explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

2152: Westerns

2019-05-20T12:56:26Z

108.162.241.118: Included further explanation of the title text

{{comic
| number = 2152
| date = May 20, 2019
| title = Westerns
| image = westerns.png
| titletext = Sitting here idly trying to figure out how the population of the Old West in the late 1800s compares to the number of Red Dead Redemption 2 players.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2 PLAYER IN THE 1800s. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

For the most part, genres of film, games and the like based on historical time periods frequently take hold after the time period is over. Over time, the time period will remain the same size while the "genre"'s lifespan will grow, eventually leading to the genre being as long as its origin. In this case, the Western genre is not equal to nor double but TRIPLE the size of the time period it is based on. While this might be taken to suggest that we have used up everything good in Westerns, it probably is more Randall looking at time passing.

The title text is in reference to the popular game [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Dead_Redemption_2 Red Dead Redemption 2], a game within the western genre. According to the United States Census of 1800 the population of the States was around 5 million at the time, whereas Red Dead Redemption 2 has sold in excess of 24 million copies.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
A horizontal timeline spanning between the years 1840 and 2020. Every decade is indicated by a tick below the line, and labeled every 50 years. Two ranges are highlighted by brackets and labeled:

1862-1898: The “Wild West” era

1902-2019: Western films, books, video games, etc

Below the timeline:

It's weird to realize that the Western genre has now existed for three times longer than the period it's based on.

{{comic discussion}}

2116: .NORM Normal File Format

2019-02-25T18:21:44Z

108.162.241.118: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2116
| date = February 25, 2019
| title = .NORM Normal File Format
| image = norm_normal_file_format.png
| titletext = At some point, compression becomes an aesthetic design choice. Luckily, SVG is a really flexible format, so there's no reason it can't support vector JPEG artifacts.
}}

==Explanation==
Cueball's friend seem to have sent him a rather unusual datafile passed off as a new "normal" standard.

People who work with data, and need data sent to them electronically, typically need it sent in a way that they can easily use it -- either in a text format that can be copy-pasted, or as a spreadsheet or CSV file that can be imported into a spreadsheet program, or such. Information sent in this fashion -- a photograph of a spreadsheet embedded into a word processing file -- is absolutely useless for any purpose beyond being looked at. The recipient has no choice but to retype the entire data set, and hope that no mistakes are made in the process.

Further, the size of the data is bloated by being converted first from text into graphics, and then from graphics to embedded graphics in a word processing document. This adds nothing to the content, and only adds steps to the process of retrieving the data.

The comic image links to a [https://twitter.com/openelex/status/853977391747801088 tweet by OpenElections] that displays an Excel file produced by the City of Detroit that contains a lookup table for the city's absentee precincts in 2016.

This comic is reminiscent of the comic [[763:_Workaround|Workaround]], which also describes convoluted formats.

The title text suggests that eventually compression (or at least compression with data/quality loss) will be unnecessary as technology improves in the future. SVG is a vector graphic format that is fundamentally a lossless format. Randall suggests that some people in the future may choose to include JPEG artifacts to SVG vector graphics for its "aesthetics", perhaps as a throwback to when lower quality JPEG images were commonplace.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Cueball is at a computer. Someone is talking to him from off-panel.]
:Voice: I sent you the data.
:Cueball: Thanks!
:Cueball: …this is a Word document containing an embedded photo you took of your screen with the spreadsheet open.
:Voice: Yeah? Does your computer not support .NORM files? Maybe you need to update.

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Since everyone sends stuff this way anyway, we should just formalize it as a standard.

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Computers]]

{{comic discussion}}

2071: Indirect Detection

2018-11-12T15:55:35Z

108.162.241.118:

{{comic
| number = 2071
| date = November 12, 2018
| title = Indirect Detection
| image = indirect_detection.png
| titletext = I'm like a prisoner in Plato's Cave, seeing only the shade you throw on the wall.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a PLATONIC PRISONER. Needs details on both the subject of the social media post and further exposition on what throwing shade is. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic shows an angry social media post by one of Cueball's spiky-haired friends, condemning other comments which declare that "adopting pets from shelters is for losers" and "those animals should all be hunted for sport" - cartoonishly evil attitudes that no ordinary human being would ever condone, and which Randall has never directly seen someone support. Text follows, in which Randall states that the outrage expressed by his associates, over the opinions of ''their'' associates gives Randall an unusually remote means of assessing the subjective quality of his next-nearest peers.

The title text is a pun comparing the shadows of [[Wikipedia:Allegory of the Cave|Plato's cave]] to the practice of "[[Wikipedia:Throwing shade (slang)|throwing shade]]."

Plato's Cave is an allegorical tale taking place in a hypothetical cave. The lifelong occupants of the cave cannot see the outside world, but instead see events at the cave entrance only as shadows of firelight upon the cave wall; Lacking a more complete or direct source of information, the cave occupants can only guess about the outside world by interpreting these shadows as a view of the world itself, & therefore base their other beliefs about the outside world upon the transitory appearances of these shadows. In this way, Plato's Cave serves as an allegory for our limited understanding of phenomena which occur primarily or entirely outside direct perception by our natural senses.

In the same way one might make incorrect assumptions about the makeup & chemical properties of air if one's information on the subject were gathered entirely from watching wind blow through leaves, the hypothetical occupants of Plato's Cave may reasonably be expected to produce wildly inaccurate theories about the outside world; a world which they experience only as a kind of shadowplay.

A further joke behind the pun about "throwing shade" may be that judging anything based only upon the most outrageous points of measurement available will likely produce an inaccurate assessment.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

: [Social media post]

: Everyone on here needs to stop laughing about how "adopting pets from a shelter is for losers" and "those animals should all be hunted for sport instead." It's reprehensible on so many levels! First of all...

: [Caption under the panel]

: Sometimes, one of my friends posts an angry response to some terrible opinion I've never heard before, and it's a weird indirect way to learn how awful their other friends must be.

{{comic discussion}}

Talk:1695: Code Quality 2

2018-10-03T23:51:07Z

108.162.241.118:

Edward Estin Cummings was a poet (pseudonym e e cummings) who used capitalization, punctuation, and line breaks in unconventional ways. When a new user creates an account that duplicates an existing user name, many websites will suggest a user name with the user's first name followed by a string of digits. [[User:The Dining Logician|The Dining Logician]] ([[User talk:The Dining Logician|talk]]) 14:42, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

I really love these ones :) I hope there will be a part 3. Can we please make a contest for these?[[Special:Contributions/162.158.83.246|162.158.83.246]] 15:22, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
:Yes please! How about:
<nowiki>"It's as if you used a kaleidoscope while following a style-guide written in Rongorongo & applied a pseudo-random number generator to the Unicode table for all your regular expressions. Also, you're not supposed to use line-breaks to draw letters using pipe symbols when defining your variables."</nowiki>
(A nice [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boustrophedon#Reverse_boustrophedon example of the Reverse Boustrophedon format used in Rongorongo])
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.68.137|162.158.68.137]] 22:05, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

I know Ponytail is female but I keep reading her voice as TJ Miller's character from the movie Deadpool.--[[User:R0hrshach|R0hrshach]] ([[User talk:R0hrshach|talk]]) 15:45, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
:Are you also a fan of Dr. Mrs. The Monarch, from Venture Bros? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.68.137|162.158.68.137]] 22:05, 17 June 2016 (UTC)

"This is further compounded by Ponytail's suggestion that Cueball made rampant use of JavaScript reserved words in his declarations, which is strictly forbidden by the language." I don't think Ponytail made any such suggestion. I think all Ponytail is suggesting is that reserved words occur more often than they would in an ordinary scrabble game. A "house rule" giving triple points for using particular words would explain their high frequency.

Of course in pretty much any program reserved words do occur with high frequency, it's hard to write without them. There is also heavy overlap in the list of reserved words in different languages, so that the program might not be in javascript. A typical C program uses lots of javascript reserved words.--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.218.59|108.162.218.59]] 16:12, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
:I agree, and as "the program runs fine for now" it appears to be at the very least a syntactically correct program. --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.76|141.101.104.76]] 21:17, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
:I also agree that it's highly speculative to assume that Cueball's use of reserved words is necessarily erroneous; However, that may be the funnier interpretation, as it indicates an even higher level of improper usage. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.68.137|162.158.68.137]] 22:05, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
:I interpreted it quite differently: that he uses variable names very similar to reserved words. For example, "stririg" or "strlng" for a string. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.70|173.245.52.70]] 11:12, 19 June 2016 (UTC)

Do we really need the "funny bus crash" photos in the transcript?[[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.123|141.101.98.123]] 20:01, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
:"Funny" bus crash is redundant, in my antisocial opinion. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.68.137|162.158.68.137]] 22:05, 17 June 2016 (UTC)
::No we do not need them. Feel free to delete them. They are though not in the transcript (where they would for sure not belong). The transcript shoudl genreally have no links. They are in the explanation above the transcript as is also the case with the crash photos. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:43, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

"It works fine for now" is the reason we still have such a hard time figuring out genetics.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.35.83|172.68.35.83]] 05:57, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

Somehow the "OCR on the photo of a ''Scrabble'' board" line reminded me of [[1685: Patch]]. [[User:Tepples|Tepples]] ([[User talk:Tepples|talk]]) 22:43, 18 June 2016 (UTC)

Much shorter insult, courtesy StackOverflow: "The garbage collector is broken".
"What? Impossible!" "Surely. Your program is still there." [[Special:Contributions/162.158.201.84|162.158.201.84]] 08:37, 20 June 2016 (UTC)

;"Navy weather forecast"
The link given in the explanation to a navy weather forecast is to a graphical weather forecast product. This doesn't make sense, since Randall was clearly referring to a textual weather forecast product. I believe the type of weather forecast Randall intended to reference is an aviation weather forecast, which is textual, not graphical, and is indecipherable to a lay person (pilots must learn how to read them during their training). An example of such a forecast is the blue text on [https://www.aviationweather.gov/static/help/taf-decode.php this page explaining how to decode them] —[[User:SaxTeacher|SaxTeacher]] [[User talk:SaxTeacher|(talk)]] 14:14, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

In the 1st panel her hands are on desk but others are on the drawer underneath :) [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.50|108.162.245.50]] 20:36, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

That's easily explained away as she is also hunched over in panel 1 trying to read his code. Holding onto the desk like that would make sense as she would not currently be using her hands to type and correct things (not that it's possible to correct Cueball's code).

Talk:2052: Stanislav Petrov Day

2018-09-30T04:35:23Z

108.162.241.118:

Wednesday was also Talk Like a Pirate Day [[User:Barmar|Barmar]] ([[User talk:Barmar|talk]]) 14:51, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
: What is a pirate's favorite letter?
: Aaaar!
: Many people think it's the 'R', but it's actually the 'C'! [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.168|162.158.106.168]] 15:05, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
::...I feel like I've read that on a webcomic somewhere... [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.16|172.68.174.16]] 15:32, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
:::Ye'd think they'd be the most fond if the 'C', but without 'P', they just be irate. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.100|108.162.241.100]] 16:01, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
Ayyy, got this one pretty fast. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.13|162.158.154.13]] 15:18, 28 September 2018 (UTC)
:I thought that International Talk Like A Pirate Day was September 19th. I've been celebrating it on that day for decades [[User:Mr. I|Mr. I]] ([[User talk:Mr. I|talk]]) 19:37, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

I just read about Mr Petrov the other day, maybe on Quora. I wonder if Randall received the same article in his daily digest :) [[Special:Contributions/141.101.107.78|141.101.107.78]] 16:26, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

'''History of Petrov Day as a holiday'''

My critics: Not explaining much to the comics content; even admires that a stupid citation is still needed; this Wiki isn't a link list; I can do more... But I don't want to do censorship so maybe we can put this into a single sentence belonging to an explanation. Otherwise some could be moved to a trivia section. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 18:17, 28 September 2018 (UTC)

I can't find anything specific, but a couple other articles list this BBC link https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-24280831 which states that his heroism was kept secret until after the collapse of the Soviet Union (1991ish) and that Mr. Petrov "kept silent for 10 years" - so 1993 or maybe 2001. [[User:Afbach|Afbach]] ([[User talk:Afbach|talk]])
:Read the first paragraph: "The incident was unknown to the public until it was revealed shortly before the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991." --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:41, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

I think everyone missed the subtle point in this comic - Stanislav was famous for correctly identifying the nuclear attack alert as a false alarm, and Cueball thought the calendar alert he received was a false alarm as well! I believe that's the real joke here! [[User:Ianrbibtitlht|Ianrbibtitlht]] ([[User talk:Ianrbibtitlht|talk]]) 14:30, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

You all missed the joke of the “false alarm clock”, which is that if it keeps going off when it’s not supposed to, you very well might assume that it’s another false alarm when you are actually supposed to wake up, and thus will sleep late anyway, completely defeating the point of the alarm. [[User:PotatoGod|PotatoGod]] ([[User talk:PotatoGod|talk]]) 20:33, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

Is it just me, or does Eliezer Yudkowsky show up abnormally frequently in explainXKCD? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.118|108.162.241.118]] 04:35, 30 September 2018 (UTC)

Talk:2052: Stanislav Petrov Day

2018-09-30T04:35:00Z

108.162.241.118:

207: What xkcd Means

2018-09-29T16:42:42Z

108.162.241.118: Title text is a singular noun, not a plural one

{{comic
| number = 207
| date = January 8, 2007
| title = What xkcd Means
| image = what xkcd means.png
| titletext = It means shuffling quickly past nuns on the street with ketchup in your palms, pretending you're hiding stigmata.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic purports to finally answer the question, "What does 'xkcd' mean?" However, instead of giving an answer as to what the letters actually mean (according to Randall, it's literally "just a word with no phonetic pronunciation"), he offers five quirky behaviors. This is reminiscent of TV commercials that ask, "What does [brand name] mean? It means [happy activity]!".

The first panel shows a driver, marked by a red line, making a {{w|right turn on red|right turn at a red light}}, a {{w|U-turn}} on the connecting road, and then another right turn, returning them to their original direction presumably faster than waiting for the light. Right turns at red lights and U-turns are legal in some states and at some intersections, but not always. Hence, this complicated maneuver is "questionably legal".

The second panel shows [[Cueball]] searching for his mobile phone by having his friend call it to locate the ringtone, only to hear a ring from inside of his dog's stomach.

In the third panel, {{w|Graham's number}} is a (very) large number (once celebrated as the largest number ever used in a proof, although it is no longer the record holder), and the {{w|Ackermann function}} is a (very) fast-growing function, thus the function's output must be insanely large. (In fact, A(g64, g64) is actually smaller than g65.)

The fourth panel shows somebody walking in a pattern based on the position of black and white tiles on the floor. This is further referenced in [[245: Floor Tiles]].

The title text refers to {{w|stigmata}}, marks corresponding to Jesus' crucifixion wounds. Devout Catholics have claimed to have spontaneously developed stigmata.

==Transcript==
:What does xkcd mean?

:[Two cars sitting at a red light at a multi-lane intersection; one of them makes a right turn, then shifts over to the left lane and makes a U-turn across the dividing line to go back the way it came. It then shifts back to the right lane and makes another right turn, continuing down the road past the traffic light. This is shown with a red arrow.]
:It means saving a few seconds at a long red light via elaborate and questionably legal maneuvers.

:[In an inset circle in the panel, someone is on a cell phone. In the panel itself, a second person is looking at a dog.]
:It means having someone call your cell phone to figure out where it is.
:Dog's stomach: ''Ring''

:[The mathematical function "A(g64, g64)=" appears in the panel. Next to the equal sign stands a mathematician, clutching his head.]
:It means calling the Ackermann function with Graham's number as the arguments just to horrify mathematicians.
:Mathematician: ''Aughhh''

:[An approximately 8 by 8 square of floor tiles is shown; the first, fourth, and seventh across in the first, fourth, and seventh rows are black, and the rest are white. A guy and girl are shown next to it, walking on what is presumed to be the same pattern of floor tiles.]
:It means instinctively constructing rules for which floor tiles it's okay to step on and then walking funny ever after.
:[Line indicating the uppermost right black tile: Black tiles okay.]
:[Line indicating tile directly below it: White tiles directly between black tiles okay.]
:[Line indicating a white tile in the last column over: Not okay.]

==Trivia==
*In his [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJOS0sV2a24#t=44m30s Google-speech], [[Randall]] said that ''xkcd'' originated as a previously unused random 4 letter string which he used, e.g., as his account name on various internet services.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Logic]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Traffic light]]
[[Category:Religion]]

Talk:2050: 6/6 Time

2018-09-24T21:19:15Z

108.162.241.118:

This is actually how time worked in ancient Greece, minus the 6 o'clock part. Sunrise was at 12, sunset at 12 and the length of each hour varied depending on the part of the year [[Special:Contributions/172.68.189.163|172.68.189.163]] 16:15, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Not just Greece but most of medeaval Europe. The concept of a fixed length hour only arises with clockwork. that Noon, the ninth hour, now occurs at the sixth hour - that we call 12 - is mainly due to post black death labour shortages. {{unsigned|Arachrah}}

: Also ancient Rome. I ''think'' Romans borrowed this system from Greeks and it later spread along with the Roman Empire's influence. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.10.22|172.68.10.22]] 16:52, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

:: To be fair, the Romans "borrowed" (stole) a lot of other things from the Greeks, not the least of which was their pantheon. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.216.172|108.162.216.172]] 18:21, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

: Before clockwork (as mentioned above) was created, variable hours/minutes/seconds were necessary (at least during daylight hours) as the sundial obviously ({{w|citation needed}}) is just based off of the sun's angle in the sky.[[User:Rajakiit|Raj-a-Kiit]] ([[User talk:Rajakiit|talk]]) 17:42, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Some facts: {{w|September equinox}} was at 01:54 UTC on September 23 when in the entire US it still was September 22 as can be seen here: [http://aa.usno.navy.mil/seasons?year=2018&tz=-5&dst=1 U.S. Naval Observatory Astronomical Applications Department (Apsides and Seasons 2018)]. This comic was released two days later. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 16:32, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Could the timing of this comic be related to the [https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-45366390 EU voting to end DST within its borders?] [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.100|108.162.241.100]] 16:51, 24 September 2018 (UTC)
:This isn't about daylight saving time, which just moves clocks forwards and backwards by one hour in most cases. Cueball refers to an equinox when day and night are both 12 hours. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 17:05, 24 September 2018 (UTC)
:: This comic is about "unfixably messy and complicated" time standards (of which DST is one) at least as much as equinoxes (which aren't quite what you say they are; I won't get a 12-hour interval between sunrise and sunset at my latitude for another few days yet). [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.220|108.162.241.220]] 19:51, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

The hours/minutes/seconds get really short/long in the polar regions. {{unsigned ip|162.158.74.243}}

The caption can also be referring to the alteration of time zones for political reasons, such as China having only one now rather than the five it used to use, or the Republic of Kiribati pushing the International Date Line east of its entire territory.[[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.140|172.69.22.140]] 17:50, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Here is a YouTube video explaining the Japanese system (and how they created mechanical clocks to support it) - [https://youtu.be/3iclecbIgN0?t=135 Begin Japanology - Clocks and Watches]. -- [[User:Dhericean|Dhericean]] ([[User talk:Dhericean|talk]]) 18:15, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Swatch time: Still more sensible than any other division of the day I've ever heard.

Seriously though, isn't it about time we all switched to metric? 10 segments in a day, not 24. 100 units in a segment. Straightforward, easy to figure pay rates, & pretty simple to convert to & from.

Increments of 24 & 60 have no relevance to anything these days. The only reason to continue using a 24hr day is because "that's how it's been done for ages" & that's no excuse for anything.

[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 18:23, 24 September 2018 (UTC)
:I wouldn't mind redefining the division of a day. My problem would be with redefining the second, which would necessarily be a consequence of switching to metric time, and thus also the three base and nineteen derived SI units that depend on the current definition of s.
:If you can switch us to metric time without redefining the length of a second, nor having an excessive number of leap seconds, I'm all for that. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.118|108.162.241.118]] 21:19, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

== From Wikipedia ==

“In Judaism, an hour is defined as 1/12 of the time from sunrise to sunset, so, during the winter, an hour can be much less than 60 minutes, and during the summer, it can be much more than 60 minutes. This proportional hour is known as a sha'ah z'manit (lit. a timely hour). A Jewish hour is divided into 1080 halakim (singular: helek) or parts. A part is 3⅓ seconds or 1/18 minute. The ultimate ancestor of the helek was a small Babylonian time period called a barleycorn, itself equal to 1/72 of a Babylonian time degree (1° of celestial rotation).[6] These measures are not generally used for everyday purposes.”

2042: Rolle's Theorem

2018-09-05T15:46:32Z

108.162.241.118: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 2042
| date = September 5, 2018
| title = Rolle's Theorem
| image = rolles_theorem.png
| titletext = I mean, if it's that easy to get a theorem named for you ... "a straight line that passes through the center of a coplanar circle always divides the circle into two equal halves." Can I have that one? Wait, can I auction off the naming rights? It can be the Red Bull Theorem or the Quicken Loans Theorem, depending who wants it more.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

==Transcript==
:'''Rolle's Theorem'''
:''From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia''

: Rolle's Theorem states that any real, differentiable function that has the same value at two different points must have at least one "stationary point" between them where the slope is zero.
: [Example graph of a downward-pointing curve - points "a" and "b" are x-intercepts, point "c" has a vertical line to the apex, and f'(c)=0 is drawn with a horizontal line.]

: Every now and then, I feel like the math equivalent of the clueless art museum visitor squinting at a pinting and saying "c'mon, my kid could make that."

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]

2042: Rolle's Theorem

2018-09-05T15:45:45Z

108.162.241.118: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 2042
| date = September 5, 2018
| title = Rolle's Theorem
| image = rolles_theorem.png
| titletext = I mean, if it's that easy to get a theorem named for you ... "a straight line that passes through the center of a coplanar circle always divides the circle into two equal halves." Can I have that one? Wait, can I auction off the naming rights? It can be the Red Bull Theorem or the Quicken Loans Theorem, depending who wants it more.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

:''Rolle's Theorem''
:From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia

: Rolle's Theorem states that any real, differentiable function that has the same value at two different points must have at least one "stationary point" between them where the slope is zero.
: {Example graph of a downward-pointing curve - points "a" and "b" are x-intercepts, point "c" has a vertical line to the apex, and f'(c)=0 is drawn with a horizontal line.}

: Every now and then, I feel like the math equivalent of the clueless art museum visitor squinting at a pinting and saying "c'mon, my kid could make that."

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]

2042: Rolle's Theorem

2018-09-05T15:45:00Z

108.162.241.118: /* Transcript */

{{comic
| number = 2042
| date = September 5, 2018
| title = Rolle's Theorem
| image = rolles_theorem.png
| titletext = I mean, if it's that easy to get a theorem named for you ... "a straight line that passes through the center of a coplanar circle always divides the circle into two equal halves." Can I have that one? Wait, can I auction off the naming rights? It can be the Red Bull Theorem or the Quicken Loans Theorem, depending who wants it more.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

:''Rolle's Theorem''
:From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia

: Rolle's Theorem states that any real, differentiable function that has the same value at two different points must have at least one "stationary point" between them where the slope is zero.
: {Example graph of a downward-pointing curve - points "a" and "b" are x-intercepts, point "c" has a vertical line to the apex, and f'(c)=0 is drawn with a horizontal line.}

: Every now and then, I feel like the math equivalent of the clueless art museum visitor squinting at a pinting and saying "c'mon, my kid could make that."

: Title text: I mean, if it's that easy to get a theorem named for you ... "a straight line that passes through the center of a coplanar circle always divides the circle into two equal halves." Can I have that one? Wait, can I auction off the naming rights? It can be the Red Bull Theorem or the Quicken Loans Theorem, depending who wants it more.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Wikipedia]]

Talk:1995: MC Hammer Age

2018-05-19T11:40:21Z

108.162.241.118:

Hitting next on this page brings you to comic #768 titled 1996. This comic is #1995. I thought that there was an extra comic today at first. [[User:MrNinja|MrNinja]] ([[User talk:MrNinja|talk]]) 14:58, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
:Yeah, I decided to let it stay there as it is but on Monday that redirect will AND must be overwritten in the meaning of a comic number. That will happen a few times more in the future. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 15:03, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I suspect we’ll start needing Wikipedia-style disambiguation pages soon, given comic numbers that overlap other comic’s names. [[User:PotatoGod|PotatoGod]] ([[User talk:PotatoGod|talk]]) 16:13, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

"Hammer Age" > "hemorrhage", coincidence? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.88.16|141.101.88.16]] 15:19, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I came here from xkcd to find out who in the world MC Hammer was. (I guess I'm too old to really care, but I was curious.) At least there was a wiki link, but the explanation here could say something. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.170|172.69.22.170]] 16:27, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

But MC Hammer is actually almost 60? He's 56. {{unsigned|Captaindomon}}
:r/whooosh [[Special:Contributions/162.158.202.94|162.158.202.94]] 21:22, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I wonder what comic 2000 will be. Maybe it will be like 1000?[[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.118|108.162.241.118]] 11:40, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Talk:1995: MC Hammer Age

2018-05-19T11:38:41Z

108.162.241.118:

Hitting next on this page brings you to comic #768 titled 1996. This comic is #1995. I thought that there was an extra comic today at first. [[User:MrNinja|MrNinja]] ([[User talk:MrNinja|talk]]) 14:58, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
:Yeah, I decided to let it stay there as it is but on Monday that redirect will AND must be overwritten in the meaning of a comic number. That will happen a few times more in the future. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 15:03, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I suspect we’ll start needing Wikipedia-style disambiguation pages soon, given comic numbers that overlap other comic’s names. [[User:PotatoGod|PotatoGod]] ([[User talk:PotatoGod|talk]]) 16:13, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

"Hammer Age" > "hemorrhage", coincidence? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.88.16|141.101.88.16]] 15:19, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

I came here from xkcd to find out who in the world MC Hammer was. (I guess I'm too old to really care, but I was curious.) At least there was a wiki link, but the explanation here could say something. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.170|172.69.22.170]] 16:27, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

But MC Hammer is actually almost 60? He's 56. {{unsigned|Captaindomon}}
:r/whooosh [[Special:Contributions/162.158.202.94|162.158.202.94]] 21:22, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
I wonder what comic 2000 will be. Maybe it will be like 1000?

1544: Margaret

2018-05-19T10:58:15Z

108.162.241.118: changed all to some

{{comic
| number = 1544
| date = June 29, 2015
| title = Margaret
| image = margaret.png
| titletext = Otherwise known as Margaret the Destroyer, I will bring pain to the Great One. Then again, maybe I won't.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic uses the starting lines of an innocent children's book and creates irony by delivering a dark message.

In the book ''{{w|Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.}}'' by {{w|Judy Blume}}, the opening lines are "Are you still there, God? It's me, Margaret. I know you're there, God. I know you wouldn't have missed this for anything! Thank you, God. Thanks an awful lot..." These lines describe a prayer, in which Margaret privately speaks to God, expressing gratitude and seeking guidance.

In the second and third panels, Margaret asks God "Are you scared, God?", and states "You should be". This is similar to threats delivered in some action movies, such as Taken, in which the protagonist or antagonist speaks directly to their opponent, issuing threats and indicating that they are coming after their opponent. The final panel is a shot of Margaret standing imposingly in a dark landscape, and a caption over the top of the image says "Margaret is coming for you", making this comic reminiscent of an action movie trailer. The irony is that "Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret." is a very innocent book, especially when compared to this type of action movie.

The title text is a mashup of three of Blume's other books: ''{{w|Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great}}'', ''{{w|The Pain and the Great One}}'', and ''{{w|Then Again, Maybe I Won't}}'', and likely the inspiration for the dark lines in the comic.

==Transcript==
:[Margaret, shown in full body, is alone. She is talking while looking out towards the reader.]
:Margaret: Are you there, God? It's me, Margaret.
:Margaret: I know you're listening.

:[Zoom in on her face and torso.]
:Margaret: Are you scared, God?
:Margaret: Are you?

:[Zooming so far in that not even her whole face is visible.]
:Margaret: You should be.

:[Zooming far out showing her in a white silhouette against a black sky, standing on the white earth.]
:Margaret: ''Margaret is coming for you''.

==Trivia==
*There seems to be a typo in the title text with double the:
**''I will bring pain to '''the the''' Great One''.
**It could however also be a reference to the book ''The Pain and the Great One'', so this is the "The Great One".
**Maybe it was supposed to be "thee, The Great One".

*There doesn't seem to be a typo if you pause after the first the. '''thee the''' would have been better. Realizing that God is "the Great One" may be the reason for the last part of the title text (Then again, maybe I won't.)
*I know you're listening" may refer to an earlier xkcd comic, [[525: I Know You're Listening]].
*The idea of turning an innocent children's book into a violent movie was previously touched in [[633: Blockbuster Mining]].
*Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret was previously referenced in the title text of [[1354: Heartbleed Explanation]].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with inverted brightness]]
[[Category:Religion]]

1544: Margaret

2018-05-19T10:55:53Z

108.162.241.118: changed "super violent action movies" to "action movies" as similar lines are in less violent movies

{{comic
| number = 1544
| date = June 29, 2015
| title = Margaret
| image = margaret.png
| titletext = Otherwise known as Margaret the Destroyer, I will bring pain to the Great One. Then again, maybe I won't.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic uses the starting lines of an innocent children's book and creates irony by delivering a dark message.

In the book ''{{w|Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.}}'' by {{w|Judy Blume}}, the opening lines are "Are you still there, God? It's me, Margaret. I know you're there, God. I know you wouldn't have missed this for anything! Thank you, God. Thanks an awful lot..." These lines describe a prayer, in which Margaret privately speaks to God, expressing gratitude and seeking guidance.

In the second and third panels, Margaret asks God "Are you scared, God?", and states "You should be". This is similar to threats delivered in action movies, such as Taken, in which the protagonist or antagonist speaks directly to their opponent, issuing threats and indicating that they are coming after their opponent. The final panel is a shot of Margaret standing imposingly in a dark landscape, and a caption over the top of the image says "Margaret is coming for you", making this comic reminiscent of an action movie trailer. The irony is that "Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret." is a very innocent book, especially when compared to this type of action movie.

The title text is a mashup of three of Blume's other books: ''{{w|Otherwise Known as Sheila the Great}}'', ''{{w|The Pain and the Great One}}'', and ''{{w|Then Again, Maybe I Won't}}'', and likely the inspiration for the dark lines in the comic.

==Transcript==
:[Margaret, shown in full body, is alone. She is talking while looking out towards the reader.]
:Margaret: Are you there, God? It's me, Margaret.
:Margaret: I know you're listening.

:[Zoom in on her face and torso.]
:Margaret: Are you scared, God?
:Margaret: Are you?

:[Zooming so far in that not even her whole face is visible.]
:Margaret: You should be.

:[Zooming far out showing her in a white silhouette against a black sky, standing on the white earth.]
:Margaret: ''Margaret is coming for you''.

==Trivia==
*There seems to be a typo in the title text with double the:
**''I will bring pain to '''the the''' Great One''.
**It could however also be a reference to the book ''The Pain and the Great One'', so this is the "The Great One".
**Maybe it was supposed to be "thee, The Great One".

*There doesn't seem to be a typo if you pause after the first the. '''thee the''' would have been better. Realizing that God is "the Great One" may be the reason for the last part of the title text (Then again, maybe I won't.)
*I know you're listening" may refer to an earlier xkcd comic, [[525: I Know You're Listening]].
*The idea of turning an innocent children's book into a violent movie was previously touched in [[633: Blockbuster Mining]].
*Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret was previously referenced in the title text of [[1354: Heartbleed Explanation]].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with inverted brightness]]
[[Category:Religion]]

665: Prudence

2017-11-12T19:36:44Z

108.162.241.118: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 665
| date = November 20, 2009
| title = Prudence
| image = prudence.png
| titletext = Moments later, the White Witch rolls up and, confused, tries to tempt the probe with a firmware upgrade.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic references the fantasy novel series "{{w|The Chronicles of Narnia}}" by {{w|C. S. Lewis}}. In the first book, {{w|The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe}}, Lucy discovers the fictional world of Narnia which can be accessed through a wardrobe, and she walks into it without ever considering the risks. Her three older siblings do not believe her, so she travels back alone again. But this second time her brother Edmund follows her, and he is seduced by the White Witch in order for her to be able to kill him and his three siblings (see title text explanation below). Thus proving that it was a rather dangerous move to just walk into the wardrobe.

The comic mocks the imprudent behavior shown by the protagonists Lucy of the novel, who enter the world of Narnia without knowing anything about its dangers. In the comic, [[Megan]] discovers the magical wardrobe while playing {{w|hide-and-seek}}, like in the book. Unlike Lucy in the original book, Megan does not precipitately set foot into Narnia. Instead, she fetches her technical equipment and sends a remote-controlled probe through the wardrobe door in order to sound the situation first.

The probe is clearly modeled after Mars rovers like Spirit and Opportunity, which [[Randall]] depicted for the first time only a few comics later in [[681: Gravity Wells]] and then in [[695: Spirit]]. The probe looks even more like the one in [[1504: Opportunity]]. This also explains the title of the comic, as it is the name of Megan's probe. The naming scheme is similar to the two probes mentioned above that were already on Mars at the time of this comics release. And even more so like the upcoming {{w|Curiosity_(rover)|Curiosity rover}} which was first launched two years after this comic, but had {{w|Curiosity_(rover)#The_name:_Curiosity|been named}} earlier in the year this comic was released. Lucy was ''curious'' in the first Narnia book, Megan is ''[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/prudent prudent]'' in this comic..

The probe encounters {{w|Mr. Tumnus}} the faun with his umbrella at a lamppost in a snowy wood on the last panel. This picture is the first impression of Narnia in the novels and was apparently Lewis' original idea for the series.

The {{w|White Witch}} mentioned in the title text is the main antagonist in the novel. She originally lures Edmund with a hot drink and magical {{w|Turkish delight}} after her sleigh passes right by him. In the scenario mentioned in the title text, she is confused when she rolls up to the rover and then tries to tempt the probe with a firmware update accordingly.

The procedure of sending a probe first through a portal has also been used in the early Stargate episodes. This draws a parallel between the wardrobe in Narnia and the Stargate, both connecting two distant worlds. The stargate probe can be seen at [http://stargate.wikia.com/wiki/Mobile_Analytic_Laboratory_Probe here]

Megan takes a scientific approach to Narnia again in [[821: Five-Minute Comics: Part 3|a later comic]]. In that comic she uses the different passage of time in Narnia to her advantage (it usually runs much faster than on Earth). That effect would have been a problem with controlling the rover...

==Transcript==
:[Megan is running towards a closed wardrobe.]
:Voice (off-panel): Everyone hide! 99... 98... 97...

:[Megan opens one of the two doors on the wardrobe.]
:Wardrobe: click

:[Megan is looking inside the wardrobe through the fully opened door.]
:Megan: !!!

:[Megan puts a hand to her chin.]

:[Megan walks away.]

:[Megan returns with an armful of electronics including lots of wires and a rover with wheels.]

:[Megan is kneeling, typing on a laptop, which has a cord extending into the wardrobe.]

:[In a forest with many tall leafless trees the Mars rover is approaching a lamppost with a lit candle. Behind it stands a faun with horns, goatee beard and hooves holding an umbrella.]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Megan‏‎]]
[[Category:Mars rovers]]
[[Category:Fiction]]

1548: 90s Kid

2017-11-02T02:25:46Z

108.162.241.118:

{{comic
| number = 1548
| date = July 8, 2015
| title = 90s Kid
| image = 90s_kid.png
| titletext = We remember Rugrats, and think of them every time our kids look at us through their baby gates.
}}

==Explanation==
This is another example where [[Randall]] describes the inexorable passage of time.

The children are complaining about things their parents tell them, as children are wont to do. Their first complaint is something recognizable, the usual "just eat your vegetables, they're good for you." The second is about a comment "LOL, remember Rugrats and Doug? Share if you're a 90's kid" which, however, is a generic social media comment that a "90's kid" would make, not something you would expect a mother to say. At least not in the context of things their children are embarrassed about. But it illustrates that the teens and tweens of yesteryear are now adults, and parents at that.

According to the [https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2256.html CIA World Factbook,] in the USA the median age of mothers at their first birth is 25.6 (2011 estimate). On the date this comic was published, this would center the mother's own birth date in very late 1989.

Although there are various interpretations of the term "90's kid," most center around the person in question having had most or all of their childhood during the 1990s. The stereotypical '90s kid has a strong attachment to objects, movies, TV shows, phrases etc. from the era of their childhood, which bring back memories of their younger days. In this comic Randall picks up on a number of things which could be used to identify a '90s kid:

*The use of the acronym "{{w|LOL}}" means '''laughing out loud''', or '''laugh out loud''', and was probably coined in the 1980s, finding its way into general usage with the later uptake of wider public Internet and should be known to every kid working or playing on a computer today.

*{{w|Rugrats}} is a cartoon that was produced from 1991 all the way to 2004, featuring the adventures of a group of toddlers and babies.

*[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_(TV_series) Doug] is another cartoon that ran from 1991 to 2000.

*The use of traditional social media, and more specifically of sharing the type of post described.

Given that the children shown in the comic appear to be somewhat older than newborn babies is not contradictory, since a 90s kid is anyone who was a kid during the '90s. So that would also include kids who turned five in 1990 or even ten; so today a 90s kid could easily be more than 30 years old and thus have children more than 10 years old.

The title text suggests that viewing a child of one's own peering through such a barrier elicits nostalgia for the Rugrats cartoon. A {{w|baby gate}} is a semi-fixed piece of child-safety equipment to restrict a small child, typically a toddler, from leaving a safe area of a house, and especially to prevent access to stairways (up or down, where falls may happen), without overly inconveniencing an adult who can open the gate. Baby gates, fully enclosed {{w|playpen}}s and similar barriers around cots feature as usually insurmountable barriers to the younger characters in Rugrats, who are of crawling and toddling age.

==Transcript==
:[Two kids, with very different hair style, are in a playground. A fence is visible in the background, and on the ground appear to be various items including a puddle or rug and toy blocks.]
:Scruffy-haired kid: Ugh don't you hate how parents are all "Eat your carrots" and "LOL, remember Rugrats and Doug? Share if you're a 90's kid!"
:[Caption below the panel:]
:'''The median age at first birth in the US is 25, which means the typical new mother is now a 90's kid.'''

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics to make one feel old]]

Talk:1088: Five Years

2017-08-02T14:35:10Z

108.162.241.118:

*So is the interviewer dead?!?! Tebow Time, Twice a Day. 17:11, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

I think the comic invokes additional satire on the length of 'the standard interview', and the time wasted in adhering to the template, given that originally, the whole point of an interview was to judge a candidate on a person by person basis - understanding him/her on a human level, and figuring out where the position fit into their "big pictures".

Disagree. I think the comic is simply poking fun at the "Where do you see yourself in ___ years?" question which is very common in job interviews. Instead of speculating on the future, Beret Guy - who has shown himself to be a weird hippyish type with nonstandard approaches to life - decides to wait for the passing of five years in order to find out. There is a secondary joke that, after the five years have passed, he says "I thought so!", implying that at the interview he did indeed speculate on where he would be in five years: still sitting there, not having moved, and waiting for the five years to pass. Very meta. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.81.216|141.101.81.216]] 10:50, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Fridge Horror: Beret Guy and the interviewer must have both sat motionless as spiders crawled on their faces, erecting webs. I can't get the image out of my mind now. :s [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.207|199.27.128.207]] 05:33, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

I think I saw you in an ice-cream parlor / Drinking milkshakes cold and long / Smiling and waving and looking so fine / I don't think you knew were in this song / And it was cold, and it rained / So I felt like an actor / And I thought of Ma / And I wanted to get back there / Your face, your race / The way that you talk / I kiss you, you're beautiful / I want you to walk [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.118|108.162.241.118]] 14:35, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

1806: Borrow Your Laptop

2017-03-08T10:31:00Z

108.162.241.118: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1806
| date = March 3, 2017
| title = Borrow Your Laptop
| image = borrow_your_laptop.png
| titletext = If used with software that could keep up, a scroll wheel mapped to send a stream of 'undo' and 'redo' events could be kind of cool.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Needs review, maybe grammar. Two-finger scroll and scroll-wheel are still mixed up. No category links in the text because that belongs to the bottom and explains nothing. Remove double spaces.}}
[[White Hat]] asks to borrow [[Cueball|Cueball's]] laptop to do an upload. Cueball permits this, but immediately begins rattling off a list of very unusual key- and mouse-bindings that he has applied to the device. In the caption, [[Randall]] states that he himself tends to continually re-configure computers that he owns in weird ways, eventually rendering it unusable or at least unpleasant to use for others.

Of the three items in Cueball's list of customizations only the first and half of the second change seems like a real and relevant change.

At first he has programmed the computer so that hitting both shift keys simultaneously will change the keyboard back to QWERTY. The {{w|QWERTY}} keyboard is the standard in the US (as well as some other places using the roman alphabet). This implies that Cueball prefers a different keyboard layout but doesn't need the printed letters or the laptop itself is not standard US. But Cueball has to write his own software for this because the two shift key pressing without any other key wouldn't trigger anything in a standard OS.

The first part of the second point on the list Cueball has changed his keyboard layout that {{w|capslock}} acts as the {{w|control key}}. Swapping capslock and control is a common thing to do in the world of computer freaks on Unix or for users of [https://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/MovingTheCtrlKey the Emacs editor]; the "Caps Lock" key (immediately to the left of the "A" in a traditional layout) is much easier to reach for a touch typist than the more out-of-the-way "Ctrl", and the latter is often used more frequently, especially by programmers.

But the second part where Cueball says he has then moved capslock so that it is activated when hitting the {{w|spacebar}} makes less sense. It is quite impractical, as the spacebar is the largest key and likely normally not be used for anything other than spaces. It would make the common accidental application of caps lock more likely. And more worse he doesn't tell White Hat where he has put the space bar function, making it impossible to write a simple text.

Finally Cueball goes out on a limb with an impossible setting, which is that his scroll wheel [[:Category:Time travel|moves through time]] instead of through "space" (as in up and down on the screen), but only when using {{w|Touchpad#Operation_and_function|two-finger scroll}}, which is often used on {{w|Touchpad|touchpads}}/track pads for laptops as a gesture for scrolling. This refers to {{w|spacetime}}, a common model in relativistic physics.
The title text may suggest that "moving through time" may pertain to undo/redo, or perhaps browser history.

Finally it becomes clear these three settings are not the only important changes, as Cueball's list continues with at least one other point which he doesn't get to finish in the comic.

In the title text Randall says that he would actually find a feature where the scroll wheel was mapped to send a stream of undo/redo commands kind of cool. But he doesn't think that the software could keep up with such a feature. Such continuous {{w|undo|undo/redo}} action would produce unexpected and chaotic results. This could also indicate that this was a similar feature that Cueball was referring to when talking about moving through time. So not as in the computer traveling through time, but rather scrolling through the previous actions performed on the computer, as in moving through the computers past.

People often have reasons to change their keyboard layouts on laptops, due to the reduced keyboard, which can leave vital keys out. Rather than change the keyboard layout all the time in order to access keys which are not accessible in one of the layouts, one can take advantage of text substitution and keyboard remapping programs to set shortcuts for keys they use often.

==Transcript==
:[White Hat walks toward Cueball's desk pointing at his laptop while looking back at Cueball standing behind him.]
:White Hat: Can I load it up on your laptop?
:Cueball: Sure!
:Cueball: Oh, just hit both shift keys to change over to QWERTY.
:Cueball: Caps lock is control. And spacebar is capslock.
:Cueball: And two-finger scroll moves through time instead of space.
:Cueball: And–

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Once I've used a computer for a while, no one else will ever use it again.

==Trivia==
*It has been a recurrent theme for Randall to refer to the {{w|Dvorak Simplified Keyboard|Dvorak}} keyboard layout, and, although he doesn't say so, it seems safe to assume that this is the current setting, as it is one of the most common QWERTY competitors, and has been [[:Category:Dvorak|repeatedly referenced]] in xkcd.
**Supporters claim that typing speed is faster on a Dvorak keyboard, although this is still contentious, and this is a reason Randall often makes jokes about it.
**The laptop has most likely a standard QWERTY keyboard, but if Cueball can type blindly in Dvorak he would not be troubled by the fact that the keys typed a different letter than what is on the keyboard's key.
***In the recent comic [[1787: Voice Commands]], which did reference Dvorak directly, Cueball is shown to be able to speak the QWERTY version of a Dvorak keyboard layout, proving that he really knows by heart the relation between these two settings used on a QWERTY keyboard layout.
**The same problem would arise if the computer is set to another language than what the keyboard was meant for, which often happens in countries where the second language is English.
*A day after the release of this comic, a user on reddit [http://www.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/5xi92h/a_scroll_wheel_mapped_to_send_a_stream_undo_and/ suggested] a way to make the undo-redo-scrolling work in emacs using undo-tree. It uses shift-scrolling to avoid conflicts with normal scrolling.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]
[[Category:Computers]]
[[Category:Time travel]]
[[Category:Time]]

Talk:1053: Ten Thousand

2017-03-02T19:50:01Z

108.162.241.118:

Regarding: "This also assumes that 10,000 people learn of something every day from the day they are born." That's not accurate. Whatever the any distribution of "age you learn" is, the average will hold. For example, if everybody learns some particular fact on their 21st birthday, it holds simply becuase there are roughly 10,000 people having their 21st birthday each and every day.

I think it also may be referring, in a tongue-in-cheek manner, to the fact that people who call people idiots because they don't know something, and yet fail to explain it, are creating ignorance to criticise it.

Person A says, "What is x?"

Person B responds, "You're an idiot for not knowing x."

Person B is now responsible for the idiocy he claims Person A to have, thus making Person B the ''real'' idiot. In this comic, he makes this point by refusing to be Person B, while at the same time making subtle references to still having the sadistic glee person B has.[[Special:Contributions/76.29.225.28|76.29.225.28]] 22:37, 24 June 2013 (UTC)

I think he's getting the pleasure of seeing the look on Person A's face when Person A learns/sees something incredible! I think it's more of a positive. {{unsigned|Theo}}

I wonder which relative came back to life?[[User:Pennpenn|Pennpenn]] ([[User talk:Pennpenn|talk]]) 05:02, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

Would someone care to explain the math behind this comic? {{unsigned ip|108.162.219.10}}
:I did a try. The age is unimportant, it's only the birth rate. I'm happy about a feedback. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:18, 13 May 2014 (UTC)

Looks like there might be a callback to this comic in the latest What-If. http://what-if.xkcd.com/135/ [[Special:Contributions/108.162.210.177|108.162.210.177]] 10:14, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

Yesterday I did just this! My mother had mentos and I had diet coke, and asked her if we should try to mix them (so I could show it to my children). And it turned out she'd never heard about it. So after we tried it with some success, I showed her this comic as well ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:20, 11 March 2016 (UTC)

To explain the math...In a given year the age of people under 30 is 4 million/yr * 30 yrs. Each of these people have a 1/30 chance of learning "it" in a given year: 4 000 000/yr * 30yr * 1/30yr * 1yr/365day = 4 000 000 / 365day = 10 959/day ~= 10 000 [[User:Zelcon|Zelcon]] ([[User talk:Zelcon|talk]]) 23:37, 7 September 2016 (UTC)

Before solving a math problem, the most important thing to do is recognize what you are trying figure out and what the variables are. So let's examine your "statistics" for learning it. I will accept your estimation of 30 years*4 million (even though the number of people being born each year grows). However, when we get to 1/30, I have a serious issue. You are saying that my chance of learning anything in a given year is 1/30. Where did you get 30 from? The years that people are under. So you are essentially saying that a person has a 1/x chance of learning something in a given year where x is the age? This makes no sense!!! There is not a 1/30 chance that I am going to learn the cure to cancer this year!! {{unsigned ip|108.162.245.82}}

The 30 comes from the assumption that roughly 100% of people learn the "something" by age 30. You do not have a 1/30 chance of learning the cure to cancer this year, because there is not 100% chance of you knowing the cure to cancer by age 30. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.241.118|108.162.241.118]] 19:50, 2 March 2017 (UTC)