2111: Opportunity Rover
| Opportunity Rover |
 Title text: Thanks for bringing us along. |
Explanation
|
This explanation may be incomplete or incorrect: Please mention here why this explanation isn't complete. Do NOT delete this tag too soon. If you can address this issue, please edit the page! Thanks. |
This comic is a discussion about the Opportunity rover, and its nearly 15 year mission in which it sent back publically available photos and research from Mars to Earth. The evening prior to this comic uploading (Feb 12, 2018), Nasa's JPL sent their final data request to the rover, in hopes that it would respond. When it did not, the rover was declared to be officially lost.
Transcript
|
|
This transcript is incomplete. Please help editing it! Thanks. |
add a comment! ⋅ add a topic (use sparingly)! ⋅ 
refresh comments!Discussion
The subject of this comic, the Opportunity Rover, is being officially declared dead today, the day the comic was released. I wonder how long this comic has been ready, waiting to eulogize the rover. Blaisepascal (talk) 18:03, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
- I'm not crying, you're crying! But seriously, I hope this one becomes a poster... one of my favorite comics in a good long while. --172.69.46.46 20:25, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
- Stop slicing those onions ! 162.158.91.125 14:12, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
- Yes, more of a paean than "a discussion about ... " the Opportunity rover, and more, it justifies a yearning for the "opportunity" in general to share the knowledge with the world. Uplifting, for me. PGilm (talk) 20:59, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
The fact that the rover ran for 15 years is already magical. He was just designed to last several months (I sincerely use this surname), and people at NASA was suspecting that it may just last days. Yet he worked so hard for us. When I saw the movie about him 10 years ago, I wad SO moved. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0436595/ All of you should watch it now. I had no idea that I would edit a wiki page about him today. Kazeita (talk) 23:51, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
On one hand, this feels like a subtle nod to xkcd itself. In a sense, a lot of xkcd is Randall's own journal of what he thinks of every so often, and he gets to share it with millions and millions of people. On the other, "and here's a trench I dug with my wheel" makes me think that Opportunity was using time outside of its feed to slowly but surely dig out an actual 100-meter or so trench. Getting larger. And larger. Until one day, it will rival even the trenches of Earth. And on that day...Their conquest will have begun. 172.68.78.52 03:33, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
- The Netherlands? 172.68.65.228 23:05, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
I'm wondering if Rover is truly "dead". (Is there an explanation in an outside article?) Possibly another device, or some future human expedition, could dust off its solar panels and/or replace the batteries and revive it.These Are Not The Comments You Are Looking For (talk) 05:34, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
In the fourth paragraph of the explanation, there are a couple of sentences about the reference to dust devils. I would submit that the mention of a dust devil in the comic is more likely a reference to this image captured by Opportunity in 2016: Opportunity's Devilish View from on High. MWinter (talk) 21:20, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
