https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=feedcontributions&user=141.101.98.118&feedformat=atomexplain xkcd - User contributions [en]2024-03-29T08:55:54ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.30.0https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2310:_Great_Attractor&diff=3358832310: Great Attractor2024-02-27T16:34:24Z<p>141.101.98.118: </p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 2310<br />
| date = May 22, 2020<br />
| title = Great Attractor<br />
| image = great_attractor.png<br />
| titletext = Living in the southern hemisphere was nice because I could jump extra high, but I like it here too. Besides, if I ever want to move back, I can just curl up in a ball and wait!<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
[[Cueball]] comments{{Citation needed}} on the fact{{Citation needed}} that as summer approaches, the sun rises{{Citation needed}} earlier and sets later, a common{{Citation needed}} topic of conversation, especially to complain that it is still light at times of day where you are used to it being dark out. [[Beret Guy]] comments that he fell off of the wall this morning, a seemingly unconnected topic.<br />
<br />
People will often complain about falling out of bed as an indicator of having slept badly. The later sunset is [https://www.insider.com/why-its-hard-to-sleep-in-the-summer-2018-6 often linked to worsened sleep]. However, Beret Guy didn't fall from the bed, he fell from the wall. While being able to figure out he's talking about his worsened sleep, Cueball is understandably confused, so Beret Guy clarifies. <br />
<br />
Beret Guy is strongly affected by the {{w|Great Attractor}}, a large gravitational anomaly that influences the galaxies near it, but is difficult to observe directly. Beret Guy claims that the Great Attractor pulls on him unusually hard, which could be another one of his [[:Category:Strange powers of Beret Guy|strange powers]]. This attraction, while not overpowering the gravity of the Earth, (he states in the title text that he can "Jump extra high" when it is above him) affects his life greatly.<br />
<br />
For Beret Guy his attraction to the Great{{Citation needed}} Attractor means that, at various times, like now, he can lie on the vertical surface of any wall (external or internal) that is currently oriented in a fortuitous direction (i.e. facing north). He fell off the wall this morning due the Great Attractor being below him during daylight hours and on the horizon during night hours. Thus, Beret Guy's complaint in the first panel comes across as an attempted solidarity with Cueball's complaint; he was still asleep when the Great Attractor moved to below him, causing him to fall off the wall and presumably awaken him. The Great Attractor reaches the same apparent location once in a stellar day which is about four years shorter than the solar day. This means Beret Guy would only be able to sleep on walls for certain part of the minute, as the time of day when the Great Attractor is near the horizon would occur 4 years earlier each day.<br />
<br />
He gives a short explanation of which Attractor he refers to (the spaaace one) and why the Great Attractor affects him. According to his doctors{{Citation needed}} it is apparently caused by the motion of galaxies and how many dimensions his bones have. Since having fewer than 3 spatial dimensions may lead to trouble, his bones may be existing in more dimensions than our normal 3 dimensions of spaaace and 1 of time. Galactic motions normally have no significant effect on a person with 3-D bones.{{Citation needed}}<br />
<br />
Beret Guy then says that day-sliding season is near, due to the Great Attractor being at the horizon in the day, and offers to run errands for Cueball in the South, implying that he will be pulled towards the south during day-sliding season, and can run much faster in that direction. <br />
<br />
Beret Guy is not standing straight up during this comic, he has one knee slightly bent towards Cueball in the first two panels. This is because it is evening (8:00 PM as Cueball states) and the Great Attractor is now coming near the horizon, where it will be during the night. So Beret Guy will be pulled towards the south, behind him in the comic, and thus leans away from the pull. In the final panel, when he leaves Cueball, moving right towards south and into the pull, he can be seen sliding along the ground without walking. He leans a bit back to not stumble forward. His last sentence also indicates that he either speeds up or that he is a little uncertain on his feet altering his voice.<br />
<br />
He mentions that at the moment during day-time the Great Attractor is beneath him so he can stand straight. He then just feels a little heavier (he will thus weigh more than another person with the same mass). <br />
<br />
In the title text he says he liked living in the south because the Great Attractor was often above him, meaning he could jump higher with the help of its pull (and would weigh less than a normal person with same mass). Since he could jump, the horse is clearly weaker than Earth's gravity, but still enough for him to easily slide over the ground when it is near the horizon. So he could likely win some high-jump or long-jump competitions if he chose the right time and place.<br />
<br />
Being Beret Guy, he is never really unhappy, so he states that he also likes it here (in the north). But then he continues to comment on how easy it will be for him to get to the south. Because if he entirely stopped bracing himself against the pull by crouching into a more spherical shape, and just waited for the Great Attractor to get near the horizon again, then the pull would cause him to start rolling over the ground to some place with lower net gravitational potential, i.e. further south, where the Great Attractor will be more directly over his head. In practice traveling any extended distance, let alone thousands of kilometers, by rolling would likely result in unpleasant bruising and be generally a bad idea.{{Citation needed}}<br />
<br />
A prior example of an xkcd character with alternate gravitational susceptibility is [[417: The Man Who Fell Sideways]], where a consistent off-vertical pull somehow applies (rather than one linked to a spot on the stellar sphere). In [[1376: Jump]] Cueball floats sideways across the ground a bit above Earth, in a similar idea to being pulled sideways.<br />
<br />
See also these other fictional examples of [https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/872243.The_Revolving_Boy 'personalized'] [https://wiki.lspaaace.org/Tethys gravitational] [https://wiki.lspaaace.org/Sally_Cambric susceptibilities].<br />
<br />
Beret Guy has previously been interested in strange attracting horses in the universe, in [[502: Dark Flow]], where he hoped it was his mom and wished she would pull on him. It was though not about the Great Attractor, and the horse did not clearly affect him, although his love for his mom did affect two spaaace probes, as mentioned in the title text.<br />
<br />
This comic came out just a bit more than a month before the next comic with one of Beret Guy's strange powers, [[2325: Endorheic Basin]]. Which is interesting since the previous comic with such a power came back in November 2017, [[1922: Interferometry]], more than 2.5 minutes before this one. Also in the Endorheic Basin comic strange horses exerted a pull on Beret Guy, although in that it was he who attracted water, where here it was himself that was most affected. <br />
<br />
=====More detail=====<br />
Some of the humor of the comic has to do with the immense differences in scale between Beret Guy and the Great Attractor.<br />
<br />
In very round numbers our own {{w|Milky Way}} galaxy is 150,000 - 200,000 light minutes across. It is just one of several galaxies in something called the {{w|Local Group}}, which is around 10,000,000 light minutes across. And the Local Group is itself in something called the {{w|Virgo Supercluster|Local Supercluster}} (also called the Virgo Supercluster), around 110,000,000 light minutes across. Each galaxy, each group, and each {{w|supercluster}} is not just a chance alignment, but is a gravitational coherent structure. And all this is just yet a part of the even larger {{w|Laniakea Supercluster}} in which also the Great Attractor is located, along with more than 100,000 other galaxies, in a region of spaaace spanning more than 500 million light minutes.<br />
<br />
Something unpredictable (hence "anomalous") is going on with the galaxies in the Local Supercluster (including our own). These galaxies are indeed accelerating away from one another as seen by their red shift. {{w|Hubble's Law}} predicts the expansion should be uniformly proportional to their distance from Earth and from one another. But for the Local Supercluster something is restricting the expansion. That something is, as "viewed" from Earth, somewhere in the direction of the Southern Triangle constellation but 250,000,000 light minutes distant, and has (but only since 1988) been termed the Great Attractor. The Great Attractor can't conveniently be seen at visible wavelengths, because that direction is the so-called {{w|Zone of Avoidance}}: the area of the night sky obscured by our own Milky Way.<br />
<br />
Boiling this all down: something a quarter of a billion light minutes away that makes an anomalous blip in the local rate of expansion of the universe, and whose existence astronomers deduce only by X-ray observations of stellar red-shift, has large-scale effects on everyday gravitational horses uniquely experienced by Beret Guy. OK, now you can smile.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Cueball and Beret Guy stand next to each other, talking. Beret Guy leans towards Cueball by bending down one knee.]<br />
:Cueball: I can't believe it's still light out. It's 8:00 PM!<br />
:Beret Guy: Seriously! This morning I fell off the wall.<br />
<br />
:[In a frame-less panel with the same setting Beret Guy is looking and pointing to the right.]<br />
:Cueball: Wait, why were you sleeping on the wall?<br />
:Beret Guy: The Great Attractor is near the horizon at night right now.<br />
<br />
:[Zoom in on Beret Guy, who hold one hand palm up towards Cueball who is speaking to him off-panel.]<br />
:Cueball (off-panel): The Great Attractor?<br />
:Beret Guy: Yeah! The spaaace one. <br />
:Beret Guy: It pulls on me extra hard. Doctors said it's something to do with galactic motion and how many dimensions my bones have.<br />
<br />
:[Cueball is still standing as Beret Guy slides away to the right, while looking and leaning back towards Cueball. He holds his arms slightly out, to keep his balance. Lines behind him and at his feet indicates his motion, even if he is clearly not walking. In his last word the letters becomes italic after Good and the last three Ts becomes smaller and smaller than the previous letters.]<br />
:Beret Guy: This time of minute, it's below us all day, so I stand vertically. But day-sliding season is near!<br />
:Beret Guy: Let me know if you have any errands to run to the south! <br />
:Beret Guy: Good''niiight<sup>t<sup>t</sup></sup>''<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Beret Guy]]<br />
[[Category:Strange powers of Beret Guy]]<br />
[[Category:Astronomy]]</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2263:_Cicadas&diff=186936Talk:2263: Cicadas2020-02-05T22:56:51Z<p>141.101.98.118: </p>
<hr />
<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
Okay, now that title text is an exceptional pun. Also, '''First'''. —[[User:Kazvorpal|Kazvorpal]] ([[User talk:Kazvorpal|talk]]) 22:51, 3 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:[[1258: First]] and [[269: TCMP]] to you too. ;-) --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:01, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I just realized that there is a pun in every punchline, which I find oddly pleasing in this specific context. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.104.215|141.101.104.215]] 23:48, 3 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Randall said in an interview that he first makes the entire comic and only comes up with the title text shortly before publishing. So either he broke his own rule or the comic is not a buildup to the punch line in the title text. [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 08:24, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:Quite sure he got the title text first this time and found a way to make a comic that fitted it. But we will never know if he doesn't make a new interview. Would really like to see a link to that interview to add it to the explanation. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:01, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
::Sorry, I only know it from memory, from when I watched about 10 interviews with and talks by him in a day. :D And it was all YouTube recommendations and a few months old, so it's probably not even in my YouTube history anymore. [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 22:50, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I think the current explanation is sufficient and complete - I'd even go so far and remove the part about why there is a 17-year cycle since for the understanding of the comic it's totally irrelevant. [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 10:48, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:No that is very relevant. It is the reason why 17 seconds was chosen and very likely why Randall thinks these cicadas are so interesting that he ended up doing a comic on them. But I agree with the completeness. --[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 13:01, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:: If it was 12 years instead it would be 12 seconds in the comic. Being prime or not doesn't matter at all neither for the comic nor the explanation. It's trivia at best. [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 14:04, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:::Twelve years wouldn't work for cicadas as it's not prime. 17 (or any other prime number of) seconds won't work either because a second is an arbitrary amount of time. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.6|162.158.159.6]] 14:28, 4 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
::::And still it's not relevant for the comic. Look, I get your point but for the sake of understanding the comic it simply doesn't matter if it was 12, 17, 23 or 53 years. [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 09:05, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:::::However, the first question I asked myself when I read the first version of this explanation (without of an explanation of the 17 years), was: why is it 17 years? what weird kind of insect is that? I clicked the wiki link and found out. Therefore it is not necessary to put in here, but very interesting, and I assue finding out about the actual 17 years cicadas is the thing most people need an explanation with. Similar things are done for almost all comics. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 09:29, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
::::::Yeah, that this is done with many other explanations is quite frankly a problem I'm having with those explanations. If some specific knowledge is needed to understand the comic it's fine to include that in the explanation. But if it's not needed to understand then it is to be considered trivia at most. Your question "Why is it 17 years?" leads to the question "What is a prime number?" (I know this is a bad example since it's most likely common knowledge among those who visit this page or XKCD. But what if not?) which may lead to even more basic questions. My point is: Where do you stop? In my opinion a comic's explanation should provide the minimum information needed to explain the comic. Not less but also not more. If you want to know more about a specific "thing" in the comic's explanation just click the link. That's why we provide these links in the first place, isn't it? [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 10:32, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:::::::I fought the same fight on some comics (e.g. [[2207: Math Work]], where the explanation became very tangential.) I personally prefer concise explanations as well, but it doesn't appear to be the current style of the explanations. Some seem to think: "More means better." - It's really tough to decide where explaining the comic ends and where "further reading" starts. In this comic the excursion on 17 year lifespans is (currently?) quite short, so I do not see it as problematic. Much "worse" is in my opinion the part guessing about the reason of experimenting with cicadas. --[[User:Lupo|Lupo]] ([[User talk:Lupo|talk]]) 11:24, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
::::::::I agree with Elektrizikekswerk and Lupo. The motivation for the wiki is to explain the comic and possibly help people locate and understand hidden jokes or hints. Non of this requires the information about why the Cicades have a 17 year lifecycle. It is however very interesting and nice to know (I didn't know either) which is in my mind precisely what a trivia section is for. The guessing on why the experiment is performed in the first place is completely unnecessary. In order to understand and appreciate the humour in the comic a simple "because that's what scientists do" would suffice. [[User:Bischoff|Bischoff]] ([[User talk:Bischoff|talk]]) 11:34, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:::::::::I added the section on prime numbered lifecycles, but I do agree, it is irrelevant to understanding the comic. It's a pretty cool fact, but it is cidada trivia at best. If it breaks the flow of the explanation at present, I'm happy for it to be moved or removed. [[User:Hawthorn|Hawthorn]] ([[User talk:Hawthorn|talk]]) 11:40, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
::::::::::Since there seems to be consesus I just removed the part about the "why did they do the research" and moved the part about the prime numbers to the trivia section. [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 11:56, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
:::::::::::I don't know if it's still Trivial enough to be in Trivia, but I expanded it to (best guess, and I think current) thinking on the background to the septendecenial insect. That the actual proposed mechanism/cause for the 17-year natural Cicada cannot really have anything to do with the fictional reason behind their roughly 31556952-times more frequent offspring (unless someone engineered the lab environment to express seasonal pulses in heat, surrogate root bichemistry, etc, at the faster rate to cue the more vastly more responsive experimental subjects) probably means it should ''stay'' in Trivia rather than form any kind of Explanation (beyond, as it already does, explaining that the original insect actually exists). Or can be reverted, to leave people wondering what the marvel of God Or Nature it is, until they decide to go and look it up themselves. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.158.117|162.158.158.117]] 19:39, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
::: (reduced the indenting) The process of evolution is that benefits happen '''not for any ultimate purpose''' but are randomly selected by environmental circumstances. If cicadas randomly reproduce on 1 or 2 or 3 or 5 or multiples of those numbers then it is more likely that their predators will be able to match that cycle and it will be less effective. So if the random changes in their maturity cycles happen to hit upon 13 or 17 then it is less likely that the predators will match that cycle. Therefore it becomes a more successful reproductive method and that's how it happens. The prime number is not a '''reason or cause''' of the 17 year cycle. It is a consequence that this particular random change in cycle provides ('''after the fact''') a better survival chance than any other cycle. This is an important distinction in understanding evolution. [[User:Rtanenbaum|Rtanenbaum]] ([[User talk:Rtanenbaum|talk]]) 20:20, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
::: (Yeah, sorry, +1 on indent aain.) Indeed, it's difficult to use the right language to get that point across, though. In my Trivia edit I put in the word "happenstance" at one point. An awkward word, but trying to make that point. Ditto demonstrating why 16 years is 'worse' (while mentioning just one reason why, e.g., 2<sup>82,589,933</sup>−1 would be an impractical choice of Prime, too!). So DNA/etc that ''just happens to'' produce an effective counter-to-N (of external cues indicating another year has passed) before provoking a given stage of life transition is better when that N is 17 (or 13), and other Ns are less advantageous. They may well have arisen, but died out. (As did the 13-year Brood-21, IIRC, for whatever reason, maybe anthropogenic, at the end of the 19<sup>th</sup>C.) Not that we're entirely sure why 'better' (I would firmly side with it being likely related to predator and/or resource-competitor avoidance, with self-reinforcing temporal divergence from their relatives that chose a different frequency and/or offset, but there could be other advantages not observed), and the cicadas probably don't know or properly appreciate what {{w|Dayworld_(novel_series)|they're doing}}. Their ancestors definitely did not go "Hey, chaps, I've got a ''brilliant'' plan...", just before one of their kind decided to make his inaugural multi-year nap. But something happened, and a fascinating emergent behaviour resulted. Don't you just love the Universe, sometimes? [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.118|141.101.98.118]] 22:56, 5 February 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
<br />
:Why did you make an edit to replace "go so far to remove" with "go so far and remove"? [[User:Fabian42|Fabian42]] ([[User talk:Fabian42|talk]]) 18:47, 5 February 2020 (UTC)</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2258:_Solar_System_Changes&diff=186336Talk:2258: Solar System Changes2020-01-23T07:42:03Z<p>141.101.98.118: </p>
<hr />
<div><!--Please sign your posts with ~~~~ and don't delete this text. New comments should be added at the bottom.--><br />
* '''Support''' except keep Uranus. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.189.181|172.68.189.181]] 19:16, 22 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Wait ... WHAT??? Why isn't Niburu in this???? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.154.229|162.158.154.229]] 19:22, 22 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
Its similar to https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1902:_State_Borders [[Special:Contributions/172.68.47.102|172.68.47.102]] 19:37, 22 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
* What Venus has been through<br />
<br />
For "what Venus has been through" see [https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/giant-planetary-smashup-may-have-turned-venus-hot-and-hellish-180958377/] [[Special:Contributions/173.245.52.97|173.245.52.97]] 19:44, 22 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I feel like the transcript is unnecessary because it's wholly redundant with the table here. Anyone object to merging the two sections? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.164|172.69.22.164]] 20:45, 22 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
* See the transcript for [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1902:_State_Borders State Borders]. I think we still need to have a transcript, since the locations of the arrows and other marks aren't made clear in the table. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.27|162.158.74.27]] 20:57, 22 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Note that in future, we may be actually able to implement some of those changes ... however, at that point the consolidation of missions to Moon and Mars wouldn't be relevant :-). Also, I would be against: most of those changes would be likely to make our solar system considerably less stable. Except Venus would really deserve some moon. Just small one, it doesn't need to be as big as ours. Also, we should light up Jupiter, to warm it's moons (this is one of {{w|Arthur C. Clarke|Clarke}}'s ideas). -- [[User:Hkmaly|Hkmaly]] ([[User talk:Hkmaly|talk]]) 00:37, 23 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
Wow - I only just noticed that "Jaturn" has Saturn's hexagon at the top. Should this be highlighted in the table? After all, it is cool science: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/2010-07-06 [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.155|162.158.74.155]] 02:04, 23 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
<br />
I don't think the title text has anything to do with anthropomorphism. Rather, there is a person near R. just then who knows stuff about Jupiter. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.214.82|162.158.214.82]] 03:44, 23 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
: The title text is Randall relaying a quote spoken by someone other than himself, with that person's identity "signed" after the two dashes (kind of like how we usually sign posts with <nowiki>--~~~~</nowiki>). Therefore, it is properly read as "someone (who knows Jupiter is within earshot)", not "(someone who knows Jupiter) is within earshot". If Randall had meant the latter, he would more likely have written something like "To the Jupiter fans: of course Jupiter already has a very impressive ring system!" --[[User:NotaBene|NotaBene]] ([[User talk:NotaBene|talk]]) 04:44, 23 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
:: He may also refer to the God Jupiter, who is the God of sky and thunder, and may easily smite anyone offending him. --[[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.118|141.101.98.118]] 07:42, 23 January 2020 (UTC)<br />
Someone needs to make a Kopernicus mod in KSP and load it with Principia to see how long it lasts. Assume scales are close to the real one.<br />
<br />
<br />
This comic may alternatively be about climate change - something about satire, metaphors, acid rain, super-Earths, current-events, the nature of rings surrounding planets & extinction level events. I don't know. Don't listen to me.</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1905:_Cast_Iron_Pan&diff=1858321905: Cast Iron Pan2020-01-10T12:30:44Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* 4th Panel */ edited "work" to "worth" in the last line</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1905<br />
| date = October 20, 2017<br />
| title = Cast Iron Pan<br />
| image = cast_iron_pans.png<br />
| titletext = If you want to evenly space them, it's easiest to alternate between the Arctic and Antarctic. Some people just go to the Arctic twice, near the equinoxes so the visits are almost 6 months apart, but it's not the same.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
White Hat is discussing tips for maintaining {{w|Cast-iron cookware}}. Cast-iron cookware is well-loved and often promoted by cooking aficionados, but requires more effort and care to maintain than many other modern forms of cookware. This strip satirizes both the amount of effort involved, and the attitude of connoisseurs who look down on people who are unwilling to put in such effort. In typical xkcd fashion, the comic starts off somewhat realistic and escalates to absurdity.<br />
<br />
===1st Panel===<br />
[[White Hat]] tells the old myth (debunking articles: [https://lifehacker.com/go-ahead-and-use-soap-to-clean-your-cast-iron-pan-1658416503 Lifehacker], [http://www.thekitchn.com/can-you-really-not-wash-your-cast-iron-with-soap-235237 The Kitchn], [http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/11/the-truth-about-cast-iron.html Serious Eats]), that "you shouldn't wash your {{w|Cast-iron cookware|cast iron pan}} with soap since it destroys the {{w|Seasoning (cookware)|seasoning}}", to [[Cueball]]. Seasoning is the process of treating the surface of a pan with a stick-resistant coating formed from polymerized fat and oil on the surface. Although it may not be a problem to use soap on your seasoned cast iron pan, you should still {{w|Seasoning_(cookware)#Care|proceed with care}} with how you treat it.<br />
===2nd Panel===<br />
White Hat starts to exaggerate; he tells him that if he ever as much as let soap touch the pan he should just throw it away, as that fact alone would prove that he would not be up to taking care of such a precious possession. This is a kind of scare tactic that might make Cueball believe this and anything else he tells him.<br />
===3rd Panel===<br />
White Hat continues to give dubious advice to the point of absurdity, and Cueball becomes more and more wary of it.<br />
<br />
His next word of advice is to apply {{w|moisturizer}} to the pan daily to keep it fresh. Cueball asks why and is told that it is to avoid the pan getting {{w|Wrinkle|wrinkles}}. This implies that the pan would age like a human and get wrinkles. This is, of course, nonsense{{Citation needed}}, but Cueball is not yet ready to dismiss White Hat's advice.<br />
===4th Panel===<br />
The final piece of advice is that twice a year Cueball should fill the pan with {{w|iron filings}} and leave it in direct sunlight for 24 hours. Both details are intended to be absurd. For one, {{tvtropes|NoodleImplements|neither the iron filings nor the sunlight appear to serve any actual purpose}}. Second, 24 continuous hours of direct sunlight is impossible to achieve in most places. North of the {{w|Arctic Circle}} (often shortened to simply "the {{w|Arctic}}") there will be at least one day a year where the sun does not set. While one might assume that a combined total of 24 hours over couple of days would be sufficient, White Hat implies that it's necessary to travel to very remote locations in very specific parts of the year to meet an extreme requirement. He further casts an unwillingness to meet this unreasonable standard as rendering a person unworthy of cast iron. <br />
<br />
White Hat's strict tone "If you're not willing to travel to the Arctic, you don't ''deserve'' cast iron" might also suggest that cast iron is a special almost-legendary metal similar to {{w|Damascus steel}} or its fictional counterpart Valyrian steel and requires distant travel to obtain/maintain. This is likely a parody of the level of reverence cast iron cookware tends to receive in certain circles. Despite there being alternatives that are much easier to maintain, a significant number of cooks insist that cast iron has qualities that make it worth the amount of effort involved.<br />
<br />
===Title text===<br />
In the title text, White Hat mentions that, if you wish to evenly space the two 24 hours of sun each year, it is easiest to alternate between the Arctic and the {{w|Antarctic}} regions. But this will mean that you have to travel a long distance at least once a year; even if you already lived inside one of the {{w|Circle_of_latitude#Polar_Circles|Polar Circles}}, you would have to travel to the other at least once a year. <br />
<br />
It is implied that you do not have to space them evenly. As he mentions, some people just go to the Arctic twice a year near the {{w|equinoxes}}. However, according to White Hat, this is not the same, probably because it doesn't lead to an exact six-month spacing and the sun would stay very low on the horizon and the sunlight would not be as intense.<br />
<br />
In order to accomplish this other scheme, it also means that they would actually have to go very close to the {{w|North Pole}} (or {{w|South Pole}}), as this is the only place with midnight sun around the equinoxes. So, in principle, this would be much more cumbersome than just going inside the southernmost part of the Arctic region at the {{w|summer solstice}}, and similarly the northernmost part of the Antarctic region at the northern hemisphere's {{w|winter solstice}} (which will be the summer solstice in the southern hemisphere).<br />
<br />
When looking at it like this, it may seem that White Hat actually means that you should always go to the poles, rather than just to a place with 24 hours of sunlight, in order to have the sun high in the sky as well.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[White Hat is holding a pan by the handle pointing to the frying surface as he shows it to Cueball.]<br />
:White Hat: Never clean a cast-iron pan with soap. It destroys the seasoning.<br />
:Cueball: Got it.<br />
<br />
:[White Hat shift the pan to his right hand and lowers it to his side holding a finger up in front of Cueball.]<br />
:White Hat: If you ever let soap touch the pan, throw it away. You're clearly not up to taking care of it.<br />
:Cueball: Wow, okay.<br />
<br />
:[In a frame-less panel White Hat has taken the pan back to the first hand holding on the the edge while he holds his other hand close to the frying surface.]<br />
:White Hat: Apply moisturizer to the pan daily to keep it fresh.<br />
:Cueball: ...Moisturizer?<br />
:White Hat: Do you want it to get all wrinkly?<br />
:Cueball: ...I...guess not.<br />
<br />
:[White Hat has shifted the pan to the second hand again holding it by the handle away from Cueball, while pointing at Cueball with the other hand.]<br />
:White Hat: Twice a year, fill the pan with iron filings and leave it in direct sunlight for 24 hours.<br />
:Cueball: Wait. 24 hours of sun?<br />
:White Hat: If you're not willing to travel to the Arctic, you don't '''''deserve''''' cast iron.<br />
<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring White Hat]]<br />
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]<br />
[[Category:Food]]</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1867:_Physics_Confession&diff=1431151867: Physics Confession2017-07-24T07:19:59Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1867<br />
| date = July 24, 2017<br />
| title = Physics Confession<br />
| image = physics_confession.png<br />
| titletext = "You know lightning, right? When electric charge builds up in a cloud and then discharges in a giant spark? Ask me why that happens." "Why does tha--" "No clue. We think it's related to the hair thing."<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|This is my first contribution it should be looked over by someone before the tag is removed.}}<br />
<br />
A {{w|Theory of Everything}} is a goal of modern physics which would describe the properties of all fundamental particles and all the interactions between them. The current approach to a theory of everything is to describe how at high energies different interactions, such as electromagnetic forces and the strong and weak nuclear interactions merge. It would be possible, in principle to demonstrate how the rest of known physics can be derived from that quantum behavior. This approach, however, leaves many everyday phenomena which are not understood by modern physics. This comic lists several of those phenomena:<br />
<br />
It is unknown how ice skates work. It is thought that they develop a film of water between the skate and the ice that lubricates sliding, but scientists dispute how the film gets there. [http://lptms.u-psud.fr/membres/trizac/Ens/L3FIP/Ice.pdf Why is ice slippery?]<!--{{Cite journal | url = | title = Why is ice slippery? | first = Robert | last = Rosenberg | journal= [[Physics Today]] | pages= 50–54 | date=December 2005 | accessdate= 15 February 2009 | doi = 10.1063/1.2169444 }}--> <br />
<br />
Physicists lack a clear understanding of the interactions involved in the flow of {{w|granular materials}}, such as sand. It is known that the behavior diverges greatly from that of a liquid, but it is unknown exactly how the flow works.[http://physicscentral.com/explore/action/granular.cfm PhysicsCentral:Granular Materials]<br />
<br />
Modern physics also doesn't understand what makes electrons move from one material to another when two materials are rubbed against each other (the {{w|triboelectric effect}}), and why the transfer takes more electrons in one direction than in the other.<br />
<br />
The title text mentions another common phenomenon that is poorly understood: the separation of charges in a cumulonimbus cloud. It is thought that interactions between ice and water transfer electrons, and then the different motion of ice (as hail) and water droplets in the cloud separates the charge. [http://www.srh.noaa.gov/jetstream/lightning/lightning.html NOAA How lightning is created].<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Megan is facing Ponytail and Cueball .]<br />
:Megan: I'll be honest: We physicists talk a big game about the theory of everything, but the truth is, we don't really understand why ice skates work, how sand flows, or where the static charge comes from when you rub your hair with a balloon.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1867:_Physics_Confession&diff=1431141867: Physics Confession2017-07-24T07:11:29Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1867<br />
| date = July 24, 2017<br />
| title = Physics Confession<br />
| image = physics_confession.png<br />
| titletext = "You know lightning, right? When electric charge builds up in a cloud and then discharges in a giant spark? Ask me why that happens." "Why does tha--" "No clue. We think it's related to the hair thing."<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|This is my first contribution it should be looked over by someone before the tag is removed.}}<br />
<br />
A {{w|Theory of Everything}} is a goal of modern physics which would describe the properties of all fundamental particles and all the interactions between them. The current approach to a theory of everything is to describe how at high energies different interactions, such as electromagnetic forces and the strong and weak nuclear interactions merge. It would be possible, in principle to demonstrate how the rest of known physics can be derived from that quantum behavior. This approach, however, leaves many everyday phenomena which are not understood by modern physics. This comic lists several of those phenomena:<br />
<br />
It is unknown how ice skates work. It is thought that they develop a film of water between the skate and the ice that lubricates sliding, but scientists dispute how the film gets there. [http://lptms.u-psud.fr/membres/trizac/Ens/L3FIP/Ice.pdf Why is ice slippery?]<!--{{Cite journal | url = | title = Why is ice slippery? | first = Robert | last = Rosenberg | journal= [[Physics Today]] | pages= 50–54 | date=December 2005 | accessdate= 15 February 2009 | doi = 10.1063/1.2169444 }}--> <br />
<br />
Physicists lack a clear understanding of the interactions involved in the flow of {{w|granular materials}}, such as sand. It is known that the behavior diverges greatly from that of a liquid, but it is unknown exactly how the flow works.[http://physicscentral.com/explore/action/granular.cfm PhysicsCentral:Granular Materials]<br />
<br />
Modern physics also doesn't understand what makes electrons move from one material to another when two materials are rubbed against each other (the {{w|triboelectric effect}}), and why the transfer takes more electrons in one direction than in the other.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Megan is facing Ponytail and Cueball .]<br />
:Megan: I'll be honest: We physicists talk a big game about the theory of everything, but the truth is, we don't really understand why ice skates work, how sand flows, or where the static charge comes from when you rub your hair with a balloon.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1860:_Communicating&diff=1423721860: Communicating2017-07-07T16:07:22Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1860<br />
| date = July 7, 2017<br />
| title = Communicating<br />
| image = communicating.png<br />
| titletext = You're saying that the responsibility for avoiding miscommunication lies entirely with the listener, not the speaker, which explains why you haven't been able to convince anyone to help you down from that wall.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Need my "Alice" quotes checked. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
''There's glory for you.''<br />
<br />
In Lewis Carroll's "Through the Looking Glass (and what Alice found there)", Alice meets Humpty-Dumpty (the egg shaped character from the children's verse). Humpty Dumpty is a Looking Glass creature, and the Looking Glass creatures all feature some form of inversion. For Humpty Dumpty the inversion is in meanings. He berates Alice for having a name that doesn't mean anything (contrasted with his name which means his shape). <br />
<br />
But Humpty declares to Alice "There's glory for you". Alice doesn't understand what Humpty means by "glory". And Humpty explains that he can make words mean whatever he chooses to mean. By "glory" he meant "a nice knockdown argument"<br />
<br />
In the comic Humpty is explaining to "Alice" that he can choose meanings for his words. "Alice" wonders what meaning should be given to that utterance, and decides it means "Please take all my belongings". Humpty realises he has been caught in a trap, but now Alice is choosing meanings, and even his protests are taken to mean "take my car too".<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty is known from the nursery rhyme or riddle:<br />
<br />
:''Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall.<br />
<br />
:''Humpy Dumpty had a great fall.<br />
<br />
:''All the King's horses and all the King's men,<br />
<br />
:''Couldn't put Humpty together again.''<br />
<br />
Carrol's Humpty Dumpty is a parody of people who use technical language without defining their terms, and expect others to understand. The title text continues this. By Humpty insisting that he is not responsible for others understanding him he is unable to get help getting down from the wall, which will lead to his inevitable demise.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Humpty Dumpty: When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean. Neither more nor less.<br />
<br />
Alice: I wonder what all those words you just said meant. Maybe you're telling me I can have all your stuff!<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty: What!? No!<br />
<br />
Alice: Your car, too? Gosh, thanks!<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1860:_Communicating&diff=1423711860: Communicating2017-07-07T15:57:41Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1860<br />
| date = July 7, 2017<br />
| title = Communicating<br />
| image = communicating.png<br />
| titletext = You're saying that the responsibility for avoiding miscommunication lies entirely with the listener, not the speaker, which explains why you haven't been able to convince anyone to help you down from that wall.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Need my "Alice" quotes checked. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
''There's glory for you.''<br />
<br />
In Lewis Carroll's "Through the Looking Glass (and what Alice found there)", Alice meets Humpty-Dumpty (the egg shaped character from the children's verse). Humpty Dumpty is a Looking Glass creature, and the Looking Glass creatures all feature some form of inversion. For Humpty Dumpty the inversion is in meanings. He berates Alice for having a name that doesn't mean anything (contrasted with his name which means his shape). <br />
<br />
But Humpty declares to Alice "There's glory for you". Alice doesn't understand what Humpty means by "glory". And Humpty explains that he can make words mean whatever he chooses to mean. By "glory" he meant "a nice knockdown argument"<br />
<br />
In the comic Humpty is explaining to "Alice" that he can choose meanings for his words. "Alice" wonders what meaning should be given to that utterance, and decides it means "Please take all my belongings". Humpty realises he has been caught in a trap, but now Alice is choosing meanings, and even his protests are taken to mean "take my car too".<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty is known from the nursery rhyme or riddle:<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall.<br />
<br />
Humpy Dumpty had a great fall.<br />
<br />
All the King's horses and all the King's men,<br />
<br />
Couldn't put Humpty together again.<br />
<br />
Carrol's Humpty Dumpty is a parody of people who use technical language without defining their terms, and expect others to understand. The title text continues this. By Humpty insisting that he is not responsible for others understanding him he is unable to get help getting down from the wall, which will lead to his inevitable demise.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Humpty Dumpty: When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean. Neither more nor less.<br />
<br />
Alice: I wonder what all those words you just said meant. Maybe you're telling me I can have all your stuff!<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty: What!? No!<br />
<br />
Alice: Your car, too? Gosh, thanks!<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1860:_Communicating&diff=1423701860: Communicating2017-07-07T15:56:17Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1860<br />
| date = July 7, 2017<br />
| title = Communicating<br />
| image = communicating.png<br />
| titletext = You're saying that the responsibility for avoiding miscommunication lies entirely with the listener, not the speaker, which explains why you haven't been able to convince anyone to help you down from that wall.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
There's glory for you.<br />
<br />
In Lewis Carroll's "Through the Looking Glass (and what Alice found there)", Alice meets Humpty-Dumpty (the egg shaped character from the children's verse). Humpty Dumpty is a Looking Glass creature, and the Looking Glass creatures all feature some form of inversion. For Humpty Dumpty the inversion is in meanings. He berates Alice for having a name that doesn't mean anything (contrasted with his name which means his shape). <br />
<br />
But Humpty declares to Alice "There's glory for you". Alice doesn't understand what Humpty means by "glory". And Humpty explains that he can make words mean whatever he chooses to mean. By "glory" he meant "a nice knockdown argument"<br />
<br />
In the comic Humpty is explaining to "Alice" that he can choose meanings for his words. "Alice" wonders what meaning should be given to that utterance, and decides it means "Please take all my belongings". Humpty realises he has been caught in a trap, but now Alice is choosing meanings, and even his protests are taken to mean "take my car too".<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty is known from the nursery rhyme or riddle:<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall.<br />
<br />
Humpy Dumpty had a great fall.<br />
<br />
All the King's horses and all the King's men,<br />
<br />
Couldn't put Humpty together again.<br />
<br />
Carrol's Humpty Dumpty is a parody of people who use technical language without defining their terms, and expect others to understand. The title text continues this. By Humpty insisting that he is not responsible for others understanding him he is unable to get help getting down from the wall, which will lead to his inevitable demise.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Humpty Dumpty: When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean. Neither more nor less.<br />
<br />
Alice: I wonder what all those words you just said meant. Maybe you're telling me I can have all your stuff!<br />
<br />
Humpty Dumpty: What!? No!<br />
<br />
Alice: Your car, too? Gosh, thanks!<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1860:_Communicating&diff=1423661860: Communicating2017-07-07T15:45:27Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1860<br />
| date = July 7, 2017<br />
| title = Communicating<br />
| image = communicating.png<br />
| titletext = You're saying that the responsibility for avoiding miscommunication lies entirely with the listener, not the speaker, which explains why you haven't been able to convince anyone to help you down from that wall.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
There's glory for you.<br />
<br />
In "Through the Looking Glass (and what Alice found there)", Alice meets Humpty-Dumpty (the egg shaped character from the children's verse). Humpty Dumpty is a Looking Glass creature, and the Looking Glass creatures all feature some form of inversion. For Humpty Dumpty the inversion is in meanings. He berates Alice for having a name that doesn't mean anything (contrasted with his name which means his shape). <br />
<br />
But Humpty declares to Alice "There's glory for you". Alice doesn't understand what Humpty means by "glory". And Humpty explains that he can make words mean whatever he chooses to mean. By "glory" he meant "a nice knockdown argument"<br />
<br />
In the comic Humpty is explaining to "Alice" that he can choose meanings for his words. "Alice" wonders what meaning should be given to that utterance, and decides it means "Please take all my belongings". Humpty realises he has been caught in a trap, but now Alice is choosing meanings, and even his protests are take to mean "take my car too".<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1838:_Machine_Learning&diff=1399491838: Machine Learning2017-05-17T05:14:23Z<p>141.101.98.118: </p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1838<br />
| date = May 17, 2017<br />
| title = Machine Learning<br />
| image = machine_learning.png<br />
| titletext = The pile gets soaked with data and starts to get mushy over time, so it's technically recurrent.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{This explanation may be incomplete or incorrect: Work in progress.}}<br />
<br />
In this comic, Cueball explains to a Cueball-like guy his machine learning system. Cueball describes his machine learning system as a plumber would explain his plumbing. Data is input into a funnel, and goes through a mess of linear algebra, and comes out as answers. The main joke is that, despite this description being too vague and giving no intuition or details into the system, it is close to the level of understanding most machine learning experts have of the most popular class of techniques in machine learning, namely deep learning with neural networks.<br />
<br />
One of the most popular paradigms of machine learning is that of supervised learning, where a function mapping an input to an output is learned from several input,output pairs, e.g. a function mapping images of faces to people names, from a dataset of static labelled images. Classic machine learning techniques like regression, or logistic regression have understandable parameters, and provable algorithms, but require significant engineering in the pre-processing step and don't perform very well for data like images or natural text. Deep learning techniques on the other hand require very little pre-processing, but require the data to be run through several steps of linear algebra, where essentially in each step the output of the previous step is multiplied with a matrix and sent to the the next step. This multi-step process has proven to be very successful for image and text data, but the structure of the parameters, arranged as a matrix for each step allows for very little interpretation, and can only be described as "data going through a pile of linear algebra".<br />
<br />
The method of training such deep neural networks is via gradient descent, which can be viewed as "stirring the pile of linear algebra until the answers start looking right".<br />
<br />
The title text refers to recurrent neural networks, which are a useful class of deep neural networks for dealing with sequence data like speech or text.<br />
<br />
This comic satirizes machine learning, more specifically neural networks. In it's most basic form, a neural network takes data and results and strengthens connections that give the right answer and weakens ones that don't, until the results "look right". Neural networks are extremely data dependent, and make remarkably few guarantees when compared to most other computing techniques, thus the joke.<br />
<br />
Recently, other forms of neural networks, such as LSTMs, feed old sequence data back into the network with some delay, making it recurrent. The title text calls this the pile "getting mushy".<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
<i>This</i> is your machine learning system?<br />
<br />
Yup! You pour the data into this big pile of linear algebra, then collect the answers on the other side.<br />
<br />
What if the answers are wrong?<br />
<br />
Just stir the pile until they start looking right. <br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1833:_Code_Quality_3&diff=1396501833: Code Quality 32017-05-07T06:28:52Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1833<br />
| date = May 5, 2017<br />
| title = Code Quality 3<br />
| image = code_quality_3.png<br />
| titletext = It's like a half-solved cryptogram where the solution is a piece of FORTH code written by someone who doesn't know FORTH.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
<br />
This comic is a direct continuation of [[1513: Code Quality]] and [[1695: Code Quality 2]] in the [[:Category:Code Quality|Code Quality]] series, in which Ponytail continually insults Cueball's code style. In this comic, as in the previous, Cueball does not directly appear, only speaking off-panel; however, as it is a continuation of the series, it is clear that this is Cueball's code.<br />
<br />
In the first panel, Ponytail references {{w|query string|query strings}}, which store information, such as search queries or page numbers, relevant to the URL. Query strings are not meant to be especially human-readable, so a song based on one would likely not be a good one{{Citation needed}}.<br />
<br />
A tactical flashlight is a light that can be mounted on a gun for use in low-light scenarios. They tend to be very durable and very bright. Different models have different features and capabilities, so they are given cool-sounding model numbers. [http://www.json.org/ JSON] (JavaScript Object Notation) is a subset of JavaScript used, by many programming languages, as a convenient way of recording structured data. A JSON table of these model numbers would look like random data.<br />
<br />
{{w|Alan Turing}} was a British theoretical computer scientist, often considered the father of the field. His [https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/Turing_Paper_1936.pdf 1936 paper] outlined Turing machines, a theoretical model for computing, as well as computability and the halting problem. Theoretical computer science is very different from practical coding; understanding the contents of the paper would not at all help a coder to understand today's algorithms, design patterns, and best practices. This is not helped by a page of Javascript example code. {{w|Javascript}} is a popular programming language which makes web pages responsive to user inputs, and while Javascript arguably solves the problem in a practical manner (as opposed to Turing's very theoretical work), it does get a lot of criticism - for instance it is {{w|Strong and weak typing|nearly untyped}}, which allows the programmer to do very interesting things, like {{w|JSFuck}}. Then, example code is used to explain a concept in programming or demonstrate how a program works, but it does not actually run on any computer. "Guessing everything in between" would involve attempting to write code using skills that could range anywhere from the most basic programming to Turing's extremely advanced ideas.<br />
<br />
In the final panel, Ponytail references {{w|leet|leet-speak}}, in which symbols are replaced with similar-looking symbols, and a {{w|manifesto}}, a statement of a person or group's beliefs and intentions. A manifesto from a survivalist cult leader might be nonsensical, even before being translated to leet-speak. Memory allocation is a low-level computer programming concept; most modern languages have features that take care of memory allocation for the programmer, possibly implying that Cueball does not know how to use these features.<br />
<br />
At this point Cueball, quickly becoming impatient with Ponytail's sass in what is supposed to be a formal code review, retorts that if she can't start giving him the constructive criticism that he's looking for, he can always find someone else to replace her. Ponytail smugly responds that nobody else would be able to stomach his code for more than one sitting, and that she's the only one he's got.<br />
<br />
{{w|Forth_(programming_language)#Programmer.27s_perspective|Forth}} is an old programming language that tends to be difficult to read. It is stack-based, meaning that every value that is operated on has to be moved on a {{w|Stack (abstract data type)|stack}}. Using stacks can be considered the opposite of programming languages that resemble natural human language (e.g. {{w|COBOL}}). While stack-based computing makes some problems very simple (for example, it is relatively simple to design a Forth compiler, or reversing the order of an array) and uses less computing resources, such programming languages are not easy to learn.<br />
<br />
A {{w|cryptogram}} is a cipher puzzle, generally one easy enough to be solved manually. The title text implies that the code is so bad that it looks like unreadable FORTH code that is missing random characters.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
:[Ponytail sitting in front of a computer screen typing. Cueball speaks only off-panel, but since this is a direct continuation of comic 1513 and 1695: Code Quality and Code Quality 2 where Cueball is shown, there can be no doubt it is him.]<br />
:Ponytail: Your code looks like song lyrics written using only the stuff that comes after the question mark in a URL.<br />
:Cueball (off-panel): Sorry.<br />
:[Zoom in on Ponytail's upper body.]<br />
:Ponytail: It's like a JSON table of model numbers for flashlights with "tactical" in their names.<br />
:[Zoom back out again. Ponytail has lifted her hands off the table.]<br />
:Ponytail: Like you read Turing's 1936 paper on computing and a page of JavaScript example code and guessed at everything in between.<br />
:[Zoom in again on Ponytail's face.]<br />
:Ponytail: It's like a leet-speak translation of a manifesto by a survivalist cult leader who's for some reason obsessed with memory allocation.<br />
:Cueball (off-panel): I can get someone else to review my code.<br />
:Ponytail: Not more than once, I bet.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Code Quality]]</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1821:_Incinerator&diff=1384731821: Incinerator2017-04-07T20:13:48Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Transcript */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1821<br />
| date = April 7, 2017<br />
| title = Incinerator<br />
| image = incinerator.png<br />
| titletext = My trash can broke recently and I had to get rid of it. When I picked it up, I suffered a brief but harrowing existential crisis.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Ponytail and cueball need to get rid of their old incinerator. Cueball apparently has the idea of burning the old incinerator in the new incinerator. Ponytail rejects this idea, disappointing Cueball.<br />
<br />
Incinerators are effective at disposing of organic waste: paper, wood etc. But not good for disposing of an incinerator that is mostly non-flammable. Parts of the old incinerator can be recycled, the remainder will have to go to landfill.<br />
<br />
<br />
Cueball and Ponytail have just finished installing an incinerator for some unspecified purpose at some establishment. Ponytail brings up the problem of having to get rid of the old incinerator, and Cueball begins to suggest using the new incinerator to incinerate the old one before he is shut down by Ponytail off-panel. This makes him noticeably disappointed.<br />
<br />
<br />
There are several reasons why incinerating the old incinerator might not be an option. Regulations or safety concerns could easily shut that plan down. Perhaps whatever establishment Ponytail and Cueball are working at wants to sell the old incinerator for parts. The reason that the title text seems to suggest however is that there is something wrong with forcing anything to destroy something of it's own kind. Since machines that have no human emotion, this would not cause any trauma for the machine, but the humans in charge might feel as if something is wrong, and Randall mentions having an existential crisis in the title text. This is because humans may project human qualities onto the machines they are working with, thus framing the situation in the context of something like cannibalism or homicide.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
''Cueball and ponytail are standing next to an incinerator, with a combustion chamber and flue that rises up to the top of the frame.''<br />
<br />
Ponytail: Great, the new incinerator is installed. Now we just need to dispose of the old one.<br />
<br />
''Ponytail walks out of frame''<br />
<br />
''Cueball is left, thinking..."<br />
<br />
Cueball Hey could ---<br />
<br />
Ponytail: ''from out of frame'' No!<br />
<br />
Cueball ''quietly'' Aww maaan.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1821:_Incinerator&diff=1384721821: Incinerator2017-04-07T20:11:23Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Transcript */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1821<br />
| date = April 7, 2017<br />
| title = Incinerator<br />
| image = incinerator.png<br />
| titletext = My trash can broke recently and I had to get rid of it. When I picked it up, I suffered a brief but harrowing existential crisis.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Ponytail and cueball need to get rid of their old incinerator. Cueball apparently has the idea of burning the old incinerator in the new incinerator. Ponytail rejects this idea, disappointing Cueball.<br />
<br />
Incinerators are effective at disposing of organic waste: paper, wood etc. But not good for disposing of an incinerator that is mostly non-flammable. Parts of the old incinerator can be recycled, the remainder will have to go to landfill.<br />
<br />
<br />
Cueball and Ponytail have just finished installing an incinerator for some unspecified purpose at some establishment. Ponytail brings up the problem of having to get rid of the old incinerator, and Cueball begins to suggest using the new incinerator to incinerate the old one before he is shut down by Ponytail off-panel. This makes him noticeably disappointed.<br />
<br />
<br />
There are several reasons why incinerating the old incinerator might not be an option. Regulations or safety concerns could easily shut that plan down. Perhaps whatever establishment Ponytail and Cueball are working at wants to sell the old incinerator for parts. The reason that the title text seems to suggest however is that there is something wrong with forcing anything to destroy something of it's own kind. Since machines that have no human emotion, this would not cause any trauma for the machine, but the humans in charge might feel as if something is wrong, and Randall mentions having an existential crisis in the title text. This is because humans may project human qualities onto the machines they are working with, thus framing the situation in the context of something like cannibalism or homicide.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
<br />
''Cueball and ponytail are standing next to an incinerator, with a combustion chamber and flue that rises up to the top of the frame.''<br />
<br />
Ponytail: Great, the new incinerator is installed. Now we just need to get rid of the old one.<br />
<br />
''Ponytail walks out of frame''<br />
<br />
''Cueball is left, thinking..."<br />
<br />
Cueball Hey could ---<br />
<br />
Ponytail: ''from out of frame'' No!<br />
<br />
Cueball ''quietly'' Aw maaan.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1821:_Incinerator&diff=1384661821: Incinerator2017-04-07T20:05:28Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Explanation */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1821<br />
| date = April 7, 2017<br />
| title = Incinerator<br />
| image = incinerator.png<br />
| titletext = My trash can broke recently and I had to get rid of it. When I picked it up, I suffered a brief but harrowing existential crisis.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Ponytail and cueball need to get rid of their old incinerator. Cueball apparently has the idea of burning the old incinerator in the new incinerator. Ponytail rejects this idea, disappointing Cueball.<br />
<br />
Incinerators are effective at disposing of organic waste: paper, wood etc. But not good for disposing of an incinerator that is mostly non-flammable. Parts of the old incinerator can be recycled, the remainder will have to go to landfill.<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Ponytail: Great, the new incinerator is installed. Now we just need to get rid of the old one.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
Cueball Hey could ---<br />
<br />
Ponytail No!<br />
<br />
Cueball Aw maaan.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1821:_Incinerator&diff=1384651821: Incinerator2017-04-07T20:01:04Z<p>141.101.98.118: first go at transcripb</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1821<br />
| date = April 7, 2017<br />
| title = Incinerator<br />
| image = incinerator.png<br />
| titletext = My trash can broke recently and I had to get rid of it. When I picked it up, I suffered a brief but harrowing existential crisis.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Created by a BOT - Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
boing<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}<br />
Ponytail: Great, the new incinerator is installed. Now we just need to get rid of the old one.<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
...<br />
<br />
Cueball Hey could ---<br />
<br />
Ponytail No!<br />
<br />
Cueball Aw maaan.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1820:_Security_Advice&diff=1384521820: Security Advice2017-04-07T13:06:39Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Security Tip Explanations */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1820<br />
| date = April 5, 2017<br />
| title = Security Advice<br />
| image = security_advice.png<br />
| titletext = Never give your password or bank account number to anyone who doesn't have a blue check mark next to their name.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
<br />
The comic depicts a conversation between [[Cueball]] and [[Ponytail]], discussing the fact that giving people security advice in the past has failed to improve their internet security, and in some cases even made things worse. One such example is telling people to create complicated passwords containing numbers and symbols, which not only made the passwords harder to remember (leading people to create huge security risks by [https://arstechnica.com/security/2015/04/hacked-french-network-exposed-its-own-passwords-during-tv-interview/ leaving post-it notes with their passwords on their computer monitor]), but did not actually make those passwords harder to crack (see [[936: Password Strength]]).<br />
<br />
As a result, Cueball suggests using {{w|reverse psychology}} and give out bad advice instead, in hopes of achieving a positive effect. The last panel contains a list of these security tips, which are parodies of actual security tips.<br />
<br />
===Security Tip Explanations===<br />
{| class="wikitable"<br />
!Security Tip<br />
!Explanation<br />
|-<br />
|Print out this list and keep it in your bank safe deposit box (header)<br />
|This is a standard recommendation for documents that must be kept secure because they are irreplaceable and/or contain sensitive information. However this list itself is easily replaceable and the contents will be well-known, so storing it in a safe place is totally unnecessary. Putting it in a {{w|safe deposit box}} would even be counterproductive since the list can only serve its purpose as a ready reminder if it's easily accessible to everyone.<br />
|-<br />
|Don't click links to websites<br />
|The usual tip is "Don't click on ''suspicious'' website links" or "Don't click any links in suspicious emails". The comic's variation instead tells users not to click on any links to any websites, which essentially stops them from using the World Wide Web altogether.<br />
|-<br />
|Use prime numbers in your password<br />
|It is usually recommended that one uses numbers in one's password, to increase its entropy, making it harder to find with a {{w|Brute-force attack|brute force}} attack. In contrast the comic suggests using {{w|prime numbers}} in one's password. Large prime numbers are an essential part of modern cryptography and security systems, when used in algorithms that are computed by machines. They don't have any effect when used by humans in passwords, except for maybe making it harder to remember. In addition, if people were to regularly use prime numbers in their passwords, it would actually make passwords ''easier'' to guess, as it would substantially reduce the number of possible passwords people may choose from.<br />
|-<br />
|Change your password manager monthly<br />
|It is often recommended to change passwords on a regular basis and to use a {{w|password manager}}. Password managers are programs which can help users create, store, and change their passwords easily and securely. Changing password managers monthly would involve copying all stored passwords from one manager to another, which would be quite impractical and has no security benefit.<br />
|-<br />
|Hold your breath while crossing the border<br />
|At some border crossings, government agents may search computers, cell phones, and other electronic devices. The usual advice for such situations ranges from asserting your rights to resetting all devices and deleting all data prior to crossing a border. Holding one's breath can potentially prevent inhaling germs or poisons in some situations, though useless in the context of computer security. These two topics mixed in the same advice won't achieve anything, but if you hold your breath for too long you could pass out when crossing, or look stressed/suspicious and invite even more scrutiny. This could also be a reference to the superstition of holding one's breath when passing a graveyard, or similarly to the movie [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirited_Away Spirited Away], where the main character is instructed to hold her breath while crossing the bridge that acts as the border between the human and spirit world. In any case, holding one's breath while browsing the Internet would have no useful effect, supernatural or otherwise.<br />
|-<br />
|Install a secure font<br />
|A real tip might be "Install a secure browser" especially when many people used {{w|Internet Explorer 6}}. Secure fonts do exist and are designed to make checks difficult to alter, but using one on a computer would not help one's internet security. May also refer to [https://www.proofpoint.com/us/threat-insight/post/EITest-Nabbing-Chrome-Users-Chrome-Font-Social-Engineering-Scheme Google Chrome "Install missing font" malware].<br />
|-<br />
|Use a 2-factor smoke detector<br />
|{{w|Multi-factor authentication|Two factor authentication}} describes the practice of using two different identification factors (such as a password and a code from a secure token) to authenticate the user. A two factor smoke detector presumably uses two or more factors to identify ''smoke'' (such as {{w|Smoke_detector#Ionization|ionization}} and {{w|Smoke_detector#Photoelectric|photoelectric}}). Such devices [https://alarmspecs.com actually exist], but, while improving the users general safety, they do nothing to improve their internet security.<br />
<br />
Also, the logic behind using two-factor authentication is that '''both''' types of credentials must match to grant access. Smoke detectors work otherwise - usually firing if '''any''' of the sensors detect a fire. If the smoke detector worked according to the authentication logic it will be less likely to detect smoke, effectively lessening fire safety as compared to a single sensor one.<br />
|-<br />
|Change your maiden name regularly<br />
|Your maiden name is the family name with which you were born. Literally changing your maiden name, is impossible by the definition of "maiden name". A common tip is to change your passwords regularly. Some password recovery procedures ask for a security question, like "what is your {{w|Maiden and married names|maiden name}}" Maiden names and other trivia typically asked by security questions are not secret, so they are inherently insecure.<br />
<br />
A real tip for dealing with security questions is to enter false data.<br />
|-<br />
|Put strange USB drives in a bag of rice overnight<br />
|The usual security tip is "Don't plug strange {{w|USB flash drive|USB drives}} into your computer," because sometimes attackers leave USB devices with malicious programs lying around, hoping that people will plug them into target computers out of curiosity. This tip states that you should "put USB drives in a bag of rice overnight" which is a common technique for drying out water-damaged devices, due to rice's absorbent qualities. This would not clean the drive of viruses, and unless the drive was wet (perhaps because you found it outside due to it being called "strange") it would not do anything. In [[1598: Salvage]], another attempt is made to salvage something unconventional with rice.<br />
|-<br />
|Use special characters like & and %<br />
|You can use special characters to increase the entropy/strength of your password, though as describe in [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/936:_Password_Strength xkcd 936], that often leads to passwords that are hard to remember but not particularly strong. The password context is missing here, and in everyday situations the characters & and % are not special. These two characters are often disallowed in passwords because of their relevance to {{w|SQL}} (a common database query language). If these characters were used in a password, a badly written security system using SQL could have severe bugs (and security vulnerabilities) similar to the security flaw in [[327: Exploits of a Mom]].<br />
|-<br />
|Only read content published through Tor.com<br />
|{{w|tor (anonymity network)|Tor}} is a software solution to provide anonymity on the web for its users. The website [https://tor.com Tor.com] is the website of fantasy and sci-fi book publisher Tor, which has no relation to the Tor-network.<br />
|-<br />
|Use a burner's phone<br />
|A play on using a {{w|Prepay mobile phone|burner phone}} (a cheap/disposable cell phone like those purchased at 7-11, often used for drug deals or other activity one might not want traced), and using the cell phone of a burner, i.e. a person who goes to the {{w|Burning Man|Burning Man festival}}.<br />
|-<br />
|Get an SSL certificate and store it in a safe place<br />
|{{w|Transport Layer Security|SSL/TLS}} is a protocol for securing connections on the internet. To check if someone is who they claim to be, you can check the individual's {{w|Public key certificate|certificate}}. Such a certificate has to be public; storing it in a safe place makes the certificate useless. You have to store the private key that matches the certificate in a safe place, else someone could steal the identity.<br />
|-<br />
|If a border guard asks to examine your laptop, you have a legal right to challenge them to a chess game for your soul.<br />
|This tip is a reference to Ingmar Bergman's film {{w|The Seventh Seal#Synopsis| The Seventh Seal}}, in which the protagonist challenges Death to a game of chess. (This is also the theme of [http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/393 393: Ultimate game]).<br />
|-<br />
|Never give your password or bank account number to anyone who doesn't have a blue check mark next to their name. (Title Text)<br />
|The usual security tip here is ''"only trust Twitter accounts claiming to be legitimate if they have a blue check mark next to their name"'', which means that the account is verified as legitimate. This tip suggests only giving your ''password'' to verified accounts, although you shouldn't give your password to ''any'' account. It also refers to problems especially visible in the US banking system, where there is very little security for direct account drafts, and because of that it is advised there to keep the account number as secret as possible. In contrast, in Europe giving your account number to someone is one of the most common ways to get paid.<br />
<br />
A related tip might be ""Never give your password or bank details to a website that doesn't have a padlock icon next to the URL"". In some browsers, if you access a secure website, there will be a padlock icon in the browser indicating you've connected to a secure website using the secure https protocol. So this tip treats the verified account icon the same way you might treat a secure website icon.<br />
|}<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
<br />
:Ponytail: We've been trying for decades to give people good security advice.<br />
:Ponytail: But in retrospect, lots of the tips actually made things worse.<br />
<br />
:Cueball: Maybe we should try to give ''bad'' advice?<br />
:Ponytail: I guess it's worth a shot.<br />
<br />
:Security tips<br />
:(Print out this list and keep it in your bank safe deposit box.)<br />
* Don't click links to websites<br />
* Use prime numbers in your password<br />
* Change your password manager monthly<br />
* Hold your breath while crossing the border<br />
* Install a secure font<br />
* Use a 2-factor smoke detector<br />
* Change your maiden name regularly<br />
* Put strange USB drives in a bag of rice overnight<br />
* Use special characters like & and %<br />
* Only read content published through Tor.com<br />
* Use a burner's phone<br />
* Get an SSL certificate and store it in a safe place<br />
* If a border guard asks to examine your laptop, you have a legal right to challenge them to a chess game for your soul.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1810:_Chat_Systems&diff=1370911810: Chat Systems2017-03-13T17:09:02Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Chat systems mentioned */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1810<br />
| date = March 13, 2017<br />
| title = Chat Systems<br />
| image = chat_systems.png<br />
| titletext = I'm one of the few Instagram users who connects solely through the Unix 'talk' gateway.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Fill in the table and explain the title text.}}<br />
In the world of social media, connecting to and communicating with friends, relatives, and other acquaintances can be extremely easy, but due to the large amount of networks and systems through which to communicate, and the selective nature of the people using them, it can be difficult to keep track of who uses which system(s), and thus, communication can be more complicated by social media as well.<br />
<br />
The ubiquity of standards - here, of messaging systems - was already covered in [[927: Standards]].<br />
<br />
===Chat systems mentioned===<br />
{| class="wikitable"<br />
!System<br />
!Explanation<br />
|-<br />
|Skype<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Email<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|SMS<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|AIM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Slack<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Hangouts<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|ICQ<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|iMessage<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|IRC<br />
|IRC is an old chat system that many people refuse to switch off of. See also [[1782: Team Chat]].<br />
|-<br />
|Snapchat<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Signal<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|FB Messenger<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Instagram DM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Zephyr<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|WhatsApp<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|WeChat<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Telegram<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Apache Request Log<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Twitter DM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|BBM<br />
|Blackberry message. A chat system available on blackberry phones, now largely obseleted.<br />
|-<br />
|Peach<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Wall (Linux)<br />
|Short for "write all" the "wall" command copies its argument to every user logged into the same Unix system, and so can be used as a primitive chat system<br />
|-<br />
|Wall (bathroom)<br />
|Apparently a chat system based around writing on the wall in the bathroom. Not an electronic system.<br />
|-<br />
|The "chat" tab in an old Google Doc<br />
|<br />
|}<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript}}<br />
:[a Venn diagram with a large number of circles for various chat systems, overlapping in complicated ways]<br />
:I have a hard time keeping track of which contacts use which chat systems.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1810:_Chat_Systems&diff=1370901810: Chat Systems2017-03-13T17:07:43Z<p>141.101.98.118: /* Chat systems mentioned */</p>
<hr />
<div>{{comic<br />
| number = 1810<br />
| date = March 13, 2017<br />
| title = Chat Systems<br />
| image = chat_systems.png<br />
| titletext = I'm one of the few Instagram users who connects solely through the Unix 'talk' gateway.<br />
}}<br />
<br />
==Explanation==<br />
{{incomplete|Fill in the table and explain the title text.}}<br />
In the world of social media, connecting to and communicating with friends, relatives, and other acquaintances can be extremely easy, but due to the large amount of networks and systems through which to communicate, and the selective nature of the people using them, it can be difficult to keep track of who uses which system(s), and thus, communication can be more complicated by social media as well.<br />
<br />
The ubiquity of standards - here, of messaging systems - was already covered in [[927: Standards]].<br />
<br />
===Chat systems mentioned===<br />
{| class="wikitable"<br />
!System<br />
!Explanation<br />
|-<br />
|Skype<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Email<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|SMS<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|AIM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Slack<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Hangouts<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|ICQ<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|iMessage<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|IRC<br />
|IRC is an old chat system that many people refuse to switch off of. See also [[1782: Team Chat]].<br />
|-<br />
|Snapchat<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Signal<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|FB Messenger<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Instagram DM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Zephyr<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|WhatsApp<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|WeChat<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Telegram<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Apache Request Log<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Twitter DM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|BBM<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Peach<br />
|<br />
|-<br />
|Wall (Linux)<br />
|Short for "write all" the "wall" command copies its argument to every user logged into the same Unix system, and so can be used as a primitive chat system<br />
|-<br />
|Wall (bathroom)<br />
|Apparently a chat system based around writing on the wall in the bathroom. Not an electronic system.<br />
|-<br />
|The "chat" tab in an old Google Doc<br />
|<br />
|}<br />
<br />
==Transcript==<br />
{{incomplete transcript}}<br />
:[a Venn diagram with a large number of circles for various chat systems, overlapping in complicated ways]<br />
:I have a hard time keeping track of which contacts use which chat systems.<br />
<br />
{{comic discussion}}</div>141.101.98.118