explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:1516: Win by Induction

2015-04-24T19:56:26Z

199.27.130.204: Comment

Is the alt text a reference to double-yolkers (eggs with two yolks)? [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16118149 They're only about 1 in every 1000] but it seems like an obvious reference. --[[User:Fenn|Fenn]] ([[User talk:Fenn|talk]]) 08:32, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:Makes sense to me. I didn't even think of double yolks until you mentioned it here. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.89|173.245.50.89]] 09:04, 24 April 2015 (UTC)BK201
::Seconded. --[[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.52|188.114.110.52]] 14:34, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:::I'd think it's a reference to the rate of twins, which is currently almost exactly 1/30 (and on the rise) [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin#Statistics] [[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.186|173.245.56.186]] 17:45, 24 April 2015 (UTC)Merkky[[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.186|173.245.56.186]] 17:45, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

The explanation currently says that doubling makes it uncountably infinite. I'm pretty sure that doubling at each step (or every few steps) is still a countable infinite set. Proof here: http://practicaltypography.com/the-infinite-pixel-screen.html (see section "The internet demands a recount", because the first attempt is wrong). We can also prove it using the same argument as when proving that N x N is countable infinite (making zig-zag), but in this case making a breadth-first search of the tree of Pikachus: map 1 to the first Pikachu, map 2 and 3 to the two Pikachus at the second level, map 4, 5, 6, 7 to the four Pikachus at the third level, map (2^(n-1))…((2^n) - 1) to the 2^(n-1) Pikachus at level n. {{unsigned ip|108.162.229.177}}
:Saw this too late. Yes, I agree, and I have fixed it accordingly. --[[User:Stephan Schulz|Stephan Schulz]] ([[User talk:Stephan Schulz|talk]]) 09:28, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:The problem being that we don't have an exact number for how many steps include double Pikachus. Granted, this is just a problem of practice, not theory. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.88|173.245.50.88]] 12:37, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

"infinite, but countable" {Cough.} Someone doesn't understand infinity. Perhaps they meant "enumerable". [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.155|108.162.250.155]] 09:29, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:Someone doesn't understand countability. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.89.217|141.101.89.217]] 09:46, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
::enumeration is counting, in the simplest sense. "To name one by one; specify, as if in a list". That said, the whole of infinite whole numbers CAN be counted, just not by a human and not within a reasonable amount of time. --[[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.52|188.114.110.52]] 14:34, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

"The front most Pikachu speaks." Hey, look, it has those little lines to show it's speaking, not the blank white space behind it. Duh. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.250.155|108.162.250.155]] 09:32, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Looks like Megan is looking at her watch as well. Mention in transcript/explanation? [[User:Fenn|Fenn]] ([[User talk:Fenn|talk]]) 09:34, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:Are Megan and Cueball supposed to fight each other? It seems like Cueball still has his closed Pokéball in his hands. Is it then Megan's Pokéball that has evolved into all these Pikachu? And is it because she waits for her Pokémon to be ready to fight Cueball, that she checks her watch? I do not know anything about the Pokémon game/world. But it seems to me that some part of this setup is unexplained by the above... --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 11:23, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Friendly reminder: Grammatically speaking, Pokémon are like sheep or deer. Singular and plural are both written the same. One Pikachu, many Pikachu, all the Pikachu. You'd be surprised at how much rage forgetting this causes in certain corners of the Internet. {{unsigned ip|141.101.99.42}}

What doesn't make sense to me is how this could continue indefinitely – after all, each of those Pikachu must have caught its own Pikachu beforehand. I don't see any infinite loop here, just a bunch of Pikachu that already had one another caught itselves. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.96.217|141.101.96.217]] 10:13, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

The word "induction" could also be intended to have a double meaning, referring also to electromagnetic induction. Pikachu is, after all, and electric pokémon. {{unsigned ip|141.101.105.194}}
:Yes, I think this is right. Something about Maxwell's equations and induction. {{unsigned ip|173.245.54.203}}
::From an engineering standpoint, in my opinion, Pikachu act more like biological capacitors (stored electric charge at potentially high voltage able to deliver large discharge currents) than inductors ("storing" magnetic energy via constant current, able to deliver high voltage when interrupted, like the ignition coil for an older automotive engine). I'm not too familiar with the Pokémon in-game/in-show universe, but I would imagine the Nurse Jenny corps could use electric Pokémon such as Pikachu (or Raichu) like defibrillators for cardiac events! --BigMal // [[Special:Contributions/173.245.50.177|173.245.50.177]] 11:42, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:::There are certain moves, including some that Pikachu can learn, that appear to be based on induction (Thunder Wave and Shock Wave). Besides, they build up charge in their bodies from somewhere; I'd suspect induction from the surrounding environment is what charges them up. --[[Special:Contributions/188.114.110.52|188.114.110.52]] 14:34, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

There's a point floating about how infinity doesn't imply completion. For instance, the number of all even integers is infinite, yet any given integer "only has a 50% chance of being even", so the series is quite obviously incomplete. This article seems to tend towards the idea (in diction) that an infinite number of pikachu would result in a win based on a 'logical' premise, without referring specificially to the terms of it's assumption. [[User:Xerxesbeat|Xerxesbeat]] ([[User talk:Xerxesbeat|talk]]) 11:38, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

What happens if the Pikachu in the ball is recursing - picking himself? That doesn't fit the 30-40 double yolk thing, but would explain an infinite series. Food for thought. Megan is bored, waiting for the fight to start. I thought the game was supposed to begin when the players choose, though, so I don't understand why the wait is happening at all. {{unsigned ip|108.162.221.151}}

I doubt this is an intentional part of the joke, but the strongest Ground-type moves (Earthquake, Precipice Blades, etc.) are multi-target, hitting all foes in a 1v5 situation such as Horde Battles. In theory, a strong enough super effective move from Cueball's lead would still end the battle in one turn. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.176|173.245.56.176]] 12:04, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
:Not Land's Wrath, Dig, or Earth Power, which are strong ground-type moves.[[Special:Contributions/173.245.48.126|173.245.48.126]] 13:05, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
::Actually, Land's Wrath is multi-target. (The ones you named are also weaker than Earthquake and Precipice Blades, so the original comment stands regardless. Although a lucky Magnitude is more powerful than any of those.) --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.98|108.162.221.98]]

I normally get a hearty chuckle out of Randall's graphical musings, but this one had me scratching my head. Fortunately, ExplainXKCD always comes to the rescue! After reading this page, my first thought was: Pokéception! 13:17, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

;Induction

Two other possibilities: one, in a bit of googling, it would appear that there is a type of Pokémon evolution called induced evolution, which involves stones of some kind? Alternately, we can use the term induction in the sense of soneone being ''inducted'' into a group. In this case, Megan has trained her Pikachu to be a Pokémaster. (Perhaps by arranging for it to be inducted into a rarified "gym"? I confess, I know nothing about the show.) [[Special:Contributions/173.245.56.196|173.245.56.196]] 13:11, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

I'm surprised no one mentioned that Pokémon is a game a long time before becoming a show. Although it was because of the animated series that Pikachu became "special" among the hundreds of other cute critters.

Also, no mention to the russian matryoshka dolls? Come on...
Closest other xkcd I recall is https://xkcd.com/878/ {{unsigned ip|198.41.230.68}}

;Axiom of choice

Could this be to do with the {{w|axiom of choice}} from set theory? From my understanding, it's a fundamental axiom of set theory that says 'given a set of sets, it's possible to choose one element from each of those sets'. "Choosing" is in this case a specific operation that can be performed on an element.

One specific detail about the axiom is that all sets under consideration must be nonempty; that is, they must contain at least one element. So I think this is analogous to the situation of a Pokemon trainer owning multiple (full) Pokeballs: his Pokeballs are a collection of non-empty sets from which he is now trying to choose a single element ("Pikachu, I choose you!").

Under ''normal'' circumstances, he can do this without invoking the axiom of choice because he knows the names of all his Pokemon and so can select one from each set. In this case, he could prove his ability to make the choice simply by releasing all of his Pokemon from their balls one at a time. (The Pokemon's name is actually irrelevant, because simply releasing the Pokemon counts as a choice).

However, the situation becomes more complex if it turns out that his Pokemon also possess Pokeballs, because now his ability to make the choice is uncertain. In this situation, there could be ''infinitely many'' Pikachus, and so he can't definitely select a Pikachu from all the Pokeballs under his control. In a situation like this, a mathematician would invoke the axiom of choice.

However, it seems that Cueball is actually having a go at it using an inductive method of choice: first by choosing a Pikachu, then having each Pikachu choose a Pikachu. If the number of Pikachus carrying Pokeballs is finite, then eventually, this will demonstrate that the choice can be made and so the axiom of choice is unnecessary. However, if it's ''infinite'', then this will generate a neverending stream of Pikachus. In the latter case, the game never begins, because you can't begin a Pokemon battle until all participants have chosen Pokemon. Most likely, the other players would simply abandon the game, which Cueball could claim as a victory. [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 13:52, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

This sentence is nonsensical: ''When Trainers do battle, the anime's dub has immersed the phrase "<Pokémon's name>, I choose you!" into popular culture memory, which is accompanied by throwing the ball containing the selected Pokémon to the ground, which releases the Pokémon at full size.'' [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.161|108.162.219.161]] 17:51, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Should it be noted that the Pikachu is drawn without its tail? It would normally a have lightning bolt shaped tail that appears to the side or from behind its head. (Trivia or other note?) [[User:Azule|Azule]] ([[User talk:Azule|talk]]) 15:22, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

In Pokemon games from Gold and up, pokemon are able to hold items, including pokeballs. While in the game, once a pokeball is filled it is no longer available to select as an item, this comic would seem to imply the possible 'inception' scenario of having a pokemon hold an active pokeball (as the games have already shown that a pokeball can go into a pokeball). --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.193|173.245.54.193]] 14:13, 24 April 2015 (UTC)
: ahem... "pokeception" short for "pocket inception" - I can't be the first one to coin this (?) - [[User:Brettpeirce|Brettpeirce]] ([[User talk:Brettpeirce|talk]]) 16:33, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

With Megan looking at her watch and Cueball holding the ball, I think we're meant to understand that Megan IS the Pokémon Cueball intends to use against Pikachu.[[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.153|108.162.221.153]] 19:12, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

It is possible the "win by induction" is from the Pikachu's opponent inferring the series in infinite, and conceding. 19:56, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

1394: Superm*n

2014-07-22T19:48:16Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1394
| date = July 14, 2014
| title = Superm*n
| image = superm_n.png
| titletext = See also: Spider-Man reboot in which he can produce several inches of web, doesn't need as much chalk powder on his hands when he goes rock climbing, and occasionally feels vaguely uneasy about situations.
}}

==Explanation==
By depicting how unimpressive the superhero {{w|Superman}} would be if his increase in powers, when compared to humans, were the same as the moons increase in apparent size during a {{w|supermoon}}, Randall points that the use of the term supermoon is an exaggeration.

This comic was posted one day after a supermoon, an informal astronomical event where a full moon occurs when it is closest to earth, causing the moon to appear 10% brighter and about 7% larger. This is due to the {{w|apsidal precession}} of moon's {{w|elliptic orbit}} which has an {{w|orbital eccentricity}} of about 0.0549. The conditions for a supermoon happen once every 411 days, and the loose definition of the term means that the supermoon lasts for about two or three full moons.

Returning back to the not-so-Superman, the average American adult man is 69 inches tall, with a {{w|standard deviation}} of 2.9 inches. Not-so-Superman, at an assumed 74 inches tall, is within the 95th percentile - certainly a tall man, but by no means phenomenal. "7% stronger" (most likely a reference to how the supermoon is 7% brighter) is a bit harder to quantify, but it communicates "not actually impressive" to the reader all the same.

===Title===
The comic's title makes use of an asterisk that is being used as a wildcard. When using search queries an asterisk represents an unknown character, or in some cases a set of characters. Therefore, Superm*n can represent the strings "Superman" and "Supermoon".

===Title Text===
The title text refers makes this same comparison with {{w|Spider-Man}}. Spider man is capable of firing large amounts of webbing, can can cling to surfaces with superhuman gripping abilities, and has a sixth sense, "spider sense", that warns him about impending danger. The title text describes trivially minimal versions of these powers, analogous to the trivial size and brightness difference between a "supermoon" and a normal full moon.

==Trivia==
Supermoon has been mentioned previously in [[1080: Visual Field]] and [[1052: Every Major's Terrible]].

==Transcript==
[Cueball is reaching for an item on a high shelf. Superman is rushing towards him]

Superman: I'll get it! I'm 5 inches taller and 7% stronger than the average man!

Caption: The new supermoon-inspired Superman reboot

==References==
<references />

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]

1363: xkcd Phone

2014-05-22T00:49:36Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1363
| date = May 2, 2014
| title = xkcd Phone
| image = xkcd_phone.png
| titletext = Presented in partnership with Qualcomm, Craigslist, Whirlpool, Hostess, LifeStyles, and the US Chamber of Commerce. Manufactured on equipment which also processes peanuts. Price includes 2-year Knicks contract. Phone may extinguish nearby birthday candles. If phone ships with Siri, return immediately; do not speak to her and ignore any instructions she gives. Do not remove lead casing. Phone may attract/trap insects; this is normal. Volume adjustable (requires root). If you experience sudden tingling, nausea, or vomiting, perform a factory reset immediately. Do not submerge in water; phone will drown. Exterior may be frictionless. Prolonged use can cause mood swings, short-term memory loss, and seizures. Avert eyes while replacing battery. Under certain circumstances, wireless transmitter may control God.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a parody of a multitude of mobile-technology related issues that, when brought together, create a general satire of smartphone advertising. The advertised features here either make previously useful capabilities useless or add features nobody wants. Except for "your mobile world (going) digital", which is old news. To market something as "going digital" implies that the corporation has found a way to integrate computers and/or the internet into a market that previously existed without them; the market for mobile phones has ''always'' involved computers, making the xkcd phone's marketing feel dated and clueless.

From bottom left, going clockwise:

* '''FlightAware partnership:''' This is a reference to the [http://www.flightaware.com/ FlightAware] flight tracking service. This FlightAware partnership results in the phone playing airplane engine noise whenever a flight passes over the phone's current location, an annoying and arbitrary feature. It may also be superfluous, as such noise may be heard from the plane itself, depending on altitude.
* '''Realistic case:''' possibly a joke on various audiovisual devices like gaming consoles that advertise realistic sound, graphics, etc. Of course, applying "realistic" to an actual physical case is ridiculous. Either the case is actually real, or it doesn't actually function as a case. Possible reference to [[331: Photoshops]], where [[Cueball]] finds a physical object to not look realistic.
* '''Clear screen:''' This is a pointless descriptor from the perspective of the consumer. Of course the screen is clear. This joke works in tandem with the previous joke, as a play on "clear case, realistic screen," which are both hypothetically viable selling points.
* '''Side Facing Camera:''' There was a recent controversy surrounding an [https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/spy-cam-peek-i Indiegogo for a surreptitious, side-mounted camera device] for smartphones due to the advertisement of the device as a good way to take creep shots, which are illegal in many places. Widespread dissemination of these devices as a built-in feature would likely result in a sharp increase in delinquency of this nature. May also be an ''ad absurdum'' extension of devices with both forward and backward facing cameras.
* '''Custom blend OS:''' iOS and Android are offered by different conglomerates and run on different kernels. A "custom blend" would probably be a nightmare to work with.
* '''Simulates alternative speed of light:''' This renders the clock useless as a means of telling time. The {{w|speed of light}} is 299,792,458 meters per second; relativistic effects, such as {{w|time dilation}}, are only noticeable at significant fractions of the speed of light. Since the phone is simulating a much slower speed of light, driving at even highway speeds will cause a significant amount of time dilation. For example, driving at 90mph (90% of the default simulated speed of light) will give a time dilation factor of about 2.29, causing the clock to advance only 26 minutes for each hour; driving at exactly 100mph makes the dilation factor infinite and will stop the clock entirely. Driving beyond 100mph would...make the clock start advancing through imaginary/complex time rather than real time. Somehow. (Let's not go there.)
* '''Wireless:''' as in cordless phone. This is the bare minimum a phone has to have in order to be a mobile phone, so advertising it as a feature feels dated by decades.
* '''Accelerometer screams in free fall:''' A humorous function. Rather than having some sort of feature to prevent breakage or cracking when a drop is detected, the phone just makes you more aware of its potential imminent doom.
* '''When exposed to light, phone says "hi":''' Bait and switch, and also a build from the previous joke. The implied feature is that the screen or camera will automatically adjust, but instead the phone is weirdly anthropomorphized.

The ominous warnings and disclaimers in the title text are probably a reference to the ''Saturday Night Live'' parody ad for {{w|Happy Fun Ball}} ([http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/pictures/50-greatest-saturday-night-live-sketches-of-all-time-20140203/happy-fun-ball-0459912 original video hosted on rollingstone.com]).

* '''Presented in partnership with {{w|Qualcomm}}, {{w|Craigslist}}, Whirlpool, {{w|Hostess}}, LifeStyles, and the US Chamber of Commerce.''' Qualcomm is a semiconductor company that designs and produces chips for mobile phones. {{w|Whirlpool Corporation}} is a large American multinational manufacturer and marketer of home appliances, while {{w|Whirlpool (website)|Whirlpool}} is a prominent Australian tech forum website, originally created for discussion of Australian broadband providers but now extending to cover general tech topics, including mobile phones. The other companies mentioned here have no association with mobile phones, though there is a long history of unrelated companies attempting to leverage their respective brands to help promote each other.
* '''Manufactured on equipment which also processes peanuts.''' A warning often seen on candy and other foods for people with a peanut allergy. It is highly unlikely that equipment used to produce mobile phones would also process food.
* '''Price includes 2-year Knicks contract.''' Mobile phones are often sold by phone companies in combination with a cell phone plan, but a contract with the {{w|New_York_Knicks|Knicks}} would only appeal to pro basketball players.
* '''Phone may extinguish nearby birthday candles.''' A rather oddly specific capability, which might also be annoying for anyone attempting to host a birthday party. As to how it would do this, a very powerful directional speaker would be able to blow out a nearby candle, but the speakers in mobile phones aren't going to be that big.
* '''If phone ships with {{w|Siri}}, return immediately; do not speak to her and ignore any instructions she gives.''' {{w|Siri}} is a virtual personal assistant application for Apple devices. Not speaking to it and not following its instructions would defeat its purpose. It may suggest that a malevolent "Siri AI" has sneaked itself onto some devices, at the manufacturing stage, for some diabolical purpose. May be a reference to the Companion Cube in the game Portal, in which the player is instructed to disregard its advice if the cube appears to be animate.
* '''Do not remove lead casing.''' A mobile phone encased in lead would not function because it could not transmit or receive data. Devices that emit high levels of ionizing radiation are often encased in lead, but a phone that would emit that level of radiation would be unhealthy to carry around. If encased in sufficient lead to mitigate the danger, it would be uncomfortably heavy. This might be reference to [https://xkcd.com/925/ xkcd comic no 925: Cell phones] where Randall makes fun of the WHO claiming that cell phones might cause cancer despite huge studies showing the opposite. This could also mean the device is an actual bananaphone as regular phones emit no ionizing radiation ([http://xkcd.com/radiation xkcd Radiation Dose Chart]). Regrettably, the lead casing would render the phone inedible, although this somewhat mitigates the issues with having been manufactured on equipment that also processes peanuts.
* '''Phone may attract/trap insects; this is normal.''' Some plants, like the {{w|Venus_flytrap|Venus flytrap}}, attract and trap insects, but mobile phones are not known to exhibit this behaviour. May be a reference to {{w|Raspberry crazy ant}}s which are attracted to electronics.
* '''Volume adjustable (requires root).''' {{w|Android_rooting|Rooting}} is the method to gain privileged access on Android phones. Adjusting the volume should be available to any user and sould not be restricted to root access only.
* '''If you experience sudden tingling, nausea, or vomiting, perform a factory reset immediately.''' These symptoms are usually associated with chemical or radiation poisoning, or Cialis commercials. It is unclear why these would be cured by a {{w|Factory_reset|factory reset}}, though software apps could plausibly be used to display nauseating visual effects.
* '''Do not submerge in water; phone will drown.''' Most phones are not waterproof and will probably short-circuit when submerged. Drowning however, would imply that the phone breathes air (which actually would be possible if it had a {{w|Lithium–air battery|Li-air battery}}).
* '''Exterior may be frictionless.''' The front of a smartphone is usually made of glass and should have a surface with very low friction. The back of a phone is usually made from a material that has higher friction to make it pleasant to hold and to make sure it doesn't slide off objects it is placed on. A [[669: Experiment|completely frictionless surface]] would make it almost impossible to hold and would make it very susceptible to drops (at which point the phone will scream).
* '''Prolonged use can cause mood swings, short-term memory loss, and seizures.''' These are all side effects that are associated with certain kinds of medication or radiation treatment of the brain and would not be acceptable for mobile phones.
* '''Avert eyes while replacing battery.''' Actions that would warrant averting your eyes are usually associated with high-intensity light capable of causing eye damage. Depending on the specific energy source, this may be accompanied by high levels of other types of radiation (e.g. making an {{w|X-ray}} photo). This may hint that the phone might be powered by a radionuclide battery which would explain the lead casing and the possible radiation side effects. A phone that emits X-ray radiation would not be healthy to be around. Alternately, this may be a reference to the {{w|Ark_of_the_Covenant|Ark Of The Covenant}}, implying that gazing upon the battery or the compartment wall behind it is forbidden on pain of severe punishment. Or merely that with its back removed the phone would be naked, and the user should avert their eyes to preserve the phone's modesty.
* '''Under certain circumstances, wireless transmitter may control God.''' In the monotheistic religions, God is the omnipotent creator of the universe; the very notion that He could be controlled is both heretical and, under the definition of omnipotent, impossible.

==Transcript==
:Runs custom blend on Android and iOS
:Side-facing camera
:Simulates alternate speeds of light (default: 100 miles per hour) and adjusts clock as phone accelerates
:Clear screen
:Realistic case
:Wireless
:Accelerometer detects when phone is in free fall and makes it scream
:Flightaware partnership: Makes airplane noise when flights pass overhead
:When exposed to light, phone says "hi!"

:''Introducing''
:'''The xkcd phone'''
:Your mobile world just went digital®

{{comic discussion}}

1363: xkcd Phone

2014-05-22T00:33:16Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1363
| date = May 2, 2014
| title = xkcd Phone
| image = xkcd_phone.png
| titletext = Presented in partnership with Qualcomm, Craigslist, Whirlpool, Hostess, LifeStyles, and the US Chamber of Commerce. Manufactured on equipment which also processes peanuts. Price includes 2-year Knicks contract. Phone may extinguish nearby birthday candles. If phone ships with Siri, return immediately; do not speak to her and ignore any instructions she gives. Do not remove lead casing. Phone may attract/trap insects; this is normal. Volume adjustable (requires root). If you experience sudden tingling, nausea, or vomiting, perform a factory reset immediately. Do not submerge in water; phone will drown. Exterior may be frictionless. Prolonged use can cause mood swings, short-term memory loss, and seizures. Avert eyes while replacing battery. Under certain circumstances, wireless transmitter may control God.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a parody of a multitude of mobile-technology related issues that, when brought together, create a general satire of smartphone advertising. The advertised features here either make previously useful capabilities useless or add features nobody wants. Except for "your mobile world (going) digital", which is old news.

From bottom left, going clockwise:

* '''FlightAware partnership:''' This is a reference to the [http://www.flightaware.com/ FlightAware] flight tracking service. This FlightAware partnership results in the phone playing airplane engine noise whenever a flight passes over the phone's current location, an annoying and arbitrary feature. It may also be superfluous, as such noise may be heard from the plane itself, depending on altitude.
* '''Realistic case:''' possibly a joke on various audiovisual devices like gaming consoles that advertise realistic sound, graphics, etc. Of course, applying "realistic" to an actual physical case is ridiculous. Either the case is actually real, or it doesn't actually function as a case. Possible reference to [[331: Photoshops]], where [[Cueball]] finds a physical object to not look realistic.
* '''Clear screen:''' This is a pointless descriptor from the perspective of the consumer. Of course the screen is clear. This joke works in tandem with the previous joke, as a play on "clear case, realistic screen," which are both hypothetically viable selling points.
* '''Side Facing Camera:''' There was a recent controversy surrounding an [https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/spy-cam-peek-i Indiegogo for a surreptitious, side-mounted camera device] for smartphones due to the advertisement of the device as a good way to take creep shots, which are illegal in many places. Widespread dissemination of these devices as a built-in feature would likely result in a sharp increase in delinquency of this nature. May also be an ''ad absurdum'' extension of devices with both forward and backward facing cameras.
* '''Custom blend OS:''' iOS and Android are offered by different conglomerates and run on different kernels. A "custom blend" would probably be a nightmare to work with.
* '''Simulates alternative speed of light:''' This renders the clock useless as a means of telling time. The {{w|speed of light}} is 299,792,458 meters per second; relativistic effects, such as {{w|time dilation}}, are only noticeable at significant fractions of the speed of light. Since the phone is simulating a much slower speed of light, driving at even highway speeds will cause a significant amount of time dilation. For example, driving at 90mph (90% of the default simulated speed of light) will give a time dilation factor of about 2.29, causing the clock to advance only 26 minutes for each hour; driving at exactly 100mph makes the dilation factor infinite and will stop the clock entirely. Driving beyond 100mph would...make the clock start advancing through imaginary/complex time rather than real time. Somehow. (Let's not go there.)
* '''Wireless:''' as in cordless phone. This is the bare minimum a phone has to have in order to be a mobile phone, so advertising it as a feature feels dated by decades.
* '''Accelerometer screams in free fall:''' A humorous function. Rather than having some sort of feature to prevent breakage or cracking when a drop is detected, the phone just makes you more aware of its potential imminent doom.
* '''When exposed to light, phone says "hi":''' Bait and switch, and also a build from the previous joke. The implied feature is that the screen or camera will automatically adjust, but instead the phone is weirdly anthropomorphized.

The ominous warnings and disclaimers in the title text are probably a reference to the ''Saturday Night Live'' parody ad for {{w|Happy Fun Ball}} ([http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/pictures/50-greatest-saturday-night-live-sketches-of-all-time-20140203/happy-fun-ball-0459912 original video hosted on rollingstone.com]).

* '''Presented in partnership with {{w|Qualcomm}}, {{w|Craigslist}}, Whirlpool, {{w|Hostess}}, LifeStyles, and the US Chamber of Commerce.''' Qualcomm is a semiconductor company that designs and produces chips for mobile phones. {{w|Whirlpool Corporation}} is a large American multinational manufacturer and marketer of home appliances, while {{w|Whirlpool (website)|Whirlpool}} is a prominent Australian tech forum website, originally created for discussion of Australian broadband providers but now extending to cover general tech topics, including mobile phones. The other companies mentioned here have no association with mobile phones, though there is a long history of unrelated companies attempting to leverage their respective brands to help promote each other.
* '''Manufactured on equipment which also processes peanuts.''' A warning often seen on candy and other foods for people with a peanut allergy. It is highly unlikely that equipment used to produce mobile phones would also process food.
* '''Price includes 2-year Knicks contract.''' Mobile phones are often sold by phone companies in combination with a cell phone plan, but a contract with the {{w|New_York_Knicks|Knicks}} would only appeal to pro basketball players.
* '''Phone may extinguish nearby birthday candles.''' A rather oddly specific capability, which might also be annoying for anyone attempting to host a birthday party. As to how it would do this, a very powerful directional speaker would be able to blow out a nearby candle, but the speakers in mobile phones aren't going to be that big.
* '''If phone ships with {{w|Siri}}, return immediately; do not speak to her and ignore any instructions she gives.''' {{w|Siri}} is a virtual personal assistant application for Apple devices. Not speaking to it and not following its instructions would defeat its purpose. It may suggest that a malevolent "Siri AI" has sneaked itself onto some devices, at the manufacturing stage, for some diabolical purpose. May be a reference to the Companion Cube in the game Portal, in which the player is instructed to disregard its advice if the cube appears to be animate.
* '''Do not remove lead casing.''' A mobile phone encased in lead would not function because it could not transmit or receive data. Devices that emit high levels of ionizing radiation are often encased in lead, but a phone that would emit that level of radiation would be unhealthy to carry around. If encased in sufficient lead to mitigate the danger, it would be uncomfortably heavy. This might be reference to [https://xkcd.com/925/ xkcd comic no 925: Cell phones] where Randall makes fun of the WHO claiming that cell phones might cause cancer despite huge studies showing the opposite. This could also mean the device is an actual bananaphone as regular phones emit no ionizing radiation ([http://xkcd.com/radiation xkcd Radiation Dose Chart]). Regrettably, the lead casing would render the phone inedible, although this somewhat mitigates the issues with having been manufactured on equipment that also processes peanuts.
* '''Phone may attract/trap insects; this is normal.''' Some plants, like the {{w|Venus_flytrap|Venus flytrap}}, attract and trap insects, but mobile phones are not known to exhibit this behaviour. May be a reference to {{w|Raspberry crazy ant}}s which are attracted to electronics.
* '''Volume adjustable (requires root).''' {{w|Android_rooting|Rooting}} is the method to gain privileged access on Android phones. Adjusting the volume should be available to any user and sould not be restricted to root access only.
* '''If you experience sudden tingling, nausea, or vomiting, perform a factory reset immediately.''' These symptoms are usually associated with chemical or radiation poisoning, or Cialis commercials. It is unclear why these would be cured by a {{w|Factory_reset|factory reset}}, though software apps could plausibly be used to display nauseating visual effects.
* '''Do not submerge in water; phone will drown.''' Most phones are not waterproof and will probably short-circuit when submerged. Drowning however, would imply that the phone breathes air (which actually would be possible if it had a {{w|Lithium–air battery|Li-air battery}}).
* '''Exterior may be frictionless.''' The front of a smartphone is usually made of glass and should have a surface with very low friction. The back of a phone is usually made from a material that has higher friction to make it pleasant to hold and to make sure it doesn't slide off objects it is placed on. A [[669: Experiment|completely frictionless surface]] would make it almost impossible to hold and would make it very susceptible to drops (at which point the phone will scream).
* '''Prolonged use can cause mood swings, short-term memory loss, and seizures.''' These are all side effects that are associated with certain kinds of medication or radiation treatment of the brain and would not be acceptable for mobile phones.
* '''Avert eyes while replacing battery.''' Actions that would warrant averting your eyes are usually associated with high-intensity light capable of causing eye damage. Depending on the specific energy source, this may be accompanied by high levels of other types of radiation (e.g. making an {{w|X-ray}} photo). This may hint that the phone might be powered by a radionuclide battery which would explain the lead casing and the possible radiation side effects. A phone that emits X-ray radiation would not be healthy to be around. Alternately, this may be a reference to the {{w|Ark_of_the_Covenant|Ark Of The Covenant}}, implying that gazing upon the battery or the compartment wall behind it is forbidden on pain of severe punishment. Or merely that with its back removed the phone would be naked, and the user should avert their eyes to preserve the phone's modesty.
* '''Under certain circumstances, wireless transmitter may control God.''' In the monotheistic religions, God is the omnipotent creator of the universe; the very notion that He could be controlled is both heretical and, under the definition of omnipotent, impossible.

==Transcript==
:Runs custom blend on Android and iOS
:Side-facing camera
:Simulates alternate speeds of light (default: 100 miles per hour) and adjusts clock as phone accelerates
:Clear screen
:Realistic case
:Wireless
:Accelerometer detects when phone is in free fall and makes it scream
:Flightaware partnership: Makes airplane noise when flights pass overhead
:When exposed to light, phone says "hi!"

:''Introducing''
:'''The xkcd phone'''
:Your mobile world just went digital®

{{comic discussion}}

1369: TMI

2014-05-18T02:39:20Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1369
| date = May 16, 2014
| title = TMI
| image = tmi.png
| titletext = 'TMI' he whispered, gazing into the sea.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Final review mode now; we're close but not quite there yet}}
"TMI" is an acronym that means "too much information". It is typically used as a response to someone "oversharing" — telling details (usually gross, boring, or otherwise unpleasant) that the listener would rather not have heard. Here, however, [[Cueball]] may be using it in a more literal and absolute sense: he feels {{w|Information overload|overwhelmed by the colossal amount of information}} that is now generally available to anyone with an Internet connection. Additionally, he could be disgusted by how ridiculous the Internet is.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is sitting at a desk, looking at a laptop.]
:Cueball: Ugh, TMI.

:Offscreen: Oh? What?

:Cueball: Just... Everything.
:Offscreen: ''True.''

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

1369: TMI

2014-05-16T08:31:10Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 1369
| date = May 16, 2014
| title = TMI
| image = tmi.png
| titletext = 'TMI' he whispered, gazing into the sea.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page.}}
"TMI" is an acronym that means "too much information". It is typically used as a response to someone telling you details that you would prefer to have no heard. Here, however, Cueball is using it to voice his frustrations: he feels stressed and overwhelmed with whatever his job is.

==Transcript==
Cueball is at a desk looking at a laptop
:Cueball: Ugh, TMI.
:Someone Off-panel: Oh? What?
:Cueball: Just... Everything.
:Someone Off-panel: True.

{{comic discussion}}

1047: Approximations

2014-05-16T02:46:46Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */ The discussion and the article seem to have reached a consensus about the "protip equations", and that we've solved it

{{comic
| number = 1047
| date = April 25, 2012
| title = Approximations
| image = approximations.png
| titletext = Two tips: 1) 8675309 is not just prime, it's a twin prime, and 2) if you ever find yourself raising log(anything)^e or taking the pi-th root of anything, set down the marker and back away from the whiteboard; something has gone horribly wrong.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic lists some approximations for numbers, most of them mathematical and physical constants. All of them work astonishingly well. There are reoccurring math jokes along the lines of, “3/5 + π/(7 – π) – √2 = 0, but your calculator is probably not good enough to compute this correctly”, which are mainly used to troll geeks.

Furthermore, there are some useful approximations (which were even more useful in times before calculators) such as “pi is approximately equal to 22/7”.

[[Randall]] makes fun of both of these, using rather strange approximations (honestly: you may handle 22/7, but who can calculate in a sensible way with 99^8, let alone 30^(pi^e)?) to calculate some constants that are easy enough to handle in the decimal system, and stating such “slightly wrong” trick equations, one of which ''is'' actually correct (which may astonish only those who are not familiar with cosines).

There are a few cultural references in this comic:

*998 and 698 are sexual references.
*“Rent Method” refers to the song “Seasons of Love” from the musical “{{w|Rent (musical)|Rent}}.” The song asks, “How do you measure a year?” One line says “525,600 minutes” while most of the rest of the song suggests the best way to measure a year is moments shared with a loved one.
*(202) 456-1414 is the phone number for the White House switchboard. Truncated, Randall's formula yields 0.2024561414.
*Jenny's constant comes from Tommy Tutone's tune {{w|867-5309/Jenny}}. Randall's formula gives approximately 867.530901981685.
*{{w|42 (number)|42}} is, according to Douglas Adams' ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'', the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.

And here are some of the mathematical and physical ones, with Wikipedia links.

*Informally, the {{w|Planck constant}} is the smallest action possible in quantum mechanics.
*The {{w|fine structure constant}} indicates the strength of electromagnetism. It is unitless and around 0.007297, close to 1/137. At one point it was believed to be exactly the reciprocal of 137, and many people have tried to find a simple formula explaining this (with a pinch of {{w|numerology}} thrown in at times), including the infamous {{w|Arthur Eddington|Sir Arthur Adding-One}}.
*In {{w|mathematics}}, the {{w|Euler-Mascheroni constant}} (Euler gamma constant) is a mysterious number describing the relationship between the {{w|Harmonic series (mathematics)|harmonic series}} and the {{w|natural logarithm}}.
*The {{w|gravitational constant}} relates to, uh, gravity.
*The {{w|gas constant}} relates energy to temperature in physics, as well as a gas's volume, pressure, temperature and {{w|mole (unit)|molar amount}} (hence the name).
*ϕ is the {{w|golden ratio}}, or (1 + √5)/2. It has many interesting geometrical properties.
*The ruby laser wavelength varies because “ruby” is not clearly defined.
*The {{w|Earth radios#mean radii|mean earth radius}} varies because there is not one single way to make a sphere out of the earth. Randall's value lies within the actual variation of Earth's radius.

The correct equation in the "Pro tip - Not all of these are wrong" section is cos(pi/7) + cos(3pi/7) + cos(5pi/7) = 1/2 as [http://math.stackexchange.com/questions/140388/how-can-one-prove-cos-pi-7-cos3-pi-7-cos5-pi-7-1-2 shown here]. If you're still confused, the functions use {{w|radians}}, not {{w|degrees (angle)|degrees}}.

The number 8675309 at the title text refers to the song 867-5309/Jenny as mentioned above, causing a fad of people dialing this number and asking for "Jenny". The number is in fact a {{w|twin prime}} because 8675311 is also a prime. Twin primes have always been a subject of interest, because they are comparatively rare, and because it is not yet known whether there are infinitely many of them.

{{w|Pi}} is a natural constant that arises in describing circles or ellipses. As such, useful as it may be, it doesn't usually occur anywhere in an exponent. When it does, such as with complex numbers, taking the pi-th root is rarely helpful. For example, if we try to derive:

''e''π''i'' + 1 = 0

''e''π''i'' = -1

(''e''''i'')π = -1

''e''''i'' = π√(-1)

We get nowhere.

Same goes for the e-th power: e typically appears in the basis of a power (forming the {{w|exponential function}}), not in the exponent. (This is later referenced in [http://what-if.xkcd.com/73/ Lethal Neutrinos]).

The software referred to in the comic is [http://mrob.com/pub/ries/ ries], a 'reverse calculator' which forms equations matching a given number.
:{| class="wikitable"
|-
|colspan="2" align="center"|Actual
|colspan="2" align="center"|Approximation
|-
|align="center"|One light year(m)
|align="center"|9.46x1015
|align="center"|998
|align="center"|9.23x1015
|-
|align="center"|Earth Surface(m2)
|align="center"|
|align="center"|698
|align="center"|
|-
|align="center"|Ocean's volume(m3)
|align="center"|
|align="center"|919
|align="center"|
|-
|align="center"|Seconds in a year
|align="center"|31557600
|align="center"|754
|align="center"|31640625
|-
|align="center"|Seconds in a year (rent method)
|align="center"|31557600
|align="center"|525,600 x 60
|align="center"|31536000
|-
|align="center"|Age of the universe (seconds)
|align="center"|
|align="center"|1515
|align="center"|4.379x1017
|-
|align="center"|Planck's constant
|align="center"|6.626x10-34
|align="center"|1/(30πe)
|align="center"|6.685x10-34
|-
|align="center"|Fine structure constant
|align="center"|7.297x10-3
|align="center"|1/140
|align="center"|7.143x10-3
|-
|align="center"|Fundamental charge
|align="center"|1.602x10-19
|align="center"|3/(14πππ)
|align="center"|1.599x10-19
|}

After this comic was released [[Randall]] got many responses by viewers. So he did add this statement to the top of the comic page:
*"Lots of emails mention the physicist favorite, 1 year = pi x 107 seconds. 754 is a hair more accurate, but it's hard to top 3,141,592's elegance."
One non leap year is exactly 31,536,000 seconds, pi x 107 is nearly equal to 31,415,926.536, and 754 is exactly 31,640,625. Randall's elegance belongs to the number pi, but it should be multiplied by the factor of ten.

==Transcript==
:'''A table of slightly wrong equations and identities useful for approximations and/or trolling teachers.'''
:(Found using a mix of trial-and-error, ''Mathematica'', and Robert Munafo's ''Ries'' tool.)
: All units are SI MKS unless otherwise noted.

:{| class="wikitable"
|-
|colspan="2" align="center" | Relation:
|align="center" | Accurate to within:
|-
|align="center" | One light year(m)
|align="center" | 998
|align="center" | one part in 40
|-
|align="center" | Earth Surface(m2)
|align="center" | 698
|align="center" | one part in 130
|-
|align="center" | Ocean's volume(m3)
|align="center" | 919
|align="center" | one part in 70
|-
|align="center" | Seconds in a year
|align="center" | 754
|align="center" | one part in 400
|-
|align="center" | Seconds in a year (rent method)
|align="center" | 525,600 x 60
|align="center" | one part in 1400
|-
|align="center" | Age of the universe (seconds)
|align="center" | 1515
|align="center" | one part in 70
|-
|align="center" | Planck's constant
|align="center" | 1/(30πe)
|align="center" | one part in 110
|-
|align="center" | Fine structure constant
|align="center" | 1/140
|align="center" | [I've had enough of this 137 crap]
|-
|align="center" | Fundamental charge
|align="center" | 3/(14 * πππ)
|align="center" | one part in 500
|-
|align="center"|White House Switchboard
|colspan="2" align="center"|1/ 
π√(e(1 + (e-1)√8)
|-
|align="center"|Jenny's Constant
|colspan="2" align="center"|(7(e/1 - 1/e) - 9) * π2
|-
|colspan="3" align="center"|Intermission: World Population Estimate which should stay current for a decade or two: 
Take the last two digits of the current year

Example: 20[14]

Subtract the number of leap years since hurricane Katrina

Example:14 (minus 2008 and 2012) is 12

Add a decimal point

Example: 1.2

Add 6

Example: 6 + 1.2

7.2 = World population in billions.

Version for US population:

Example: 20[14]

Subtract 10

Example: 4

Multiply by 3

Example: 12

Add 10

Example: 3[22] million
|-
|align="center"|Electron rest energy
|align="center"|e/716 Joules
|align="center"|one part in 1000
|-
|align="center"|Light-year(miles)
|align="center"|2(42.42)
|align="center"|one part in 1000
|-
|colspan="2" align="center"|sin(60°) = 3√/2 = e/π
|align="center"|one part in 1000
|-
|colspan="2" align="center"|√3 = 2e/π
|align="center"|one part in 1000
|-
|align="center"|gamma(Euler's gamma constant)
|align="center"|1/√3
|align="center"|One part in 4000
|-
|align="center"|Feet in a meter
|align="center"|5/(e√π)
|align="center"|one part in 4000
|-
|colspan="2" align="center"|√5 = 2/e + 3/2
|align="center"|one part in 7000
|-
|align="center"|Avogadro's number
|align="center"|69π√5
|align="center"|one part in 25,000
|-
|align="center"|Gravitational constant G
|align="center"|1 / e(pi - 1)(pi + 1)
|align="center"|one part in 25,000
|-
|align="center"|R(gas constant)
|align="center"|(e+1) √5
|align="center"|one part in 50,000
|-
|align="center"|Proton-electron mass ratio
|align="center"|6*π5
|align="center"|one part in 50,000
|-
|align="center"|Liters in a gallon
|align="center"|3 + π/4
|align="center"|one part in 500,000
|-
|align="center"|g
|align="center"|6 + ln(45)
|align="center"|one part in 750,000
|-
|align="center"|Proton-electron mass ratio
|align="center"|e8 - 10 / ϕ
|align="center"|one part in 5,000,000
|-
|align="center"|Ruby laser wavelength
|align="center"|1 / (12002)
|align="center"|[within actual variation]
|-
|align="center"|Mean Earth Radius
|align="center"|(58)*6e
|align="center"|[within actual variation]
|-
|colspan="3" align="center"|Protip - not all of these are wrong:
|-
|colspan="2" align="center"|√2 = 3/5 + π/(7-π)
|align="center"|cos(π/7) + cos(3π/7) + cos(5π/7) = 1/2
|-
|align="center"|γ(Euler's gamma constant) = e/34 + e/5
|align="center"|√5 = 13 + 4π / 24 - 4π
|align="center"|Σ 1/nn = ln(3)e
|}

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Physics]]
[[Category:Protip]]

1364: Like I'm Five

2014-05-14T19:42:41Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1364
| date = May 5, 2014
| title = Like I'm Five
| image = like_im_five.png
| titletext = 'Am I taking care of you? I have a thesis to write!' 'My parents are at their house; you visited last--' 'No, no, explain like you're five.'
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|The explain and the title text need some more rework.}}

"Explain like I'm five" is a way of asking for a simpler explanation of some difficult topic -- a concept Randal has explored [[1133: Up Goer Five|previously]]. This is inspired (and apparently misquoted) by the [http://muse.tau.ac.il/maslool/boidem/54groucho.html famous quote] "''Why a four-year-old child could understand this report! Run out and find me a four-year-old child, I can't make head or tail of it''" (Groucho Marx, Duck Soup, 1933).

"Explain like I'm Five" is most notable on the highly popular subreddit [http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/ explain like im five], which incidentally bills itself as "not for literal five-year-olds."

As for the actual comic, Megan takes it literally by acting as if Cueball is an actual five year old. A five-year-old kid standing miles away from home without his parents talking to a strange woman is worrying, so Megan pretends to panic and asks where his parents are.

The title text is a continuation of the literalism. When Cueball attempts to respond to Megan's questions, she asks him to also speak as if he is five.
:Megan: Am I taking care of you? I have a thesis to write!
:Cueball: My parents are at their house; you visited last--
:Megan: No, no, explain like you're five.

==Transcript==
:Cueball: What've you been up to?
:Megan: Doing tons of math for my thesis.
:Cueball: Can you explain it like I'm five?
:Megan: "Oh my god, where are your parents?"

==External links==
*[http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/ A thread with heavy traffic on Reddit after this comic was published.]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:My_Hobby]]

1366: Train

2014-05-11T01:20:55Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 1366
| date = May 9, 2014
| title = Train
| image = train.png
| titletext = Trains rotate the Earth around various axes while elevators shift its position in space.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic, which appeared the day before {{w|National Train Day}}, plays on the fact that a choice of a {{w|Inertial frame of reference|reference frame}} is arbitrary, a {{w|Principle of relativity|basic principle}} in {{w|Albert Einstein}}'s theories of {{w|special relativity}} and {{w|general relativity}}. But at speeds much lower than the speed of light it also applies to the {{w|Classical mechanics|newtonian mechanics}}.

Rather than viewing this situation as a train causing itself to move relative to an immobile Earth, [[Randall]] provides the unconventional perspective of a train remaining fixed in space while causing the Earth itself and all the stars in the sky to rotate instead. In principle either perspective is equally valid (though in practice different trains often move in mutually-exclusive directions, thus each train would have to define its own frame of reference). There is a quotation, attributed to Einstein, that he once asked a ticket collector, "What time does Oxford stop at this train?"

From the Newtonian perspective this choice of frame is valid, but results in unnecessarily complicated maths; the equation of motion would include terms for centrifugal, Coriolis and other so-called "fictional forces" see [[123: Centrifugal Force]]. Newton supposes the existence of "inertial frames", in which these forces are zero, and the surface of the Earth approximates an inertial frame well. In General Relativity, the presence of mass in a system curves the {{w|spacetime}} around of it. The train-earth system could be modeled in general relativity, taking the train as fixed. However the resulting equations would be complex, and not amenable to an exact solution

The title text takes this further by saying that elevators do the same thing by pulling the Earth up and down, rather than moving up and down by themselves.

These examples use the train and the elevator as fixed points to define relative travel. The more common method to define movement is to use the Earth's surface as fixed point, but other reference points could be the {{w|Earth's_rotation|Earth's center}}, the {{w|Earth's_orbit|Sun}}, predefined {{w|Fixed_star|"fixed" stars}} or the {{w|Galactic_year|center of our galaxy}}. Each of these would result in a completely different movement speed:
* The speed of the train (stationary on the equator) relative to the earth's center: 465 m/s (1,674 km/h or 1,040 mph)
* The speed of the train (on earth) relative to the sun: 30 km/s (108,000 km/h or 67,000 mph)
* The speed of the train (on earth) relative the center of our galaxy: 220 km/s (828,000 km/h or 514,000 mph)

The train, as seen from the earth's surface, doesn't seem to rotate the earth, but it does in fact have a minute, immeasurable effect on the Earth's rotation (see [http://what-if.xkcd.com/41/ what-if? 41: Go West] and [[162: Angular Momentum|comic 162: Angular Momentum]]).

==Transcript==
:'''TRAIN:'''
:[On the upper edge of a circle representing the Earth in a wrong scale, Cueball is in a train car, looking to his left.]
:Cueball:...almost...
:[The train tracks run between another person standing at the 2:00 position, and Hairy standing at the 9:30 position. There's yet another person standing at the 6:00 position, between some snow-capped mountains and some low hills.]
:[There's a counterclockwise arrow in the middle of the circle, and motion lines indicate that everyone and everything on the planet is moving counterclockwise, except for the train, which is motionless.]

:A machine that grabs the Earth by metal rails and rotates it until the part you want is near you

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Physics]]

1366: Train

2014-05-10T03:15:11Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1366
| date = May 9, 2014
| title = Train
| image = train.png
| titletext = Trains rotate the Earth around various axes while elevators shift its position in space.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|How does it work in general relativity? A falling elevator would be valid but not the one which is moving in reality.}}

This comic plays on the fact that a choice of a {{w|Inertial frame of reference|reference frame}} is arbitrary, a {{w|Principle of relativity|basic principle}} in {{w|Albert Einstein}}'s theories of {{w|special relativity}} and {{w|general relativity}}. But at speeds much lower than the speed of light it also applies to the {{w|Classical mechanics|newtonian mechanics}}.

Rather than viewing this situation as a train causing itself to move relative to an immobile Earth, [[Randall]] provides the unconventional perspective of a train remaining fixed in space while causing the Earth itself and all the stars in the sky to rotate instead. In principle either perspective is equally valid (though in practice different trains often move in mutually-exclusive directions, which would cause jams in Randall's viewpoint).

The title text takes this further by saying that elevators do the same thing by pulling the Earth up and down, rather than moving up and down by themselves.

These examples use the train and the elevator as fixed points to define relative travel. The more common method to define movement is to use the Earth's surface as fixed point, but other reference points could be the {{w|Earth's_rotation|Earth's center}}, the {{w|Earth's_orbit|Sun}}, predefined {{w|Fixed_star|"fixed" stars}} or the {{w|Galactic_year|center of our galaxy}}. Each of these would result in a completely different movement speed:
* The speed of the train (stationary on the equator) relative to the earth's center: 465 m/s
* The speed of the train (on earth) relative to the sun: 29.78 km/s
* The speed of the train (on earth) relative the center of our galaxy: 220 km/s

The trains would, however, have a minute, immeasurable effect on the Earth's rotation (see [http://what-if.xkcd.com/41/ what-if? 41: Go West] and [[162: Angular Momentum|comic 162: Angular Momentum]]).

==Transcript==
:'''TRAIN:'''
:[On the upper edge of a circle representing the Earth in a wrong scale, Cueball is in a train car, looking to his left.]
:Cueball:...almost...
:[The train tracks run between another person standing at the 2:00 position, and Hairy standing at the 9:30 position. There's yet another person standing at the 6:00 position, between some snow-capped mountains and some low hills.]
:[There's a counterclockwise arrow in the middle of the circle, and motion lines indicate that everyone and everything on the planet is moving counterclockwise, except for the train, which is motionless.]

:A machine that grabs the Earth by metal rails and rotates it until the part you want is near you

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Physics]]

1366: Train

2014-05-09T10:49:14Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1366
| date = May 9, 2014
| title = Train
| image = train.png
| titletext = Trains rotate the Earth around various axes while elevators shift its position in space.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|First explain - please check or correct anything I may have done wrong.}}

This comic plays on the way everything in the universe can be viewed from a relativistic perspective. Rather than viewing it as the train moving itself relative to Earth, Randall explains it as trains moving the Earth relative to itself.

The title text takes this further by saying that elevators do the same thing by pulling the Earth up and down, rather than moving up and down by themselves.

These examples use the train and the elevator as fixed points to define relative travel. The more common method to define movement is to use the earths surface as fixed point, but other reference points could be the {{w|Earth's_rotation|earths center}}, the {{w|Sun|sun}}, predefined {{w|Fixed_star|"fixed" stars}} or the {{w|Galactic_Center|center of our galaxy}}. Each of these would result in a completely different movement speed. It should also be noted that the comic's logic only holds true for single, isolated trains; if all the trains on the planet were actually causing rotation than their mutually exclusive directions would cause jams.

==Transcript==

TRAIN:

''A picture of a tiny planet (presumably meant to be Earth) with [[Cueball]] on the south, [[Hairy]] on the right, and [[Megan]] on the left. At the top is a train on tracks with another cueball in it.''

A machine that grabs the
Earth by metal rails and
rotates it until the part
you want is near you

{{comic discussion}}

1364: Like I'm Five

2014-05-05T08:09:55Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

Talk:24: Godel, Escher, Kurt Halsey

2014-05-03T18:51:09Z

199.27.130.204:

I have been told during editing comic [[287]] that the trivia should be below the transcript. But can see here that this is not always the case. As I have stated in the talk on that comic it would make so much more sense to have the interesting trivia above the (in most cases) uninteresting transcript. I only look into the last if I cannot easily read the text. But the trivia info is always interesting to me. And often the transcript is long enough that I would not notice a trivia entry below. I may now know better, but new users may overlook interesting bits of info. If there is a "rule" I would suggest it was changed to the format that this comic had when I wrote this entry. Trivia before transcript. (Written here only because it is todays [[explain xkcd:Incomplete Explanation of the Day |Incomplete Explanation of the Day]]). [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:07, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
:The trivia section doesn't belong to any explanation. Like other wikis do, it's at the bottom of the page. If there is important content belonging to the explain section it has to be moved. Trivia means triviality and contains only some sidesteps to some similar issues or even more. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:54, 14 March 2014 (UTC)
::Agree but the trivia header makes that clear. The transcript is not a normal part of wikis so could have been at the bottom. That is just my opinion. I will not move any trivia sections! And I can see you have corrected the error here so the trivia is now at the bottom. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 10:59, 16 March 2014 (UTC)
:::This layout isn't an invention by me. But I think that it's correct to show some remarks, but if it doesn't explain the comic it belongs to a special section at the bottom. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:07, 16 March 2014 (UTC)
This comic is on the "incomplete explanation of the day" like twice a week these days. Is everyone just like me and literally helpless? Because we didn't have this problem when the two Online Communities were undergoing rewrites [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.204|199.27.130.204]] 18:51, 3 May 2014 (UTC)

987: Potential

2014-05-03T18:01:27Z

199.27.130.204: I'm stumped

{{comic
| number = 987
| date = December 7, 2011
| title = Potential
| image = potential.png
| titletext = The bunch of disadvantaged kids I was tutoring became too good at writing, and their essays were forcing me to confront painful existential questions, so I started trying to turn them on to drugs and crime instead.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete| Doesn't explain the title text}}

This comic jokes about what a student could potentially create if they were working at their full potential. Instead of something like a better essay or a better {{w|science fair}} project, this student creates a 6-legged, car-destroying, helicopter-shooting monster robot.

The title text is a similar, more grounded scenario.

The moral of the comic is for students to not live up to their potential, because the havoc that results from doing so far outweighs the benefits of lethargy.

==Transcript==
:Narrator: When teachers complain, "You're not working at your full potential!"
:[Explosion in background.]

:Narrator: Don't take it too hard.
:[Car casually spirals through the air while a crash is heard in the background.]

:Narrator: They complain ''way'' more when you do.
:[A mechanized, 6-tentacled robot rampages around, picking up cars and creating a small warzone before the student inside while the lamentations of people and the building of military forces are in the background.]
:Throughout the third frame: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!
:In the control center of the robot: Click, beep, whirr
:Out-of-frame: It's headed this way!
:Ponytail: Somebody stop him!

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

Talk:1292: Pi vs. Tau

2014-05-03T05:07:04Z

199.27.130.204:

I started an explanation. Hopefully others will help improve it, as I don't think it's quite adequate. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.174|199.27.130.174]] 05:32, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

The comic currently shows the symbol π (pi) in all three cases, but it should have the symbol τ (tau) in the rightmost case. I'm sure there is a compromise symbol "pau" too. Maybe with a deformed left leg? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.97.4|141.101.97.4]] 07:07, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

WolframAlpha gives
<pre>
4.5545743763144164456766617143366171162404440766665105335330776311513504520604364524762740226212061363100001776216741750712622557020442741544760057441760026766230424023460366047331305225241275347777145543054127636365666430221066167347236617261603127725745513663702031155234027041040155322217227723576660045156156303357534162372112340027743775672417274565277274565735325624457113522164166560115654407251403563246444122664066521461311773474046032763760765740133706761276420415672577471077133607673035331070364705651055376634161405567176532346433567731715723623721267302576735154761375545411215522177775706407470673020025353246535120744232706060324711633457720155013202527060250466252665661576165164140301645132275526153126363575631176312270212441433434206352313125326760006365710744276056412434626534152021052065172556442150110056601034116570607064550553636566432544260105637423220411372664024454234201642615033200331506013362432026775605543212342336511350621361642654426372425415023071413764173735461042064323757413414533013..._8</pre> which does indeed have four 666 sequences. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.254|141.101.99.254]] 08:06, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
This number contains 7777, 000 and 444 twice, though. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.93.11|141.101.93.11]] 09:08, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Wrote the transcript, not sure if I explained the visual well enough, so I left the incomplete tag if someone else has a better idea. Should suffice for understanding however, considering the content [[Special:Contributions/108.162.248.18|108.162.248.18]] 08:55, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

----

(The discussion about different results was trimmed)

Wolfram gives the result with 666

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=1.5+pi+octal
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777714554305412763636566643022
</pre>
The Unix arbitrary precision calculator gives the result without

$ echo "scale=200; obase=8; 6*a(1)" | bc -l
<pre>
4.554574376314416443236234514475050122425471573015650314763354527003043167712611655054674757031331252340351471657646433317273112431020107644727072362457372164022043765215506554422014311615574251563446213636251744101107770257
</pre>
Any suggestions how we can check them?

"Randall says so" is probably correct, but insufficient :-) {{unsigned|Mike}}

:Please use the <nowiki><pre></nowiki> tag for this long numbers.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 09:20, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Testing Wolfram Alpha with <pre>4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000177621674175071262255_8 in decimal</pre> and <pre>4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000_8 in decimal</pre> both indicate the approximation is only accurate to a limited degree.
<pre>
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000177621674175071262255_8+in+decimal
</pre>
<pre>
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000177621674175071262255_8+in+decimal
</pre>

The method I used to get the value I put in the text was; I used the following command to generate my approximation:
<pre>echo 'scale=200; obase=8; a(1) * 6' | bc -l | tr -d ' \\\n' ; echo</pre> which outputs<pre>
4.554574376314416443236234514475050122425471573015650314763354527003043167712611655054674757031331252340351471657646433317273112431020107644727072362457372164022043765215506554422014311615574251563446213636251744101107770257
</pre>
In 'bc'', a(1) is arctangent of 1 (i.e. 45 degrees, or pi/4); (pi/4 * 6) should be equal to 'pau'. I additionally checked the result using base 2 encoding, and converted each three bit binary value into an octal value. The decimal value of pi (using a(1) * 4) matches with the value of pi to at lease 1000 digits.
[[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.86|173.245.54.86]] 09:21, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Both Maxima and the GNU Emacs calculator output as the first 1000 octal digits:
<pre>
4.5545743763144164432362345144750501224254715730156503147633545270030431677126116550546747570313312523403514716576464333172731124310201076447270723624573721640220437652155065544220143116155742515634462136362517441011077702611156024117447125224176203716336742057353303216470257662666744627534325504334506002730517102547504145216661211250027531716641276765735563341721214013553453654106045245066401141437740626707757305450703606440651111775270032710035521352101513622062164457304326450524432531652666626042202562202550566425643040556365710250031642467447605663240661743600041052212627767073277600402572027316222345356036301002572541750000114422036312122341474267232761775450071652613627306745074150251171507720277250030270442257106542456441722455345340370205646442156334125564557520336340223313312556634450170626417234376702443117031135045420165467426237454754566012204316130023063506430063362203021262434464410604275224606523356702572610031171344411766505734615256121034660773306140032365326415773227551
</pre>
This also agrees with the first 220 digits of the previous result (last two digits above are 57 vs 61 here, maybe due to rounding when converting to octal). Again, no 666 within the first 200 digits. The Wolfram result deviates from this at the 18th digit already. --[[User:Ulm|ulm]] ([[User talk:Ulm|talk]]) 10:21, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Also e+2 does not contain the substring '666':
<pre>echo "scale=200; obase=8; e(1) + 2" | bc -l</pre>
<pre>4.55760521305053551246527734254200471723636166134705407470551551265170233101050620637674622347347044466373713722774330661414353543664033100253542141365517370755272577262541110317650765740633550205306625</pre>--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 10:43, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

: A sudden flash of realization: are we getting nerd-sniped here?--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.254.168|108.162.254.168]] 11:55, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

::Not unlikely. Have posted this as a trivia. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:11, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

: The claim is clearly about e+2, making Dgbrt's comment closest to the right direction. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.40|173.245.54.40]] 12:03, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

When I take Wolfram alpha's octal(pi*1.5) I get the first 303 (base 10) characters as this:
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777714554305412763636566643022106616734723661726160312772574551366370203115523402704104015532221722772357666
</pre>
200(base 10) is 310(base 8) so in the fist '200' characters, 666 shows up 4 times (5 if you count 6666 as twice?) [[User:Xami|Xami]] ([[User talk:Xami|talk]]) 14:01, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

: The Wolfram result is what you get when you calculate pi*3/2 in decimal, round to 14 digits after the decimal point and then convert to octal. That is, 4.7123889803846910 converted to octal. Definitely, this won't give you 200 digits precision. --[[User:Ulm|ulm]] ([[User talk:Ulm|talk]]) 15:15, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
:: It lines up too perfectly to be a coincidence. It fits all the requirements: has 666 four times within 2008 digits, and although 0000, 222, 444, and 7777 appear, they only appear once as a run. You can't double count 7777 as two 777's because it is a single run. If WolframAlpha doesn't give the correct precision, it is likely that Randall made the same error. --[[User:RainbowDash|RainbowDash]] ([[User talk:RainbowDash|talk]]) 16:59, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Being τ, tau, is already being expressed in terms of π, pi, it shows bias. (Though I think Pau would lead to some interesting spherical geometry equations. ~~Drifter {{unsigned ip|108.162.219.214}}

The bias is worse than that: From the perspective of π, the discussion is about multiples of π, so (3/2)π (that is 3π/2 = 3τ/4) is indeed the compromise between π and 2π. But from the perspective of τ, the discussion is about fractions of τ, so the compromise between τ and τ/2 is τ/(3/2) (that is 2τ/3 = 4π/3). Maybe we can call this ‘ti’ (or ‘tie’, pace 173.245.53.184 below). —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 20:47, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Actually, both compromises are wrong. (3/2)π is the arithmetic mean of π and τ, while τ/(3/2) is their harmonic mean. But for geometric ratios (which these are), the appropriate mean is generally the geometric mean (hence the name). You can see how even-handed this is: it's (√2)π = τ/(√2). —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 20:50, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

---

I am in favour of just calling it ti(e). --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.184|173.245.53.184]] 17:52, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

---

There are real world uses to both Tau and Pi: Pi is the number that relates to what you get when you measure a circle (the distanced around divided by the distance across); and Tau is get when you draw a circle (the distance around divided by the distance from the center). It is the difference between a mic (aka "micrometer" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micrometer ) and a protractor. Tau might have some mathematical advantages in both 2D and 3D in that it has no integer attached to it to find either circumference (2D) or surface area (3D) which makes radians and solid angles simpler. However, that advantage is lost in other dimensions and for the area of a circle.

Pau, of course, has a 61% chance of going to the dribbling spheroid hall of fame. (ref: http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/g/gasolpa01.html ), to which neither Tau nor Pi can hold a candle.~~Remo ( [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.183|199.27.128.183]] 19:19, 18 November 2013 (UTC) )

---

The differences between Wolfram and BC really bothered me since I have used both for precision calculation in the past. The long and short of the matter, having done most of the maths 'long hand', BC is correct, Wolfram is wrong, and sadly, Randall was also wrong. It seems as tho Wolfram is rounding pi*1.5 to around 15 decimals but leaving the 9 repeating before converting to Octal.

If you take the output of octal(pi * 1.5) and paste it back into the input like so:
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777_8
</pre>
Wolfram gives you back (converted to decimal):
<pre>
4.71238898038468999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
</pre>
If you give that same input to BC and ask it to convert to decimal you get:
<pre>
4.712388980384689999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999992894219160392567888
</pre>
If you do the math long hand out to 55 decimal places, pi * 1.5 equals:
<pre>
4.712388980384689857693965074919254326295754099062658731462416...
</pre>
Converting that by hand into octal is a bit of a pain, but if you do, at the 18th decimal place where BC and Wolfram differ you end up with the following:
<pre>
0.000000000000000183697019872102976583909889841150158731462416... is your remainder to be converted so far
0.000000000000000055511151231257827021181583404541015625 = 8 ^ -18
</pre>
Wolfram gives the 18th decimal as 5, BC as 3. I can't see 5 going into 18 5 times, but 3 times fits nicely.
--[[User:DarkJMKnight|DarkJMKnight]] ([[User talk:DarkJMKnight|talk]]) 20:04, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Looks like Wolfram is simply using floating-point mathematics, presumably the IEEE "double precision". Interestingly, this is not the first time floating-point maths has been a problem; in [[287]], a similar problem caused an unintended trivial solution. [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 04:41, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
* On second thoughts, there's no indication that he used Wolfram Alpha; as with [[287]], it simply could have been a Perl script (or Python or pretty much any programming language). [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 05:25, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

---

How can 200 be octal and then mean 310 decimal???
If 200 were octal, that would be 128 decimal, so we would end up writing 128 decimals.
Of course 310 octal is 200 decimal, but taking 2008 to mean 31010 is plain crazy, even if it's the only way to make it fit the "four times 666" constraint!
What am I missing here? [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.149|173.245.53.149]] 21:27, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

This Mathematica code searches for the pattern 666 in the octal expansion of 1.5 pi:
<pre>digits = RealDigits[3*Pi/2, 8, 10000][[1]]; Select[Range[10000 - 2], Take[digits, {#, # + 2}] == {6, 6, 6} &]
{279, 326, 495, 496, 3430, 3728, 4153, 6040, 7031, 7195, 7647, 7732, 8353, 8435, 8436, 8575, 8768, 9008}</pre>
These positions start counting with the leading "4" as position 1. It does not occur in the first 200 digits, but occurs 18 times in the first 10,000 digits. Many other digit combinations occur more times in the first 10,000 digits, including "123" (23 times), "222" (21 times), and "555" (26 times). Note that "xkcd" converted to numbers (a=1, b=2, etc.) is 24, 11, 3, 4. The combination 241134 first occurs in 1.5 pi at digit number 250,745. [[User:Dcoetzee|Dcoetzee]] ([[User talk:Dcoetzee|talk]]) 06:44, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Wow, this filled up fast. Is it time to remove the Incomplete tag yet? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.66|199.27.128.66]] 03:14, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

:Please do your adds at the bottom. Otherwise it looks like as the first discussion here and everybody will ignore your comment.
:My answer is: NO. We still have to figure out if Randall is wrong or just using an algorithm nobody does understand right now.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:10, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

---

Someone said there's no indication that Randall used Wolfram, and that double-precision IEEE numbers in mostly any language would cause the same error.
This is not true: IEEE double precision numbers (binary64) are stored internally in binary.
Converting them to octal would give at most 18 nonzero significant (octal) digits, and from that point on all additional digits would be zeros (remember that an octal digit is equivalent to three bits).
What Wolfram does is rounding to a decimal number, which is not round in octal.

I think the previous is an indication that Randall did indeed use Wolfram.
Added to that, he used Wolfram in several what-if's, and in one case he used it so heavily that his IP got temporarily banned from Wolfram.
This leaves little or no doubts in me that Wolfram is the source of Randall's mistake.

Also, I still would like to know why everybody is interpreting "200 digits" as "2008 digits" and pretending that's equal to "31010 digits" instead of "12810 digits".

And out of curiosity, what happened with [[287]] and floating point numbers?
The explainxkcd for 287 says nothing about floating point.

[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.145|173.245.53.145]] 22:09, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
* With [[287]], there was only meant to be one solution, the other solution was unintended. It's mentioned in the discussion only, not in the body of the explanation, but there's a link to an interview where he indicates that it was indeed unintentional. [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 07:13, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

;What is the period of the wolfram answer?
What is the repeat period of the octal answer with the 666's, (the length of the repetend) i.e. the one that comes from Wolfram, that is converting 4.71238898038469 decimal to octal? And how many 666's are in the full repetend? Oooh - I like that new word - thanks to {{w|repeating decimal}}! [[User:Nealmcb|Nealmcb]] ([[User talk:Nealmcb|talk]]) 23:22, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

:Dunno, either Randall uses WolframAlpha whithout further checks, so he has to check his sources, or we all are just dumb.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 23:54, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

: The period is 4882812500. Yes, what I mean is that it repeats every 488281250010 digits. Not sure I want to count the number of 666's in there. Oh, and thanks for the answer about [[287]], I've seen it now. -- [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.139|173.245.53.139]] 17:46, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

I hardly dare to ask now... ;)
*What is an octal expansion?
*This explanation cannot be complete before someone explains what this actually means, to someone who have never herd of octal expansion before (like me)
[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:33, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
:You are absolutely right, the incomplete tag is back. It seems only math geeks were working here but it should also be explained for people with less knowledge on math.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:02, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

:*The wikipedia page for {{w|Octal}} contains a complete explanation. I wrote a plainer one but mine is still very long, so instead of posting it here I uploaded it [http://www.jojonete.com/00/20131121_Octal/ there]. It's very crappily formatted and not thoroughly checked as I don't have time for more at the moment, but I might improve it some other day. Please note that the only reason for not posting it here is its length, and in particular it has nothing to do with copyright issues. I mean, everybody feel free to copy, rewrite, summarize, expand, correct, destroy or do whatever to that text with no attribution, just as if it had been posted here. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.145|173.245.53.145]] 22:37, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

::The explain for non math people should be much more simple. Randall likes simple English, I like simple Math. Not everything is covered but more people will understand the essentials. While I like all that details many people don't. We still do need an simple Math explain here.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 23:42, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

::I know and I agree, that's why I kept my explanation out of this discussion. My summarizing skills are just not good enough. I used the time I didn't have to reformat my explanation, but that just means it's now a bit longer than it was. I hope someone else will write a much shorter and simple one, as I just seem to be unable to do so. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.145|173.245.53.145]] 01:10, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

:::Thanks for a great explanation. I knew about this system but only for integers. However, still need a word on how to get pi in Octal. Until anyone does better a link could be posted for your explanation! [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:54, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

::::I added the conversion part to the explanation, it's in the same link. Still way too long to post here. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.117|173.245.53.117]] 03:29, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Note that pau is Catalan for peace, which is a good solution for the pi/tau dispute. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.150|173.245.53.150]] 00:10, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

:Has posted this as a trivia item. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:11, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

The trivia that states that e here represents Euler's Constant, and not Euler's Number, seems to be false, is it not? e+2 being ~4.71, not ~2.58. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.11|108.162.237.11]] 17:39, 24 November 2013 (UTC)
:I have removed that sentence. It was simply wrong. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 19:35, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

4/3*Pau=Tau, 2/3*Pau=Pi, therefore, It can have a practical use.--[[User:ParadoX|ParadoX]] ([[User talk:ParadoX|talk]]) 10:57, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Dear DgBrt, Please leave the explain as it is. It's "way too complex" for a reason. And the Title Text does in fact need its own header (it's not the only title text to have earned it) [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 19:03, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
:Hello 199.27.128.65, please post new comments to the bottom. I did revert your revert because you didn't solve any of the remarks by me. And the title text EXPLAIN could be done easy: Explain that comparing e and and pi is nonsense and explain the mistake done by Randall when using Wolfram Alpha. Everything else belongs to the trivia section. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:36, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
::OK, we need to get the admins in here before we end up in a revert war. We already explained the intentional error from Randall, which is why it's in the explanation and not the trivia section. It CAN'T go in the trivia section because we're EXPLAINING what the error is. You don't put long explanations in the trivia section, you put them in the explanation section. THAT'S why the title text is getting its own header. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 02:46, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
::All right, I've submitted a request for the admins to help up. No idea when they'll get here, but it should help smooth this big mess out. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 02:52, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
::: [[http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Admin_requests#Potential_Edit_War.3B_we_want_to_resolve_it_before_it_starts Here's what they've said so far]]. What do you think Dgbrt? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 04:27, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
::::After a week I haven't been here I still can say: calm down. My reasons are still at the incomplete tag — just read it.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:52, 27 March 2014 (UTC)
:::::Let's run through your arguments:
:"non Math people should also be able to understand this." I'd say the other editors did a pretty good job of that; that's the ENTIRE REASON we have an explain.
:"Randalls mistake has to be emphasised" They were. Read the explaination again.
:"everything else here is still too much, it even doesn't belong to a trivia section" But should the explanation not be as complete as possible? You underestimate just how nerdy we can get here.
:I have to side with the mods. I think this explanation was done and you're holding out for an impossible edit that will never come. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 02:19, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
::I will work on this, but it needs some time because I don't want to remove any of the great findings here. Non math people DON'T read all that number talks. They don't know what wolfram alpha is and that this site is sometimes WRONG. That has to be clearly explained.
::Furthermore this is NOT a nerd sniping by Randall; it's a nerd sniping ON Randall. He did use the result by wolfram alpha by error, he did figure out all that wrong "666" appearances, while he otherwise is very accurate on math.
::My idea is: Extract the essentials for the title text and add a paragraph like "Math details", "Background", or however to the bottom of the explain. In effect non math people would not read this paragraph but they can understand the essentials, other people would be happy about the deeper explain.
::I don't want to delete content, I'm just looking for a better presentation to the public. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:03, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
:::The amount of research Randal does, it's far more likely he made the mistakes on purpose in order to nerd snipe, as opposed to "he just made the mistakes on accident."
:::I agree with you on the wolfram alpha part, though, and I like your idea to summarize the errors before exploring them in full detail
:::Sorry for being so antagonizing before. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 04:28, 1 April 2014 (UTC)
:Just a comment here, as a non-math person, I understood all of this perfectly well. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.221.72|108.162.221.72]] 16:13, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

;Tone of "Title text" section
The [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1292:_Pi_vs._Tau&oldid=66351 current] tone of the title text section is inconsistent with the rest of this site. Where else does this wiki say, "Math is hard! It's not worth your time trying to understand the concepts here."?

''It consists of some of advanced trigonometry and other assorted college-level concepts that will in all likelihood just bore you if you don't care about them already.'' Really? There is not even any elementary trigonometry involved here, other than the value of PI itself. And since when is advanced trig a college level course? What is involved is the concept of bases other than base 10, specifically octal, but that is also a secondary school subject, both in mathematics and computer science.

I propose the following outline of the section:
*State that the property given in the title text does not actually hold for 1.5 * PI, but that due to an early rounding error, it might look as if it holds when shown via Wolfram Alpha. Further state that it is not clear if Randall, in relying on Wolfram Alpha, made a mistake, or if he is partaking in nerd sniping.
*Show how close Pau is to e+2.
*Explain octal -- base 8 -- first for integers, then for fractions.
*Present the actual octal expansion and show that the property does not hold.
*Explain why the Wolfram Alpha answer is different.
*Present the Wolfram Alpha answer, and show how the property [almost?] holds with that value.
*Depending on how self-referential we wish to be, explain how it might have been a plausible mistake for Randall to have relied on Wolfram Alpha, but that if it was a case of nerd sniping, then it was highly successful.
*Mention the similarity to the Feynman point.
This wiki is about explanations. We shouldn't bemoan a subject as being more difficult than it is; we should explain. -- [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.43|108.162.219.43]] 22:52, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

:We should have two different paragraphs here:
:*The standard explain, containing the essentials like shown by 108.162.219.43 just before.
:*A "Deeper into math" one, going into more depth.
:*The "Title text" header is wrong!
:My 2 cents --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 18:58, 30 April 2014 (UTC)
::I tried to fix my old "Title Text" header, what do you think? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.204|199.27.130.204]] 03:29, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

:::I did my first attempt on a simple explain. Please do not revert this, but I would be happy about any enhancements. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 20:40, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
::::That is actually way better. Sorry for not giving you a chance before. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.204|199.27.130.204]] 05:07, 3 May 2014 (UTC)

1292: Pi vs. Tau

2014-05-03T03:35:24Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 1292
| date = November 18, 2013
| title = Pi vs. Tau
| image = pi vs tau.png
| titletext = Conveniently approximated as e+2, Pau is commonly known as the Devil's Ratio (because in the octal expansion, '666' appears four times in the first 200 digits while no other run of 3+ digits appears more than once.)
}}

==Explanation==

This is yet another of [[Randall]]'s [[:Category:Compromise|compromise comics]]. A few mathematicians argue as to whether to use pi, which is the ratio between a circle's circumference and its diameter, or tau, which is the ratio between a circle's circumference and its radius.

Some consider pi to be the wrong convention and are in favor of using tau as ''the'' circle constant (see the [http://tauday.com/tau-manifesto Tau Manifesto], which was inspired by the article "[http://www.math.utah.edu/~palais/pi.html Pi is wrong!]" by mathematician Robert Palais). Others consider proponents of tau to be foolish and remain loyal to pi (see the [http://www.thepimanifesto.com Pi Manifesto]). Of course, regardless of which convention is used, the change is merely in notation — the underlying mathematics remains unaltered. Still, the choice of pi vs. tau can affect the clarity of equations, analogies between different equations, and how easy various subjects are to teach.

Most people know π (pi) by the approximation 3.14, but do not know τ (tau) which, by definition, is twice as large as pi. Randall is suggesting using "pau", which is a portmanteau of "pi" and "tau", as a number situated, appropriately enough, halfway between pi and tau, i.e. 1.5 pi (or 0.75 tau). But of course his number would be inconvenient, as this value does not naturally turn up when working with circles or other mathematical constructs, so there are no commonly used formulas that would use pau.

The title text claims that pau can be approximated by e+2, as both values are roughly 4.7 — a similarity that holds little practical value in any serious calculation, due to the impreciseness of the approximation. It also attributes the nickname "Devil's Ratio" to pau, due to the sequence {{w|Number of the Beast|666}} supposedly appearing four times in the first 200 digits of pau when expressed in the {{w|octal}} base. However, this is not the case, and was likely due to an error in the computer system used by WolframAlpha; for more details see below.

==Transcript==
:[On the left is a "forbidden"-style slashed circle with the π symbol, captioned "Pi". On the right is a "forbidden"-style slashed circle with 2π, captioned "Tau". In the middle it reads 1.5π, captioned "Pau".]
:A compromise solution to the Pi Tau dispute

==Math details==
{{incomplete|Too complex, non-mathematicians should also be able to understand this.}}
The title text is a bunch of slightly-incorrect mathematical [[356: Nerd Sniping|nerd sniping]] that Randall included for seemingly no better reason than trolling us. Specifically, Randall laid out a simple irrational number "e plus 2", made a rounding error when writing it in base-8 (possibly intentionally), and then made a cheap "{{w|Number of the Beast}}" joke about the resulting string of data, subtly challenging us to dig through the same long string of data so we could verify it. Unfortunately for those of you with short attention spans, we've got quite a bit to cover before we can explain what exactly the errors are...

"Octal expansion" refers to writing out the number in base-8. In base-8, only the numerals 0-7 are used to express numbers. This does not mean that values such as 18, 19, 28, 29, and so on do not exist; rather, said values are represented with a more limited range of numerals.

For the sake of simplicity in this next demonstration, we will only acknowledge whole numbers with positive values.

In base-8, the numbers 1 through 7 have the same values as in base-10. The next number, eight, is written out as 10. This is because the "ones" digit has run out of unique numerals to express this value, so it rolls over to the "eights" digit. Nine is 11. Ten is 12. Numbering continues in this manner, up to fifteen (17). The "ones" digit must roll over to the "eights" digit again, so sixteen is 20. Seventeen is 21. After twenty-three (27), it rolls over again, giving us twenty-four (30).

Counting by eights, the next numbers are thirty-two (40), forty (50), forty-eight (60), and fifty-six (70). At sixty-three (77), both the "ones" and "eights" digit has run out of unique numerals, so the excess value must roll over to the "sixty-fours" digit, giving us sixty-four (100). If we keep counting, we will eventually reach five-hundred-eleven (777). A new "five-hundred-twelves" digit is created. The next number is five-hundred-twelve (1000).

As you can see, numbers written in base-8 tend to be longer and less economical to write than in base-10, but it does serve its purpose. Trust us on this.

In this next demonstration, we will look at how to write non-integers in base-8. Again, we will acknowledge only positive values.

In base-8, all the numerals that follow the period are not known as the "decimal", but as the "octal". This is because "decimal" specifically refers to tenths, while "octal" refers to eighths.

In decimal, the first place after the periods depicts "tenths", the next place "hundredths", the next "thousandths", and so on. In octal, the first place represents "eighths", the next "sixty-fourths", the next "five-hundred-twelfths", etc.

One eighth is 0.1. Two eighths, or one fourth, is 0.2. Four eighths, or one half, is 0.4.
One sixty-fourth is 0.01. Five sixty-fourths is 0.05. Nine sixty-fourths, or one eighth plus one sixty-fourth, is 0.11.
One five-hundred-twelfth is 0.001. Five-hundred-eleven five-hundred-twelfths is 0.777.

Unfortunately, this entire lesson has a very disappointing end. As it turns out, the title text for the comic is incorrect. The first 200 digits of 'pau' in octal are:
<pre>
4.5545743763144164432362345144750501224254715730156503147633545270030431677126116550546747570313312523403514716576464333172731124310201076447270723624573721640220437652155065544220143116155742515634462
</pre>
The sequence '666' does not occur at all in it.

Possibly, [[Randall]] used [http://www.wolframalpha.com/ Wolfram|Alpha] to calculate the result (he uses it a lot, for example [http://what-if.xkcd.com/70/ What-if 70: The Constant Groundskeeper] or [http://what-if.xkcd.com/62/ What-if 62: Falling With Helium]).
However, when the comic was published, there was (and still is, as of April 29, 2014) a bug in Wolfram|Alpha so that, when getting 200 octal digits from "pau", it just calculates the decimal value rounded to 15 significant digits (this is 4.71238898038469) and expands that as octal digits as far as needed.

This gives a periodically repeating number. In the first 200 digits of the octal expansion, the sequences 666 and 6666 do occur, but each only once. There are 4 occurrences, however, in the first 300 digits:
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777714554305412763636566643022106616734723661726160312772574551366370203115523402704104015532221722772357666</pre>
Expansion that long indeed does contain 666 (the {{w|Number of the beast|number of the beast}}) four times (with one instance as 6666). It also contains 0000, 222, 444, and 7777, but they only appear once in a run.

{{w|Mathematical coincidence|Coincidentally}}, e+2 is also very similar to 1.5 pi, although only to a few digits.
<pre>
1.5π = 4.71238898038...
e+2 = 4.71828182845...
</pre>

The "Devil's Ratio" may be an allusion to the "{{w|Tritone|Devil's Interval}}", aka the "Devil's Chord" or 'Diabolus in Musica' ('The Devil in music'), which is the name sometimes given to the harmony between a root note and its tritone/augmented fourth/diminished fifth. This note is situated halfway between octaves, and is named for its dissonant quality. It is possibly a cross-reference between this and the "{{w|golden ratio}}".

==Trivia==
*For Pi the sequence '666' occurs for the first time at position 2440. Many more occurrences can be found here: [http://www.angio.net/pi/ The Pi-Search Page].
* Note that pau is Catalan for peace, which is a good solution for the pi/tau dispute.
* In the discussion it has been theorized that Randall used [[356: Nerd Sniping|Nerd Sniping]]. In which case he was aware of the mistake in Wolfram!
*For an entertaining introduction to the concept of tau, see this [https://www.khanacademy.org/math/recreational-math/vi-hart/pi-tau/v/pi-is--still--wrong Vi Hart video].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Compromise]]

1363: xkcd Phone

2014-05-03T00:41:01Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 1363
| date = May 2, 2014
| title = xkcd Phone
| image = xkcd_phone.png
| titletext = Presented in partnership with Qualcomm, Craigslist, Whirlpool, Hostess, LifeStyles, and the US Chamber of Commerce. Manufactured on equipment which also processes peanuts. Price includes 2-year Knicks contract. Phone may extinguish nearby birthday candles. If phone ships with Siri, return immediately; do not speak to her and ignore any instructions she gives. Do not remove lead casing. Phone may attract/trap insects; this is normal. Volume adjustable (requires root). If you experience sudden tingling, nausea, or vomiting, perform a factory reset immediately. Do not submerge in water; phone will drown. Exterior may be frictionless. Prolonged use can cause mood swings, short-term memory loss, and seizures. Avert eyes while replacing battery. Under certain circumstances, wireless transmitter may control God.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic is a parody of a multitude of mobile-technology related issues that, when brought together, create a general satire of smartphone advertising. The advertised features here either make previously useful capabilities useless or add features nobody wants. Except for "your mobile world (going) digital", which is old news.

From bottom left, going clockwise:

* '''FlightAware partnership:''' This is a reference to the [http://www.flightaware.com/ FlightAware] flight tracking service. This FlightAware partnership results in the phone playing airplane engine noise whenever a flight passes over the phone's current location, making this an annoying and intrusive feature that no one wants.
* '''Realistic case:''' possibly a joke on various audiovisual devices like gaming consoles that advertise realistic sound, graphics, etc. Of course, applying "realistic" to an actual physical case is ridiculous. Either the case is actually real, or it doesn't actually function as a case.
* '''Clear screen:''' This is a pointless descriptor from the perspective of the consumer. Of course the screen is clear. This joke works in tandem with the previous joke, as a play on "clear case, realistic screen," which are both hypothetically viable selling points.
* '''Side Facing Camera:''' There was a recent controversy surrounding an [https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/spy-cam-peek-i Indiegogo for a surreptitious, side-mounted camera device] for smartphones due to the advertisement of the device as a good way to take creep shots, which are illegal in many places. Widespread dissemination of these devices as a built-in feature would likely result in a sharp increase in delinquency of this nature. May also be an ''ad absurdum'' extension of devices with both forward and backward facing cameras.
* '''Custom blend OS:''' iOS and Android are offered by different conglomerates and run on different kernels. A "custom blend" would probably be a nightmare to work with.
* '''Simulates alternative speed of light:''' This renders the clock useless. The speed of light is roughly 2.99x108 meters per second. Relativistic effects, such as time dilation, only occur at significant fractions of the speed of light. Since the phone is simulating a much slower speed of light, driving at highway speeds will cause time dilation. For example, driving at 90mph (90% of the default simulated speed of light) gives a time dilation of about 2.29. So while you are driving at 90mph your clock will run 2.29 times slower than a stationary one. Travelling faster than the simulated speed of light will make the clock run backwards.
* '''Wireless:''' as in cordless phone. This is the bare minimum a phone has to have in order to be a mobile phone, so advertising it as a feature feels dated by decades. Or, perhaps Munroe is implying the entire phone is without wires, in which case it wouldn't function.
* '''Accelerometer screams in free fall:''' Another useless function. Rather than having some sort of feature to prevent breakage or cracking when a drop is detected, the phone just makes you more aware of its potential imminent doom.
* '''When exposed to light, phone says "hi":''' Bait and switch, and also a build from the previous joke. The implied feature is that the screen or camera will automatically adjust, but instead the phone is weirdly anthropomorphized.

The ominous warnings and disclaimers in the title text are probably a reference to the ''Saturday Night Live'' parody ad for {{w|Happy Fun Ball}} ([http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/pictures/50-greatest-saturday-night-live-sketches-of-all-time-20140203/happy-fun-ball-0459912 original video hosted on rollingstone.com]).

* '''Presented in partnership with Qualcomm, Craigslist, Whirlpool, Hostess, LifeStyles, and the US Chamber of Commerce.''' {{w|Qualcomm}} is a semiconductor company that designs and produces chips for mobile phones. [http://whirlpool.com.au Whirlpool] is a prominent Australian tech forum website, originally created for discussion of Australian broadband providers but now extending to cover general tech topics, including mobile phones. The other companies mentioned here have no association with mobile phones.
* '''Manufactured on equipment which also processes peanuts.''' A warning often seen on candy and other foods for people with a peanut allergy. It is highly unlikely that equipment used to produce mobile phones would also process food.
* '''Price includes 2-year Knicks contract.''' Mobile phones are often sold by phone companies in combination with a cell phone plan, but a contract with the {{w|New_York_Knicks|Knicks}} would only appeal to pro basketball players.
* '''Phone may extinguish nearby birthday candles.''' A rather oddly specific capability, which might also be annoying for anyone attempting to host a birthday party. As to how it would do this, a very powerful directional speaker would be able to blow out a nearby candle, but the speakers in mobile phones aren't going to be that big.
* '''If phone ships with Siri, return immediately; do not speak to her and ignore any instructions she gives.''' {{w|Siri}} is a virtual personal assistant application for Apple devices. Not speaking to it and not following its instructions would defeat its purpose. It may suggest that a malevolent "Siri AI" has sneaked itself onto some devices, at the manufacturing stage, for some diabolical purpose. May be a reference to the Companion Cube in the game Portal, in which the player is instructed to disregard it's advice if the cube appears to be animate.
* '''Do not remove lead casing.''' A mobile phone encased in lead would not function because it could not transmit or receive data. Devices that emit high levels of ionizing radiation are often encased in lead, but a phone that would emit that level of radiation would be unhealthy to carry around. If encased in sufficient lead to mitigate the danger, it would be uncomfortably heavy. This might be reference to [https://xkcd.com/925/ xkcd comic no 925: Cell phones] where Randall makes fun of the WHO claiming that cell phones might cause cancer despite huge studies showing the opposite. This could also mean the device is an actual bananaphone as regular phones emit no ionizing radiation ([http://xkcd.com/radiation xkcd Radiation Dose Chart]). Regrettably, the lead casing would render the phone inedible.
* '''Phone may attract/trap insects; this is normal.''' Some plants, like the {{w|Venus_flytrap|Venus flytrap}}, attract and trap insects, but mobile phones are not known to exhibit this behaviour. May be a reference to "crazy ants" which are attracted to electronics.
* '''Volume adjustable (requires root).''' {{w|Android_rooting|Rooting}} is the method to gain privileged access on Android phones. Adjusting the volume should be available to any user and would not be restricted to root access only.
* '''If you experience sudden tingling, nausea, or vomiting, perform a factory reset immediately.''' These symptoms are usually associated with chemical or radiation poisoning. Neither of these would be cured by a {{w|Factory_reset|factory reset}}.
* '''Do not submerge in water; phone will drown.''' Most phones are not waterproof and will probably short-circuit when submerged. Drowning however, would imply that the phone breathes air (which actually would be possible if it had a {{w|Lithium-air_battery|Li-air battery}}).
* '''Exterior may be frictionless.''' The front of a smartphone is usually made of glass and should have a surface with very low friction. The back of a phone is usually made from a material that has higher friction to make it pleasant to hold and to make sure it doesn't slide off objects it is placed on. A [[669: Experiment|completely frictionless surface]] would make it <s>almost</s> impossible to hold and would make it very susceptible to drops.
* '''Prolonged use can cause mood swings, short-term memory loss, and seizures.''' These are all side effects that are associated with certain kinds of medication or radiation treatment of the brain and would not be acceptable for mobile phones.
* '''Avert eyes while replacing battery.''' Actions that would warrant averting your eyes are usually associated with high-intensity light capable of causing eye damage. Depending on the specific energy source, this may be accompanied by high levels of other types of radiation (e.g. making an {{w|X-ray}} photo). This may hint that the phone might be powered by a radionuclide battery which would explain the lead casing and the possible radiation side effects. A phone that emits X-ray radiation would not be healthy to be around. Alternately, this may be a reference to the {{w|Ark_of_the_Covenant|Ark Of The Covenant}}, implying that gazing upon the battery or the compartment wall behind it is forbidden on pain of severe punishment.
* '''Under certain circumstances, wireless transmitter may control God.''' According to most religions, God (or Gods) are usually in control of us. Gods are usually viewed as not directly controllable.

==Transcript==
:Runs custom blend on Android and iOS
:Side-facing camera
:Simulates alternate speeds of light (default: 100 miles per hour) and adjusts clock as phone accelerates
:Clear screen
:Realistic case
:Wireless
:Accelerometer detects when phone is in free fall and makes it scream
:Flightaware partnership: Makes airplane noise when flights pass overhead
:When exposed to light, phone says "hi!"

:''Introducing''
:'''The xkcd phone'''
:Your mobile world just went digital®

{{comic discussion}}

338: Future

2014-05-01T06:39:32Z

199.27.130.204: Any better?

{{comic
| number = 338
| date = November 5, 2007
| title = Future
| image = future.png
| titletext = But the past was much too cramped!
}}

==Explanation==
To understand this comic you have to do some back-and-forth reading. [[Cueball]], in the last panel, is telling [[Megan]] in the first panel to come explore the future with him. Since the panels appear in chronological order, he is literally in the future. [[Megan]] replies that she can't, since she is not drawn in the last panel, a.k.a. the future. She is stuck, figuratively and literally.

The title text is another pun. Cueball says the past is too "cramped"; indeed, there are twice as many people in the first panel as there are in the last panel.

There are several different deeper interpretations of the comic, such as Cueball asking Megan to break up with Hairy. This would give Cueball's assertation that the past is too cramped another double meaning, that there was too much emotional turmoil and/or that Megan would supposedly be better off without Hairy.

==Transcript==
:[The comic has three panels. In the first panel, Hairy and Megan are holding hands. There is a voice bubble originating from Cueball standing in the third panel.]
:Cueball: Come explore the future with me!
:[And Megan says something which goes to the third panel.]
:[The two voice bubbles cross in the middle of the second panel.]
:[The voice of Megan says…]
:Megan: I can't.
{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairy]]
[[Category:Romance]]

451: Impostor

2014-05-01T06:32:31Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 451
| date = July 18, 2008
| title = Impostor
| image = impostor.png
| titletext = If you think this is too hard on literary criticism, read the Wikipedia article on deconstruction.
}}

==Explanation==
While the comic is ostensibly about grad students, it is really [[Randall]]'s way of poking fun at different fields. Given that engineers can detect his {{w|bullshit|bullshit}} quickly suggests he regards engineering with some respect. In other words, he thinks engineering has a low {{w|Bollocks#.22Talking_bollocks.22_and_.22Bollockspeak.22|bullshit quotient}}. Similarly with linguists. He clearly thinks less of sociology, since his bullshit can go undetected for considerably longer. And the field of "Literary Criticism" is something he considers mostly, or entirely, BS, since he claims his BS has repeatedly been published.

The first panel shows [[Cueball]] discussing an engineering problem with [[Ponytail]]. {{w|logarithm|Logarithms}} are a mathematical tool used for expressing an exponential relationship as a linear one. While this has many uses in a variety of fields, it is not a suitable tool for dissipating excess heat. (It might have value in plotting temperature change over time, or temperature over distance, however.)

Since {{w|Klingon language|Klingon}} is a constructed language designed to sound "alien" and which explicitly avoids sounding like any human language, it cannot be part of any real-world linguistic family. Any linguist who knows what a Klingon is would instantly recognize his statement as a joke, so the detection time should be only a few seconds. His assertion that his bullshit went undetected for over a minute either suggests he does not expect linguists to be familiar with Star Trek, or that the panels indicate the moment of detection rather than the beginning of the conversation.

The third panel is a bit more subtle. While {{w|sociology}} can certainly use ranking as an analytical tool, the trouble lies in the complete lack of meaning in the tags "best" and "worst". Detecting this as BS requires a bit more effort on the part of the sociology grad students.

Literary criticism, on the other hand, is almost completely written in {{w|buzzword|buzz words}} and {{w|jargon}}, and is thus difficult for anyone, including those versed in the field, to understand. His assertion that he published 8 papers and 2 books could also be his way of saying that he doesn't believe anyone actually reads any of the stuff published in the field.

The title text challenges the lenient, forgiving souls in the audience to take a look at {{w|deconstruction|the Wikipedia article for literary deconstruction}} and attempt to understand just what the heck the article is trying to talk about. The article in question is almost constantly flagged for "cleanup" on the grounds that it's a jumbled mess.

==Transcript==
:My Hobby: Sitting down with grad students and timing how long it takes them to figure out that I'm not actually an expert in their field.

:Engineering:
:Student: Our big problem is heat dissipation
:Cueball: Have you tried logarithms?
:48 seconds

:Linguistics:
:Cueball: Ah, so does this Finno-ugric family include, say, Klingon?
:63 Seconds

:Sociology:
:Cueball: Yeah, my latest work is on ranking people from best to worst.
:4 Minutes

:Literary Criticism:
:Cueball: You see, the deconstruction is inextricable from not only the text, but also the self.
:Eight papers and two books and they haven't caught on.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:My Hobby]]

1292: Pi vs. Tau

2014-05-01T03:34:10Z

199.27.130.204: /* Title text */

{{comic
| number = 1292
| date = November 18, 2013
| title = Pi vs. Tau
| image = pi vs tau.png
| titletext = Conveniently approximated as e+2, Pau is commonly known as the Devil's Ratio (because in the octal expansion, '666' appears four times in the first 200 digits while no other run of 3+ digits appears more than once.)
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Too complex, non Math people should also be able to understand this. Randalls mistake has to be emphasised, everything else here is still too much, it even doesn't belong to a trivia section. See the discussion page.}}

This is yet another of [[Randall]]'s [[:Category:Compromise|compromise comics]]. A few mathematicians argue as to whether to use pi, which is the ratio between a circle's circumference and its diameter, or tau, which is the ratio between a circle's circumference and its radius.

Some consider pi to be the wrong convention and are in favor of using tau as ''the'' circle constant (see the [http://tauday.com/tau-manifesto Tau Manifesto], which was inspired by the article "[http://www.math.utah.edu/~palais/pi.html Pi is wrong!]" by mathematician Robert Palais). Others consider proponents of tau to be foolish and remain loyal to pi (see the [http://www.thepimanifesto.com Pi Manifesto]). Of course, regardless of which convention is used, the fundamental mathematics will remain unaltered. But the choice of pi vs. tau can affect the clarity of equations, analogies between different equations, and how easy various subjects are to teach.

Most people know π (Pi) by the approximation 3.14, but do not know τ (tau) which is just twice as large as pi. Randall is suggesting using "pau", which is a portmanteau of "pi" and "tau", as a number situated, appropriately enough, halfway between pi and tau. But of course his number would be inconvenient, as there are currently no commonly used formulas that involve 1.5 pi (or 0.75 tau). Additionally, it is highly unlikely that substituting e+2 for pau would ever result in 'convenience'.

===Title text===

The title text is a bunch of slightly-incorrect mathematical [[356: Nerd Sniping|nerd sniping]] that Randall included for seemingly no better reason than trolling us. Specifically, Randall laid out a simple irrational number "e plus 2", made a rounding error when writing it in base-8 (possibly intentionally), and then made a cheap "{{w|Number of the Beast}}" joke about the resulting string of data, subtly challenging us to dig through the same long string of data so we could verify it. Unfortunately for those of you with short attention spans, we've got quite a bit to cover before we can explain what exactly the errors are...

"Octal expansion" refers to writing out the number in base-8. In base-8, only the numerals 0-7 are used to express numbers. This does not mean that values such as 18, 19, 28, 29, and so on do not exist; rather, said values are represented with a more limited range of numerals.

For the sake of simplicity in this next demonstration, we will only acknowledge whole numbers with positive values.

In base-8, the numbers 1 through 7 have the same values as in base-10. The next number, eight, is written out as 10. This is because the "ones" digit has run out of unique numerals to express this value, so it rolls over to the "eights" digit. Nine is 11. Ten is 12. Numbering continues in this manner, up to fifteen (17). The "ones" digit must roll over to the "eights" digit again, so sixteen is 20. Seventeen is 21. After twenty-three (27), it rolls over again, giving us twenty-four (30).

Counting by eights, the next numbers are thirty-two (40), forty (50), forty-eight (60), and fifty-six (70). At sixty-three (77), both the "ones" and "eights" digit has run out of unique numerals, so the excess value must roll over to the "sixty-fours" digit, giving us sixty-four (100). If we keep counting, we will eventually reach five-hundred-eleven (777). A new "five-hundred-twelves" digit is created. The next number is five-hundred-twelve (1000).

As you can see, numbers written in base-8 tend to be longer and less economical to write than in base-10, but it does serve its purpose. Trust us on this.

In this next demonstration, we will look at how to write non-integers in base-8. Again, we will acknowledge only positive values.

In base-8, all the numerals that follow the period are not known as the "decimal", but as the "octal". This is because "decimal" specifically refers to tenths, while "octal" refers to eighths.

In decimal, the first place after the periods depicts "tenths", the next place "hundredths", the next "thousandths", and so on. In octal, the first place represents "eighths", the next "sixty-fourths", the next "five-hundred-twelfths", etc.

One eighth is 0.1. Two eighths, or one fourth, is 0.2. Four eighths, or one half, is 0.4.
One sixty-fourth is 0.01. Five sixty-fourths is 0.05. Nine sixty-fourths, or one eighth plus one sixty-fourth, is 0.11.
One five-hundred-twelfth is 0.001. Five-hundred-eleven five-hundred-twelfths is 0.777.

Unfortunately, this entire lesson has a very disappointing end. As it turns out, the title text for the comic is incorrect. The first 200 digits of 'pau' in octal are:
<pre>
4.5545743763144164432362345144750501224254715730156503147633545270030431677126116550546747570313312523403514716576464333172731124310201076447270723624573721640220437652155065544220143116155742515634462
</pre>
The sequence '666' does not occur at all in it.

Possibly, [[Randall]] used [http://www.wolframalpha.com/ Wolfram|Alpha] to calculate the result (he uses it a lot, for example [http://what-if.xkcd.com/70/ What-if 70: The Constant Groundskeeper] or [http://what-if.xkcd.com/62/ What-if 62: Falling With Helium]).
However, at the date of the comic publication and up to (at least) April 29, 2014, there's a bug in Wolfram|Alpha so that, when getting 200 octal digits from "pau", it just calculates the decimal value rounded to 15 significant digits (this is 4.71238898038469) and expands that as octal digits as far as needed.

This gives a periodically repeating number. In the first 200 digits of the octal expansion, the sequences 666 and 6666 do occur, but each only once. There are 4 occurrences, however, in the first 300 digits:
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777714554305412763636566643022106616734723661726160312772574551366370203115523402704104015532221722772357666</pre>
Expansion that long indeed does contain 666 (the {{w|Number of the beast|number of the beast}}) four times (with one instance as 6666). It also contains 0000, 222, 444, and 7777, but they only appear once in a run.

{{w|Mathematical coincidence|Coincidentally}}, e+2 is also very similar to 1.5pi, although only to a few digits.
<pre>
1.5π = 4.71238898038...
e+2 = 4.71828182845...
</pre>

The "Devil's Ratio" may be an allusion to the "{{w|Tritone|Devil's Interval}}", aka the "Devil's Chord" or 'Diabolus in Musica' ('The Devil in music'), which is the name sometimes given to the harmony between a root note and its tritone/augmented fourth/diminished fifth. This note is situated halfway between octaves, and is named for its dissonant quality. It is possibly a cross-reference between this and the "{{w|golden ratio}}".

==Transcript==
:[On the left is a "forbidden"-style slashed circle with the π symbol, captioned "Pi". On the right is a "forbidden"-style slashed circle with 2π, captioned "Tau". In the middle it reads 1.5π, captioned "Pau".]
:A compromise solution to the Pi Tau dispute

==Trivia==
*For Pi the sequence '666' occurs for the first time at position 2440. Many more occurrences can be found here: [http://www.angio.net/pi/ The Pi-Search Page].
* Note that pau is Catalan for peace, which is a good solution for the pi/tau dispute.
* In the discussion it has been theorized that Randall used [[356: Nerd Sniping|Nerd Sniping]]. In which case he was aware of the mistake in Wolfram!
*For an entertaining introduction to the concept, see this [https://www.khanacademy.org/math/recreational-math/vi-hart/pi-tau/v/pi-is--still--wrong Vi Hart video].

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Math]]
[[Category:Compromise]]

Talk:1292: Pi vs. Tau

2014-05-01T03:29:35Z

199.27.130.204:

I started an explanation. Hopefully others will help improve it, as I don't think it's quite adequate. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.174|199.27.130.174]] 05:32, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

The comic currently shows the symbol π (pi) in all three cases, but it should have the symbol τ (tau) in the rightmost case. I'm sure there is a compromise symbol "pau" too. Maybe with a deformed left leg? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.97.4|141.101.97.4]] 07:07, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

WolframAlpha gives
<pre>
4.5545743763144164456766617143366171162404440766665105335330776311513504520604364524762740226212061363100001776216741750712622557020442741544760057441760026766230424023460366047331305225241275347777145543054127636365666430221066167347236617261603127725745513663702031155234027041040155322217227723576660045156156303357534162372112340027743775672417274565277274565735325624457113522164166560115654407251403563246444122664066521461311773474046032763760765740133706761276420415672577471077133607673035331070364705651055376634161405567176532346433567731715723623721267302576735154761375545411215522177775706407470673020025353246535120744232706060324711633457720155013202527060250466252665661576165164140301645132275526153126363575631176312270212441433434206352313125326760006365710744276056412434626534152021052065172556442150110056601034116570607064550553636566432544260105637423220411372664024454234201642615033200331506013362432026775605543212342336511350621361642654426372425415023071413764173735461042064323757413414533013..._8</pre> which does indeed have four 666 sequences. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.254|141.101.99.254]] 08:06, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
This number contains 7777, 000 and 444 twice, though. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.93.11|141.101.93.11]] 09:08, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Wrote the transcript, not sure if I explained the visual well enough, so I left the incomplete tag if someone else has a better idea. Should suffice for understanding however, considering the content [[Special:Contributions/108.162.248.18|108.162.248.18]] 08:55, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

----

(The discussion about different results was trimmed)

Wolfram gives the result with 666

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=1.5+pi+octal
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777714554305412763636566643022
</pre>
The Unix arbitrary precision calculator gives the result without

$ echo "scale=200; obase=8; 6*a(1)" | bc -l
<pre>
4.554574376314416443236234514475050122425471573015650314763354527003043167712611655054674757031331252340351471657646433317273112431020107644727072362457372164022043765215506554422014311615574251563446213636251744101107770257
</pre>
Any suggestions how we can check them?

"Randall says so" is probably correct, but insufficient :-) {{unsigned|Mike}}

:Please use the <nowiki><pre></nowiki> tag for this long numbers.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 09:20, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Testing Wolfram Alpha with <pre>4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000177621674175071262255_8 in decimal</pre> and <pre>4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000_8 in decimal</pre> both indicate the approximation is only accurate to a limited degree.
<pre>
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000177621674175071262255_8+in+decimal
</pre>
<pre>
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=4.55457437631441644567666171433661711624044407666651053353307763115135045206043645247627402262120613631000177621674175071262255_8+in+decimal
</pre>

The method I used to get the value I put in the text was; I used the following command to generate my approximation:
<pre>echo 'scale=200; obase=8; a(1) * 6' | bc -l | tr -d ' \\\n' ; echo</pre> which outputs<pre>
4.554574376314416443236234514475050122425471573015650314763354527003043167712611655054674757031331252340351471657646433317273112431020107644727072362457372164022043765215506554422014311615574251563446213636251744101107770257
</pre>
In 'bc'', a(1) is arctangent of 1 (i.e. 45 degrees, or pi/4); (pi/4 * 6) should be equal to 'pau'. I additionally checked the result using base 2 encoding, and converted each three bit binary value into an octal value. The decimal value of pi (using a(1) * 4) matches with the value of pi to at lease 1000 digits.
[[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.86|173.245.54.86]] 09:21, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Both Maxima and the GNU Emacs calculator output as the first 1000 octal digits:
<pre>
4.5545743763144164432362345144750501224254715730156503147633545270030431677126116550546747570313312523403514716576464333172731124310201076447270723624573721640220437652155065544220143116155742515634462136362517441011077702611156024117447125224176203716336742057353303216470257662666744627534325504334506002730517102547504145216661211250027531716641276765735563341721214013553453654106045245066401141437740626707757305450703606440651111775270032710035521352101513622062164457304326450524432531652666626042202562202550566425643040556365710250031642467447605663240661743600041052212627767073277600402572027316222345356036301002572541750000114422036312122341474267232761775450071652613627306745074150251171507720277250030270442257106542456441722455345340370205646442156334125564557520336340223313312556634450170626417234376702443117031135045420165467426237454754566012204316130023063506430063362203021262434464410604275224606523356702572610031171344411766505734615256121034660773306140032365326415773227551
</pre>
This also agrees with the first 220 digits of the previous result (last two digits above are 57 vs 61 here, maybe due to rounding when converting to octal). Again, no 666 within the first 200 digits. The Wolfram result deviates from this at the 18th digit already. --[[User:Ulm|ulm]] ([[User talk:Ulm|talk]]) 10:21, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Also e+2 does not contain the substring '666':
<pre>echo "scale=200; obase=8; e(1) + 2" | bc -l</pre>
<pre>4.55760521305053551246527734254200471723636166134705407470551551265170233101050620637674622347347044466373713722774330661414353543664033100253542141365517370755272577262541110317650765740633550205306625</pre>--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 10:43, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

: A sudden flash of realization: are we getting nerd-sniped here?--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.254.168|108.162.254.168]] 11:55, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

::Not unlikely. Have posted this as a trivia. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:11, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

: The claim is clearly about e+2, making Dgbrt's comment closest to the right direction. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.40|173.245.54.40]] 12:03, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

When I take Wolfram alpha's octal(pi*1.5) I get the first 303 (base 10) characters as this:
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777714554305412763636566643022106616734723661726160312772574551366370203115523402704104015532221722772357666
</pre>
200(base 10) is 310(base 8) so in the fist '200' characters, 666 shows up 4 times (5 if you count 6666 as twice?) [[User:Xami|Xami]] ([[User talk:Xami|talk]]) 14:01, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

: The Wolfram result is what you get when you calculate pi*3/2 in decimal, round to 14 digits after the decimal point and then convert to octal. That is, 4.7123889803846910 converted to octal. Definitely, this won't give you 200 digits precision. --[[User:Ulm|ulm]] ([[User talk:Ulm|talk]]) 15:15, 18 November 2013 (UTC)
:: It lines up too perfectly to be a coincidence. It fits all the requirements: has 666 four times within 2008 digits, and although 0000, 222, 444, and 7777 appear, they only appear once as a run. You can't double count 7777 as two 777's because it is a single run. If WolframAlpha doesn't give the correct precision, it is likely that Randall made the same error. --[[User:RainbowDash|RainbowDash]] ([[User talk:RainbowDash|talk]]) 16:59, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Being τ, tau, is already being expressed in terms of π, pi, it shows bias. (Though I think Pau would lead to some interesting spherical geometry equations. ~~Drifter {{unsigned ip|108.162.219.214}}

The bias is worse than that: From the perspective of π, the discussion is about multiples of π, so (3/2)π (that is 3π/2 = 3τ/4) is indeed the compromise between π and 2π. But from the perspective of τ, the discussion is about fractions of τ, so the compromise between τ and τ/2 is τ/(3/2) (that is 2τ/3 = 4π/3). Maybe we can call this ‘ti’ (or ‘tie’, pace 173.245.53.184 below). —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 20:47, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Actually, both compromises are wrong. (3/2)π is the arithmetic mean of π and τ, while τ/(3/2) is their harmonic mean. But for geometric ratios (which these are), the appropriate mean is generally the geometric mean (hence the name). You can see how even-handed this is: it's (√2)π = τ/(√2). —[[User:TobyBartels|TobyBartels]] ([[User talk:TobyBartels|talk]]) 20:50, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

---

I am in favour of just calling it ti(e). --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.184|173.245.53.184]] 17:52, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

---

There are real world uses to both Tau and Pi: Pi is the number that relates to what you get when you measure a circle (the distanced around divided by the distance across); and Tau is get when you draw a circle (the distance around divided by the distance from the center). It is the difference between a mic (aka "micrometer" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micrometer ) and a protractor. Tau might have some mathematical advantages in both 2D and 3D in that it has no integer attached to it to find either circumference (2D) or surface area (3D) which makes radians and solid angles simpler. However, that advantage is lost in other dimensions and for the area of a circle.

Pau, of course, has a 61% chance of going to the dribbling spheroid hall of fame. (ref: http://www.basketball-reference.com/players/g/gasolpa01.html ), to which neither Tau nor Pi can hold a candle.~~Remo ( [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.183|199.27.128.183]] 19:19, 18 November 2013 (UTC) )

---

The differences between Wolfram and BC really bothered me since I have used both for precision calculation in the past. The long and short of the matter, having done most of the maths 'long hand', BC is correct, Wolfram is wrong, and sadly, Randall was also wrong. It seems as tho Wolfram is rounding pi*1.5 to around 15 decimals but leaving the 9 repeating before converting to Octal.

If you take the output of octal(pi * 1.5) and paste it back into the input like so:
<pre>
4.554574376314416445676661714336617116240444076666510533533077631151350452060436452476274022621206136310000177621674175071262255702044274154476005744176002676623042402346036604733130522524127534777_8
</pre>
Wolfram gives you back (converted to decimal):
<pre>
4.71238898038468999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999
</pre>
If you give that same input to BC and ask it to convert to decimal you get:
<pre>
4.712388980384689999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999992894219160392567888
</pre>
If you do the math long hand out to 55 decimal places, pi * 1.5 equals:
<pre>
4.712388980384689857693965074919254326295754099062658731462416...
</pre>
Converting that by hand into octal is a bit of a pain, but if you do, at the 18th decimal place where BC and Wolfram differ you end up with the following:
<pre>
0.000000000000000183697019872102976583909889841150158731462416... is your remainder to be converted so far
0.000000000000000055511151231257827021181583404541015625 = 8 ^ -18
</pre>
Wolfram gives the 18th decimal as 5, BC as 3. I can't see 5 going into 18 5 times, but 3 times fits nicely.
--[[User:DarkJMKnight|DarkJMKnight]] ([[User talk:DarkJMKnight|talk]]) 20:04, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

Looks like Wolfram is simply using floating-point mathematics, presumably the IEEE "double precision". Interestingly, this is not the first time floating-point maths has been a problem; in [[287]], a similar problem caused an unintended trivial solution. [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 04:41, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
* On second thoughts, there's no indication that he used Wolfram Alpha; as with [[287]], it simply could have been a Perl script (or Python or pretty much any programming language). [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 05:25, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

---

How can 200 be octal and then mean 310 decimal???
If 200 were octal, that would be 128 decimal, so we would end up writing 128 decimals.
Of course 310 octal is 200 decimal, but taking 2008 to mean 31010 is plain crazy, even if it's the only way to make it fit the "four times 666" constraint!
What am I missing here? [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.149|173.245.53.149]] 21:27, 18 November 2013 (UTC)

This Mathematica code searches for the pattern 666 in the octal expansion of 1.5 pi:
<pre>digits = RealDigits[3*Pi/2, 8, 10000][[1]]; Select[Range[10000 - 2], Take[digits, {#, # + 2}] == {6, 6, 6} &]
{279, 326, 495, 496, 3430, 3728, 4153, 6040, 7031, 7195, 7647, 7732, 8353, 8435, 8436, 8575, 8768, 9008}</pre>
These positions start counting with the leading "4" as position 1. It does not occur in the first 200 digits, but occurs 18 times in the first 10,000 digits. Many other digit combinations occur more times in the first 10,000 digits, including "123" (23 times), "222" (21 times), and "555" (26 times). Note that "xkcd" converted to numbers (a=1, b=2, etc.) is 24, 11, 3, 4. The combination 241134 first occurs in 1.5 pi at digit number 250,745. [[User:Dcoetzee|Dcoetzee]] ([[User talk:Dcoetzee|talk]]) 06:44, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

Wow, this filled up fast. Is it time to remove the Incomplete tag yet? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.66|199.27.128.66]] 03:14, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

:Please do your adds at the bottom. Otherwise it looks like as the first discussion here and everybody will ignore your comment.
:My answer is: NO. We still have to figure out if Randall is wrong or just using an algorithm nobody does understand right now.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:10, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

---

Someone said there's no indication that Randall used Wolfram, and that double-precision IEEE numbers in mostly any language would cause the same error.
This is not true: IEEE double precision numbers (binary64) are stored internally in binary.
Converting them to octal would give at most 18 nonzero significant (octal) digits, and from that point on all additional digits would be zeros (remember that an octal digit is equivalent to three bits).
What Wolfram does is rounding to a decimal number, which is not round in octal.

I think the previous is an indication that Randall did indeed use Wolfram.
Added to that, he used Wolfram in several what-if's, and in one case he used it so heavily that his IP got temporarily banned from Wolfram.
This leaves little or no doubts in me that Wolfram is the source of Randall's mistake.

Also, I still would like to know why everybody is interpreting "200 digits" as "2008 digits" and pretending that's equal to "31010 digits" instead of "12810 digits".

And out of curiosity, what happened with [[287]] and floating point numbers?
The explainxkcd for 287 says nothing about floating point.

[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.145|173.245.53.145]] 22:09, 19 November 2013 (UTC)
* With [[287]], there was only meant to be one solution, the other solution was unintended. It's mentioned in the discussion only, not in the body of the explanation, but there's a link to an interview where he indicates that it was indeed unintentional. [[User:Sabik|Sabik]] ([[User talk:Sabik|talk]]) 07:13, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

;What is the period of the wolfram answer?
What is the repeat period of the octal answer with the 666's, (the length of the repetend) i.e. the one that comes from Wolfram, that is converting 4.71238898038469 decimal to octal? And how many 666's are in the full repetend? Oooh - I like that new word - thanks to {{w|repeating decimal}}! [[User:Nealmcb|Nealmcb]] ([[User talk:Nealmcb|talk]]) 23:22, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

:Dunno, either Randall uses WolframAlpha whithout further checks, so he has to check his sources, or we all are just dumb.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 23:54, 19 November 2013 (UTC)

: The period is 4882812500. Yes, what I mean is that it repeats every 488281250010 digits. Not sure I want to count the number of 666's in there. Oh, and thanks for the answer about [[287]], I've seen it now. -- [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.139|173.245.53.139]] 17:46, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

I hardly dare to ask now... ;)
*What is an octal expansion?
*This explanation cannot be complete before someone explains what this actually means, to someone who have never herd of octal expansion before (like me)
[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:33, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
:You are absolutely right, the incomplete tag is back. It seems only math geeks were working here but it should also be explained for people with less knowledge on math.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:02, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

:*The wikipedia page for {{w|Octal}} contains a complete explanation. I wrote a plainer one but mine is still very long, so instead of posting it here I uploaded it [http://www.jojonete.com/00/20131121_Octal/ there]. It's very crappily formatted and not thoroughly checked as I don't have time for more at the moment, but I might improve it some other day. Please note that the only reason for not posting it here is its length, and in particular it has nothing to do with copyright issues. I mean, everybody feel free to copy, rewrite, summarize, expand, correct, destroy or do whatever to that text with no attribution, just as if it had been posted here. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.145|173.245.53.145]] 22:37, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

::The explain for non math people should be much more simple. Randall likes simple English, I like simple Math. Not everything is covered but more people will understand the essentials. While I like all that details many people don't. We still do need an simple Math explain here.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 23:42, 21 November 2013 (UTC)

::I know and I agree, that's why I kept my explanation out of this discussion. My summarizing skills are just not good enough. I used the time I didn't have to reformat my explanation, but that just means it's now a bit longer than it was. I hope someone else will write a much shorter and simple one, as I just seem to be unable to do so. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.145|173.245.53.145]] 01:10, 22 November 2013 (UTC)

:::Thanks for a great explanation. I knew about this system but only for integers. However, still need a word on how to get pi in Octal. Until anyone does better a link could be posted for your explanation! [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 19:54, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

::::I added the conversion part to the explanation, it's in the same link. Still way too long to post here. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.117|173.245.53.117]] 03:29, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Note that pau is Catalan for peace, which is a good solution for the pi/tau dispute. --[[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.150|173.245.53.150]] 00:10, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

:Has posted this as a trivia item. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 20:11, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

The trivia that states that e here represents Euler's Constant, and not Euler's Number, seems to be false, is it not? e+2 being ~4.71, not ~2.58. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.11|108.162.237.11]] 17:39, 24 November 2013 (UTC)
:I have removed that sentence. It was simply wrong. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 19:35, 24 November 2013 (UTC)

4/3*Pau=Tau, 2/3*Pau=Pi, therefore, It can have a practical use.--[[User:ParadoX|ParadoX]] ([[User talk:ParadoX|talk]]) 10:57, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

Dear DgBrt, Please leave the explain as it is. It's "way too complex" for a reason. And the Title Text does in fact need its own header (it's not the only title text to have earned it) [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 19:03, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
:Hello 199.27.128.65, please post new comments to the bottom. I did revert your revert because you didn't solve any of the remarks by me. And the title text EXPLAIN could be done easy: Explain that comparing e and and pi is nonsense and explain the mistake done by Randall when using Wolfram Alpha. Everything else belongs to the trivia section. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:36, 19 March 2014 (UTC)
::OK, we need to get the admins in here before we end up in a revert war. We already explained the intentional error from Randall, which is why it's in the explanation and not the trivia section. It CAN'T go in the trivia section because we're EXPLAINING what the error is. You don't put long explanations in the trivia section, you put them in the explanation section. THAT'S why the title text is getting its own header. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 02:46, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
::All right, I've submitted a request for the admins to help up. No idea when they'll get here, but it should help smooth this big mess out. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 02:52, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
::: [[http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Admin_requests#Potential_Edit_War.3B_we_want_to_resolve_it_before_it_starts Here's what they've said so far]]. What do you think Dgbrt? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 04:27, 20 March 2014 (UTC)
::::After a week I haven't been here I still can say: calm down. My reasons are still at the incomplete tag — just read it.--[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:52, 27 March 2014 (UTC)
:::::Let's run through your arguments:
:"non Math people should also be able to understand this." I'd say the other editors did a pretty good job of that; that's the ENTIRE REASON we have an explain.
:"Randalls mistake has to be emphasised" They were. Read the explaination again.
:"everything else here is still too much, it even doesn't belong to a trivia section" But should the explanation not be as complete as possible? You underestimate just how nerdy we can get here.
:I have to side with the mods. I think this explanation was done and you're holding out for an impossible edit that will never come. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 02:19, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
::I will work on this, but it needs some time because I don't want to remove any of the great findings here. Non math people DON'T read all that number talks. They don't know what wolfram alpha is and that this site is sometimes WRONG. That has to be clearly explained.
::Furthermore this is NOT a nerd sniping by Randall; it's a nerd sniping ON Randall. He did use the result by wolfram alpha by error, he did figure out all that wrong "666" appearances, while he otherwise is very accurate on math.
::My idea is: Extract the essentials for the title text and add a paragraph like "Math details", "Background", or however to the bottom of the explain. In effect non math people would not read this paragraph but they can understand the essentials, other people would be happy about the deeper explain.
::I don't want to delete content, I'm just looking for a better presentation to the public. --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 21:03, 31 March 2014 (UTC)
:::The amount of research Randal does, it's far more likely he made the mistakes on purpose in order to nerd snipe, as opposed to "he just made the mistakes on accident."
:::I agree with you on the wolfram alpha part, though, and I like your idea to summarize the errors before exploring them in full detail
:::Sorry for being so antagonizing before. [[Special:Contributions/199.27.128.65|199.27.128.65]] 04:28, 1 April 2014 (UTC)

;Tone of "Title text" section
The [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1292:_Pi_vs._Tau&oldid=66351 current] tone of the title text section is inconsistent with the rest of this site. Where else does this wiki say, "Math is hard! It's not worth your time trying to understand the concepts here."?

''It consists of some of advanced trigonometry and other assorted college-level concepts that will in all likelihood just bore you if you don't care about them already.'' Really? There is not even any elementary trigonometry involved here, other than the value of PI itself. And since when is advanced trig a college level course? What is involved is the concept of bases other than base 10, specifically octal, but that is also a secondary school subject, both in mathematics and computer science.

I propose the following outline of the section:
*State that the property given in the title text does not actually hold for 1.5 * PI, but that due to an early rounding error, it might look as if it holds when shown via Wolfram Alpha. Further state that it is not clear if Randall, in relying on Wolfram Alpha, made a mistake, or if he is partaking in nerd sniping.
*Show how close Pau is to e+2.
*Explain octal -- base 8 -- first for integers, then for fractions.
*Present the actual octal expansion and show that the property does not hold.
*Explain why the Wolfram Alpha answer is different.
*Present the Wolfram Alpha answer, and show how the property [almost?] holds with that value.
*Depending on how self-referential we wish to be, explain how it might have been a plausible mistake for Randall to have relied on Wolfram Alpha, but that if it was a case of nerd sniping, then it was highly successful.
*Mention the similarity to the Feynman point.
This wiki is about explanations. We shouldn't bemoan a subject as being more difficult than it is; we should explain. -- [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.43|108.162.219.43]] 22:52, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

:We should have two different paragraphs here:
:*The standard explain, containing the essentials like shown by 108.162.219.43 just before.
:*A "Deeper into math" one, going into more depth.
:*The "Title text" header is wrong!
:My 2 cents --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 18:58, 30 April 2014 (UTC)
::I tried to fix my old "Title Text" header, what do you think? [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.204|199.27.130.204]] 03:29, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

1360: Old Files

2014-04-28T17:07:06Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 1360
| date = April 25, 2014
| title = Old Files
| image = old_files.png
| titletext = Wow, ANIMORPHS-NOVEL.RTF? Just gonna, uh, go through and delete that from all my archives real quick.
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|The file explains are better now, but still need work.}}
Cueball is digging through a pile of old files, which the comic represents as literally digging into the depths of his filesystem. The files are in concentric layers because each directory contains files moved over from an older system, so his "Documents" folder contains an "Old Desktop" folder from an older computer, the "Old Desktop" contains files recovered from the drive crash of the system before that, which had its own "My Documents" folder, which contained files saved from a [[wikipedia:Zip Disk|Zip Disk]] in high school. The result is that files from all the way back in high school have survived to his present-day machine. He discovers several files he is embarrassed about, including a poetry file that surprises him, since he does not remember writing poetry, and an "[[wikipedia:Animorphs|Animorphs]] Novel" mentioned in the title text, most likely a fan fiction of the Animorphs series, although possibly a copy of one of the original books.

This comic came out the day after [http://news.sky.com/story/1248397/andy-warhol-originals-found-on-floppy-disk Sky News published the story] of original {{w|Andy Warhol}} artwork, created in 1985 on an {{w|Amiga 1000}}, was recovered from recently found floppy disks.

The folders and files in detail:
*'''Documents''' (47 GB) - A large folder containing many of [[Cueball]]'s personal files.
**''misc.txt'' - A miscellaneous {{w|text file}} of unknown size. Quite likely, no one except Cueball will know what's in it.
**''Video projects'' - Video files can take up a lot of space, and likely make up a significant chunk of that 47 GB.
*'''Old desktop''' (12 GB) - A backup from a former computer.
**''Facebook pics'' - Because {{w|Facebook}} started in 2004, his old computer must have been functional by that time.
**''Pics from other camera'' - No mention about the content, only the creator will remember.
**''Temp'' - Old temporary files. Quite likely, even Cueball won't know what's in here.
**''Misc PDFs'' - {{w|Portable Document Format|PDF files}} are often used for documentation on programs, but this could be also a collection of digitized books or other scanned documents.
**''MP3'' - Probably mostly music. {{w|MP3}} is a widely-used format for digital audio files.
*'''Recovered from drive crash''' (4 GB) - When a {{w|Hard disk drive|hard drive crashes}}, sometimes part of that content can be recovered.
**''Temp'' - More old temporary files.
**''Work misc'' - Only the creator does maybe understand what's inside of this folder.
**''Audio books'' - {{w|Audiobook|Audio books}} are recordings of a text being read.
*'''My Documents''' (570 MB) - This is a typical {{w|Microsoft Windows}} for your own documents.
**''Downloads'' - A common default location for downloaded files. Its content can be anything.
**''Kazaa shared'' - {{w|Kazaa}} was a peer-to-peer file sharing program, defunct in August 2012. The "shared" folder was open to other people on the internet for downloading.
**''AYB'' - {{w|All your base are belong to us|All Your Base}} is an internet meme based on a famously bad translation of the video game ''{{w|Zero Wing}}''. Probably a reference to [[286: All Your Base]].
**''EV Override'' - {{w|Escape Velocity Override}} is an {{w|Apple Macintosh}} video game, released in 1998.
**''Angband'' - [http://rephial.org/ Angband] is a game named after a fictional stronghold created by {{w|J. R. R. Tolkien}}.
**''GIFs'' - {{w|GIF}} is an old image format widely used for small, often animated images.
**''FIGHT CLUB.wmv'' - ''{{w|Fight Club}}'' is a movie from 1999. Nobody knows if this download was legal. As feature movies are typically compressed to 700 megabyte or more when shared over the Internet, it seems Cueball's file is either compressed in some obscure, irregular format; uses a small screen size; or is not the Brad Pitt movie - either way strongly in keeping with the original movie's themes of subversion.
**''Elasto Mania'' - {{w|Elasto Mania}} is a physics-simulation game released in 2000. It claims to show real physics on this game, but there is still a dispute on this.
**''AIM Direct Connect files'' - This may have to do with files transferred via {{w|AOL Instant Messenger}}.
**''4chan'' - {{w|4chan}} is an imageboard where users can upload pictures anonymously; we know from [[512: Alternate Currency|a previous comic]] that Randall impulsively saves pictures from there.
**''ICQ logs'' - {{w|ICQ}} is an instant messaging program introduced in 1996. It is no longer used much in North America.
*'''High school Zip disk''' (94 MB) - This refers to the {{w|Zip drive}}, the most popular form of {{w|superfloppy}}, introduced in 1994 with a capacity of 100 MB. These have long since given way to writable CDs/DVDs and {{w|USB flash drive}}s. These files are from when [[Cueball]] was in {{w|high school}} (i.e., a teenager) or earlier.
**''Korn MIDI'' - {{w|Korn}} is an American {{w|nu metal}} band formed in 1993. {{w|MIDI}} is a music format used by synthesizers and early computer games, which can not really produce the sound of that metal band very well.
**''Photos3'' - This is a folder of old photos from when Cueball was in high school.
***''Prom'' - A {{w|prom}} is a kind of semi-formal dance held every year by students at most US high schools. These photos were presumably taken at one.
**''lovenote.txt'' - An old text file of a {{w|love letter}}, probably to a classmate in high school.
**''Gorilla.bas'' - {{w|Gorillas (video game)|Gorillas}} is a video game first distributed with MS-DOS 5 and published in 1991 by IBM. The suffix "bas" indicates a {{w|BASIC}} program; the game was included with copies of QBasic (see below).
**''Dream.txt'' - Some private dreams.
**''James.txt'' - Who is James? Is our user addicted to him? Perhaps [[James]] is a friend of Randall, and the same as the one who came up with [http://explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/107 xkcd #107]?
**''AOL'' - {{w|AOL}} is an early online and internet service, founded in 1985 and popular in the 1990s.
***''Citadel'' - {{w|Citadel (software)|Citadel}} was a {{w|BBS}} and email platform that was widely used in the 1980s and early '90s.
**''QBasic'' - {{w|QBasic}} is an old MS-DOS program (an {{w|Integrated development environment|IDE}}), released by {{w|Microsoft}} in 1991, which was used to write and run computer programs in the BASIC language.
**''NYET'' - ''NYET'' was a {{w|Tetris}}-like game for MS-DOS, released in 1988.
**''Jokes.txt'' - An old text file of jokes.
*'''AAAFILES''' (9.4 MB) - some of [[Cueball]]'s oldest documents, likely prefixed with "AAA" to put the folder at the top of an alphabetically-sorted list.
*'''TXT''' (850 K) - old text files, which include the poetry he didn't remember writing.

==Transcript==

:Megan (on top of stack of files): ''You OK down there?''

:'''Documents''' (47 GB)
::misc.txt
::Video projects
:'''Old desktop''' (12 GB)
::Facebook pics
::Pics from other camera
::Temp
::Misc PDFs
::MP3
:'''Recovered from drive crash''' (4 GB)
::Temp
::Work misc
::Audio books
:'''My Documents''' (570 MB)
::Downloads
::Kazaa shared
::AYB
::EV Override
::Angband
::GIFs
::FIGHT CLUB.wmv
::Elasto Mania
::AIM Direct Connect files
::4chan
::ICQ logs
:'''High school Zip disk''' (94 MB)
::Korn MIDI
::Photos3 (Prom)
::lovenote.txt
::Gorilla.bas
::Dream.txt
::James.txt
::AOL (Citadel)
::QBasic
::NYET
::Jokes.txt
:'''AAAFILES''' (9.4 MB)
:'''TXT''' (850 K)
:Cueball (deep inside the AAAFILES section looking at his txt files): ''Oh my god. I wrote '''poetry'''.''
{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

482: Height

2014-04-28T07:17:44Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 482
| date = September 29, 2008
| title = Height
| image = height.png
| titletext = Interestingly, on a true vertical log plot, I think the Eiffel Tower's sides would really be straight lines.
}}

==Explanation==
{{Incomplete|Lots of the little references aren't even mentioned, e.g. Human Altitude record, the space elevator, and I just added an explanation for "All Hail Discordia!" This is nearly there, but not yet.}}
The comic is a companion piece to [[485: Depth]], which explores a {{w|logarithmic scale}} from Earth's atmosphere down to the interior of a single proton. ''Height'' begins this process by viewing logarithmically smaller scales showing several objects in the universe, both real and fictional, from farthest (top) to closest (bottom). The comic starts with [[Black Hat]] throwing a cat off the edge of the universe, probably a reference to {{w|Schrodinger's cat}} (as since it is outside the {{w|observable universe}} (for us), it exists in a super-position of both living and dead until we actually 'observe' it and force it to be in one of the states). It may also refer to the common myth that a cat will always land on its feet, a myth Black Hat appears to be testing to the extreme. The top of the universe is shown as the distance from which the oldest rays of light reach Earth.

Displaying height logarithmically while displaying width linearly noticeably distorts the shapes of the terrestrial objects. The title text notes that this distortion would approximately cancel out the curve of the Eiffel Tower's profile, and speculates that the cancellation might in fact be exact enough to convert its silhouette to a straight-edged triangle.

The {{w|age of the universe}} is currently stated as 13.8 billion years. But the {{w|Observable universe}} is about 14.0 billion {{w|parsecs}} or 46 billion {{w|light years}}, as shown on the top of the image.

===Fictional Objects===

*[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/cat-on-a-keyboard-in-space Cat on a keyboard in space].
*{{w|Ford_Prefect (character)|Ford Prefect}}, character from {{w|The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy}}, shown near his home star; Betelgeuse.
*The [http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Romulan_Neutral_Zone Romulan Neutral Zone], marking the edge of the {{w|Star Trek}} Federation.
*{{w|Federation Sector 0-0-1}}, the sector of space assigned to Earth in {{w|Star Trek}}.
*"missing WMDs", a reference to the controversy about {{w|Iraq and weapons of mass destruction}}.
*{{w|Bupkis}} is Yiddish for "nothing". Only a handful of objects are known to orbit between the outer edge of the Kuiper Belt and the inner edge of the Oort Cloud, hence "Bupkis".
*A comet scheduled to hit earth in 2063, to coincide with the latest date for a supposed [http://www.askelm.com/prophecy/p971105.htm Biblically prophesized end of the world].
*Life on the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, which may or may not exist.
**The arrows most likely points to the following moons:
**Jupiter’s moon {{W|Europa (moon)|Europa}} which may be covered by a deep ocean of water - which is again covered by layer of ice many kilometers thick. In such an ocean life could have formed.
**Saturn’s moon {{W|Titan (moon)|Titan}} is the only known moon to have an atmosphere - although nothing like the one on earth. There may be oceans on the moon, but not filled with water but with liquid methane and ethane. It is way too cold for liquid water. Still in such oceans life could also have formed.
**For either moon the oceans cannot be viewed from earth either due to thick ice or opaque atmosphere.
*The little spaceship from {{w|Asteroids (video game)}}.
*The {{w|Discovery One}} from {{w|2001: A Space Odyssey}}, referring to the quote "open the pod bay door, HAL."
*The spaceplane is most likely the Planet Express from {{w|Futurama}}, where Fry once discussed "a big heaping bowl of salt." However, it could conceivably refer to these instead:
**The Quasi-elemental plane of Salt from the {{w|Inner Plane}} in {{w|Dungeons and Dragons}}.
**The Great Salt Vampire from [http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/M-113_creature Star Trek TOS].
**A relative of {{w|Russell's teapot}}.
*A lunar lander with someone inside proclaiming "In retrospect, they shouldn't have sent a poet. I have no idea how to land". The goal of {{w|Lunar Lander (arcade game)}} is to land the vehicle without crashing it. The quote is a reference to {{w|Contact (1997 film)}} where the main character Ellie Arroway after witnessing a celestial light show up close says "Poetry! They should've sent a poet.". The actual vehicle in the movie was round and not shaped like a lunar lander.
*{{w|Cory Doctorow}}'s balloon. (first referenced in [[239]].)
*[[Cueball]], who is apparently still using Python as shown in comic [[353]].
*A {{w|Space elevator}} is a proposed method of transporting cargo or people into orbit, consisting of a large mass beyond geosynchronous orbit, a station at the geosynchronous point, a cable connecting it to the Earth, and a climber that can scale the cable. No space elevator has been built to date, but according to the comic, one will be deployed "one of these days, promise!"
*Black Hat throwing a cat off the top of the comic, presumably to determine whether it will land on its feet.
*Snoop Dogg, a rapper notorious for smoking marijuana, is shown as having the second-highest altitude record, a reference to slang for ingesting marijuana being "getting high". Someone who has ingested marijuana may also be described as "high".
*The person in the tree saying, "Hey, squirrels!" is a reference to [[167]].

===Real Objects===

*{{w|Hubble Deep Field}}, a long-exposure photograph of extremely distant galaxies.
*{{w|Great Attractor}}, an unusual concentration of intergalactic mass.
*{{w|Antennae Galaxies}}, a pair of colliding galaxies.
*{{w|Andromeda Galaxy}}, a sibling to our Milky Way.
*{{w|Magellanic Clouds}}, a pair of nearby dwarf galaxies.
*{{w|Crab Nebula}}, {{w|Orion Nebula}}, and {{w|Horsehead Nebula}}, supernova remnants.
*{{w|Pleiades}}, {{w|Rigel}}, and {{w|Betelgeuse}}, stars. The Pleiades also have a derogatory remark, as per [[66: Abusive Astronomy]]
*The distance that human radio transmissions have traveled so far. See {{w|Contact (1997 film)}} for a depiction of this. This is also referenced in [[1212]].
*{{w|Pollux}}, {{w|Arcturus}}, {{w|Sirius}}, {{w|Alpha Centauri}}, and {{w|Barnard's Star}}, nearby stars.
*{{w|Oort cloud}}, a halo of ice balls surrounding our solar system, but missing the {{w|Kupier belt}} between Neptune and the Oort cloud.
*{{w|Pioneer 10}} and {{w|Voyager 1}}, two early probes headed out of the solar system.
*{{w|Eris (dwarf planet)|Eris}} and {{w|Pluto}}, a pair of {{w|Trans-Neptunian object|TNOs}} now classified as {{w|dwarf planet}}s. The "All hail Discordia!" after Eris is a reference to {{w|Discordianism}}, a somewhat tongue-in-cheek religion based around the goddess Eris.
*{{w|Neptune}}, {{w|Uranus}}, {{w|Saturn}}, and {{w|Jupiter}}, giant gas planets at our {{w|Solar System|solar system}}.
*The {{w|Asteroid|Asteroid belt}} between Mars and Jupiter.
*{{w|Mars}}, {{w|Venus}}, and {{w|Mercury}}, our neighboring inner planets. Note that Venus and Mars are shown with looping paths, reflecting the fact that their distances from Earth vary as the planets move in their orbits (this is true for all planets, but more noticeable for these two because the ratio of smallest to greatest distance is particularly large).
*The {{w|Sun}} and the {{w|Moon}}.
*Hot air balloons typically only hover at 2,500 feet (760 meters), thought the altitude record is 90,000 feet (27.4 kilometers).
*Kite string is commonly sold in large spools; a nice thick spool will probably hold 500 feet, or 150 meters.
*A "pop fly" refers to {{w|Baseball}}. Specifically, it's when the batter hits the baseball, but the baseball follows a tall arc deep into the infield where it's easy picking for the other team to catch on its way down. The highest recorded pop fly, not including those that landed in foul territory, was 172 meters.
*The {{w|Burj Khalifa}}, formerly known as the Burj Dubai, is the tallest building in the world.
*The {{w|Eiffel Tower}} is a famous landmark in Paris, France.
*The {{w|Great Pyramid of Giza}} is one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It is located in Egypt.
*The tallest {{w|stilts}} recorded by the Guinness Book of World Records (as of November 2006) were 16.4 meters, or nearly 54 feet.

==Transcript==
:[Map of the universe from observable universe to Earth. Each area of item is labelled.]
:[Labels left to right, up to down:]
:[Black Hat is standing on top, throwing a black kitty down.]
:Black Cat: mrowl!
::Top of Observable Universe
::46 Billion Light Years Up
::Hubble Deep Field Objects
:-One Billion Light Years-
::Great Attractor
:Antennae Galaxies (Colliding)
:Andromeda
:::Holy Crap Lots of Space
::-One Million Light Years-
::Magellanic Clouds
::Edge of Galaxy
::Galactic Center
::Crab Nebula
::Orion Nebula
::Horsehead Nebula
::Romulan Neutral Zone
:::The PLEIADES, Duh.
::Rigel
::Betelgeuse
::Ford Prefect
::-Expanding Shell of Radio Transmissions [Arrows are pointing up.]-
::Edge of Federation Sector 0-0-1
::Pollux
::Arcturus
::Missing WMDs
::Alpha Centauri
::Sirius
::Barnard's Star
:-One Parsec-
::-One Light Year-
::Oort Cloud (?)
::Bupkis
::Comet which will destroy Earth in late 2063
::Pioneer 10
::Eris (All hail Discordia!)
::Voyager I
::Pluto (Not a planet. Neener neener.)
::Neptune
::Uranus
:Saturn
::Asteroids
:::<~life~>
::Jupiter
::Venus
::Mars
::Sun
::Mercury
::Aircraft: Hey a heaping bowl of salt!
::"Open the fridge door, Hal."
::Moon
::Human Altitude Record (Apollo 13)
::2nd Place: Snoop Dogg
::Space Elevator - One of these days, promise!
::-Geosynchronous Orbit-
::GPS Satellites
::Lunar lander: In retrospect, they shouldn't have sent a poet. I have no idea how to land
::International Space Station
::Space Junk
::-Official Edge of Space (100 km)-
::Meteors
::-1/10 ATM-
::High Altitude Balloons
::Airliners
::-1/2 ATM-
::Cory Doctrow
::Shuttle Columbia Lost
::Everest
::Helicoptors
::Cueball: Woo Python!
::[vertical scale along right side of image, starting at 1 km and getting progressivly smaller and smaller.]
::-800 m-
::Burj Dubai (~800 m)
::Eiffel Tower (325 m)
::Kites
::Great Pyramid (140 m)
::Redwood (115 m)
::Pop Fly
::Oak (20 m)
::"Hey Squirrels!"
::Tallest Stilts
::Brachiosaur (13 m)
::Giraffe (8 m)
::[Megan and Cueball.] Folks
:The Observable Universe, from Top to Bottom ~On a log scale~
:Sizes are not to scale, but heights above the Earth's surface are accurate on a log scale (that is, each step up is double the height.)

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cory Doctorow]]
[[Category:Large drawings]]

482: Height

2014-04-28T06:55:02Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 482
| date = September 29, 2008
| title = Height
| image = height.png
| titletext = Interestingly, on a true vertical log plot, I think the Eiffel Tower's sides would really be straight lines.
}}

==Explanation==
{{Incomplete|Lots of the little references aren't even mentioned, e.g. Human Altitude record, the space elevator, and I just added an explanation for "All Hail Discordia!" This is nearly there, but not yet.}}
The comic is a companion piece to [[485: Depth]], which explores a {{w|logarithmic scale}} from Earth's atmosphere down to the interior of a single proton. ''Height'' begins this process by viewing logarithmically smaller scales showing several objects in the universe, both real and fictional, from farthest (top) to closest (bottom). The comic starts with [[Black Hat]] throwing a cat off the edge of the universe, probably a reference to {{w|Schrodinger's cat}} (as since it is outside the {{w|observable universe}} (for us), it exists in a super-position of both living and dead until we actually 'observe' it and force it to be in one of the states). It may also refer to the common myth that a cat will always land on its feet, a myth Black Hat appears to be testing to the extreme. The top of the universe is shown as the distance from which the oldest rays of light reach Earth.

Displaying height logarithmically while displaying width linearly noticeably distorts the shapes of the terrestrial objects. The title text notes that this distortion would approximately cancel out the curve of the Eiffel Tower's profile, and speculates that the cancellation might in fact be exact enough to convert its silhouette to a straight-edged triangle.

The {{w|age of the universe}} is currently stated as 13.8 billion years. But the {{w|Observable universe}} is about 14.0 billion {{w|parsecs}} or 46 billion {{w|light years}}, as shown on the top of the image.

===Fictional Objects===

*[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/cat-on-a-keyboard-in-space Cat on a keyboard in space].
*{{w|Ford_Prefect (character)|Ford Prefect}}, character from {{w|The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy}}, shown near his home star; Betelgeuse.
*The [http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Romulan_Neutral_Zone Romulan Neutral Zone], marking the edge of the {{w|Star Trek}} Federation.
*{{w|Federation Sector 0-0-1}}, the sector of space assigned to Earth in {{w|Star Trek}}.
*"missing WMDs", a reference to the controversy about {{w|Iraq and weapons of mass destruction}}.
*{{w|Bupkis}} is Yiddish for "nothing". Only a handful of objects are known to orbit between the outer edge of the Kuiper Belt and the inner edge of the Oort Cloud, hence "Bupkis".
*A comet scheduled to hit earth in 2063, to coincide with the latest date for a supposed [http://www.askelm.com/prophecy/p971105.htm Biblically prophesized end of the world].
*Life on the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, which may or may not exist.
**The arrows most likely points to the following moons:
**Jupiter’s moon {{W|Europa (moon)|Europa}} which may be covered by a deep ocean of water - which is again covered by layer of ice many kilometers thick. In such an ocean life could have formed.
**Saturn’s moon {{W|Titan (moon)|Titan}} is the only known moon to have an atmosphere - although nothing like the one on earth. There may be oceans on the moon, but not filled with water but with liquid methane and ethane. It is way too cold for liquid water. Still in such oceans life could also have formed.
**For either moon the oceans cannot be viewed from earth either due to thick ice or opaque atmosphere.
*The little spaceship from {{w|Asteroids (video game)}}.
*The {{w|Discovery One}} from {{w|2001: A Space Odyssey}}, referring to the quote "open the pod bay door, HAL."
*The spaceplane is most likely the Planet Express from {{w|Futurama}}, where Fry once discussed "a big heaping bowl of salt." However, it could conceivably refer to these instead:
**The Quasi-elemental plane of Salt from the {{w|Inner Plane}} in {{w|Dungeons and Dragons}}.
**The Great Salt Vampire from [http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/M-113_creature Star Trek TOS].
**A relative of {{w|Russell's teapot}}.
*A lunar lander with someone inside proclaiming "In retrospect, they shouldn't have sent a poet. I have no idea how to land". The goal of {{w|Lunar Lander (arcade game)}} is to land the vehicle without crashing it. The quote is a reference to {{w|Contact (1997 film)}} where the main character Ellie Arroway after witnessing a celestial light show up close says "Poetry! They should've sent a poet.". The actual vehicle in the movie was round and not shaped like a lunar lander.
*{{w|Cory Doctorow}}'s balloon. (first referenced in [[239]].)
*[[Cueball]], who is apparently still using Python as shown in comic [[353]].
*A {{w|Space elevator}} is a proposed method of transporting cargo or people into orbit, consisting of a large mass beyond geosynchronous orbit, a station at the geosynchronous point, a cable connecting it to the Earth, and a climber that can scale the cable. No space elevator has been built to date, but according to the comic, one will be deployed "one of these days, promise!"
*Black Hat throwing a cat off the top of the comic, presumably to determine whether it will land on its feet.
*Snoop Dogg, a rapper notorious for smoking marijuana, is shown as having the second-highest altitude record, a reference to slang for ingesting marijuana being "getting high". Someone who has ingested marijuana may also be described as "high".
*The person in the tree saying, "Hey, squirrels!" is a reference to [[167]].

===Real Objects===

*{{w|Hubble Deep Field}}, a long-exposure photograph of extremely distant galaxies.
*{{w|Great Attractor}}, an unusual concentration of intergalactic mass.
*{{w|Antennae Galaxies}}, a pair of colliding galaxies.
*{{w|Andromeda Galaxy}}, a sibling to our Milky Way.
*{{w|Magellanic Clouds}}, a pair of nearby dwarf galaxies.
*{{w|Crab Nebula}}, {{w|Orion Nebula}}, and {{w|Horsehead Nebula}}, supernova remnants.
*{{w|Pleiades}}, {{w|Rigel}}, and {{w|Betelgeuse}}, stars. The Pleiades also have a derogatory remark, as per [[66: Abusive Astronomy]]
*The distance that human radio transmissions have traveled so far. See {{w|Contact (1997 film)}} for a depiction of this. This is also referenced in [[1212]].
*{{w|Pollux}}, {{w|Arcturus}}, {{w|Sirius}}, {{w|Alpha Centauri}}, and {{w|Barnard's Star}}, nearby stars.
*{{w|Oort cloud}}, a halo of ice balls surrounding our solar system, but missing the {{w|Kupier belt}} between Neptune and the Oort cloud.
*{{w|Pioneer 10}} and {{w|Voyager 1}}, two early probes headed out of the solar system.
*{{w|Eris (dwarf planet)|Eris}} and {{w|Pluto}}, a pair of {{w|Trans-Neptunian object|TNOs}} now classified as {{w|dwarf planet}}s. The "All hail Discordia!" after Eris is a reference to {{w|Discordianism}}, a somewhat tongue-in-cheek religion based around the goddess Eris.
*{{w|Neptune}}, {{w|Uranus}}, {{w|Saturn}}, and {{w|Jupiter}}, giant gas planets at our {{w|Solar System|solar system}}.
*The {{w|Asteroid|Asteroid belt}} between Mars and Jupiter.
*{{w|Mars}}, {{w|Venus}}, and {{w|Mercury}}, our neighboring inner planets. Note that Venus and Mars are shown with looping paths, reflecting the fact that their distances from Earth vary as the planets move in their orbits (this is true for all planets, but more noticeable for these two because the ratio of smallest to greatest distance is particularly large).
*The {{w|Sun}} and the {{w|Moon}}.
*A "pop fly" refers to {{w|Baseball}}. Specifically, it's when the batter hits the baseball, but the baseball follows a tall arc deep into the infield where it's easy picking for the other team to catch on its way down. The highest recorded pop fly, not including those that landed in foul territory, was 172 meters.
*The {{w|Burj Khalifa}}, formerly known as the Burj Dubai, is the tallest building in the world.
*The {{w|Eiffel Tower}} is a famous landmark in Paris, France.
*The {{w|Great Pyramid of Giza}} is one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It is located in Egypt.
*The tallest {{w|stilts}} recorded by the Guinness Book of World Records (as of November 2006) were 16.4 meters, or nearly 54 feet.

==Transcript==
:[Map of the universe from observable universe to Earth. Each area of item is labelled.]
:[Labels left to right, up to down:]
:[Black Hat is standing on top, throwing a black kitty down.]
:Black Cat: mrowl!
::Top of Observable Universe
::46 Billion Light Years Up
::Hubble Deep Field Objects
:-One Billion Light Years-
::Great Attractor
:Antennae Galaxies (Colliding)
:Andromeda
:::Holy Crap Lots of Space
::-One Million Light Years-
::Magellanic Clouds
::Edge of Galaxy
::Galactic Center
::Crab Nebula
::Orion Nebula
::Horsehead Nebula
::Romulan Neutral Zone
:::The PLEIADES, Duh.
::Rigel
::Betelgeuse
::Ford Prefect
::-Expanding Shell of Radio Transmissions [Arrows are pointing up.]-
::Edge of Federation Sector 0-0-1
::Pollux
::Arcturus
::Missing WMDs
::Alpha Centauri
::Sirius
::Barnard's Star
:-One Parsec-
::-One Light Year-
::Oort Cloud (?)
::Bupkis
::Comet which will destroy Earth in late 2063
::Pioneer 10
::Eris (All hail Discordia!)
::Voyager I
::Pluto (Not a planet. Neener neener.)
::Neptune
::Uranus
:Saturn
::Asteroids
:::<~life~>
::Jupiter
::Venus
::Mars
::Sun
::Mercury
::Aircraft: Hey a heaping bowl of salt!
::"Open the fridge door, Hal."
::Moon
::Human Altitude Record (Apollo 13)
::2nd Place: Snoop Dogg
::Space Elevator - One of these days, promise!
::-Geosynchronous Orbit-
::GPS Satellites
::Lunar lander: In retrospect, they shouldn't have sent a poet. I have no idea how to land
::International Space Station
::Space Junk
::-Official Edge of Space (100 km)-
::Meteors
::-1/10 ATM-
::High Altitude Balloons
::Airliners
::-1/2 ATM-
::Cory Doctrow
::Shuttle Columbia Lost
::Everest
::Helicoptors
::Cueball: Woo Python!
::[vertical scale along right side of image, starting at 1 km and getting progressivly smaller and smaller.]
::-800 m-
::Burj Dubai (~800 m)
::Eiffel Tower (325 m)
::Kites
::Great Pyramid (140 m)
::Redwood (115 m)
::Pop Fly
::Oak (20 m)
::"Hey Squirrels!"
::Tallest Stilts
::Brachiosaur (13 m)
::Giraffe (8 m)
::[Megan and Cueball.] Folks
:The Observable Universe, from Top to Bottom ~On a log scale~
:Sizes are not to scale, but heights above the Earth's surface are accurate on a log scale (that is, each step up is double the height.)

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Charts]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cory Doctorow]]
[[Category:Large drawings]]

1360: Old Files

2014-04-25T18:49:27Z

199.27.130.204: /* Files */ I have no idea how to edit the template (or even where the correct template is). Can you guys put this there?

Talk:1360: Old Files

2014-04-25T18:19:37Z

199.27.130.204: /* Can we get some instructions on how to edit the page? */ new section

I notice backup and recovery files. I once had a folder on my father's computer that housed everything I did. When the drive crashed, I managed to recover it and store it to a CD-ROM (this was before thumb drives). I copied everything onto my first computer within my main folder (I don't use My Documents), and I continue to move my main folder into a new main folder each time I migrate between computers. I have so many nested memories. I, too, have incomplete fan-fiction and instant message logs. Oh, and a dream.txt. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.218|108.162.237.218]] 04:47, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

I don't have as much of a problem with the "old files room", because I keep nearly all of my files on my laptop, but my hard drive is almost full. Another hard drive replace the CD drive, but this computer won't last much longer (bye cd drive workaround). I'll have to build an "old files room" sooner or later. [[User:Z|Z]] ([[User talk:Z|talk]]) 05:07, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Back in the... early '90s, I think it was... I recall there being someone like a buddhist monk (or someone ''claiming'' to be someone like a buddhist monk, and the religion could have been something else) who set up an internet site (not necessarily a website) as a temple for "all lost data". The files you had accidentally deleted, the floppies that got damaged or otherwise corrupted, forgotten formats on old drives that you'd lost the wherewithall to access them. Between this and the "hoarder" behaviour exhibitted in the above XKCD folder we encompass ''all'' long-term computer users. At the same time. I know I regret the dead USB sticks (with irreplacable content) and yet I stare in hopelessness at the folders "GStick" and "FStick" within My Documents, that really need looking at again. (No, they don't contain the lost material. Datestamped at 2009.) But they're two of fifty-three separate subfolders (and a helluva lot of loose files) in that level. "WebRedo"? I remember that. That site hasn't even been ''active'' for about a decade. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.89.224|141.101.89.224]] 06:50, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

;Explanation
I think the point of the comic doesn't come across in the explanation. It's not just that he's sifting through files, but that he's finding files nested deeply in his folder structure that just came to pass because he always copied contents of an old computer to some folder on the next computer and then ignored its contents.

I.e. in his "Documents" folder, there is the "Old Desktop" folder from a previous computer, which contains the "Recovered from drive crash" folder from another previous system, which has another "Mu Documents" folder within, ... etc. The nesting aspect should somehow be integrated into the explanation.
--[[Special:Contributions/108.162.229.57|108.162.229.57]] 09:59, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

The shape of the panel is vaguely reminiscent of a hard drive, this may be intentional, being emphasized by the increasing size of the individual layers. In which case there might be some metaphor construed by the placement of the two characters based on their location in the structure of the hard-drive perhaps involving the catalog index. {{unsigned ip|108.162.216.35}}

It should be pointed out that the AYB folder is directly referencing https://xkcd.com/286/ {{unsigned ip|108.162.238.211}}

I have done this before on my hard drive(s) and I always find my old qbasic programs. Anyone knows of an emulator for qbasic so I could see my old programs running again? [[User:Bigfatbernie|Bigfatbernie]] ([[User talk:Bigfatbernie|talk]]) 13:56, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

:DOSBox will run QBasic programs if you grab the QBasic 1.1 interpreter from either an old copy of Windows 98 that still has it in its dos utilities folder, or just download it from here: http://www.qbasic.net/en/qbasic-downloads/compiler/qbasic-interpreter.htm [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.42|108.162.219.42]] 17:01, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

Anybody know what Citadel is? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.42|108.162.219.42]] 16:58, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

== Can we get some instructions on how to edit the page? ==

It makes no sense to me whatsoever, and it's unlike every other page on the wiki. I can find the list we use in the transcript, but I can't figure out how to add the explainations [[Special:Contributions/199.27.130.204|199.27.130.204]] 18:19, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

877: Beauty

2014-04-24T23:13:20Z

199.27.130.204: this help at all?

{{comic
| number = 877
| date = March 25, 2011
| title = Beauty
| image = beauty.png
| titletext = The best hugs are probably from hagfish, which can extrude microscopic filaments that convert a huge volume of water around them to slime in seconds. Instant cozy blanket!
}}

==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Too short and vague}}
Many people believe that over-analysis is boring and only serves to detract from the beauty, wonder, or emotional moments of the subject. This is especially compounded in literature classes, but it's a gripe common throughout many studies. Many experts and professionals, however, disagree greatly, claiming that thy see ''more'' wonder and excitement in those subjects than they did before.

[[Ponytail]]'s statement in the first panel is proved wrong by [[Megan]]'s actions throughout the comic and the statement in the title text, to the point where she retracts and changes her statement.

Concerning the {{w|hagfish}} - "Their unusual feeding habits and slime-producing capabilities have led members of the scientific and popular media to dub the hagfish as the most 'disgusting' of all sea creatures."

==Transcript==
:[Ponytail and Cueball are discussing science. They are interrupted by an off-panel shout.]
:Ponytail: The problem with scientists is that you take the wonder and beauty out of everything by trying to analyze it.
:Megan: ''Dude!''

:[Megan runs across the panel, carrying a microscope and a slime mold.]
:Megan: My plasmoidal slime molds have heightened pigment production! Check out that yellow color! That actually makes them zinc-resistant. Amazing, huh?

:[The slime mold is proffered to the same human who was speaking earlier. The close up hides Megan's face.]
:Ponytail: It looks like dog barf.
:Megan: Hah, yeah! F. Septica is nicknamed "dog vomit slime mold." Cool, huh? Check out my slides!

:[Megan has set down the microscope on the floor of the panel, and the slime mold is jiggling.]
:Ponytail: Okay, never mind: What's wrong with scientists is that you ''do'' see wonder and beauty in everything.
:Ponytail: Oh God, it's ''moving!''
:Megan: It wants to hug you! So cute!

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Biology]]

802: Online Communities 2

2014-04-24T03:07:14Z

199.27.130.204: /* Facebook Region */

{{comic
| number = 802
| date = October 6, 2010
| title = Online Communities 2
| image = online_communities_2.png
| titletext = Best trivia I learned while working on this: 'Man, Farmville is so huge! Do you realize it's the second-biggest browser-based social-networking-centered farming game in the WORLD?' Then you wait for the listener to do a double-take.
}}
A larger version of this picture can be found here: [http://xkcd.com/802_large/ http://xkcd.com/802_large/].
<div class="toclimit-3" style="float:right; margin-left: 10px;"> __TOC__ </div>
==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Not all of the regions are fully explained. Many labels aren't even mentioned outside of the transcript.}}
This comic shows a map of internet communities where the size of each region roughly corresponds to its size, and its proximity to other regions indicates similarities.

This is the successor of [[256: Online Communities]]. It differs in that it is updated, and furthermore, instead of using the ''membership'' of whichever service to determine its size on the map, it uses its "daily social activity."

The map actually has two super−maps: the online community map is surrounded by the "countries" of E−Mail and SMS ("Instant Messaging"). These, in turn, are surrounded by the "Spoken Language" country (which is odd, considering that e−mail, SMS, and the Internet in general are based on ''written'' language) with its own sub−country, "cell phones" (which ''do'' involve e−mail and the Internet while being the mean medium of SMS's).

At the title text [[Randall]] explains that, using his definition of "most activity per day", Farmville is actually the ''second'' most popular "Facebook farming game". This will strike many as odd, because Farmville is by far the most famous, leading one to wonder how the most famous could not be the most played. The phrase "browser-based social-networking-centered farming game" is an example of [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/OverlyNarrowSuperlative an overly-narrow superlative].

==Facebook Region==
The Facebook region deals with social networks, that is, websites oriented towards having people meet.

'''{{w|Facebook}}''' is a social networking site that allows people to meet old real−life friends and make new friends that share similar interests. One of its most notable features is that a member can update a "status" or make normal posts about the happenings of the member's life, complete with pictures, other members "liking" these posts. The size of the Facebook region is not exaggerated; most websites seem to allow "liking" their content or allow/require logging in the website with a Facebook account. There even are cell phones with a "Facebook" button!

'''Farmville''', '''Happy Farm''', and '''Farm Town''' are all Facebook games. The "Unethical Bay" refers to how these games tend to addict players into constantly buying virtual items of questionable value.

The '''People You Can't Unfriend''' refer to people whom, due to real-life expectations and relationships, unfriending them is difficult, no matter how you really feel about them.

The '''Data Mines''' refer to the data mining that Facebook does with the interests of its members. This fuels the profitable advertising business at the expense of customer trust.

The '''Plains of Awkwardly Public Family Interactions''' refer to how interactions with family members on Facebook suddenly become more awkward because everyone on Facebook (and sometimes ''off'' Facebook, given that you do not necessarily need to log in if you want to see someone's Facebook account) if you are discussing with your family through post comments.

'''"Old Facebook" Resistance''' refers to Facebook's earlier users, who have often resisted (and resented) changes made to Facebook as it became more popular.

'''Privacy Controls''' is located on the map surrounded by a Lava Pool, which is a reference to how difficult it is to find the privacy controls within Facebook.

While Facebook is the largest "country" of the Facebook Region, there are a lot of smaller "countries" that represent smaller social networks.

*Below Facebook (and "'Old Facebook' Resistance") is '''{{w|Diaspora (social network)|Diaspora}}''', a fully open-source, decentralized, privacy-respecting-and-expecting alternative to Facebook. From what this map tells, Diaspora is little-known, even if Facebook is taken out of the context.
*'''{{w|Taringa!}}''' is a Spanish-speaking social network that is based on a forums. Copyrighted material is frequently found there.
*'''{{w|Classmates.com}}''' is a services in which the user can meet fellow classmates that came from the same high school. The website is probably best-known by its memetic advertisement that said [http://dudemanphat.blogspot.com/2005/10/how-am-i-supposed-to-care-about-nick.html "She married him??!! And they've got 7 kids??"] (Incidentally, [http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2003325519_adcouple27.html there is more to the coupled picture than what the advertisement says.])
*'''{{w|MySpace}}''' is a social networking website that is a kind of proto-Facebook: users could customize their one-page websites with whatever they wanted, make their interests and daily lives public, and interact with other users. Back in the mid 2000's, MySpace was the largest social network, many people using the website; however, the surprisingly-less-customizable Facebook ended up taking the place of MySpace. The "bands" country of MySpace refers to how a lot of bands in the day advertised and interacted using the website. Indeed, the latest incarnation of MySpace (in terms of 2013) is more oriented towards band members.
*'''{{w|LinkedIn}}''' is a social network aimed towards people in the workplace, which is why it is adjancent to '''Corporate Bay'''.
*'''{{w|Orkut}}''' is one of Google's first social networks before Google made [https://plus.google.com/ Google+].
*'''{{w|Hi5}}''' is a social network that is very popular among people in Latin America.
*'''{{w|Renren}}''' ('''「人人」''', "people" in Chinese) is "a Chinese copy of Facebook."
*'''{{w|Bebo}}''' is a social network popular in the United Kingdom and Ireland.
*'''{{w|Friendster}}''' - One of the first major social networks, it has fallen way off in usage in recent years and was eclipsed by MySpace.
*'''{{w|Vkontakte}}''' or VK, is the second largest social network service in Europe after Facebook. It is available in several languages, but particularly popular among Russian-speaking users around the world.
*'''{{w|Netlog}}''' Netlog (formerly known as Facebox and Bingbox) is a Belgian social networking website specifically targeted at the global youth demographic.
*'''{{w|Mixi}}''' is an online Japanese social networking service.
*'''{{w|Qzone}}''' is a social networking website, which is big in China. According to a report published by Tencent, possibly surpassing other social networking websites like Facebook and MySpace in China.
*'''{{w|Tuenti}}''' is a Spain-based, social networking service, that has been referred to as the "Spanish Facebook."
*'''{{w|Cloob}}''' is a Persian-language social networking website, mainly popular in Iran. After the locally (and internationally) popular social networking website Orkut was blocked by the Iranian government, a series of local sites and networks, including Cloob, emerged to fill the gap.
*'''{{w|Kaixin001}}''' is a social networking website which ranks as the 13th most popular website in China and 67th overall.
*'''{{w|Piczo}}''' was a privately held blog website for teens. In November 2012, Piczo.com shut down.
*'''{{w|Odnoklassniki}}''' is a social network service for classmates and old friends. It is popular in Russia and former Soviet Republics.
*'''{{w|Adult Friend Finder}}''' is a pornographic dating site.
*'''{{w|Match.com}}''' is a dating site.
*'''{{w|Ok Cupid}}''' is another dating site.
*'''{{w|Plenty of Fish}}''' is yet another dating site.

Other areas of note are the '''Niche Market Mountains''', where social networks aimed towards more niche markets are located. Similar to how mountains tend to be isolated from mainland, niche social networks tend to be just that: niche, without much interaction with the general populace. Above the Niche Market Mountains are the '''Charred Wasteland of Abandoned Social Networks'''. Given the popularity of MySpace and Facebook, there would be no doubt tons of websites wanting to take advantage of the success of these websites or even wanting to compete or even overpower with them. Even so, these websites tend to not have the userbase or even the expertise towards the long-term, hence they become wastelands: environments devoid of life, except the few life forms that are from these wastelands (in this case, the ones who are loyal to the website or which are sadly few). Within the '''Charred Wasteland of Abandoned Social Networks''' stands [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ozymandias Ozymandias], the titular broken statue of Shelley's poem. In the poem, only "two vast and trunkless legs of stone" and a "shattered visage" are all that remain of the once-great statue and both of these features are present in the comic.

Also visible are the '''Duckface Mountains''', the '''Red Cup Mountains''', and '''Buzzword Bay'''. "Duckface" refers to [http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/duck-face this incredibly obnoxious facial expression], and "red cup pictures" are any pictures containing party-goers holding disposable red plastic beverage cups. Facebook is absolutely flooded with both types of pictures. {{w|Buzzword}}s are words and phrases that make you sound a lot more topical than you actually are, used to garner attention; again, Facebook status updates are commonly filled with buzzwords.

==MMO Isle==
MMO's (short form of "MMORPG", short form of "Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Player Game") are websites that host online games where multiple people take the role of a character and play in a setting hosted by the website. These types of games tend to be fantastical in setting. Frequently, missions are added to the game, giving current player more incentive towards playing more.

*'''[https://www.habbo.com/ Habbo Hotel]''' is a website where someone creates a human avatar an interacts in a virtual world that is not that different from the one in real life.
*'''[http://www.clubpenguin.com/ Club Penguin]''' is [http://disney.com/ Disney's] MMO where someone creates a penguin avatar and interacts with other in a more polar, cartoony setting. Club Penguin is aimed towards children.
*'''[http://maplestory.nexon.net/ Maple Story]''' is an MMO that has a more natural setting. The most distinguishing feature of Maple Story is its cartoony pixel art.
*'''[http://www.gamefaqs.com/ GameFAQs]''', while not an MMO, is a website that has the largest repository of walkthoughs, that is, guides that help someone beat a game. GameFAQs is notable for not only its large repository of walkthroughs of games that are across an extreme variety of consoles, handhelds, and even computers (not all of them MMOs), but also the drama that is rumoured to happen in the GameFAQs forums.
*'''[http://www.ign.com/ IGN]''' (full: '''Imagine Games Network'''), while also not an MMO, is the largest website that gives news on video games in general, not just MMOs. Each of the games mentioned in the site have pages that have summaries, reviews, screenshots, other art, videos, and links to news related to its games.
*'''[http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/index.shtml FFXI]''' (full: '''Final Fantasy XI''') is an MMO from SquareEnix, being the first MMO of the popular ''Final Fantasy'' series.
*'''[http://www.runescape.com/community Runescape]''' is an older MMO.
*'''[http://us.battle.net/sc2/en/ Starcraft II]''' is a realtime strategy game with a science fiction setting that heavily involves space travel. While technically not an MMO, it has a significant online multiplayer component.
*'''[http://us.battle.net/wow/en/ WoW]''' (full: '''World of Warcraft''') is the definitive MMO, being not only the most popular and one of the longest-running but also the most expansive (having its own spinoff games, comic books, novels, and even figurines), WOW giving the idea of how an MMO should be. A player can choose from a variety of races, each with its own heavy history.
*'''[http://secondlife.com/ Second Life]''' is similar to Habbo, albeit with a bigger suspension of disbelief (one example being that the player does not need to be a human) and in a 3D setting.
*'''[http://www.nationstates.net/ NationStates]''' is a text-based political simulation game. Notably, some of its traffic comes not from the actual game (which is optional), but the extensive set of political, roleplaying, and general forums attached.
*'''[http://www.eveonline.com/ Eve Online]''' is a science fiction MMO which is notable because of its virtual economy.
*'''[http://www.gaiaonline.com/ Gaia]''' (full: '''Gaia Online'''), while not an MMO, is a forums oriented towards pop culture, including video games and Japanese media. Its most notable feature is the heavy customization possible of a member's pixel-art avatar. Its members tend to roleplay a lot, albeit in a more written, story-based form. Gaia has gained a revaination of its members stealing art and causing drama.

Other notable regions include:
*The '''Mountains of Steam''', referring to the game distribution service [http://store.steampowered.com/ Steam] where people could buy and download video games in general, not just MMOs.
*'''River Grind''' refers to "grinding." In most MMOs, the character is a fighter of some sorts, yet starts at a level 1, signifying the character's aptitude level in combat. The character can level up and gain more aptitude levels through earning experience, of which the most reliable and otherwise common way is the process of "grinding," that is, repeatedly fighting opposing monsters (sometimes of a level notably lower that your character's), gaining experience points from winning these battles until your character gains a level, that is, "levels up". While a practical necessity in strengthening the character, this process can be tiresome, hence the expression "grinding."
*'''Spawn Camp''' refers to "spawn points", the places in combat-oriented MMO's tend to produce ("spawn") random AI-powered creatures, and the act of "spawn camping", in which the player character simply stands behind or around the spawn points to fight the enemy creatures as soon as they appear.
*'''Gulf of Lag''' refers to how the MMO can be slowed down a considerable amount due to the large amount of players simultaneously using the same server, this congestion bogging down the server and frustrating the users.
*'''[http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/final-boss-of-the-internet End Guy for the Internet]''' refers to "end bosses", the last -- and usually hardest to defeat -- "bad guy" in a game (or a section of a game).

==YouTube Region==
The YouTube region refers to websites that are based on user-created content.

'''[https://www.youtube.com/ YouTube]''' is the definitive video website where people can upload videos with the purpose of public viewing, ranging from home movies through official music videos through Let's Plays of people playing video games to questionably-legal uploads of cartoons and films. Google had purchased YouTube.

Many of the sites on the map are just references to {{w|viral video}}s at {{w|YouTube}}:
*'''Viral Shores''' refers to how viral videos (whether they be viral marketing or simply memes) tend to proliferate on YouTube.
*'''Britney''' likely refers to pop singer {{w|Britney Spears}} and the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHmvkRoEowc‎ "Leave Britney Alone" guy].
*'''Maru Gulf''' refers to Maru the Cat, a YouTube celebrity [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/676:_Abstraction also mentioned in xkcd].
*'''Prairie Dog Habitat''' likely refers to the viral video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1Y73sPHKxw Dramatic Chipmunk] (which is actually a Prairie Dog).
*'''Rick Rolling Hills''' references, well, {{w|Rickrolling}}. More information [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ here]. The "deserted" note likely refers to how Rick Astley himself is tired of the meme, or again, how people tend to leave the video upon getting "Rick Roll'd," never actually going to the video with the express purpose of viewing the video.
*'''Lunar Landing Soundstage''' is, of course, a reference to the {{w|Moon landing conspiracy theories}}, which Randall has railed on before.
*'''{{w|OK Go}} Bay''' refers to the band "OK Go" who have multiple viral music videos on YouTube, most famously [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTAAsCNK7RA "Here it goes again"] featuring treadmills.

The '''HTML5 swamp''' refers to the spotty support of HTML 5 (an update on HTML that is frequently touting its media capabilities, making HTML 5 a viable alternative to Flash) YouTube has. Of course, by the time the comic was written, HTML 5 was still in its infancy. The Music Video Bay refers to the amount of music videos (official or otherwise) are present in YouTube.

Other counties of the YouTube region include:
*'''[https://vimeo.com/ vimeo]''', a website where people tend to showcase artistic content that they made on their own, notably independent studios.

Snob Sound:
*'''[https://secure.flickr.com/ Flickr]''', a website where people can upload and share photographs they took.
*'''[http://fotolog.com Fotolog]''', a photo website very popular in South America in 2004-2008, which was used as a social network.
*'''[http://www.last.fm/ Last.fm]''', a music website that is notable of its "scrobbling" feature.
*'''[http://www.deviantart.com/ deviantArt]''', the largest art website, where people can upload, sell, and buy not only art itself, but also video, audio, Flash-work, and even skins (the original purpose of deviantArt). While many big-name/professional people and organizations have their works in deviantArt, the site is more infamous for the large amount of people who upload low-quality fan-art and fan-characters, most notably of media from Japan. Another point of infamy is the large amount of drama that can happen in the website.

*'''[https://www.newgrounds.com/ Newgrounds]''', a website that hosts art, (Flash-based) videos, audio, and (Flash-based) games to which other users can comment and rate. Even so, content from Newgrounds tends to be obscene, though there is a filtering system if a viewer does not wish to see obscene content.
*'''[http://www.chatroulette.com/ Chatroulette]''' is a website where people are randomly paired up with each other and video/text chat.
*'''{{w|Brickshelf}}''' is the online resource for {{w|LEGO}} fans.
*'''[https://tumblr.com/ Tumblr]''', where people could make a blog and post text, pictures, video, audio, quotes, and links. The most distinguishing feature is the ability to "reblog" these posts from other's people's blogs into the user's own blog. Notable features of Tumblr include sketchblogs (where people upload their sketches), Ask blogs (where people answer questions other users ask, the moderators of these blogs usually pretending to be a character from a form of media), and the large amount of "social justice" (where people fight against racism, sexism, and other forms of negative discrimination). (See also [[1043: Ablogalypse]].)
*'''{{w|b3ta}}''' is a popular British website, described as a "puerile digital arts community" by The Guardian.

The '''Isle of teenagers who just discovered macroeconomics''' is a joke about how teenagers tend to think that the world and the economy are a lot simpler than they actually are. Combined with the typical internet mindset, this leads to a lot of teenagers posting blogs and videos and comments on blogs and videos describing how idiotic the government and other red-tape-related adults are.
The '''Snob Sound''' could refer to the large amount of people who look down on others in the surrounding websites (one example being an original artist looking down on people who draw mainly fan-art). '''The Iraq''' is a reference to Miss Teen USA 2007, Ms. Teen South Carolina - Lauren Katlin said "I believe that our education like such as in South Africa and the Iraq everywhere like such as...the US should help the US and should help South Africa and should help the Iraq and the asian countries so we are able to build up our future." The usage of "the iraq" became a meme.

==Twitter Region==
*'''Bieber Bay''' is a reference to {{w|Justin Bieber}} a pop singer whose singing sprouted on YouTube and became very popular on Twitter and other social media. He is very much vilified because of his rather feminine appearance and his hordes of fans (called "Beliebers") that seem to support him to ridiculous extents. Lately, though, Justin Beiber has taken a "bad boy" attitude because of all the Beliebers who are willing to defend him no matter what, him partaking in a lot of questionable activities that include tattoos, questionably-legal substances, and buying prostitution, thus lowering his popularity in the general populace.
*'''{{w|Google Buzz}}''' is a former social network attempted by Google. It has since been shut down.
*'''Bit.Ly Mountains''' is a reference to the URL shortening service {{w|bit.ly}}.
*'''Kayne's Isle of Sadness''' is a reference to the musician {{w|Kayne West}}.
*'''Sarah Palin USA''' is the Twitter handle of former politician {{w|Sarah Palin}}.
*'''Clueless Politician Coast''' is a reference to the number of politicians on Twitter and other social networks who repeatedly share clueless updates that more often create an uproar than help their election chances.
*'''Desert of Food Updates''' is a reference to the number of pictures of food that are shared on social media (especially Twitter). There has even been some controversy on posting such pictures.
*'''Journalists Trying to Find the Cutting Edge''' is referencing journalists on Twitter trying to keep up with the way that news is gathered and delivered now, despite usually working for a newspaper that publishes once a day.
*'''{{w|SHAQ}}''' is a reference to the former NBA basketball player, {{w|Shaq}}.
*'''{{w|identi.ca}}''' is an open source social networking and micro-blogging service, being an alternative to Twitter.
*''' Breaking! Waves''' is a pun on the fact that so many people used the word "Breaking" at the beginning of tweets that do not warrant that tag that the word has lost most of its meaning and become a joke. It is a pun because waves "break" on the shore.
*'''Web 3.0''' refers to the unofficial term {{w|Web 2.0}}. In this case, "Web 1.0" refers to accessing the Internet using Web Browsers, e-mail, and chatting, mainly through the use of computers. "Web 2.0" refers to accessing the Internet through new means (for example, RSS Feeds that read the news) through more devices (for example: tablets and cell phones). As such, "Web 3.0" means either what the Internet is like now in its current state of development, or what it will soon develop into; either way, it is still very much Under Construction.

==Geotagged Bay==
*'''{{w|Yelp}}''' is a website where people post reviews of real-life public locations (one example being restaurants).
*'''{{w|Geocaching}}'''
*'''{{w|Foursquare}}''' is a location-based social network.
*'''Latitude''' refers to {{w|Google Latitude}}

==Troll Bay and the Sea of Memes==
*'''Reddit''' - {{w|Reddit}} is the self-described "front page of the Internet" in which users submit stories, photos and videos and the best are "up-voted" to the top of the page.
*'''Wikipedia talk pages'''
*'''{{w|Wikia}}''' is a 3rd party wiki software.
*'''StumbleUpon'''
*'''Delicious'''
*'''{{w|Digg}}''' is a former competitor to Reddit in the social-news sphere, but now has been sold and restarted as a aggregator of news stories.
*'''Slashdot''', labeled "/." on the map,
*'''Fark'''
*'''YTMND''' is an acronym for "You're The Man Now, Dog!" It's also a community in which users can create meme-type nonsense by playing music over an image (either static or animated).

==Skype Region==
The Skype Region refers to different IM, or Instant Messaging services, that enable almost-real-time text chatting between multiple people. These often allow services like voice chat and even video calls.

*'''{{w|Skype}}''' is, according to Randall, the most popular of these among the internet. It has many features to allow peer-to-peer voice chats, as well as allowing calls to be made at a price to actual phones.
*'''{{w|AIM}}''' or AOL Instant Messenger is a chat client created by AOL.
*'''GG''' is {{w|Gadu-Gadu}} and instant messenger client popular in Poland.
*'''{{w|Yahoo Messenger}}''' is an instant messenger client by Yahoo.
*'''{{w|Google Talk}}''' - Google Talk also has an invasion fleet at its shores.
*'''{{w|ICQ}}'''
*'''{{w|Windows Live Messenger}}'''
*'''{{w|UseNet}}''' - UseNet was one of the original ways to communicate on the internet, and since it is still in use by some, it gets the tag "Still Around!" on the map.
*'''{{w|IRC}} Isles''' - one of those isles is #xkcd which is an IRC community around [[xkcd]].

==Bay of Drama==
*'''FanFiction.net'''
*'''{{w|Xanga}}'''
*'''{{w|LiveJournal}}'''
*'''ONYD''' - Reference to {{w|Oh No You Didn't}}, which is explained in the Blogosphere region.
*'''Dream WIOT?'''

==Blogosphere==
The Blogosphere region contains several general blog topics.
*'''Photo Blogs'''
*'''Diary Blogs'''
*'''Writing/Poetry'''
*'''Bay of Grammar Pedantry'''
*'''Fandom Blogs'''
*'''Sea of Zero (0) Comments''' - These are the blogs that get very little attention and therefore have no comments.
*'''Gossip Blogs'''
*'''Political Blogs'''
*'''Music Blogs'''
*'''Tech Blogs'''
*'''Business Blogs'''
*'''SpamBlog Straits''' - Spammers use blogs to increase the number of links to their site to try to game search engines.
*'''Corporate Blogs'''
*'''Religious Blogs'''
*'''Blog Blogs'''
*'''Miscellaneous Blogs'''
*'''OffTopic.com'''

==Blogosphere (Core Region)==
Gossip Blogs:
Each blog below focuses on gossip surrounding celebrities and other well-known persons.
*'''{{w|Jezebel}}'''
*'''{{w|Deadline}}'''
*'''{{w|TMZ}}'''
*'''{{w|Gawker}}'''
*'''LJ Oh No They Didn't''' - LiveJournal {{w|Oh No They Didn't}} - Oh No They Didn't, also known as ONTD, is the largest community on LiveJournal with over 100,000 members. The community focuses on celebrity gossip and pop culture with most of its posts aggregated from other gossip blogs.
*'''{{w|Doucheblog}}'''
*'''Isle of Mockery''' is a reference to the fact that some of what these blogs do is mock celebrities or other for doing or saying stupid things on camera.

Liberal Blogs:
Each blog below focuses on American political news with a "liberal" or "progressive" slant. These blogs tend to lean for the Democratic party.
*'''{{w|Huffington Post}}'''
*'''{{w|Paul Krugman}}'''
*'''{{w|Daily Beast}}'''
*'''TPM''' - {{w|Talking Points Memo}}
*'''{{w|Ezra Klein}}''' - Ezra used to have his own site at the Washington Post, but is now the editor of [Vox.com].
*'''{{w|Think Progress}}'''
*'''Kos''' - {{w|Daily Kos}}

Bay of Flame:
*Politics Daily
*CNN Political Ticker
*Mediaite
*NY Times
*The Talk
*Libertarian Isle

Conservative Blogs:
Each blog below focuses on American political news with a "conservative" or Republican slant.
*Pajamas Media
*Michelle Malkin
*Hot Air
*Red State
*American Thinker
*Townhall

Tech Blogs:
*Boy Genius Report
*Gizmodo
*Engadget
*Crunchgear
*Techcrunch
*Joystiq
*Kotaku

Assorted:
*BoingBoing
*Lifehacker
*{{w|Deadspin}} - a sports and sports gossip blog founded by Will Leitch.
*Meatorama

==QQ Region==
*'''Baidu Baike''' (「百度百科」, "Baidu Encyclopedia") and '''Hudong''' (「互动百科」, "Interactive Encyclopedia" ) are two Chinese online encyclopedias. Baidu Baike is powered by the same company as Baidu, the search engine popular in China.
* The '''Ma Le Ge Bi''' and the '''Grass Mud Horse Bay''' could refer to the {{w|Baidu 10 Mythical Creatures}}.
* The '''Location of Jia Junpeng''' refers to the Internet meme of {{w|Jia Junpeng}} in 2009 in China.
*'''{{w|Tencent QQ}}''' is a Chinese instant messaging program.
*In English communities "QQ" has several more common definitions:
**An {{w|emoticon}}, representing a face with two large, crying eyes.
**A synonym for "rage quit", in which a video game player quits the game out of sheer frustration. It originated in ''Warcraft II'' multiplayer, where pressing Ctrl+Q+Q would quit the game, and became more widely known in ''World of Warcraft''.
**These definitions are commonly combined, usually to mock the "rage quitter".
*The Gulf of China refers to how sites in the region are based in People's Republic of China ("Red China"). The '''Great Firewall''' refers to {{w|The Great Firewall of China}}, a pun on {{w|The Great Wall of China}}. Similar to how The Great Wall of China was meant to keep intruding nations out of the then-capital of the city, The Great Firewall of China is meant to keep visitors from visiting censored websites. However, either a VPN or remote access to a computer in a "freer" country can circumvent the Firewall.

==Forums Islands==
Forums are websites where one person post a topic to which other people can discuss.

While the map has a zoomed in version, this article shall discuss the two bigger islands, first.

*'''[http://www.2ch.net 2channel]''' is a Japanese imageboard that was actually the original inspiration for 4chan.
*'''[http://www.craigslist.org/about/sites Craigslist]''' is a classified advertisement website with sections devoted to just about everything... which formerly included prostitution services, hence the '''The Former Site of Adult Services'''.

In the zoomed-in map, there is...
*'''420chan''' and '''7chan''', other imageboards in the style of 4chan (see below). Their relative lack of popularity and derivative nature leads a lot of 4chan users to mock them; hence, their position on Randall's map suggests that they're mere wads of semen.
*'''[http://ohinternet.com/ Encyclopedia Dramatica]''', labeled '''ED''' on the map , is a wiki site dedicated to chronicling internet memes and other noteworthy sites, events, people, and anything else that catches their attention in an incredibly arbitrary and vulgar manner. The site is ''heavily'' steeped in the attitude of veteran, vulgar 4chan users. People who have articles in the website tend to react with despair, given not only the cruelty in which the articles talk about the person in question, but the presence of the article means that the person is now an eternal target from the trolls. The user can not retaliate, since the userbase of Encyclopedia Dramatica and 4chan tends to overpower the victim easily...
:...usually. Due to the founder's talk against the Australian Aborignals (the founder is Australian), legal action has gone against the founder to the point of the founder having to shut down Encyclopedia Dramatica, founding the far tamer Oh, Internet! website, instead. Trolls responded by not only uploading their own mirror of the website but also vilifying the former founder forever.
:(Please note that, due to the malicious nature of the pop-up advertisements of Encyclopedia Dramatica, the link above points to its safe-for-work successor, Oh, Internet!)
*'''[https://www.4chan.org/ 4chan.org]''' is an {{w|imageboard}} in which people can upload pictures while others comment on them. The website is infamous for its loose/often non-existent rules, incredibly vulgar userbase, source of new memes, and spawning of trolls. 4chan's random board, known internally as '''/b/''', is almost constantly flooded with porn and image macros. This is why Randall's incarnation of 4chan is shaped like a penis.
*'''Tunnel to Habbo''' is a reference to [http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pools-closed the 2006 Habbo Hotel Raids], in which hundreds of 4chan Anons simultaneously logged onto Habbo Hotel and proceeded to be as obnoxious as possible, standing in formations of swastikas and penises or body-blocking the swimming pools.
*'''{{w|Catbus}} Route''' is likely a reference to {{w|Lolcat}}s in general.
*'''[http://www.ebaumsworld.com/ eBaum's World]''' is a media-hosting website founded by Eric Bauman. The site has lost a lot of traffic after (quite valid) accusations of stolen content.
*The gulf labelled '''[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_(group) Anonymous]''' is a reference to the trolls that label themselves "Anonymous" who recently had gained national acknowledgement because of the group's real-life tirades, including cracking attacks against the Church of Scientology and the founding of WikiLeaks (a website that leaks confidential material related to governments).
*[http://www.somethingawful.com/ SomethingAwful] is a website that is meant to showcase all things "awful". SomethingAwful also has a large trollbase, but they tend to be more honorable than the ones from Encyclopedia Dramatica and 4chan. One example is there being a spotty holding of the no-furries rule in the forums. The forums themselves are famous because of the holding of the Let's Plays of [http://lparchive.org/Dangan-Ronpa/ Dangan Ronpa] and [http://danganronpa2mirror.tumblr.com/ Super Dangan Ronpa 2], which had cooked up public interest to the point of there being an English-language release of the games.
Please note that, due to these Let's Plays being in a forums that frequently hides behind a "paywall" that requires a paid account before accessing, the links provided go to their mirrors.

==Transcript==
:'''Map of Online Communities'''
:Size on map represents volume of Daily Social activity (posts, chat, etc). Based on data gathered over the Spring and Summer of 2010.

:[Two insets on the upper left-hand corner shows that this map is a tiny portion of the huge continent of Spoken Language, encompassing portions of the Internet, Email, and Cell Phones (SMS).]

:[The largest landmass on the map by far, which takes up nearly the entire northern half of the map is "Facebook" - with large states in the south-east of the country labeled 'Farmville' and 'Happy Farm'. There is a much smaller state to the west of these called 'Farm Town'. To the north of these states is a large swath of unremarkable land entitled 'Northern Wasteland of Unread Updates.' This is directly north of the large Dopamine Sea.

:A peninsula on the south-west, just below the Plains of Awkwardly Public Family Interactions, houses many tiny states, such as MySpace, Orkut, LinkedIn, Bebo, & Hi5. It is bordered on the south by Buzzword Bay, which contains several islands of varying sizes. Among these are YouTube and Twitter (the largest), which are separated by the Social Media Consultant Channel. To the south-east of Twitter, across the Sea of Protocol Confusion, is another, equally large island. Most of it is Skype, with the north having two largish states called AIM and Windows Live Messenger. On the south-west part of the island are two smaller states called GG and Yahoo Messenger.

:The Island of Skype is extremely close to, but separated by the Great Firewall (a dashed line), the large landmass of QQ. It's north shore is the Gulf of China and Grass Mud Horse Bay. Outside of these bays, over the Great Firewall are two islands called Craigslist and 2Channel.

:In the Dopamine Sea, off the southern shores of Farmville and Happy Farm, is MMO Isle. Its largest state is WoW, with Runescape, Lineage, Maple Story, Habbo, and the Mountains of Steam among its notable landmarks. To the southeast of the island is the Gulf of Lag, in which sits the CDC Games island, with Eve Online.

:To the east of Twitter is Troll Bay, with such islands as Reddit and Reddit, Digg, Stumbleupon, Delicio.us, and Wikipedia Talk Pages. To their south are the IRC isles, of which one is the tiny island of #xkcd.

:East of these islands, and north of Skype island, is the Sea of Memes. In this sea, to the north of Craigslist and 2Channel, is an archipelago of tiny islands. There is an inset, labeled 'Forums.' (See below.)

:To the southwest of Twitter island, in the Sea of Opinions, are the blog islands. These lie south of the islands in Buzzword Bay, as well. The northernmost islands in this group are centered around the Bay of Drama, on which can be found Diary Blogs, Gossip Blogs, and Livejournal. Gossip Blogs share an island with Political, Music, and Tech Blogs. To the north of this island is a smaller island called Photo Blogs. South of Diary Blogs, and off the southwest coast of Music blogs is a smaller island called Fandom Blogs. South of Tech Blogs, off of which sprouts the small peninsula of Business Blogs, is the Spamblog Straits. On the other side of the straits is a large island made up of Miscellaneous Blogs, with two states demarcated as Religious Blogs and Blog Blogs. Southwest of the Blog Islands is the Sea of Zero (0) Comments.]

:[An inset of a group of islands in the sea of memes located on the lower right corner of the map, labeled 'Forums'. The largest by far is 4chan and /b/. Also found here are D2JSP, JLA Frums, Fan Forum, Something Awful, and many smaller ones, too numerous to list here.]

:[The northeastern third of Gossip/Political/Tech Blogs island is another inset labeled 'Blogosphere (Core)'. This can be found on the lower left corner of the map. Two peninsulas in Political Blogs bookend the Bay of Flame -- these are Liberal Blogs and Conservative Blogs. Between them lie several tiny islands such as Politics Daily, CNN Politcal Ticker, and Mediaite. Off the coast of Liberal Blogs lies the island of NYTimes, off the coast of Conservative Blogs is Libertarian Isle. Between the two lies The Talk. The northern peninsula of Tech Blogs contains places such as Gizmodo, Engadget, Joystiq, and Kotaku.]

:[Text found between the two insets, which are directly below the main map.]
:ABOUT THIS MAP
:Communities rise and fall, and total membership numbers are no longer a good measure of a community's current size and health. This updated map uses size to represent total social activity in a community -- that is, how much talking, playing, sharing, or other socializing happens there. This meant some comparing of apples and oranges, but I did my best and tried to be consistent.

:Estimates are based on the numbers I could find, but involved a great deal of guesswork, statistical inference, random sampling, nonrandom sampling, a 20,000-cell spreadsheet, emailing, cajoling, tea-leaf reading, goat sacrifices, and gut instinct (i.e. making things up).

:Sources of data include Google and Bing, Wikipedia, Alexa, Big-Boards.com, StumbleUpon, Wordpress, Akismet, every website statistics page I could find, press releases, news articles, and individual site employees. Thanks in particular to folks at Last.fm, LiveJournal, Reddit, and the New York Times, as well as sysadmins at a number of sites who shared statistics on condition of anonymity.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Large drawings]]
[[Category:Internet]]

1359: Phone Alarm

2014-04-23T17:40:48Z

199.27.130.204: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1359
| date = April 23, 2014
| title = Phone Alarm
| image = phone_alarm.png
| titletext = Who's calling me?? WHY IS THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD CALLING ME!?
}}

==Explanation==

The flowchart seems to show a problem Randall has with using alarms built into phones. Notably, that the sound is similar to a normal ring tone (probably related to [[479: Tones]]), making it sound like someone is calling him, and not waking him up. This translates to him answering the phone in the dream, talking, and eventually hanging up. Of course this doesn't stop the phone from ringing, and he ends up answering the phone again. The looping arrow around the "beep beep" box could refer to this - the phone continues ringing while pretending to answer it - or that the phone keeps ringing until he pretends to answer it.

The title text, consisting of Randall shouting at the phone in his dream, enforces the fact that he can't tell between his ringtone or his alarm. In doing so believes that a prank caller is harassing him which infuriates him.

==Transcript==
A flowchart:

[alarm goes off]
: → [beep beep beep beep!]
:: ↺ back to [beep beep beep beep!]
:: → ["???"]
::: → [answer phone in dream] → [talk] → [hang up]
:::: → back to [beep beep beep beep!]

"My problem with phone alarms"

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Flowcharts]]

477: Typewriter

2014-04-22T16:58:14Z

199.27.130.204:

{{comic
| number = 477
| date = September 17, 2008
| title = Typewriter
| image = typewriter.png
| titletext = Somewhere in the world, my actual grandmothers are reading this and angrily exclaiming that I never write even malformed thank-you notes. DEAR GRANDMOMS: I AM SORRY! YOU ARE WONDERFUL PEOPLE AND THANK YOU FOR EVERYTHING LOVE reddit.com RANDALL.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Randall]] is writing a letter to his grandmother on a typewriter, thanking her for taking him and at least one other person on a trip. However, due to a habit he's developed from using a computer for so long, Randall inadvertently litters the letter with chunks of blank space followed by website URLs. As if through muscle memory, Randall periodically attempts to check the latest news by pressing a combination involving the Tab key, typing the URL of a specific website, then pressing a combination using the Tab key again.

On a computer the ''CTRL-TAB'' keyboard combination usually switches to another browser tab, such as between two {{w|Firefox}} windows, but there is only a simple ''TAB'' key on an old fashioned typewriter. Pressing Tab there doesn't switch to another screen, it just moves the platen (the typewriter's cursor, so to speak) to the next tab stop, leaving a wide space before the next typing on the same piece of paper. So the key combination that would satisfy Randall's somewhat hyperactive impulses on a computer is dramatically different on a typewriter, where that key instead causes movement of the platen. So, he hits the tab key, types a URL, and hits the tab key again right in the middle of his letter. It also shows Randall's love of news and information websites.

The title text references that Randall's real grandmothers, upon seeing this comic, might feel bad that he doesn't write to them at all — not even poorly-written letters like in the comic. To remedy this, he writes a brief thank you note to his grandmothers... which includes also one ''CTRL-TAB'' combination.

==Transcript==
:[A typewriter is shown with the following letter in it:]
<pre>
Dear Grandmom, cnn.com
I hope this reddit.com letter
finds you well. I wanted to say I
really news.google.com enjoyed the
trip you boingboing.net took us on,
and am looking forward to bbc.co.uk
visiting later fivethirtyeight.com
this year.
Love, slashdot.org

Your grandson,
</pre>

:I didn't realize how bad my habit of tabbing to Firefox every few seconds to check news sites had gotten until I tried writing on a typewriter.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Randall Munroe]]

Talk:1328: Update

2014-02-13T08:44:27Z

199.27.130.204:

Note that 1.) web browsers usually can remember opened tabs (and even scroll position) and reopen them automatically on start, and/or ask if reopen those tabs if browser was not closed cleanly 2.) MS Windows tries to reopen apps closed during "upgrade reboot" --[[User:JakubNarebski|JakubNarebski]] ([[User talk:JakubNarebski|talk]]) 07:48, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
:Yes, browsers can remember the last tabs you have open, but may require the user to enable that option as it's off by default (with Chrome anyway - as was my experience). I usually leave it off because I don't necessarily want the last 5 tabs I had open to open automatically the next time I want to start my browser to do something completely different. If (my) Chrome browser crashes however (or otherwise does not close cleanly), it will ask me if I want to restore my previous session, which may include multiple tabs and browsing positions. =8o) [[User:Jarod997|Jarod997]] ([[User talk:Jarod997|talk]]) 14:12, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
:Windows does not reopen apps that it closed before an upgrade (at best it has an option to reopen Explorer windows in the same state if the user enables it.) As for Chrome saving tabs, it can be often flaky especially when using multiple windows combined with multiple profiles. This is moot since in Real Life™ users generally don't trust these features, when they are even aware of them. [[User:Ralfoide|Ralfoide]] ([[User talk:Ralfoide|talk]]) 15:19, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
: While browsers remember opened tabs, it's flakey. Some browsers in the "now remembering tabs" era were sometimes inconsistent on whether they should remember tabs (Chrome), some didn't give an option to manually exit with/without remembering tabs (Firefox/Chrome), some didn't preserve form input (Opera), etc. It behaves more like a screwed-on hack rather than a fully functional feature. --[[Special:Contributions/108.162.240.6|108.162.240.6]] 14:36, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

@Jakub, thanks for bringing it up. I knew about it, but for the sake of brevity decided to leave it out. Hooray for my first explanation btw! --[[User:Akha|Akha]] ([[User talk:Akha|talk]]) 08:33, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

While one interpretation is that users would push back even a critical update, the cynical me read it the other way around: that most updates labelled as critical and notified with "!"s and yellow triangles are actually not that urgent and naturally the user desensibilizes. [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.201|173.245.53.201]] 11:16, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

:Note also that browsers are ones of VERY FEW application who can reopen exactly what you had open before restart, and even them usually fail to preserve form content. Also, physical problem is not likely to occur just after the patch was created: only problem which would really need immediate patching would be security problem related to virus just spreading, in which case it would probably be too late when the window appear anyway. So, in all cases, pressing "remind me later" and finishing your work as soon as possible is the most logical course of action regarding critical update. -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 11:18, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

It's a sad day when non-kernel updates require a reboot. [[User:Chrisp6825|Chrisp6825]] ([[User talk:Chrisp6825|talk]]) 13:13, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

I think the comic has less to do with the time a reboot takes, and more to do with losing the user's current state [[Special:Contributions/173.245.54.46|173.245.54.46]] 16:27, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

I agree with the last comment. It's not about the time it takes to reboot. It's about the current state of things. If you have a bunch of apps running in different virtual desktops, then a lot of these won't be configured exactly as they were before rebooting. By the way, updates for OS X are exactly the same, with the exception that they're not downloaded automatically. {{unsigned ip|108.162.219.57}}

My initial interpretation was that Cueball doesn't want to reboot his laptop because rebooting increases the risk of a random electrical fire. --[[User:Rael|Rael]] ([[User talk:Rael|talk]]) 21:58, 10 February 2014 (UTC)
:Well that's why we have this twiki.... 'cause you're dumb. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.229.74|108.162.229.74]] 02:18, 11 February 2014 (UTC)
:Actually, that's a pretty smart explanation. I couldn't have put it to better words. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.59|108.162.219.59]] 14:23, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

If I was faced with such an update notification, I would probably have it download and install itself, but not reboot until tonight when I'm going to shut down anyway. I find it really annoying when Windoze does things like complain about updates and run virus scans right after booting up, which just makes loading up whatever software I want to use (i.e. web browsers) take even longer. I would much rather have it use my CPU time while I was, say, Web browsing or maybe programming (but not compiling... hmm...), or, better yet, asleep. Also, Linux. --[[User:Someone Else 37|Someone Else 37]] ([[User talk:Someone Else 37|talk]]) 04:23, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

"Laptop fire" reminds me of that silly but popular phenomenon in space operas: in case the own ship is hit by some enemies "rays",
inevitably fire will spark from keybords and monitors in the command room. Georg [[Special:Contributions/173.245.53.171|173.245.53.171]] 09:59, 11 February 2014 (UTC)
: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ExplosiveInstrumentation [[User:Wwoods|Wwoods]] ([[User talk:Wwoods|talk]]) 20:17, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

The usual lot of nonsense in the comments. Why don't we talk about how to improve the explanation? Arguing that browsers remember open tabs, or advertising Linux, or going into excruciating detail how you would react in this situation, is ludicrously off the point. The following points are those by this comic:
* Windows is always banging on about something, usually incredibly unimportant.
* Even if it is important (as here) we may just skim the explanation (because of the first point) and not even realize what it is saying
* Even if we do understand it, we don't want to be interrupted during our work (or our not-work) as we hate being inconvenienced in any way
[[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.58|108.162.219.58]] 21:45, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

The nonsense is in the comic! The user knows about that the fire is almost impossible from software (mis-)function {{unsigned ip|173.245.53.154}}

Possible reference to Microsoft's monthly security patch on the second Tuesday of each month, having been posted the day before the second Tuesday of February 2014. [[User:Quetzalcoatl|Quetzalcoatl]] ([[User talk:Quetzalcoatl|talk]]) 22:23, 11 February 2014 (UTC)

;Dubious statement in explanation
"The joke goes further because a software update mostly can't prevent any hardware failures like burning laptop batteries. This specific update is just nonsense."

It's quite possible for software to put hardware into a state which damages it. In an ideal world hardware would have protection against this but sometimes the protection is either missing or incorrectly set. This sort of thing CAN be worked around in software, if you know what the bad states are you can avoid ever putting the hardware into them.

Burning laptop batteries are an extreme example but not completely implausible.

-- plugwash

:This actually happened a few years ago. A poorly-written driver (among other issues) caused some Nvidia laptop GPUs to get so hot that they'd cause the cases of some laptops to warp. [[Special:Contributions/108.162.219.44|108.162.219.44]] 07:09, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

:I think the point here is that no matter how severe the problem being fixed, the presence of a "bunch of stuff open" makes a reboot unthinkable.