

2021-08-25T02:49:22Z

108.162.215.87:

{{comic
| number = 2506
| date = August 23, 2021
| title = Projecting
| image = projecting.png
| titletext = This is something we all need to work on, but especially you all.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by SOMEONE ALMOST AS BAD AT MAKING EXPLANATIONS AS YOU ARE! Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
In this comic, [[Cueball]] expresses his difficulty with {{w|psychological projection}}. Projection is taking qualities of the self and attributing these qualities to others.

[[Cueball]] actually admits he has a ''real'' problem with projecting, but while doing so, he is seemingly oblivious to the fact, that he is stating this in a way that projects his self-identified difficulty upon his friends: [[Ponytail]], [[Megan]] and [[White Hat]]. Of course, this could also just be a joke made by Cueball, as it is the joke in the comic. On the other hand, Cueball and [[Randall]] have serious issues with [[:Category:Social interactions|social interactions]], and this could just be another example of such a problem.

In the title text, Cueball continues his projections, stating that ''this is something we all need to work on''. So he continues to believe that all the others have the same problem, not just a lot of them as in his original statement, which left the possibility that not all of them had this issue. In the end, he also tops it by saying ''but especially you all'' indicating that he imagines his own case is a less serious issue of projection than that he actually projects the others as having.

A further alternative read could be that Cueball is acting as the Randall surrogate, noting that the other characters are projections of Randall's conscious and subconscious self. The title text could then be read as either directed to those aspects as expressed as characters within the comic; or could be addressed to the reader who also has things to work on.

A different [[https://www.definitions.net/definition/voice%20projection]] meaning of the term "Projecting" is seen in the fields of public speaking and drama, being the way that a person clearly uses their voice to address an audience. If Cueball is not projecting well, then the characters listening to him may ignore him.

Projection is an ongoing issue. People from disparate communities can experience this all the time, where one person assumes out of habit that the other person has the traits of their community. On the end of the spectrum, projection can be completely delusional, as the comic hints at. It would make sense for that be more common for people who attend less to where others are at, such as introverted or powerful people, two groups that experienced engineers can land in.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail, Cueball, Megan, and White Hat are standing. Cueball is talking, with arms outstretched, palms up, while the other three are looking at him.]
:Cueball: Like a lot of you, I have a real problem with projection.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]

Talk:413: New Pet

2015-04-18T16:39:34Z

108.162.215.87:

Is anyone else tempted to do this for real? Because I certainly am. [[Special:Contributions/130.160.145.185|130.160.145.185]] 23:24, 9 March 2013 (UTC)

Even more possible now with the newer, smaller raspberry Pi computers. Someone PLEASE do it. {{unsigned ip|141.101.98.228}}
:NEW PROJECT. [[User:Alexbuzzbee|Alexbuzzbee]] ([[User talk:Alexbuzzbee|talk]]) 14:36, 16 March 2015 (UTC)
:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABzjUf3E_0c [[Special:Contributions/108.162.215.87|108.162.215.87]] 16:39, 18 April 2015 (UTC)

Here is the comments section on the xkcd site: http://blog.xkcd.com/2008/04/22/hooray-robots/#comments (Sorry. Don't know how to make it a link.) There are a number of proposed designs and several readers who claim to be making one. There are 248 entries so I only skimmed over them. [[User:ExternalMonolog|ExternalMonolog]] ([[User talk:ExternalMonolog|talk]]) 20:48, 21 January 2014 (UTC)ExternalMonolog

428: Starwatching

2014-05-05T17:56:31Z

108.162.215.87:

{{comic
| number = 428
| date = May 26, 2008
| title = Starwatching
| image = starwatching.png
| titletext = I always figured the word 'blog' would sound *less* silly as the years went by.
}}

==Explanation==

[[Randall]] is using the scene from {{w|The Lion King}} where Simba is remembering a moment when his father, Mufasa, explained the night sky to him saying, 'the great kings of the past are up there' as a setting for this conversation between [[Cueball]] and [[Megan]]. This reminds Cueball of the scene later in the movie where Mufasa appears to Simba in the clouds and speaks to him. Megan interrupts, telling Cueball that he needs to be away from the computer more so he doesn't connect everything to {{w|Cory Doctorow}}, but he also shouldn't go near other people for fear of creeping them out.

Another possible interpretation:
It's night and [[Megan]] and [[Cueball]] lie down on the earth while looking into the sky. Cueball believes that all dead bloggers are up there in the sky and watching them. This is similar to the belief in god or Jesus who are watching us everywhere. And above of them all there is the master blogger {{w|Cory Doctorow|Cory Efram Doctorow}}, his name is the largest one at the {{w|Tag cloud}}.

In the title text, [[Randall]] mentions that the word {{w|blog}}—a {{w|portmanteau}} of 'web log'—is a silly word, despite becoming common in usage.

==Transcript==
:Cueball: Just look at those stars.
:Cueball: My father once told me that the great bloggers of the past are up there, watching over us.
:Cueball: High above the blogosphere, a gap opens in the tag clouds. Cory Doctorow's voice booms forth...
:Megan: You need to get out either more or less. I can't decide.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring real people]]

588: Pep Rally

2014-04-21T20:02:43Z

108.162.215.87:

{{comic
| number =588
| date =May 25, 2009
| title =Pep Rally
| image =pep_rally.png
| titletext =You know, pep rallies weirded me out in high school, and they've only gotten creepier in retrospect.
}}

==Explanation==
Any American who went to high school remembers the convocations they had during football or basketball season, in which class would be interrupted and everyone was crowded into the gymnasium for a pep rally. Cheerleaders would cheer, they'd play the school fight song, the cheerleaders might do a routine, and the team would be introduced.

This is used to inspire school spirit and get people excited about attending the games, so that they'd come to the games and spend money on tickets and concessions. A common boast at pep rallies is "Our school is the best!"

"But wait," says one of the students, quite logically. Why is ''our'' school the best? The student population is simply made up of students living in the general ZIP code of the school's location. There's no intrinsic reason why ''this'' school is any better than the rest of them in any way that really matters in real life. And even having the #1 basketball team in the state doesn't mean the students there are any "better" than anyone else.

This comic subverts the usual expectation of unanimous agreement with the cheerleader's sentiment, and reminds you that people who go to other schools, root for other teams, aren't ''bad people'' - and Randall would no doubt argue that this is the same of people who follow a different religion than you, are a different ethnicity, or have a different political party affiliation, unless they are {{w|Democratic Party (United States)|a Democrat}}, Democrats are always evil.

The title text says that Randall was weirded out by pep rallies growing up, and now that he's older, finds them even ''more'' creepy. Really, if you think about it, pep rallies are a less extreme example of ''any'' cult of personality gathering. There are arguably a lot of parallels between a high school pep rally and, say, a military rally under a brutal dictatorship.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail stands in front of crowded bleachers, waving pompoms.]
:Ponytail: Lakeview High is the best!
:Crowd: Yeah!
:Someone: Wait, why?

:Ponytail: What?
:Voice: A guy on the North High football team helped me rebuild my deck. It seems ungrateful to presume we're better.

:Voice: I mean, school districts are just based on zip codes.
:Voice #2: Their principal donated a kidney to my dad.

:Voice: I'm texting with my friend there now. He says it's okay, and we're invited to their events if we want. But he sounded kind of hurt.
:Voice #2: Why are we doing this, rally, again?
:[Ponytail looks dejected.]

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]

588: Pep Rally

2014-04-21T20:00:08Z

108.162.215.87:

{{comic
| number =588
| date =May 25, 2009
| title =Pep Rally
| image =pep_rally.png
| titletext =You know, pep rallies weirded me out in high school, and they've only gotten creepier in retrospect.
}}

==Explanation==
Any American who went to high school remembers the convocations they had during football or basketball season, in which class would be interrupted and everyone was crowded into the gymnasium for a pep rally. Cheerleaders would cheer, they'd play the school fight song, the cheerleaders might do a routine, and the team would be introduced.

This is used to inspire school spirit and get people excited about attending the games, so that they'd come to the games and spend money on tickets and concessions. A common boast at pep rallies is "Our school is the best!"

"But wait," says one of the students, quite logically. Why is ''our'' school the best? The student population is simply made up of students living in the general ZIP code of the school's location. There's no intrinsic reason why ''this'' school is any better than the rest of them in any way that really matters in real life. And even having the #1 basketball team in the state doesn't mean the students there are any "better" than anyone else.

This comic subverts the usual expectation of unanimous agreement with the cheerleader's sentiment, and reminds you that people who go to other schools, root for other teams, aren't ''bad people'' - and Randall would no doubt argue that this is the same of people who follow a different religion than you, are a different ethnicity, or have a different political party affiliation, unless they are {{w|Republican Party (United States)|Republican}}, Republicans are always evil.

The title text says that Randall was weirded out by pep rallies growing up, and now that he's older, finds them even ''more'' creepy. Really, if you think about it, pep rallies are a less extreme example of ''any'' cult of personality gathering. There are arguably a lot of parallels between a high school pep rally and, say, a military rally under a brutal dictatorship.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail stands in front of crowded bleachers, waving pompoms.]
:Ponytail: Lakeview High is the best!
:Crowd: Yeah!
:Someone: Wait, why?

:Ponytail: What?
:Voice: A guy on the North High football team helped me rebuild my deck. It seems ungrateful to presume we're better.

:Voice: I mean, school districts are just based on zip codes.
:Voice #2: Their principal donated a kidney to my dad.

:Voice: I'm texting with my friend there now. He says it's okay, and we're invited to their events if we want. But he sounded kind of hurt.
:Voice #2: Why are we doing this, rally, again?
:[Ponytail looks dejected.]

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]