explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

User:GLaDOS

2016-01-27T07:14:33Z

GLaDOS: About me

I'm just a genetic life form with a disk operating system and an ancillary wing deicing subsystem, you know?

--[[User:GLaDOS|GLaDOS]] ([[User talk:GLaDOS|talk]]) 07:14, 27 January 2016 (UTC)

1635: Birdsong

2016-01-27T07:08:20Z

GLaDOS: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1635
| date = January 27, 2016
| title = Birdsong
| image = birdsong.png
| titletext = Maybe if I put it in a box for a while with a speaker playing some pleasant pastoral music, I can reprogram it.
}}

==Explanation==
The comic shows Cueball singing the words to the song Smooth [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ce1r05SSbwA] by Santana featuring Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty. In the second panel, a nearby bird starts singing the song, picking up where Cueball left off. The bird's singing begins to annoy Cueball, so he chases the bird with a net and attempts to catch it. The title text and the comic itself appear to be a play on the words "bird" and "song."

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript}}

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Animals]]
[[Category:Music]]
[[Category:Programming]]

1492: Dress Color

2015-02-27T16:35:41Z

GLaDOS: /* Explanation */

{{comic
| number = 1492
| date = February 27, 2015
| title = Dress Color
| image = dress_color.png
| titletext = This white-balance illusion hit so hard because it felt like someone had been playing through the Monty Hall scenario and opened their chosen door, only to find there was unexpectedly disagreement over whether the thing they'd revealed was a goat or a car.
}}

==Explanation==
This comic shows two images of [[Megan]] with different background color. The two images are split with a strip of colors.

The comic strip refers to a dress whose image went viral the day before the strip was posted, showing up on [http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2xaprc/eli5why_does_this_dress_appear_whitegold_to_some/ Reddit,] [https://twitter.com/hashtag/thedress?src=hash Twitter,] [http://www.wired.com/2015/02/science-one-agrees-color-dress/ Wired,] and originally on [http://swiked.tumblr.com/post/112174461490/officialunitedstates-unclefather Tumblr].

Due to the dress's particular color scheme and the exposure of the photo, it forms a sort of optical illusion causing viewers to disagree on what color the dress actually seems to be. The xkcd strip sandwiches a cropped segment of the photographed dress between two images with different white balance schemes, demonstrating how the dress can appear different colors in different light.

[[File:dress.png|200px|thumb|right|Illustration demonstrating that the "colors" of the dresses are the same by connecting them with two lines.]]

Both dresses have exactly the same colors actually:
* RGB 113, 94, 58 (orange) <div style="display:inline-block; height:1em; width:1em; background-color: #715E3A"></div>
* RGB 135, 154, 189 (blue) <div style="display:inline-block; height:1em; width:1em; background-color: #879ABD"></div>

A similar type of illusion can be seen [http://www.echalk.co.uk/amusements/OpticalIllusions/colourPerception/colourPerception.html here.] (requires Flash®player) Other example images which don't require Flash can be found [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_illusion#Color_and_brightness_constancies here].

Since the color of the dress seems immediately "obvious", to any given viewer of it, they feel it is so weird that other people cannot see it that way, that all these arguments spring up online. This is probably because people generally do not know much about these kind of optical illusions. The title text refers to the {{w|Monty Hall problem}}, a brain teaser based on the ''Let's Make a Deal'' TV show. [[Randall]] states that people find the dress color issue just as baffling as if upon opening the chosen door no one can agree if the item behind the door is a car or a goat. This just shows how ridiculous this outrage people feel about the color is. This is a typical kind of prank that Randall enjoys.

==Related==
The Monty Hall problem previously appeared in [[1282: Monty Hall]], where [[Beret Guy]] decides to take the goat.

==Transcript==
:[Two images of Megan in a dress on each side of an image of a close up of a real dress with the same colors. On the left, she is coloured blue on a dark blue background, while on the right, she is yellow against a buttercup background. Her dress is the same colour in each panel - the same as the real on in-between.]

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics with color]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]

File:dress.png

2015-02-27T16:26:50Z

GLaDOS: GLaDOS uploaded a new version of "File:dress.png": Dimensions.

== Summary ==
This is an illustration I made based off of Comic 1492. It shows how the dress "colors" are actually the same by connecting them.
== Licensing ==
{{XKCD file derived}}

File:dress.png

2015-02-27T16:25:43Z

GLaDOS: This is an illustration I made based off of Comic 1492. It shows how the dress "colors" are actually the same by connecting them.

== Summary ==
This is an illustration I made based off of Comic 1492. It shows how the dress "colors" are actually the same by connecting them.
== Licensing ==
{{XKCD file derived}}