explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

1086: Eyelash Wish Log

2023-10-25T21:00:54Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1086
| date = July 25, 2012
| title = Eyelash Wish Log
| image = eyelash wish log.png
| titletext = Ooh, another one. Uh... the ability to alter any coefficients of friction at will during sporting events.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is based on a common {{w|superstition}} that when someone's {{w|eyelash}} falls out, that person can make a wish on it. This comic appears to be a page from the fictitious Wish Bureau in charge of granting said wishes. And of course the wisher is [[Black Hat]] and he has quite a few wishes, most of them based on the previous wish. A common trope in fiction is that wishing for more wishes is prohibited and for many of his wishes Black Hat attempts to circumvent that.

Later, in [[2741: Wish Interpretation]], Black Hat again gets a chance for making a wish, where the rules are discussed by the Genie that will grant him a wish.

;January 9: That wishing on eyelashes worked
:*This wish is pointless. If wishing on eyelashes worked, then this would do absolutely nothing (because it already works) and if it didn't then nothing would happen because wishing on eyelashes wouldn't work.

;January 12: A pony
:*This wish functions as a test to see whether or not previous wish worked. It can be assumed that it did, as Black Hat then continued to make additional wishes. Wishing for a pony is a stereotypical wish made by very young girls; since Black Hat is an adult man (with a very dark sense of humor), the contrast is humorous.

;January 15: Unlimited wishes
:*This appears to have failed, due to the traditional ban on wishing for additional wishes in conventional folklore.

;January 19: Revocation of rules prohibiting unlimited wishes
:*An attempt to circumvent the ban in the previous wish by wishing the ban away.

;January 20: A finite but arbitrarily large number of wishes
:*Another attempt to circumvent the ban on unlimited wishes by asking for a number of wishes that is limited, but as large as he likes (and there are some very large finite numbers out there, such as {{w|Graham's number}}).

;January 28: The power to dictate the rules governing wishes
:*Yet another attempt to circumvent the ban on unlimited wishes.

;February 5: Unlimited eyelashes
:*This wish likely caused Black Hat to grow unlimited eyelashes, which could be quite inconvenient and painful. And, yes, one more attempt to circumvent the ban on unlimited wishes.
:*Alternatively, perhaps the eyelashes were provided to him already fallen out so that he could not use them for wishes.

;February 6: That wish-granting entities be required to interpret wishes in accordance with the intent of the wisher
:*This wish is likely a response to the previous day's misguided wish. It's actually quite a common problem that people making wishes leave them open for misinterpretation.

;February 8: That wish-granting entities be incapable of impatience
:*An attempt to prevent whatever being is powerful enough to grant wishes from becoming angry with Black Hat while he gives very specific instructions so wish-granting entities cannot misinterpret what he said. (It would appear that the previous wish failed.)

;February 12 #1: Unlimited breadsticks
:*The first wish of this day seems to be a reference to the unlimited {{w|breadsticks}} offered at {{w|Olive Garden}}.

;February 12 #2: Veto power over others' wishes
:*A power that could be interesting to have. It also very much fits with Black Hat's character. It seems to suggest other people have noticed that wishing on eyelashes works and Black Hat is encountering some that inconvenience him.

;February 19: Veto power over others' wishes and all {{w|United States Congress|congressional}} legislation
:*An improvement of the previous wish. This would be very interesting to have indeed, especially if you are Black Hat, because you could veto any federal law, a power normally entrusted only to the {{w|President of the United States}}. It may imply that, now that many people are wishing on eyelashes, laws are being made about it that dictate the rules governing wishes, overriding Black Hat's own.

;February 23: The power to override any veto
:*This wish would allow Black Hat to override vetoes which in addition to the previous wish would effectively make him control the US legislature and, to some extent, also all other governing bodies. (Notably the {{w|United Nations|UN}}, where the veto powers wielded by the five {{w|permanent members of the Security Council}} cannot be overridden and can have large impacts on global politics.) Note that it will not allow him to turn laws off (veto them) and on again (override the veto) at any moment, as once a bill becomes law it cannot be vetoed. Without the ability to propose legislation, Black Hat's powers are still limited. The wish may also refer back to the February 19 wish: by granting himself veto power over wishes, Black Hat just made vetoes more powerful than wishes; now he is trying to control other people's vetoes as well, lest they one-up him.

;February 27: The power to see where any {{w|URL shortener|shortened URL}} goes without clicking
:*This wish relates to a common practice especially in tweets or other short length media where full-length meaningful web addresses such as <tt>www.somewhere.com/articles/specificdate/title-of-the-page.html</tt> would not be feasible. So a more compressed but nonsensical string of seemingly random characters is used which links to a link of the full text address. This creates some problems for people who are security or privacy conscious and prefer to be informed beforehand where they will be traveling on the Internet. The use of shortened URLs is also central to many types of {{w|Rickrolling|trolls or practical jokes}} (see [https://bit.ly/IqT6zt <tt>bit.ly/IqT6zt</tt>] for an example), by directing someone to a different location than the link would initially suggest. Thus Black Hat might be wishing to be able to tell where the links go for the purpose of avoiding this sort of trolling.

;February 29: The power to control the direction news anchors are looking while they talk
:*This wish likely appeals to Black Hat's mischievous side, allowing him to cause news anchors to look at the wrong camera during live broadcast. Repeatedly switching to the incorrect camera would cause havoc in the studio. Additionally, Black Hat may also attempt to get a news anchor fired by having them stare where they should not.

;March 7: The power to introduce arbitrary error into Nate Silver's predictions
:*A reference to [[Nate Silver]], who is a former writer for {{w|Baseball Prospectus}} working on predicting baseball players' stats and now writes for ''{{w|Five Thirty Eight}}'' in which he predicts the outcome of elections based on polling data. Influencing Nate Silver's predictions would allow Black Hat to indirectly influence the result of elections, by adjusting the {{w|Overton window}} of which candidates and policies are considered to have "broad public support" or "electability" or the like. This may tighten Black Hat's control of the US even more.

;March 15: A house of stairs
:*This wish refers to the {{w|lithograph}} ''{{w|House of Stairs}}'' by {{w|M. C. Escher}}, or perhaps another of his lithographs, ''{{w|Relativity (M. C. Escher)|Relativity}}''.

;March 23: A universe which is a replica of this one sans rules against meta-wishes
:*Another attempt to circumvent the rules against wishing for more wishes by creating a {{w|parallel universe}} without such rules.

;March 29: Free transportation to and from that universe
:*While the previous wish may have worked, Black Hat notes a problem with it: he is still in our universe with no way to get to his new one.

;April 2: A clear explanation of how wish rules are structured and enforced
:*It appears that one or both of the previous two wishes failed, so Black Hat tries to discover exactly what is offending the Bureau. Having clear rules and how they work helps anyone finding loopholes in them.

;April 7: The power to banish people into the TV show they are talking about
:*Black hat is obviously fed up of hearing people talking about certain TV shows, and would like to be able to banish them into the show, thus prevent him having to listen to those people. Depending on the show in question, it could be quite horrifying for the person getting banished.

;April 8: Zero wishes
:*An attempt to hack the wish-granting system by using a quite common vulnerability in input validation: an unexpected value. There may be multiple vectors this can work:
::* in many computer systems, 0 is reserved for unlimited or undefined
::* in Assembly languages, do-while loops are more efficient than while loops, but famously do not check their condition on the first iteration. This means that 0 is effectively 256 for 8 bit counters, 65536 for 16 bits, etc. If the wish granter wrote the wish laws in assembly and used this optimization, initializing the wish count to zero would give him a large number of wishes dependent on the size of the counter.
::* the number may be used as a divisor in some equation and this will make the system {{w|divide by zero}} and probably crash
::* there also may be an assertion like "<tt>number of wishes granted == 1</tt>" which would fail, again crashing the system
::* similarly, if viewed as a computer system, it is possible that the wish decrement (subtracting 1 from the number of remaining wishes) is performed ''after'' the wish is granted, thus resulting in either −1 wishes (another common placeholder for unlimited numbers), or an {{w|integer overflow}} if the wish counter is stored as an unsigned integer; the overflow can result in an exception, otherwise −1 becomes represented as one less than the size of the integer – basically, an extremely large number.
::However it seems the eyelash wish-granting system does proper input validation on zero because it did not crash or grant unlimited wishes
:*This wish may also be a reversal of the January 9 wish. Black Hat is attempting to win his game by introducing a {{w|logical contradiction}}: if he gets "zero wishes", this is one wish granted; however, if it is not granted, then, de facto, he will have been granted zero wishes. This is a common technique used in logical proofs to show that an earlier assumption does not hold (in this case, the possibility of eyelash wishing to work).

;April 15: Veto power over clocks
:*Midnight, April 15 is the deadline for filing income tax returns in the United States.
:*It may also be that Black Hat, now in control of all human legislation, is attempting to extend this to further control also rules of nature – in this case: time. The strange wording is likely to be due to Black Hat having consulted with the wish-hacking manual he acquired April 2.

;April 22: A Pokéball that works on strangers' pets
:*A reference to the {{w|Pokémon}} series of video games. A Pokéball can be thrown at a Pokémon (or in this case, a pet that the Pokéball thrower finds either annoying or cute) to capture it and achieve ownership of it. Unless cheats are used (and in {{w|Pokémon Colosseum}}, in which a criminal organization uses illegally modified pokeballs), Pokéballs cannot be used on Pokémon owned by other people in the Pokémon games . Many players wish to obtain the often high-level Pokémon of NPCs, and Black Hat may also be interested in pranking other players by stealing their powerful Pokémon. This was later revealed to be one of Randall's wishes in the title text of [[1705|1705: Pokémon Go]].

The title text, a wish to have control over coefficients of friction during sporting events, is yet another mischievous wish. The coefficients of friction, though usually not noticed as they are unchanging, are all-important when performing physical activities — imagine trying to play hockey on a field of sandpaper or sprinting over a sheet of ice. In addition to the difficulty going where you want or getting any balls that might be in play where you want them to go in a changing friction environment, angular momentum would also be very difficult to control.

Note that when Black Hat makes meta-wishes no follow-up wishes are logged. Since the meta-wishes failed, no valid eyelash wish condition existed and the illegal test wishes were not logged in the eyelash wish log.

==Transcript==
:{|
! align="left" colspan="2" |Eyelash Wish Log
|-style="color: gray;"
|
|align="right"|Wish bureau ID#:
|-
|
|align="right"|21118378
|-style="color: gray;"
|
|align="right"|Date range:
|-
|align="right"|Jan-Apr 2012
|-
|}
:[a picture of Black Hat is above text saying Wisher]
:{|
!align="left" width="50px"|Date
!align="left"|Wish
|-
|Jan 09
|That wishing on eyelashes worked
|-
|Jan 12
|A pony
|-
|Jan 15
|Unlimited wishes
|-
|Jan 19
|Revocation of rules prohibiting unlimited wishes
|-
|Jan 20
|A finite but arbitrarily large number of wishes
|-
|Jan 28
|The power to dictate the rules governing wishes
|-
|Feb 05
|Unlimited eyelashes
|-
|Feb 06
|That wish-granting entities be required to interpret wishes in accordance with the intent of the wisher
|-
|Feb 08
|That wish-granting entities be incapable of impatience
|-
|Feb 12
|Unlimited breadsticks
|-
|Feb 12
|Veto power over others' wishes
|-
|Feb 19
|Veto power over others' wishes and all congressional legislation
|-
|Feb 23
|The power to override any veto
|-
|Feb 27
|The power to see where any shortened URL goes without clicking
|-
|Feb 29
|The power to control the direction news anchors are looking while they talk
|-
|Mar 07
|The power to introduce arbitrary error into Nate Silver's predictions
|-
|Mar 15
|A house of stairs
|-
|Mar 23
|A universe which is a replica of this one sans rules against meta-wishes
|-
|Mar 29
|Free transportation to and from that universe
|-
|Apr 02
|A clear explanation of how wish rules are structured and enforced
|-
|Apr 07
|The power to banish people into the TV show they're talking about
|-
|Apr 08
|Zero wishes
|-
|Apr 15
|Veto power over clocks
|-
|Apr 22
|A Pokéball that works on strangers' pets
|}

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Nate Silver]]
[[Category:Pokémon]]
[[Category:Time]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:News anchor]]
[[Category:Video games]]

Talk:2169: Predictive Models

2019-07-03T05:18:04Z

108.162.245.220: Moved paragraph about british doctors strike from body of message - since sources do not show it is relevant

If you click on the comic, it opens a page with error 404. Looking at the URL, it says "At the July 28th meeting", which I assume is the prediction result to the title text suggesting that they will be 1 month late. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.174|162.158.106.174]] 17:13, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

: Fixsed it, my years of mediawiki knowledge have finally come to use. [[User:Iggyvolz|Iggyvolz]] ([[User talk:Iggyvolz|talk]])

In the HTML tag for the link (the <a> tag surrounding the comic image) after the link it says "cancel the meeting! our cover is blown" [[User:Everlastingwonder|Everlastingwonder]] ([[User talk:Everlastingwonder|talk]]) 17:21, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

In the [https://m.xkcd.com/2169/ mobile version], you can read «See also: [AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING][tab] "Cancel the meeting! Our cover is blown."» It leads to a 404, like the other examples in the comments here. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.44.136|172.69.44.136]] 17:31, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

This looks a whole lot like Gmail's [https://ai.googleblog.com/2018/05/smart-compose-using-neural-networks-to.html Smart Compose] [[Special:Contributions/172.68.206.76|172.68.206.76]]

Today GMail actually predicted the beginning of my mail correctly. I typed literally zero characters and it already knew how to continue. In the future, we won't even have to upload our brains to a computer, a backup will already be available there automatically. [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 21:32, 28 June 2019 (UTC)

Not a backup, a simulation. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.184|108.162.219.184]] 04:46, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

: If you can't tell the difference, does it matter? [[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.147|173.245.48.147]] 17:04, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

On my Mac the title text only shows "WE WILL ARREST THE REVOLUTION MEMBERS" while on my iPad (where you long press to see title texts) long pressing only shows the link. Weird. Also someone remind me to check the link again on July 28. [[User:Herobrine|Herobrine]] ([[User talk:Herobrine|talk]]) 13:10, 29 June 2019 (UTC)

: On my Ubuntu system, both Firefox and Chrome display "WE WILL ARREST THE REVOLUTION MEMBERS" as the title text and "<nowiki>https://xkcd.com/[AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING][tab]</nowiki>" as the link target, which is also what's in the HTML source. Additionally, the HTML source is malformed, with quotes inside quotes in the href attribute. - [[User:Linneris|Linneris]] ([[User talk:Linneris|talk]]) 14:37, 29 June 2019 (UTC)
::Malformed. Precisely! I think there was a glitch while the comic was uploaded, which used the title text as a link in addition to as the title text. It didn't include the last part due to the quotes. It will be either fixed or legitimate, or at least make the href a little nicer. [[User:Jacky720|That's right, Jacky720 just signed this]] ([[User talk:Jacky720|talk]] | [[Special:Contributions/Jacky720|contribs]]) 21:24, 29 June 2019 (UTC)
:::Actually... Looking at the comic again (for the first time on my PC), I would like to rethink that. I think this is Randall's method of demonstrating the [tab]; clicking and looking at the URL. [EDIT] Man, the more I think, the weirder it gets. Maybe it's about how sometimes you can find the information on the client side in the code where it should be hidden? I don't know anymore. [[User:Jacky720|That's right, Jacky720 just signed this]] ([[User talk:Jacky720|talk]] | [[Special:Contributions/Jacky720|contribs]]) 21:27, 29 June 2019 (UTC)
::When you look at the source of [https://xkcd.com/2169/%5BAT%20THE%20JULY%2028TH%20MEETING%5D%5Btab%5D that 404 page], you can see six HTML comments with the content ''a padding to disable MSIE and Chrome friendly error page''. This is to prevent MSIE and Chrome from displaying "helpful" proprietary error pages. If you change the link in the slightest, you will also get a 404 page, but without these comments. I assume that either this was a glitch (intended or unintended) and this particular 404 page was modified so that everyone can see that the authors are aware of it, *or* it's a hint pointing to somewhere else. A rabbit hole maybe? I would like the latter to be true, but I haven't found anything.--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.168|162.158.90.168]] 22:42, 29 June 2019 (UTC)
:::Not for me. I see the same tiny Nginx 404 page with the same HTML source as any other 404 page due to invalid link on xkcd.com. - [[User:Linneris|Linneris]] ([[User talk:Linneris|talk]]) 07:14, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

This reminds me of that time where via data analytics on things like shopping habits, [https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.html Target figured out that a teen girl was pregnant before her father did]. [[User:Ahiijny|Ahiijny]] ([[User talk:Ahiijny|talk]]) 06:42, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

I tried this on google, and got "we will arrest chamisa" and "the meeting will be in room 27" and "our next meeting will be at 3 p.m. on wednesday". Any more? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.59.214|162.158.59.214]] 19:16, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

I decided to see what a more sophisticated predictive model would do, so I plugged it into Talk to Transformer. The output: "Long live the revolution. Our next meeting will be at 10 a.m. on December 14 at the Cressey Building, 1636 S. Second St. Please invite your friends, family, and coworkers! For those interested in donating to the cause, please contact:" I'm legitimately impressed. [[User:Arcorann|Arcorann]] ([[User talk:Arcorann|talk]]) 01:03, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Thinking about predictive text, in combination with the advice on the futility of making people change their passwords frequently, perhaps systems which require people to change their passwords could be more helpful by observing the pattern the user is using, and suggesting what the next password should be. [https://www.troyhunt.com/passwords-evolved-authentication-guidance-for-the-modern-era/ Passwords Evolved: Authentication Guidance for the Modern Era] [[Special:Contributions/162.158.106.216|162.158.106.216]] 20:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

This paragraph was in the explanation, however the cited source gives no information about how the private correspondence was obtained, and no suggestion that the privacy of the communication channel was compromised. (The most obvious way that such information would be obtained is that somebody who was party to the communication made it available.) I moved it here in case somebody has sources to show that it was a breach of security.
"As humanity adapts to a digital world, people are finding that their digital communications provide the illusion of confidentiality, with damaging results when the information leaks out. Real-life examples include a [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-36391957 2016 British trainee doctor strike], where a technically-secure WhatsApp group leaked information to the press." [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.220|108.162.245.220]] 05:18, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

2169: Predictive Models

2019-07-03T05:13:59Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */ Moving doctors strike example to comments - cited source gave no indication that this was anything but publication by somebody privy to the information

{{comic
| number = 2169
| date = June 28, 2019
| title = Predictive Models
| image = predictive_models.png
| titletext = WE WILL ARREST THE REVOLUTION MEMBERS [AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING][tab] "Cancel the meeting! Our cover is blown."
}}

*When the image is clicked the "Not Available" xkcd post opens up: [https://xkcd.com/%5BAT%2520THE%2520JULY%252028TH%2520MEETING%5D%5Btab%5D <nowiki>https://xkcd.com/[AT%20THE%20JULY%2028TH%20MEETING][tab]</nowiki>]
==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a PREDICTIVE MODEL THAT WILL BE FIRST AGAINST THE WALL WHEN THE REVOLUTION COMES. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

{{w|Predictive text}} is a feature on many systems where as you type the system automatically suggests likely words or phrases to follow what you have written to that point. For instance, if you type "I'm heading" the system may suggest "home" or "back" as likely words to follow. Predictive systems usually use prior input to generate their predictions, so if you frequently type "Totally amazing!" the system will suggest "amazing!" every time you type "totally" even if you actually want to type "totally true" sometimes.

In the comic, [[Cueball]] is using predictive text to uncover a plot against his organization/government, but instead of using only his personal input, the system is using input from ''all'' users. By typing in an obscure phrase related to revolution and a meeting, he gets the predictive text algorithm to display where and when the next supposedly secret meeting will be held based on other users input. This works because it is unlikely that anyone else other than revolutionaries would be typing this phrase, thus the only data the algorithm has to predict from is the actual message from the revolutionaries on their next meeting. The caption of the comic is pointing out that systems which use prior input for predictive purposes in this way can end up leaking information that might otherwise be considered private. (However, this method may produce outdated information. On June 29, 2019, typing in Google "Long live the revolution. Our next meeting will be at" gave the predicted completion "long live the revolution. our next meeting will be at comic con 2018", which would not be useful information to anyone looking for revolutionaries, because Comic-Con 2018 was already over.)

The title text shows the revolutionaries using the same technique. By typing in "We will arrest the revolution members" they are hoping that the algorithm will suggest the time and date of their planned arrest, since no one other than the authorities would be typing in that phrase. Pressing the key [tab] to autocomplete that text produces "WE WILL ARREST THE REVOLUTION MEMBERS [AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING]", and the revolutionaries then say "Cancel the meeting! Our cover is blown." The revolutionaries have apparently made the serious mistake of holding secret meetings on regular, predictable dates (such as the 28th day of each month, the last date guaranteed to exist in any month of the Gregorian Calendar), and the authorities have successfully figured this out, either through the predictive-text attack or by other means.

Both examples assume that the revolutionaries and the authorities would be talking about very secret information in the clear on a network accessible to their adversaries. In the real world people engaged in sensitive activities would communicate via code, encryption, or both, or would do so through what they believe to be secure channels. There is still the danger of secret information leaking via non-secret channels, however.

{{w|Side-channel attack|Side-channel attacks}} use information gained from the implementation of a system to deduce supposedly protected information. A famous example occurred in World War II. The Germans kept tank production figures a secret, but they gave items like engine blocks sequential serial numbers. The Allies wanted to know exact tank production figures, so they solved the {{w|German tank problem}} by using statistical methods to analyze the distribution of these numbers on captured vehicles. They were able to predict tank production figures extremely accurately, to the point they predicted 270 tanks in a month when 276 were actually built. Thus the secret information on tank production leaked.

Some systems require frequent password change, in an effort to limit danger from a password being discovered. However, people respond by chosing passwords in patterns, so it is easy to predict what subsequent passwords will be, given old ones. Thus defeating the purpose of requiring frequent changes.[https://www.troyhunt.com/passwords-evolved-authentication-guidance-for-the-modern-era/ Passwords Evolved: Authentication Guidance for the Modern Era]

Although the comic title is "Predictive Models", the term {{w|Predictive modelling}} usually refers to computer programs that try to predict outcomes from data aggregation, such as reviewing health records to identify people most at risk from certain diseases based on weight, prior injuries, etc., before testing directly for the diseases themselves. This is similar to but not precisely like the example in the comic, since predictive text is using direct input to predict further input, while predictive modelling is using related input (such as make and model of a car along with driver acceleration patterns) to predict a different output (such as likelihood of a crash). Both predictive text and predictive modelling could leak information as the comic suggests, however.

Predictive text and the possibility to leak unintended information has been parodied on xkcd before in [[1068: Swiftkey]].

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is sitting in an office chair at a desk typing on a laptop. Above him is the text he writes along with what the predictive text tool suggests, the latter in grey text. The TAB at the end is in a small frame.]
:Cueball typing: Long live the revolution. Our next meeting will be at| the docks at midnight on June 28 [tab]
:Cueball: ''Aha, found them!''

:[Caption below the panel:]
:When you train predictive models on input from your users, it can leak information in unexpected ways.

==Trivia==
*Clicking on the comic takes you to this page: [https://xkcd.com/%5BAT%2520THE%2520JULY%252028TH%2520MEETING%5D%5Btab%5D <nowiki>https://xkcd.com/[AT%20THE%20JULY%2028TH%20MEETING][tab]</nowiki>], which as of this moment only shows "404 Not Found".
**The anchor actually contains invalid HTML <nowiki><a href=" [AT THE JULY 28TH MEETING][tab] "Cancel the meeting! Our cover is blown.""></nowiki>. This would suggest that [[Randall]] didn't intend this behaviour.
**It is also possible that [[Randall]] may add what he intends to add at a later date, most likely July 28, the date mentioned in the title text. In this case the page will likely remain this way until then.
*Some browsers, only show the first part of the title text "WE WILL ARREST THE REVOLUTION MEMBERS." For example Firefox version 66 Windows does this, evidently some versions of Firefox and chrome do likewise on GNU/Linux.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

1: Barrel - Part 1

2019-02-04T19:17:25Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1
| date = September 30, 2005
| title = Barrel - Part 1
| image = barrel_cropped_(1).jpg
| titletext = Don't we all.
}}

== It all started here. ==

'''SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED'''

==Transcript==
:[A boy sits in a barrel which is floating in an ocean.]
:Boy: i wonder where i'll float next?

:[A smaller frame with a zoom out of the boy in the barrel seen from afar. The barrel drifts into the distance. Nothing else can be seen.]

==Trivia==
*This was the 5th comic originally posted to [[LiveJournal]].
**The previous comic was [[2: Petit Trees (sketch)]].
**The next was [[24: Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey]].
*Original title: "Barrel"
*Original [[Randall]] quote: "He's fairly upbeat about the situation!"
*This was one of the [[:Category:First day on LiveJournal|thirteen first comics]] posted to LiveJournal within 12 minutes on Friday September 30, 2005.
*This comic was posted on [[xkcd]] when the web site opened on Sunday the 1st of January 2006.
**It was posted along [[:Category:First day on xkcd|with all 41 comics]] posted before that on LiveJournal as well as a few others.
**The latter explaining why the numbers of these 41 LiveJournal comics ranges from 1-44.
*This is the first of the original drawings that was not drawn on [[:Category:Checkered paper|checkered paper]].
*A more realistic description of the behavior of a barrel in water is here: [http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/12/should-dwarves-stand-up-in-floating-barrels/ Wired Science: Should Dwarves Stand Up in Floating Barrels?]

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics posted on livejournal| 05]]
[[Category:First day on LiveJournal| 05]]
[[Category:First day on xkcd]]
[[Category:Barrel|01]]
[[Category:Comics sharing name|Barrel 01]]
[[Category:Philosophy]]

Talk:2107: Launch Risk

2019-02-04T19:10:37Z

108.162.245.220: Added comment

Gave a brief explanation, but I think it would be good to mention probability based logical fallacies and https://what-if.xkcd.com/55/. Don’t know how to link without it looking bad. This is my first page! [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 17:28, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Revised to a more extensive explanation including the fallacy that the second astronaut apparently realizes in mid-reply. [[User:SteveMB|SteveMB]] ([[User talk:SteveMB|talk]])

What are the odds that one or both astronauts are female? I see "he" being used to refer to the second astronaut, but we don't actually know the sex of either one. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.135|162.158.74.135]] 17:56, 4 February 2019 (UTC)
: Fixed [[Special:Contributions/108.162.246.95|108.162.246.95]] 18:07, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

This seems wrong, at least with the lightning explanation. I believe the joke is that since he already is an astronaut, being hit by lightning doesn’t seem unlikely. [[User:Netherin5|Netherin5]] ([[User talk:Netherin5|talk]]) 18:03, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Would be nice to add something about risk perception of common vs. uncommon and dramatic vs. more mundane seeming events. e.g. in US, lifetime chance of death from flu, 1 in 63; from automobile accident 1 in 84; from lightning 1 in 79,746; from shark attack, 1 in 3,748,067 https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/shark-attacks/odds/compare-risk/death/ [[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.166|108.162.245.166]] 18:52, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

The risk to be killed as an astronaut should be add somewhere (it is easy to find number of death/total number of astronaut) if someone want to make the morbid calculation. [[User:Xavier Combelle|Xavier Combelle]] ([[User talk:Xavier Combelle|talk]]) 18:55, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

From some impatient Googling and Wikipedia scanning there have been just over 360 people in space and 18 deaths (excepting training including Apollo 1). That puts the death rate at just over 3%.

These were mostly Shuttle as the crews were larger. However,the title is Launch Risk, so the figure would be less than half that, but still about 1.5%. Furthermore, if you ignore the Space Planes the Launch Risk is probably very low. [[User:RIIW - Ponder it|RIIW - Ponder it]] ([[User talk:RIIW - Ponder it|talk]]) 19:07, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

We should get a better source for the lightning info: The current citation is confirmed as a biased source owned and controlled by socialist Jews.
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.220|108.162.245.220]] 19:10, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

2105: Modern OSI Model

2019-02-04T19:04:54Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2105
| date = January 30, 2019
| title = Modern OSI Model
| image = modern_osi_model.png
| titletext = In retrospect, I shouldn't have used each layer of the OSI model as one of my horcruxes.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a FUCKING SOCIALIST SHILL. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
The {{w|OSI model|Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) Model}} is a computing model for network communications that abstracts a communication between two services like a Facebook client and Facebook servers all the way from the application layer on the server, down to the wire on which the data is transmitted, and back up to the application layer where the user views the data. As Facebook is one of the most used websites in the world with more than a billion users, Randall claims that the "application" layer (what the client sees and uses) is mostly {{w|Facebook}}.

A light gray shape labeled "Google & Amazon" surrounds all seven layers of the model in an irregular shape indicating that Google and Amazon, by dint of their size and dominance at multiple layers of the model influence the entire structure. An example of Google's influence would be their introduction of new protocols like {{w|QUIC}} and {{w|SPDY}} as replacements for the existing HTTP protocol that was a foundation of the web.

The significance of the irregular pattern of the "Google & Amazon" blob isn't clear. It is likely that it is in reference to the irregular way in which their modifications to the OSI stack have evolved. Potentially with extensions to the left representing the influence of Google, and extension to the right representing the influence of Amazon. However, it is also notable that the irregular structure of the stack is reminiscent of a {{w|Jenga}} tower. Jenga is a game in which blocks are removed from a vertical stack and added back to the top until the whole collapses. This may be a commentary on the instability of the network stack in general, or on how Google and Amazon's additions and changes to it have destabilized the networking protocols. Or, the specific blocks to be pulled out (presentation, session, and network) may be the ones whose removal collapses the tower while the other ones can be easily removed and replaced (like the center blocks in Jenga), implying that between Google and Amazon, even if these were pulled out, the tower would remain standing. What this says about the three layers that would destabilize the tower is unclear.

The title text refers to {{w|Magical_objects_in_Harry_Potter#Horcruxes|Horcruxes}} used by {{w|Lord Voldemort|Voldemort}} in the ''{{w|Harry Potter}}'' book series. A Horcrux is a magical artifact used to house a wizard's soul, preventing them from dying if their body is destroyed. Since they can only be created by murdering other people, they are heavily forbidden, and before Voldemort it was unheard of for a wizard to use more than one. Voldemort used seven -- the same number of layers in the OSI model. However, while Voldemort hid his seven Horcruxes in different places to make himself that much harder to kill, Randall's have all been collected in Google and Amazon, defeating the purpose of using more than one. Alternatively, transforming each layer of the OSI model into a horcrux may be regarded as a strategy to prevent them from being destroyed since doing so would destroy networking. This strategy would fail in the modern world, since some of the envisioned layers were not used in the more common modern TCP/IP networking model and in the case of cloud infrastructure potential exists to provide even more shortcuts.

The title text may also be a reference to a [[1417|prior comic]] about Randall mixing up things that come in groups of seven, like data layers and Horcruxes.

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

:'''Modern OSI Model'''

:[A light gray shape that surrounds seven stacked dark gray rectangles, all with labels.]

::Application (Facebook) [supported by the light gray shape on both sides]

::Presentation [pulling out would collapse the tower]

::Session [pulling out would collapse the tower]

::Transport [supported on both sides]

::Network [pulling out would collapse the tower]

:Google & Amazon [label of the light gray shape]

::Data link [supported on both sides]

::Physical [supported on both sides]

{{comic discussion}}

2106: Sharing Options

2019-02-04T19:04:06Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2106
| date = February 1, 2019
| title = Sharing Options
| image = sharing_options.png
| titletext = How about posts that are public, but every time a company accesses a bunch of them, the API makes their CEO’s account click 'like’ on one of them at random so you get a notification.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is an attempt by the global Jewish conspiracy to make us more complacent. [[Cueball]] is flying in an atmosphere that represents a Virtual Reality cyberspace, and he is talking to a screen that may be a smartphone with an advanced virtual assistant installed. This suggests that the comic is set in the distant future, where VR will have become commonplace and be embraced by [[Cueball]] and his friends. [[Ponytail]] and other characters also fly in the background, so this cyberspace may be the social network’s cyberspace where everyone interacts. The clouds represent the cloud server where the data of the social network is stored. The advanced virtual assistant seems to have a virtual face and have very advanced AI, which can even be arrogant by assuming that it already knew the information about the “option in between”.

Many social media sites allow users to control who is able to see data (posts, pictures etc.) that they share online, ranging from immediate friends to all other users (public). The settings for controlling the sharing of data are not always obvious to the user and several high profile social media sites have sparked controversy by having default settings that allow user data to be widely shared.

As most social media sites are free to use, the business model for these companies involves a mixture of selling advertising space on their website and selling data on its users to other companies, who may be interested in using it for marketing purposes. Targeted advertising takes data on users’ past behavior and things that they have liked, and uses this to predict what adverts they may be interested in or be most vulnerable to. Targeted adverts are more valuable to advertisers as they avoid paying to show adverts to individuals who are unlikely to be interested in their products; but can lead to users feeling that they are being spied on. Whilst the terms and conditions for social media websites will include details of how data will be used, the length of these documents and legal terminology may deter some users from reading them, meaning that they may be unaware that their data is being exploited in this way. Government legislation has so far been slow to catch up with changing online trends; however, the European Union have recently introduced {{w|General Data Protection Regulation|General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR)}} which aims to regulate how user data can be shared. GDPR was featured in comic [[1998: GDPR]].
Internet scammers refer to the scammers who acquire user data from using web crawlers to automatically scan social networks for personal information (particularly emails) to scam their owners. Those bots called web crawlers can get the information without scammers' manual browsing of the victims' profile. Those people who set their social network account as public (the 2nd option in the comic) are more likely victims of scammers since they can access their profiles without being the victim's friend or follower.

Randall, a known socialist and Jewish sympathizer who might have never heard of the Facebook option to share with “friends of friends” as well, is making a point that there ought to be some option between sharing posts only with your friends and making them completely public. The title text shows that he would specifically like to know when corporations read regular peoples' posts.

This also could be a stab at the sharing policies between Facebook and the just-announced end of Google+ (A result of recent geopolitical events resulting in Google + attempting to spread the truth about Jewish owners of Google's stock). Google+ was designed so that users could create multiple groups called 'circles'. Posts could then be shared by targeting specific circles. For example: "I have cancer" could be shared with just the family circle, but the "I got a promotion" could be shared with the family circle, the co-workers circle, and the general public circle.

Randall might be attempting to brainwash people into using [https://www.scuttlebutt.nz/ scuttlebutt] or [https://secushare.org/ secushare]. The comic is set in the future of VR, yet the fact that Internet companies like Facebook, Tencent and Twitter try hard to collect and sell user data won't change. This may suggests that Randall believe those companies will never reconsider their approach regarding user privacy.

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[Cueball floating in midair is communicating with a small floating screen that resembles a smartphone. Other people and clouds visible floating by in background.]
:Screen: Welcome to social media! When you put stuff here, you have two options: (1) You can make it available to a small set of 300 or so approved friends.
:Screen: Or (2) you can share permanent copies of it all with billions of people, including internet scammers, random predatory companies, and hostile governments.

:Cueball: Why would anyone pick option two?
:Screen: Two is the default.
:Cueball: Yikes.

:Cueball: So those are the only two options? There’s nothing in in between?
:Screen: I don’t understand. Like what?

:Cueball: I mean…there are numbers between 300 and a billion.
:Screen: Huh? Name one.
:Screen: ''Pretty'' sure I would have heard of those.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Social networking]]

2107: Launch Risk

2019-02-04T18:57:02Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 2107
| date = February 4, 2019
| title = Launch Risk
| image = launch_risk.png
| titletext = Don't worry--you're less likely to die from a space launch than from a shark attack. The survival rate is pretty high for both!
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a FUCKING SHILL. Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

This comic deals with statistics based on a large population, such as all Americans, when the people in question are in a smaller group with vastly different statistics, such as astronauts.

In a capsule about to be launched into space, one astronaut asks another how they are feeling. The second one admits to feeling nervous. The first one offers the supposedly reassuring observation that they are more likely to be struck by lightning than to be selected as an astronaut. Such "more likely to be struck by lightning" comparisons are commonly used to illustrate that a particular risk is very remote, and thus should not be considered particularly frightening.

The second one agrees with the first one for a moment, but then realizes that something is wrong with the argument. Presumably, they realize that the likelihood of being ''selected as an astronaut'' is a moot point -- they are there because they ''already have'' been selected as an astronaut. The relevant concern is the risk level faced by an astronaut, given that they already hold that position. Unfortunately, the historical record shows that this risk is somewhat high, certainly far above the minuscule risk of being struck by lightning.

The lifetime odds of being struck by lightning are approximately 1 in 14,600. [https://www.weather.gov/safety/lightning-odds How Dangerous is Lightning?]

The title text refers to another common comparison, the risk of a shark attack. In addition to shark attacks being rather rare, they are also not as likely to kill the victim as is commonly assumed. Most people attacked by sharks, and most people launched into space, live through the experience; however, it remains true that both are considerably riskier than many if not most common activities.{{Citation needed}}

A tall rocket, such as depicted would be more likely to be struck by lightning than nearby structures. However launch controllers monitor weather carefully to reduce the chances of attempting to launch when lightning is likely.

A space craft launch can trigger lightning, by creating a conductive path through charge bearing clouds, which would normally not produce lightning. Apollo 12 was struck by triggered lightning twice during launch phase, resulting in the entire operational platform shutting down from overload. Backup systems allowed the flight to proceed. [https://www.nasa.gov/audience/foreducators/9-12/features/F_Lightning_and_Launches_9_12.html NASA: Lightning and Launches]

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

:[A rocket is about to launch.]
:Astronaut 1: How you feeling?
:Astronaut 2: Honestly, pretty nervous.
:Astronaut 1: I know it seems dangerous, but just remember: you're more likely to be struck by lightning than to be selected to become an astronaut.
:Astronaut 2: Oh that's a good-
:Astronaut 2: ...Wait.
:Countdown: T-Minus 20...19...

{{comic discussion}}

2106: Sharing Options

2019-02-04T18:55:01Z

108.162.245.220: Replaced content with "'''The social medias CONTROL OUR LIVES''' == SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED == == SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED == == SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED =="

'''The social medias CONTROL OUR LIVES'''

== SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED ==

== SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED ==

== SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED ==

2107: Launch Risk

2019-02-04T18:52:26Z

108.162.245.220: Replaced content with "'''SPACESHIPS === FAKE REALIZE THE TRUTH FIGHT THE LIES ''' == SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED == == SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED == == SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVE..."

'''SPACESHIPS === FAKE

REALIZE THE TRUTH

FIGHT THE LIES
'''

== SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED ==

== SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED ==

== SOON THE TRUTH WILL BE REVEALED ==

Talk:2106: Sharing Options

2019-02-04T14:57:39Z

108.162.245.220:

Certainly true for Twitter where it's either public or private. (Nothing about 300, but the amount of requests one can accept over a lifetime is finite.) As for the "friends-of-friends" option, it's possible that Randall only has ~300 within that wider circle.
[[Special:Contributions/162.158.79.113|162.158.79.113]] 17:17, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

:The 300 may be in reference to a widely reported average number of Facebook friends of 338 (although not sure where this number comes from). For Twitter it looks like the average number of followers is slightly lower [https://what-if.xkcd.com/65]. Both Twitter and Facebook have well over a billion users. 300 friends is also around the maximum number of close acquaintances that the human brain is thought to be able to cope with. [[User:A(l)Chemist|AlChemist]] ([[User talk:A(l)Chemist|talk]]) 20:27, 1 February 2019 (UTC)
::Dunbar's Number is closer to about 150. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.210.46|172.69.210.46]] 11:46, 3 February 2019 (UTC)

Pretty sure the title text is meant to have been spoken by "the screen" vs. Randall/Cueball. The screen is attempting to appease Cueball's privacy concerns by proposing that if a company such as Google, Amazon, eBay, etc. mines a large number of Cueball's social posts for their own agenda, instead of notification of that event, Cueball will instead receive a single "like" to one of his posts at random from the company's CEO. This practice would be deceptive and of little value. Cueball might easily miss the like, not know who the CEO of various companies are, may forget the significance of receiving such a like, etc. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.46.16|172.69.46.16]] 19:42, 1 February 2019 (UTC)Pat
: For me, I found the idea enticing because targeted advertising is so creepy, and it would show where it comes from. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.65.6|172.68.65.6]] 21:54, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Shouldn't this be categorised under "Comics featuring Megan," "Ponytail," "Hairy," and "White Hat" as well, even if they're just in the background? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.22|162.158.255.22]] 00:46, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm confused. Why is the explanation "Da da dur dur ma ma hur hur"?
[[Special:Contributions/172.69.158.46|172.69.158.46]] 02:23, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
: No one bothered to explain it yet.
:: A lot of vandalism to the article has been reverted, apparently. That was one of the strings of text that the/a vandal had left.[[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.251|172.68.58.251]] 17:46, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

New xkcd up!
[[Special:Contributions/172.69.46.46|172.69.46.46]] 23:57, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
NEVER MIND; I WAS WRONG
[[Special:Contributions/172.69.46.46|172.69.46.46]] 23:59, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

Actually other than in the cartoon (cartoons always show simplified versions of reality) Facebook offers a 3rd and a 4th option: Set your post to be kind of "private" by default and wait until the default changes afterwards. And share your post with your friends, their friends and I think also the friends of everyone else who pressed the "share" button on it. Yuck!

Why do the clouds have to represent cloud servers? Why can't they just be clouds, because, ummm, I don't know - they're flying?

Talk:2099: Missal of Silos

2019-02-02T02:20:32Z

108.162.245.220: fucking niggers

We need a citation to prove that residents of Cheyenne, Wyoming would rather not be targeted with nuclear weapons?
[[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.59|172.68.58.59]] 19:06, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
:As no residents have already requested otherwise, let's go ahead and nuke them now. [[User:SDSpivey|SDSpivey]] ([[User talk:SDSpivey|talk]]) 19:49, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

:Seriously, though, a sufficiently patriotic American living in Cheyenne, WY may potentially prefer that the relatively unimportant city of his or her residence be nuked instead of the more militarily important{{Citation needed}} Cheyenne Mountain Complex. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.220|162.158.78.220]] 20:37, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
::Is the citation needed for the military importance or for the crazy patriotic guy? [[User:Linker|Linker]] ([[User talk:Linker|talk]]) 20:40, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
::I'm wondering, why would anyone want to target a site that is expressly built to withstand a nuklear strike? That's like fighting a barbarian princess and try to hit her on the bikini armor instead of the midriff [[User:Ruffy314|Ruffy314]] ([[User talk:Ruffy314|talk]]) 00:12, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
:::Enough nuclear weapons will eventually crack it, or at least that's the idea. Also, military command bases are far more important targets than cities: All nuking cities does is kill millions of people and disrupt your enemy's economy and morale, while destroying command bunkers actually reduces your enemy's ability to fight you.

::My understanding is that most military sites are only capable of withstanding near misses from nuclear weapons. This was adequate with early ICBMs because of accuracy problems, modern missiles however are supposed to be accurate enough to destroy hardened facilities. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.22|162.158.255.22]] 01:51, 18 January 2019 (UTC)

Nuking cities will also REALLY tick off the UN,{{Citation needed}} which is a plus.

"This is how the world ends, not with a bang, but a spellcheck." (Followed by a lot of bangs). [[User:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For]] ([[User talk:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|talk]]) 07:55, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

I did not laugh at the comic today. However, I startled people around me laughing at the placement of this [citation needed] in the description. Kudo's to whomever placed it. [[User:DanB|DanB]] ([[User talk:DanB|talk]]) 21:32, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

Wouldn't it make more sense to create a seperate page to collect all the "xkcd-Wikipedia effect" cases? I'm kinda surprised there isn't one already. Model Rail isn't even the only time that happened. One other example being https://xkcd.com/1485/. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.58.177|162.158.58.177]] 11:23, 17 January 2019 (UTC)

;Trivia
Does the date of the underlying Wiki revision lend a clue as to the lead time Randall takes to create non-topical strips? [[User:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For]] ([[User talk:These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For|talk]]) 07:55, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
:Checking the revision history, the revision mentioned in trivia (currently) did not influence the displayed part when viewed on a mobile, since it did only remove a picture (which I think usually is below the text on mobile). Actually the last change to the text displayed happened on 30th June 2014. So all we know is that the comic was created during the past 5 years. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:33, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
::Checking again, I notice, that the text given in the comic does not reflect any revision, since it misses the whole "The quarto missal has 157 original folios [...]" part. Therefore the trivia stated is just wrong. The article never looked like this. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 08:50, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

;Similar comics
The format of this comic is highly similar to the recent comic [[2042: Rolle's Theorem]], with a title and ''From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia'' header, and the first few paragraphs in the article.
The fact that the reference of this comic to fuzzy string matching matches [[1031: s/keyboard/leopard/]]'s reference to regex (comic 1031 also has a Wikipedia page format)
Can we have kind of a 'Meme format' explanation and Randall's fascination with this format? {{unsigned ip|172.69.186.22}}

There have been several comics referencing nuclear weapons in one way of another. Have added link to [[1655: Doomsday Clock]] in the description because there is already a collection of comics about this there. But do we need a category, so that kind of explanation could go there? --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:15, 17 January 2019 (UTC)

Why has it been cremated by a bob?

Damn it! I see comments raving about the Citation Needed, and there's none! Did some idiot remove it AGAIN? I'm getting sick and tired of the people who have grown tired of the gag. Just because YOU'VE become jaded and don't find it funny anymore doesn't mean there aren't still people who enjoy them! Case in point, just read the comments here. Be considerate of others and embrace the fact that we're all different. If you don't like the gag, move on to the next comic. [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 04:54, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Talk:1917: How to Make Friends

2017-11-20T13:08:59Z

108.162.245.220:

Please clarify: What are "friends"? [[Special:Contributions/172.68.58.95|172.68.58.95]] 08:18, 17 November 2017 (UTC)
: A friend is what you should treat people as - i.e. as a friend in themself, not as a means to a friend.[[Special:Contributions/141.101.105.156|141.101.105.156]] 11:36, 17 November 2017 (UTC)
:"Friends" are sacrificial humans you should always have with you while in the woods, in case of bear encounters.--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.245.220|108.162.245.220]] 13:08, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Randall has obviously not read Stu the Cockatoo is New at the Zoo. [[User:Pmakholm|Pmakholm]] ([[User talk:Pmakholm|talk]]) 08:36, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

hairy is a jerk and unworthy of cueball's friendship. --[[User:Misterstick|Misterstick]] ([[User talk:Misterstick|talk]]) 12:56, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

"Go eat food" might be an effect of the post-"Thing explainer" simple English addiction, already mentioned in some other strip. In fact, the rest of his speech also looks a bit like that.--[[Special:Contributions/162.158.90.162|162.158.90.162]] 17:30, 17 November 2017 (UTC)
: Yes, I also think this comic uses simple words. --[[Special:Contributions/162.158.238.191|162.158.238.191]] 09:36, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

If I had a Tumblr, I'd set this as my profile picture. But the stigma of being "the kind of person who whines about vwxyzir disability on Tumblr" is bad enough that I don't wanna go there. [[User:Promethean|Promethean]] ([[User talk:Promethean|talk]]) 05:28, 18 November 2017 (UTC)

Seems like Randall likes to blame lonely people as being morally deficient and selfish... Must be easier than acknowledging the issues they face... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.255.238|162.158.255.238]] 05:58, 20 November 2017 (UTC)

Talk:1884: Ringer Volume/Media Volume

2017-09-01T14:35:29Z

108.162.245.220:

So, is this about the volume buttons controlling all aspects of volume on the phone, and it being difficult to control sometimes (a lot!)? ~Chris

Talk:1884: Ringer Volume/Media Volume

2017-09-01T14:32:17Z

108.162.245.220:

1818: Rayleigh Scattering

2017-04-24T18:46:23Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1818
| date = March 31, 2017
| title = Rayleigh Scattering
| image = rayleigh_scattering.png
| titletext = If you ask "why are leaves green?" the usual answer is "because they're full of chlorophyll, and chlorophyll is green," even though "why does chlorophyll scatter green light?" is a great question too.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic suggests it is better to explain things in an easy-to-understand and intuitive manner, even if such explanations may not be completely accurate. This is especially the case for children whose ability to grasp abstract physics has not yet fully developed. Giving the most complete and physically accurate explanation would make the concepts much more elaborate than necessary, and would cause major confusion in inexperienced listeners.

The principle is demonstrated by the explanation on {{w|Diffuse sky radiation|why the sky is blue}}. The commonly given explanation for this is, as the comic title says, {{w|Rayleigh scattering}}. However, in order to understand how Rayleigh scattering works to produce a blue color, one must go into {{w|quantum mechanics}} and deal with properties of molecules in air and their effects on different wavelengths of light. Even then, one will also need to know about the inner workings of human visual perception to realize why the color we perceive isn't the wavelength that's being most strongly scattered (see [[1145: Sky Color]]). The child is not likely to understand this kind of explanation.

On the other hand, a much simpler explanation, such as "because air is blue", also adequately explains the phenomenon, and is much more understandable to less physically inclined listeners. When [[Science Girl]] asks [[Blondie]] (possibly [[Miss Lenhart]]) why the sky is blue, [[Megan]] walks in and starts to explain in a very scientific way. This is criticized by Blondie, who then convinces her that the simpler explanation is sufficient, as there is a quantum mechanical explanation for every color, there is no need to elaborate on the sky's color any more than any other object's color.

Megan implicitly accepts this, but then in the final panel, Science Girl asks another common question - how do planes fly? Megan starts again to give the traditional answer (airflow causing {{w|Lift_(force)|lift}}) but is interrupted by Blondie saying that it's because the wings of an airplane are full of small birds. While this might not be as ridiculous as it first seems (the child might later learn that the "tiny birds" are actually air molecules, and "flapping wings" are actually pressure differentials), it is certainly over-simplified to a staggering extent. Thus Megan and Blondie illustrate the two extremes of education philosophy: where one chooses to teach the complete truth with no regard for whether it's understandable, the other chooses to make up understandable explanations with no regard for whether it's true. Arguably, neither approach is in the student's best interest and a balance needs to be achieved.

The title text refers to another common question as for why leaves are green. This is commonly explained by the fact that they are filled with {{w|chlorophyll}}, a chemical used by plants for photosynthesis. Randall points out that it would be an equally valid question to ask why chlorophyll is green. This poses an interesting contrast to the answer to the question about the color of the sky, since even physicists are usually satisfied with the general explanation for leaves and don't feel the need to jump into describing quantum phenomena that cause chlorophyll to reflect green light. Also, "Why does chlorophyll scatter green light" may be a great question because chlorophyll reflects, not scatters, light and this challenges Megan-types to coherently explain the difference before they go challenging little children with pedantry. Or because green light is less efficient during photosynthesis, and explaining that is similar to explaining Rayleigh Scattering.

[https://what-if.xkcd.com/141/ What-if 141] also mentions the simpler explanation to the original question: Sunbeam has this relevant text: "Normal light interacts with the atmosphere through Rayleigh scattering. You may have heard of Rayleigh scattering as the answer to 'why is the sky blue.' This is sort of true, but honestly, a better answer to this question might be 'because air is blue.' Sure, it appears blue for a bunch of physics reasons, but everything appears the color it is for a bunch of physics reasons." There is also a footnote in that comment with an additional example: "When you ask, 'Why is the {{w|Statue of Liberty|statue of liberty}} green?' the answer is something like, 'The outside of the statue is copper, so it used to be copper-colored. Over time, a layer of copper carbonate formed (through oxidation), and copper carbonate is green.' You don't say 'The statue is green because of frequency-specific absorption and scattering by surface molecules.' "

==Transcript==
:[Science Girl asks Blondie a question which she answers while lifting her arm towards Science Girl.]
:Science Girl: Why is the sky blue?
:Blondie: Because air is blue.

:[Megan walks in from behind Science Girl.]
:Megan: No, the sky is blue because of Rayleigh scattering–
:Blondie: Nah, it's because air is blue. Blue light bounces off it and hits our eyes. Same as why anything is any color.

:[Zoom in on Blondie's face.]
:Blondie: It's why far-off mountains look blue – because of all the blue air in the way.

:[Zoom out to Megan standing longer from Science Girl than Blondie who has thrown her arms out. Science Girl is facing directly out towards the reader.]
:Megan: There's a specific quantum mechanism by which–
:Blondie: Yeah but there's a physics mechanism for every color. You don't have to get all quantum right away.

:[Frameless panel with Science Girl looking up at Blondie who stands holding her hands on her sides. Megan speaks from off.panel.]
:Megan (off-panel): ...OK, I guess.
:Blondie: Any other questions?
:Science Girl: How do planes stay up?

:[Blondie holds a finger up in front of Science Girl while Megan now is the one to throw out her arms.]
:Megan: Well, the airflow–
:Blondie: Tiny birds in the wings. Thousands. Flapping Hard.
:Science Girl: WOW!
:Megan: ''NO!''

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Science Girl]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Blondie]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

1825: 7 Eleven

2017-04-17T16:36:29Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1825
| date = April 17, 2017
| title = 7 Eleven
| image = 7_eleven.png
| titletext = Really, the only honest 24-hour stores are the ones in places like Arizona and Hawaii, and many of them are still wrong in certain years.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Basic Explanation. Needs more. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic pokes fun at the idiosyncrasies of time keeping. Since units of time are intimately tied to a planet's rotation, and planets rotate at different, inconsistent rates, time keeping doesn't always follow a simple pattern.

Many stores advertise being open 24/7, which means that they're open all day, every day. Many locations of the convenience store chain {{w|7-Eleven}} are now "open 24 hours", again meaning they are always open (despite historically being open only from 7 AM and 11 PM local time, hence its name).

The main joke in the comic refers to the fact that a day on Mars (the time it takes for Mars to make a full revolution on its own axis) is about 24 hours and 37 minutes of Earth time. If a 7-11 store is open for literally 24 Earth hours per Mars day, then it would actually be closed for around 37 minutes each day.

The first part of the title text refers to {{w|Daylight_saving_time|daylight saving time}}, where days can be shortened or lengthened on predefined days of the year in order to maximize use of available sunlight. In the United States, most places set clocks forward by one hour on the second Sunday of March, resulting in a 23-hour day, and back again on the first Sunday of November, resulting in a 25-hour day. Thus technically, even a 7-11 in the US would not truly be open "24 hours" every day. Arizona and Hawaii are called out as exceptions because they do not observe daylight saving time.

The second part of the title text refers to {{w|leap seconds}}, which are sometimes added to December 31 in order to synchronize time with Earth's actual rotation. Years with a leap second will see its last day being one second longer than 24 hours. Since leap seconds apply to all Earth-based clocks, any store on Earth would not technically be open for exactly 24 hours on such days.

==Transcript==
Sign: 7-Eleven Open 24 hours

[A person in a spacesuit is trying to open the door to the convenience store]

Door: Rattle rattle

Caption: I'm glad they finally opened a 7-Eleven here on Mars, but it's annoying how it closes for 37 minutes every day.

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

{{comic discussion}}

1825: 7 Eleven

2017-04-17T16:31:26Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1825
| date = April 17, 2017
| title = 7 Eleven
| image = 7_eleven.png
| titletext = Really, the only honest 24-hour stores are the ones in places like Arizona and Hawaii, and many of them are still wrong in certain years.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Basic Explanation. Needs more. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
This comic pokes fun at the idiosyncrasies of time keeping. Since units of time are intimately tied to a planet's rotation, and planets rotate at different, inconsistent rates, time keeping doesn't always follow a simple pattern.

Many stores advertise being open 24/7, which means that they're open all day, every day. Many locations of the convenience store chain {{w|7-Eleven}} are now "open 24 hours", again meaning they are always open (despite historically being open only from 7 AM and 11 PM local time, hence its name).

The main joke in the comic refers to the fact that a day on Mars (the time it takes for Mars to make a full revolution on its own axis) is about 24 hours and 37 minutes of Earth time. If a 7-11 store is open for literally 24 Earth hours per Mars day, then it would actually be closed for around 37 minutes each day.

The first part of the title text refers to {{w|Daylight_saving_time|daylight saving time}}, where days can be shortened or lengthened on predefined days of the year in order to maximize use of available sunlight. In the United States, most places set clocks forward by one hour on the second Sunday of March, resulting in a 23-hour day, and back again on the first Sunday of November, resulting in a 25-hour days. Thus technically, even a 7-11 in the US would not truly be open "24 hours" every day. Arizona and Hawaii are called out as exceptions because they do not observe daylight saving time.

The second part of the title text refers to {{w|leap seconds}}, which are sometimes added to December 31 in order to synchronize time with Earth's actual rotation. Years with a leap second will see its last day being one second longer than 24 hours. Since leap seconds apply to all Earth-based clocks, any store on Earth that is open "24 hours" would technically have to close for one second.

==Transcript==
Sign: 7-Eleven Open 24 hours

[A person in a spacesuit is trying to open the door to the convenience store]

Door: Rattle rattle

Caption: I'm glad they finally opened a 7-Eleven here on Mars, but it's annoying how it closes for 37 minutes every day.

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

{{comic discussion}}

1808: Hacking

2017-03-09T00:46:28Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1808
| date = March 8, 2017
| title = Hacking
| image = hacking.png
| titletext = The dump also contains a list of millions of prime factors, a 0-day Tamagotchi exploit, and a technique for getting gcc and bash to execute arbitrary code.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|The main joke from the caption, that this is not dramatic revelation, like Cueball seems to think (sarcasm?) is not mentioned yet.}}
This comic is referencing an incident on the day before this comic was released, March 7, 2017, in which {{w|WikiLeaks}} exposed thousands of hacking exploits (thus the title) and programs from the CIA (see for instance this article: [https://www.wired.com/2017/03/wikileaks-cia-hacks-dump/ WikiLeaks Just Dumped a Mega-Trove of CIA Hacking Secrets]). Many of the tools that were in the leak were similar to publicly available tools, or not entirely unexpected, with several coming from sites such as StackOverflow and Reddit.

The main joke in this comic refers to the common practice of adding spaces between parts of an email address when publishing them on websites. For example, "john.doe@example.org" may be written as "john dot doe at example dot org". The purported goal of doing this is to thwart page scraping bots from harvesting the correct email addresses and prevent them from becoming the target of spam or being sold as address lists for email marketers. In this comic, [[Ponytail]] tells [[Cueball]] that there is a tool which can delete such spaces. Such a tool can fix the space and most likely convert the words "dot" and "at" into their respective symbols. This will overcome the problems faced by harvesting tools, and make these email addresses more prone to receive spam. Cueball appears shocked to hear this news, but given the caption below this is likely sarcasm by [[Randall]]. In fact, it is quite simple to devise a program which detects and converts/removes such spaces; it's naive to believe that one can prevent their address from being harvested just by writing their address in a slightly weird way.

The title text describes other fictitious "hacking" exploits which sound more interesting, but are still useless:
* Millions of prime factors: The security of the {{w|RSA (cryptosystem)|RSA cipher}} relies on the difficulty of finding prime factors for a large number. Successfully calculating or stealing a prime factor used in a RSA cipher would allow an attacker to decrypt messages and impersonate the true user. However, this description doesn't specify whether those "millions of prime factors" were actually used in any ciphers. Random prime factors are very easy to find but the chances of one matching a number used in a cipher is almost nonexistent. Thus simply possessing a list of many prime factors would not necessarily be useful at all. That said, some key generation systems have been shown to re-use prime factors with catastrophic impacts [https://eprint.iacr.org/2012/064.pdf 1] [https://eprint.iacr.org/2016/961.pdf 2] so this could be a reference to a list of known shared primes.
* A 0-day exploit for {{w|Tamagotchi}}: A 0-day exploit is an exploit of which the manufacturer is not (yet) aware. 0-days are very valuable to hackers since defenses against them have not yet been developed, which makes it easy to catch victims off-guard. However, an exploit for a Tamagotchi is likely useless because they are very low-end entertainment devices that do not contain microphones or cameras, and usually don't have access to any valuable information that can be stolen. Modern Tamagotchi devices do have some network functionality, and so may be turned into a botnet.
* A way to get {{w|GNU_Compiler_Collection|gcc}} and {{w|Bash_(Unix_shell)|bash}} to execute arbitrary code: Unintentional execution of arbitrary code is serious vulnerability that allows attackers to do whatever they choose on a victim's computer. However the examples given here merely describe the intended purpose of the tools: gcc is a {{w|compiler}}, so preparing arbitrary code is its main purpose, and bash is a Unix shell, so executing {{w|Shell script|arbitrary code}} is one of its primary functions. These tools are typically isolated from any attack surface that hackers can access, and utilizing these tools for their intended purpose can't reasonably be called "hacking". Then again, this could be a reference to {{w|Shellshock_(software_bug)|ShellShock}}, a major vulnerability which allowed the unintentional execution of arbitrary attacker code. Likewise, it could be referring to a [http://wiki.c2.com/?TheKenThompsonHack compiler injection attack] which allows a compiler to inject backdoors via the binary executables in a toolchain and without leaving a trace in the source code being compiled or the compiler itself.

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail is writing on her laptop at her desk while Cueball looks over her shoulder.]
:Ponytail: You know how sometimes people put a space in their email address to make it harder to harvest?
:Cueball: Yeah?
:Ponytail: ''They have a tool that can delete the space!''
:Cueball: Oh my god.

:[Caption below the panel:]
:Less-dramatic revelations from the CIA hacking dump

==Trivia==
*This is the second comic in a row about how computers can be misused and also the second in a row where Cueball is with Ponytail rather than [[Megan]].
**This setup with Ponytail at the computer and Cueball behind has been used several times for instance in [[1513: Code Quality]], part of the [[:Category:Code Quality|Code Quality]] series.

{{comic discussion}}

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

1785: Wifi

2017-01-13T21:19:23Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1785
| date = January 13, 2017
| title = Wifi
| image = wifi.png
| titletext = Further out to the right, it works correctly, but the reason it works still involves the word 'firmware.'
}}

==Explanation==
This comic shows the supposed probability that a guest will be able to connect to the owner's {{w|Wi-Fi}} in graph form. Connecting to a new Wi-Fi network typically requires selecting the correct network name on a settings screen, then entering a password.

The graph starts with tech-illiterate people who don't even know how to control their Wi-Fi connection ("can't find wifi settings"). This group has slightly lower than normal probability of connecting successfully, since they would not know what to do if left alone. However, they still have a reasonable chance to connect as long as someone is available to help them. Once the initial setup is done, they can continue using the connection without any technical knowledge or intervention.

The average case in the middle of the graph represents typical users who simply wish to connect and gain Internet access ("works fine"). The vast majority of the population falls into this category. This group of users have enough knowledge to be able to connect and are then satisfied with the connection just working. Since networking devices use a standard protocol to communicate, users typically will not experience any issues.

Finally, the large drop in the graph on the right-hand side is explained by "something involving the word 'firmware'". Firmware is programming which operates a device at the lowest level, typically stored in a {{w|ROM}} or an EEPROM/flash. Modifying the firmware can have certain benefits, for example to gain features that aren't included in the base product. However, understanding and patching firmware requires a great deal of technical knowledge, and can be quite risky for people without experience. Not all custom firmware will interoperate correctly with all devices. Technical issues with custom firmware can also be harder to fix due to lack of support from the device manufacturer. In the worst case, installing the wrong firmware or any errors or glitches in the process can even leave devices "bricked" (inoperable and unrecoverable). It's likely that the sharp dropoff in the graph is caused by inexperienced users who know "just enough" to want to modify their firmware, but don't know how to deal with the multitude of issues that can arise. Particularly for users whose connection was already working fine but nevertheless want to experiment with new firmware, their changes often end up worsening their chances of connecting.

The title text indicates that the curve recovers once users are more experienced, and ''can'' consistently install firmware correctly to get a working connection. In such case, the users are able to enjoy better connections through their firmware changes while avoiding their pitfalls. These experienced users are often able to diagnose and fix connection issues through the appropriate use of firmware, making their chances of connecting even better than the average user.

These computer issues have previously appeared in several xkcd comics, notably [[456: Cautionary]], where WiFi problems specifically are mentioned in the title text.

The apparent paradox of people knowing more about a subject also having more problems with it is also explored in [[1760: TV Problems]]; in the title text, the ones who are more likely to die from a skydiving accident are the ones who know the more about skydiving safety, but that is of course not because they cannot make it work, but rather because they make many more dives than regular people, thus increasing the overall risk in spite of their competence.

==Transcript==
:[A line graph with a curve that starts just left of the Y-axis above the middle of the axis. Then it increases slightly and stays almost stable on a long flat plateau before it falls off fast towards the right. Each axis ends in an arrow and has a label to the left of the Y-axis and below the x-axis. Over the curve there are three labels, pointing with one arrow to the two rising and falling parts, and three arrows to the center label above the plateau.]
:Y-axis: Probability houseguest will be able to connect to WiFi
:X-axis: Houseguest tech-savviness
:Left label: Can't find wifi settings
:Center label: Works fine
:Right label: Something involving the word "firmware"

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Computers]]

1785: Wifi

2017-01-13T21:11:19Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1785
| date = January 13, 2017
| title = Wifi
| image = wifi.png
| titletext = Further out to the right, it works correctly, but the reason it works still involves the word 'firmware.'
}}

==Explanation==
This comic shows the supposed probability that a guest will be able to connect to the owner's {{w|Wi-Fi}} in graph form. Connecting to a new Wi-Fi network typically requires selecting the correct network name on a settings screen, then entering a password.

The graph starts with tech-illiterate people who don't even know how to control their Wi-Fi connection ("can't find wifi settings"). This group has slightly lower than normal probability of connecting successfully, since they would not know what to do if left alone. However, they still have a reasonable chance to connect as long as someone is available to help them. Once the initial setup is done, they can continue using the connection without any technical knowledge or intervention.

The average case in the middle of the graph represents typical users who simply wish to connect and gain Internet access ("works fine"). The vast majority of the population falls into this category. This group of users have enough knowledge to be able to connect and are then satisfied with the connection just working. Since networking devices use a standard protocol to communicate, users typically will not experience any issues.

Finally, the large drop in the graph on the right-hand side is explained by "something involving the word 'firmware'". Firmware is programming which operates a device at the lowest level, typically stored in a {{w|ROM}} or an EEPROM/flash. Modifying the firmware can have certain benefits, for example to gain features that aren't included in the base product. However, understanding and patching firmware requires a great deal of technical knowledge, and can be quite risky for people without experience. Not all custom firmware will interoperate correctly with all devices. In the worst case, installing the wrong firmware or any errors or glitches in the process can even leave devices "bricked" (inoperable and unrecoverable). It's likely that the sharp dropoff in the graph is caused by inexperienced users who know "just enough" to want to modify their firmware, but don't know enough to do so safely. Particularly for users whose connection was already working fine but nevertheless want to experiment with new firmware, their changes often end up worsening their chances of connecting.

The title text indicates that the curve recovers once users are more experienced, and ''can'' consistently install firmware correctly to get a working connection. In such case, the users are able to enjoy better connections through their firmware changes while avoiding their pitfalls. These experienced users are often able to diagnose and fix connection issues through the appropriate use of firmware, making their chances of connecting even better than the average user.

These computer issues have previously appeared in several xkcd comics, notably [[456: Cautionary]], where WiFi problems specifically are mentioned in the title text.

The apparent paradox of people knowing more about a subject also having more problems with it is also explored in [[1760: TV Problems]]; in the title text, the ones who are more likely to die from a skydiving accident are the ones who know the more about skydiving safety, but that is of course not because they cannot make it work, but rather because they make many more dives than regular people, thus increasing the overall risk in spite of their competence.

==Transcript==
:[A line graph with a curve that starts just left of the Y-axis above the middle of the axis. Then it increases slightly and stays almost stable on a long flat plateau before it falls off fast towards the right. Each axis ends in an arrow and has a label to the left of the Y-axis and below the x-axis. Over the curve there are three labels, pointing with one arrow to the two rising and falling parts, and three arrows to the center label above the plateau.]
:Y-axis: Probability houseguest will be able to connect to WiFi
:X-axis: Houseguest tech-savviness
:Left label: Can't find wifi settings
:Center label: Works fine
:Right label: Something involving the word "firmware"

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Computers]]

1785: Wifi

2017-01-13T21:03:26Z

108.162.245.220: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1785
| date = January 13, 2017
| title = Wifi
| image = wifi.png
| titletext = Further out to the right, it works correctly, but the reason it works still involves the word 'firmware.'
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Seems good, but could do with more. The ref to TV Problems title text seems far fetched.}}

This comic shows the supposed probability that a guest will be able to connect to the owner's {{w|Wi-Fi}} in graph form. Connecting to a new Wi-Fi network typically requires selecting the correct network name on a settings screen, then entering a password.

The graph starts with tech-illiterate people who don't even know how to control their Wi-Fi connection ("can't find wifi settings"). This group has slightly lower than normal probability of connecting successfully, since they would not know what to do if left alone. However, they still have a reasonable chance to connect as long as someone is available to help them. Once the initial setup is done, they can continue using the connection without any technical knowledge or intervention.

The average case in the middle of the graph represents typical users who simply wish to connect and gain Internet access ("works fine"). The vast majority of the population falls into this category. This group of users have enough knowledge to be able to connect and are then satisfied with the connection just working. Since networking devices use a standard protocol to communicate, users typically will not experience any issues.

Finally, the large drop in the graph on the right-hand side is explained by "something involving the word 'firmware'". Firmware is programming which operates a device at the lowest level, typically stored in a {{w|ROM}} or an EEPROM/flash, but sometimes it is transferred from a CPU to a device at system boot time. Modifying the firmware can have certain benefits, for example to gain features that aren't included in the base product. However, understanding and patching firmware requires a great deal of technical knowledge, and can be quite risky for people without experience. Not all custom firmware will interoperate correctly with all devices. In the worst case, installing the wrong firmware or any errors or glitches in the process can even leave devices "bricked" (inoperable and unrecoverable). It's likely that the sharp dropoff in the graph is caused by inexperienced users who know "just enough" to want to modify their firmware, but don't know enough to do so safely. Particularly for users whose connection was already working fine but nevertheless want to experiment with new firmware, their changes often end up worsening their chances of connecting.

The title text indicates that the curve recovers once users are more experienced, and ''can'' consistently install firmware correctly to get a working connection. In such case, the users are able to enjoy better connections through their firmware changes while avoiding their pitfalls.

These computer issues have previously appeared in several xkcd comics, notably [[456: Cautionary]], where WiFi problems specifically are mentioned in the title text.

The apparent paradox of people knowing more about a subject also having more problems with it is also explored in [[1760: TV Problems]]; in the title text, the ones who are more likely to die from a skydiving accident are the ones who know the more about skydiving safety, but that is of course not because they cannot make it work, but rather because they make many more dives than regular people, thus increasing the overall risk in spite of their competence.

==Transcript==
:[A line graph with a curve that starts just left of the Y-axis above the middle of the axis. Then it increases slightly and stays almost stable on a long flat plateau before it falls off fast towards the right. Each axis ends in an arrow and has a label to the left of the Y-axis and below the x-axis. Over the curve there are three labels, pointing with one arrow to the two rising and falling parts, and three arrows to the center label above the plateau.]
:Y-axis: Probability houseguest will be able to connect to WiFi
:X-axis: Houseguest tech-savviness
:Left label: Can't find wifi settings
:Center label: Works fine
:Right label: Something involving the word "firmware"

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Computers]]

1388: Subduction License

2014-06-30T04:51:41Z

108.162.245.220:

{{comic
| number = 1388
| date = June 30, 2014
| title = Subduction License
| image = subduction_license.png
| titletext = 'Dude, why can't you just be a normal roommate?' 'Because I'm coming TOWARD you!'
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page.}}

The mouseover text plays on the double-meaning of the word "normal," which in {{w|structural geology}} refers specifically to mountainbuilding faults that form when plates or other crustal blocks relax away from one another (e.g., the {{w|Tetons}}). However, since in {{w|subduction}} the plates are necessarily moving toward one another (as noted in the roommate's response in the mouseover text), the mountainbuilding is not due to normal (i.e., extensional) faults, but rather to compressional faults.

"{{w|Thrust fault}}" is a type of compressional fault that is itself part of the extended geologic play on words that drives [[1082: Geology]]

==Transcript==
:[Beret Guy is showing some cards to Cueball, who is at his computer desk.]
:Beret Guy: Sweet! I finally got my subduction license!
:Cueball: Your what?

:[Beret Guy starts sinking into the ground, causing it to ripple.]
:Cueball: ...What are you doing?

:[Beret Guy sinks further, forming a miniature mountain range in front of him. Cueball is frantically trying to keep his computer steady as his desk tilts.]
:Cueball: ''Stop it! Stop it!''

:[Beret Guy is waist-deep, and snow caps have formed on the mountains. Cueball is falling backwards from his desk, and the monitor unplugs itself from his computer.]
:Cueball: '''AUGH!'''

{{comic discussion}}
Appears to be mail he is going through, not cards. Anyone else?