explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

Talk:1308: Christmas Lights

2013-12-25T06:41:48Z

Traisjames: Created page with "If I am reading the graphs right, except for the very top there is no blue lights. ~~~~"

If I am reading the graphs right, except for the very top there is no blue lights.
[[User:Traisjames|From the guy with his eye on the sky.]] ([[User talk:Traisjames|talk]]) 06:41, 25 December 2013 (UTC)

453: Upcoming Hurricanes

2012-08-23T06:23:10Z

Traisjames: Created page with "{{comic | number = 453 | date = July 23, 2008 | title = Upcoming Hurricanes | image = upcoming_hurricanes.png | imagesize = | titletext = I'd like to see more..."

{{comic
| number = 453
| date = July 23, 2008
| title = Upcoming Hurricanes
| image = upcoming_hurricanes.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = I'd like to see more damage assessments for hurricanes hitting New York and flooding Manhattan -- something like the 1938 Long Island Express, but aimed a bit more to the west. It's just a matter of time.
}}

==Explanation==
It must be hurricane season! This comic gives some ideas on upcoming hurricane paths. Lets look at each path.

Hurricane Illinois-Has-It-Too-Easy: They really do. This smart hurricane, while actually impossible, comes from Canada to strike little old Chicago before heading back to Canada via my house :(

Hurricane Where-The-Hell-Is-Bermuda: Nice little irony here, normally people get lost once they get to the triangle and never come back. This poor hurricane can't even get there to get lost.

Hurricane Screw-It-Let's-Just-Trash-Florida-Again: Why you would want to live in Florida during hurricane season is beyond me. Sticking out from the rest of the US, Florida is in a nice spot to get hurricanes from the East, South, and West. And with the state not being very high or wide, it is common for a hurricane to run over Florida, lose some strength, then rebuild in the Gulf of Mexico, only to do a U-turn and strike again.

Hurricane Freud: You just need to know that Sigman Freud had a thing about sex, and lets just leave it at that.

Hurricane Red and Blue: Playing a game of Light Cycles from Tron, Hurricane Blue lost it crashed into the lightwall of Hurricane Red.

Hurricane Cos(x): Just following the simple math function, Hurricane Cos(x) just ossolates between 1°N and 1°S. This, while cool, is impossible as near the equator the Coriolis effect is way too weak to cause rotation. In fact, there has never been a hurricane within 5° of the equator due to the Coriolis force being too weak, and the Coriolis force is what causes the hurricane to rotate.

The Alt Text refers to a 1938 Category 5 Hurricane that cause $41.1 billion in damage in current money. Had it been further west it could have caused more damage as the right side of a hurricane is stronger and more destructive than the left side as the winds on the right side push water inland.

{{comic discussion}}

402: 1,000 Miles North

2012-08-23T06:16:27Z

Traisjames: Created page with "{{comic | number = 402 | date = March 28, 2011 | title = 1,000 Miles North | image = 1000_miles_north.png | imagesize = | titletext = Twister would've been a ..."

{{comic
| number = 402
| date = March 28, 2011
| title = 1,000 Miles North
| image = 1000_miles_north.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = Twister would've been a much better movie if they'd cut out the bad-guy storm chaser and all the emotional romance crap. All you need for a good movie are tornados and scientists. Actually, that's all you need for anything.
}}

==Explanation==
Spoofing off of tornado chasers are these permafrost chasers, who are just like tornado chasers, but they are chasing very boring permafrost. Permafrost is a layer of ground that never thaws, unlike ground south of where they are at where the ground freezes in winter and thaws in the spring.

Twister was a movie about a crazy group of tornado chasers trying to drop a probe releasing device named Dorthy into the heart of a tornado. However much of the story was about Bill and his ex, both chasers, falling back in love, another chaser who is fighting Bill for research grants and fame, and a tornado that likes to chase people.

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

510: Egg Drop Failure

2012-08-23T06:12:22Z

Traisjames: Created page with "{{comic | number = 510 | date = November 28, 2008 | title = Egg Drop Failure | image = egg_drop_failure.png | imagesize = | titletext = "I hear my brother Ric..."

{{comic
| number = 510
| date = November 28, 2008
| title = Egg Drop Failure
| image = egg_drop_failure.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = "I hear my brother Ricky won his school's egg drop by leaving the egg inside the hen."
}}

==Explanation==

We all remember the egg drop from school, make some way of getting an egg to drop to the ground without breaking using the weirdest things possible. The poor student here had an egg that was ready to hatch, and it did during the fall. Problem is you loose if your egg has any cracks in it. Unforchently birds aren't ready to fly that quickly...though if I was a bird falling to earth with a toilet paper parachute, I would take my chances and fly off too.
As for the image text, dropping a hen would guarantee a win. As it is falling the chicken will try to fly and are very good about landing softly. And most chickens lay an egg every 24 hours, so if you pick the right chicken it will lay just after hitting the ground.

{{comic discussion}}

480: Spore

2012-08-23T06:10:20Z

Traisjames: Created page with "{{comic | number = 480 | date = September 24, 2008 | title = Spore | image = spore.png | imagesize = | titletext = Image text: "Way to not support the GMA 950..."

{{comic
| number = 480
| date = September 24, 2008
| title = Spore
| image = spore.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = Image text: "Way to not support the GMA 950 under OS X, Spore. :("
}}

==Explanation==
Ah Spore, what a wonderful game. Too bad it was 50$ when it first game out. Spore starts you off as a small little water bug and when you become smart enough you leave the water for land and start growing. Scale wise you start off very small and only concerned with your spot of water. The next two stages the scale grows to being the entire continent. Once you start building cities you get to view the entire planet. The last stage is space, where you get to first travel your own solar system, then the entire galaxy. Since Cueball can't afford Spore (which is now only about 15$) he instead is playing older games, starting off with small scale games (Sim Ant comes to mind), then up to The Sims, then Sim City before playing a game on a planet level (Civilization) then galactic level (Sim Space?)

The Alt Text refers to the game not being able to run on the Mac using a GMA 950 which is a graphics card system. Sad day.

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

356: Nerd Sniping

2012-08-23T06:06:56Z

Traisjames: Changed date format

{{comic
| number = 356
| date = January 12, 2007
| title = Flying Cars
| image = nerd_sniping.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = It's hard to fit in the backseat of my flying car with my android Realdoll when we're both wearing jetpacks.
}}

==Explanation==
Nerds have a way of getting distracted easily and focusing one thing and ignoring the rest. [[Black Hat]] has decided to make this into a disturbing game of getting nerds, in this case a physicist, to stop in the middle of a street by showing a problem for the victim to solve.

The problem Black Hat shows us is an electronics engineering thought experiment to find resistance between two points. In normal wiring, a one ohm resistor would result in one ohm of resistance. Two resistors connected in a series, where electricity has to go thru each has two ohms of resistance. Two resistors in parallel gives the circuit only half an ohm since you average the resistance of the path (1 ohm of resistance over 2 paths).

The math, and the name ohm comes from [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Ohm Georg Ohm], one part of the law gives that resistance total in parallel is Rtotal = (R1*R2 / R1+R2)

With an infinite grid of resistors, you have an infinite number of paths to take, and for each path an infinite number of both series and parallel paths to consider, making this problem insolvable. Please remember that while messing with your iPod or doing math, be aware of your surrounding and stay in a safe place...else you will give someone a few points

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

150: Grownups

2012-08-23T06:05:17Z

Traisjames: /* Added parts of my explanation I submitted almost a year ago. */

{{ComicHeader|150|August 29, 2006}}

[[File:Grownups.png]]

== Image Text ==
I've looked into this, and I can't figure out a way to do it cheaply. And I guess it wouldn't be sanitary.

==Explanation==
[[Randall]] is playing with the child/grownup setup again. As we all know, our parents are defining our adulthood. Many of times, they do that by saying "That's only for grownups" (for instance, while taking controlled substances like alcohol, or smoking). At other times, you (as a child) get to hear "We don't do that anymore, we're grownups now" (for instance, playing at a playground). [[Megan]] has taken these thoughts seriously, and now she has defined her adulthood by creating a playpen in her apartment, going against the latter statement. [[Cueball]] also finds this definition great, as he comes into the playpen, and (I suppose) adulthood and childhood melt together, judging by the love heart.

The Image Text reveals that [[Randall]] also would like to own his playpen, but he finds it expensive to buy, and also hard to keep clean. Which is a fact. Most public playpens contain over 100 different samples of urine, as many children play in them, among which many toddlers. If you go to the local ball pit and count how many diapers you find at the bottom...you will be disturbed....until you find out that some of the black stuff down there did not have a diaper source.

==Real Life==
[[Randall]], author of the comic, actually built one in his apartment, which he talks about and shows pictures of at [http://blog.xkcd.com/2007/11/19/growing-up/ here] and [http://blog.xkcd.com/2008/02/27/ballpit-phase-ii/ here].
Speaking of cost, [http://www.chiliahedron.com/ballroom/] has a calculator for how much it would cost to make your own ball pit. Looks like I need $4000 to fill my bedroom 3 ft deep.

{{Comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics|0150]]

356: Nerd Sniping

2012-08-23T05:58:51Z

Traisjames: Created page with "{{comic | number = 356 | date = 2007-12-12 | title = Flying Cars | image = nerd_sniping.png | imagesize = | titletext = It's hard to fit in the backseat of my..."

{{comic
| number = 356
| date = 2007-12-12
| title = Flying Cars
| image = nerd_sniping.png
| imagesize =
| titletext = It's hard to fit in the backseat of my flying car with my android Realdoll when we're both wearing jetpacks.
}}

==Explanation==
Nerds have a way of getting distracted easily and focusing one thing and ignoring the rest. [[Black Hat]] has decided to make this into a disturbing game of getting nerds, in this case a physicist, to stop in the middle of a street by showing a problem for the victim to solve.

The problem Black Hat shows us is an electronics engineering thought experiment to find resistance between two points. In normal wiring, a one ohm resistor would result in one ohm of resistance. Two resistors connected in a series, where electricity has to go thru each has two ohms of resistance. Two resistors in parallel gives the circuit only half an ohm since you average the resistance of the path (1 ohm of resistance over 2 paths).

The math, and the name ohm comes from [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Ohm Georg Ohm], one part of the law gives that resistance total in parallel is Rtotal = (R1*R2 / R1+R2)

With an infinite grid of resistors, you have an infinite number of paths to take, and for each path an infinite number of both series and parallel paths to consider, making this problem insolvable. Please remember that while messing with your iPod or doing math, be aware of your surrounding and stay in a safe place...else you will give someone a few points

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