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201 | Christmas GPS | Christmas GPS | https://www.xkcd.com/201 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/201:_Christmas_GPS | Cueball: Check it out - I got a GPS receiver for Christmas! What should we do with it?
Megan: Let's take our latitude & longitude, put our birthdays after the decimal points, then go to that spot and make out.
[Cueball is in love.]
Merry Christmas from XKCD [ sic ] [Car driving off in to the distance.]
| In the comic, Cueball has gotten a GPS device and asks Megan what to do with it. She suggest that they take their current coordinates and modify the latitude and longitude with a simple function based on their birthdays, thereby pointing to an arbitrary, non-random location. For example, if Cueball was born on, let's s... | |
202 | YouTube | YouTube | https://www.xkcd.com/202 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/202:_YouTube | [Caption above the panel:] The Internet has always had loud dumb people, but I've never seen anything quite as bad as the people who comment on YouTube videos. [Below shows a still of a 44-second video of Moon landing. An astronaut is seen at the center of the still with an Apollo lunar lander at the background.] [Belo... | This comic is pointing out the fact that many of the comments on YouTube videos are insipid and poorly informed, being pointless arguments over some minor topic or factually incorrect position ( conspiracy ). At the time of this comic, YouTube was fairly new, and the comic's observation about the inanity of YouTube com... | |
203 | Hallucinations | Hallucinations | https://www.xkcd.com/203 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/203:_Hallucinations | [Two Cueball-like guys are talking. Above them is the following caption:] Sometimes it seems bizarre to me that we take dreaming in stride.
Friend: Are you coming to dinner? Cueball: Yeah, but first I'm gonna go comatose for a few hours, hallucinate vividly, and then maybe suffer amnesia about the whole experience. Fri... | Cueball on the right is talking to his (Cueball-like) friend about dreaming but using words and phrases to make dreaming sound much more dramatic than we usually think that it is. However, the description is technically correct.
Randall is using the comic to make a point about how we think dreaming is so normal, but if... | |
204 | America | America | https://www.xkcd.com/204 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/204:_America | [A timeline with only three ticks with years noted. Each tick is labeled with a line going to the tick. The second tick is much closer to the last on the right and has its year written below the line. The other two have it above the line and vice versa with the labels. Below in the middle there is a caption.] 1776 Decl... | On April 20, 1979, U.S. President Jimmy Carter was allegedly " attacked by a giant swimming rabbit " while solo-fishing on a boat in his hometown. The reality is a little more nuanced: According to Carter, the rabbit had actually been chased into the water by some hounds and swam near his boat. Carter splashed some wat... | |
205 | Candy Button Paper | Candy Button Paper | https://www.xkcd.com/205 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/205:_Candy_Button_Paper | When it came to eating strips of candy buttons, there were two main strategies. Some kids carefully removed each bead, checking closely for paper residue before eating. [To the right, a small section of a strip of Candy Buttons paper is shown. Two red buttons have been removed from the top of the strip.] [To the left, ... | This comic refers to Candy Buttons , a type of candy sold by Necco in the U.S. since 1980. Because they were glued to paper, each candy button would have some paper stuck to it. As said in the comic, some kids would carefully check each candy button to make sure they would not accidentally eat paper, while some kids di... | |
206 | Reno Rhymes | Reno Rhymes | https://www.xkcd.com/206 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/206:_Reno_Rhymes | [Cueball and Black Hat stand facing one another. Black Hat is on the left.] Black Hat: You know, I once shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die. Cueball: Really? Well, I once shot a man in Reno, but I couldn't tell you why.
Black Hat: I once shot a man in Reno, then I went home to cry. Cueball: I once shot a man in R... | This comic starts with a line from the song "Folsom Prison Blues" by Johnny Cash. Cash is noted as saying, "I sat with my pen in my hand, trying to think up the worst reason a person could have for killing another person, and that's what came to mind," which fits pretty well with the personality of Black Hat . Rather t... | |
207 | What xkcd Means | What xkcd Means | https://www.xkcd.com/207 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/207:_What_xkcd_Means | [Caption above the panels:] What does xkcd mean?
[Two cars sitting at a red light at a multi-lane intersection; one of them makes a right turn, then shifts over to the left lane and makes a U-turn across the dividing line to go back the way it came. It then shifts back to the right lane and makes another right turn, co... | This comic purports to finally answer the question, " What does 'xkcd' mean? " However, instead of giving an answer as to what the letters actually mean (according to Randall, it's literally "just a word with no phonetic pronunciation"), he offers five quirky behaviors. This is reminiscent of TV commercials that ask, "... | |
208 | Regular Expressions | Regular Expressions | https://www.xkcd.com/208 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/208:_Regular_Expressions | Whenever I learn a new skill I concoct elaborate fantasy scenarios where it lets me save the day.
Megan: Oh no! The killer must have followed her on vacation! [Megan points to computer.] Megan: But to find them we'd have to search through 200 MB of emails looking for something formatted like an address! Cueball: It's h... | The comic begins with Randall saying how every time he develops a new skill, he finds himself daydreaming about using it to save the day. Computer skills aren't usually superhero material, which lends itself to the humor of the comic.
In computing, a regular expression ("regex") provides a concise and flexible means to... | |
209 | Kayak | Kayak | https://www.xkcd.com/209 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/209:_Kayak | [Beret Guy, in a kayak holding a paddle, is talking to Cueball, standing on a pier.] Beret Guy: Come explore the future with me! Cueball: Huh? What's that you're in? [Close up on Beret Guy and his kayak. The tip of the pier can be seen.] Beret Guy: A two seat kayak! Cueball: I see, but why do you have it? [Close up on ... | This comic deals with two linked themes, which both come under the umbrella of existentialism , a branch of philosophy.
Beret Guy invites Cueball to join him in a two-seat kayak trip. However, Cueball is confused by his intention.
Beret Guy initially words his invitation to Cueball as "come explore the future." However... | |
210 | 90's Flowchart | 90's Flowchart | https://www.xkcd.com/210 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/210:_90%27s_Flowchart | 90's Flowchart Start: The 90's? No: Stop Yes: Stop Hammertime or Collaborate, Listen
| Here you can see an apparent flowchart. However, it has non-standard notation. The oval normally represents either the start or stop of a process. Here, both the yes and no end up in stop , which would normally imply that nothing below can be reached.
Unless we are in the 90s, this doesn't matter, as there is nothing... | |
211 | Hamster Ball Heist | Hamster Ball Heist | https://www.xkcd.com/211 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/211:_Hamster_Ball_Heist | [Cueball's Cueball-like friend tells him something.] Friend: You know that giant hamster ball you've always wanted? I just found out that Wayne Coyne from the Flaming Lips crowd-surfs in one. Cueball: Let's go.
[Wayne Coyne, with curly hair and full beard, is crowd-surfing inside a giant hamster ball shown rolling from... | Wayne Coyne , the lead singer of the band The Flaming Lips , is indeed known to crowd-surf in a giant hamster ball .
Hamster balls are a recurring subject on xkcd, starting with 152: Hamster Ball , which in direct relation to this comic showed that Cueball's biggest and only wish is such a ball.
When Cueball's friend t... | |
212 | Brain | Brain | https://www.xkcd.com/212 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/212:_Brain | My Brain [Picture of Brain. Line points at a highlighted area.] Section that is devoted, no matter where I go in life, to planning the ultimate tree house*. *Oh man, it would be like Swiss Family Robinson, but with multiple trees connected by... hey come up to my room and see the blueprints!
| The Swiss Family Robinson is a novel by the Swiss pastor and writer Johann David Wyss . In the novel, a shipwrecked family builds a tree house as good as a normal house complete with library and mechanical contraptions.
Growing up, many children grow a fascination with tree houses. Tree houses are a child's own special... | |
213 | Ghostbusters Marathon | Ghostbusters Marathon | https://www.xkcd.com/213 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/213:_Ghostbusters_Marathon | [Cueball and a friend are in a room. Cueball is standing up. There is litter around them.] Cueball: Okay, that's all the Ghostbusters marathon I can handle. Later! Friend: You can't leave! We just started the animated series!
Cueball: I've had my fill. I'm going home. Friend: I can't let you do that.
[Cueball walks alo... | Ghostbusters is a 1984 supernatural comedy film that spawned a sequel, a reboot, and two animated television series (the latter of which lasted less than a season, didn't feature the same cast of titular Ghostbusters, and therefore is probably being pointedly ignored). The box, a "Muon Containment Trap," is a device us... | |
214 | The Problem with Wikipedia | The Problem with Wikipedia | https://www.xkcd.com/214 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/214:_The_Problem_with_Wikipedia | [Heading above the chart:] The PROBLEM with WIKIPEDIA:
[Text in a frame below the heading:] Tacoma Narrows Bridge
[Lines lead down both left and right to two new frames with the following entries:] Suspension bridge Structural collapse
[Two more lines lead down from the left frame and one from the right frame, and all ... | This comic illustrates the "problems" of information explosion coupled with a dense web of hypertext links . Through most of human history, written media has been both slow and linear. Hypertext allows a new type of information consumption, through small chunks of information linked together in a web of related concept... | |
215 | Letting Go | Letting Go | https://www.xkcd.com/215 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/215:_Letting_Go | [Cueball is holding a picture of himself and Megan in a heart; it has been ripped down the middle, separating the two people.]
[Cueball sits at computer, looking at the picture.]
[The panel has been inverted. Cueball still sits at the computer with the picture in front of him and his head drooped.]
[Cueball types on th... | In fiction, a character who has had a romantic relationship end will be shown taking some act to remove a sign of their partner's presence in their life, e.g. removing/selling a wedding or engagement ring, removing the partner's toiletries from the bathroom, or deleting the partner's phone number from a cell phone. Thi... | |
216 | Romantic Drama Equation | Romantic Drama Equation | https://www.xkcd.com/216 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/216:_Romantic_Drama_Equation | TV Romantic Drama Equation (Derived during a series of 'Queer as Folk' episodes) [A table shows equations for possible romantic pairings in a TV show. The equation under "gay" is n(n-1) 2+x(x-n); the equation under "straight" is x(n-x).] x: Number of male (or female) cast members. n: total number of cast members.
[A gr... | In a group of n people, such as the cast of a TV romantic drama like Queer as Folk , the number of possible different pairs of people is n(n-1)/2. A romantic drama will often consider, over time, many possible romantic pairs of its cast members, even seeming to test the limit of how many pairs are possible. Through an ... | |
217 | e to the pi Minus pi | e to the pi Minus pi | https://www.xkcd.com/217 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/217:_e_to_the_pi_Minus_pi | Cueball: Hey, check it out: e π − π is 19.999099979. That's weird. Black Hat: Yeah. That's how I got kicked out of the ACM in college. Cueball: ...what? Black Hat: During a competition, I told the programmers on our team that e π − π was a standard test of floating-point handlers -- it would come out to 20 unless they ... | e is a mathematical constant roughly equal to 2.71828182846. π is another, roughly equal to 3.14159265359.
The first panel discusses e π − π, which is around 19.999099979 — very close to 20. Black Hat explains how he tricked a programming team into believing that e π − π really equals 20 — instead of just being weirdly... | |
218 | Nintendo Surgeon | Nintendo Surgeon | https://www.xkcd.com/218 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/218:_Nintendo_Surgeon | Scary Thought #137: The NES came out over two decades ago. Those kids are all grown-ups now. [Two surgeons are in an operating room, leaning over a patient.] First Surgeon: He's going into cardiac arrest. Stand by for defibrillation. Second Surgeon: Wait. First let's try taking out the heart, blowing into the ventricle... | The Nintendo Entertainment System , released in North America in 1985, helped revitalize the video-game industry after the video-game crash of 1983, with such games as the Super Mario Bros. series, The Legend of Zelda , the Mega Man series, Castlevania , and Metroid helping it stand alone as what is still considered by... | |
219 | Blanket Fort | Blanket Fort | https://www.xkcd.com/219 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/219:_Blanket_Fort | [Megan and Ponytail are talking with each other. There is a fort made of cushions and blankets on the left.] Megan: Like my fort? It uses every blanket and cushion in the apartment.
Ponytail: Okay, no offense, but this is like that ball pit you made -- Cute, but don't you worry you're clinging to childhood games becaus... | In an apparent continuation of comic 150: Grownups , Megan is showing off a blanket fort to her friend Ponytail . Ponytail answers that Megan's childishness stems from a fear of growing up.
Megan responds that she's fine with growing up. She sees her behavior as a mature realization that some of the things she enjoyed ... | |
220 | Philosophy | Philosophy | https://www.xkcd.com/220 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/220:_Philosophy | [Megan sits on a chair for two panels without moving.]
[In the third panel, Megan has still not moved but makes the following comment to no one in particular.] Megan: If the question of what it all means doesn't mean anything, why do I keep coming back to it?
[Two Cueball-like friends of Megan are talking to each other... | In all of philosophy , perhaps the most important questions consider the meaning of life and can be expressed as "Why are we here?" or "What does it all mean?" Many philosophers and theologians have attempted to answer the question over the course of human history, and every religion claims to have some sort of answer.... | |
221 | Random Number | Random Number | https://www.xkcd.com/221 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/221:_Random_Number | [A computer program.]
| The comic specifies a function (in a C similar syntax), which judging by its name should be designed to return a random number. Most functions of this form are random number generators , meaning that on subsequent calls they return different random numbers. But the programmer has instead implemented a function that jus... | |
222 | Small Talk | Small Talk | https://www.xkcd.com/222 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/222:_Small_Talk | [Two Cueballs standing next to each other]: [Header box on top of the panel:] Sometimes I forget how to do small talk.
Friend: Hey! Cueball: Hey, man! Friend: What's up? How've you been? Cueball: Well...
[Three overlapping identical frames of the two Cueballs standing next to each other indicate the passage of time.]
[... | Cueball is approached by his friend who offers one of the standard greetings of, "What's Up? How've you been?" In standard "small talk," an appropriate answer would be only one or two words (e.g. "Fine" or "Pretty good"). These are generally positive responses, with negative ones only offered in extreme circumstances. ... | |
223 | Valentine's Day | Valentine's Day | https://www.xkcd.com/223 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/223:_Valentine%27s_Day | Valentine's Day [There is a large, shaded, red heart.] Because love isn't quite complicated enough as it is.
| As mentioned in the comic, love is already pretty complicated, even more so on Valentine's Day . Valentine's Day makes it more complicated by introducing all kinds of questions. Is our relationship such that it should be acknowledged on Valentine's Day? If so, how? If by a card, what kind of card would be best? If by s... | |
224 | Lisp | Lisp | https://www.xkcd.com/224 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/224:_Lisp | [Floating in space.] Speaker: Last night I drifted off while reading a Lisp book. Cueball: Huh? Speaker: Suddenly, I was bathed in a suffusion of blue.
[Floating in space before a vast concept tree.] Speaker: At once, just like they said, I felt a great enlightenment. I saw the naked structure of Lisp code unfold befor... | Lisp is a computer programming language with simple, highly regular syntax. The language's most notable feature is that programs take the same form as the language's primary data structure (the linked list). This blurs the line between code and data and permits programs to inspect and even alter their own source code, ... | |
225 | Open Source | Open Source | https://www.xkcd.com/225 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/225:_Open_Source | [The first panel has the second panel inside it. It also has a slightly light gray background color. Just above the inlaid second panel is Richard Stallman lying in his bed sleeping, the bottom part at the foot of the bed hidden behind the second panel below. Below his bed under his head lies a katana sword in its shea... | Richard Stallman , or rms after his handle, is an old-school hacker known for establishing the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and initiating the GNU Project in the early 1980s, which produced major portions of what would later be the GNU/Linux [1] operating system. In this capacity, he's also known for being one of the... | |
226 | Swingset | Swingset | https://www.xkcd.com/226 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/226:_Swingset | [Woman talking to Cueball on swing-set.] Woman: You know, at the peak of a big swing, you become weightless. [Thought bubble from Cueball.] [Cueball swings higher and higher. At the peak of a big swing, he shoves himself off the swing. Cueball remains hovering in the air.] Cueball: Hey guys. Come check this out.
| In the opening panel of this comic, Blondie , possibly as Miss Lenhart , sees Cueball sitting on a swing set. She tells him that during his swing, he becomes weightless. Cueball then imagines that at the peak of his swing he is able to become permanently weightless, floating above the ground without any support.
When o... | |
227 | Color Codes | Color Codes | https://www.xkcd.com/227 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/227:_Color_Codes | [Cueball sits hunched over his desk, which is littered with objects. His Cueball-like friend holding his cell phone talks to him.] Friend: Hey, what's your cell number? Cueball: (Violet Brown Gray)— Uh, I mean, (718)-387-6962. Friend: Okay, you are putting down those resistors and going outside for a while. Cueball: Th... | Resistors are electronic components carrying color-coded bands indicating their value (measured in ohms ) and tolerance (e.g. 5%). Cueball has been hunched over his work for so long that, when asked for his phone number (by his Cueball-like friend), he absentmindedly reads out his phone's area code as a sequence of col... | |
228 | Resonance | Resonance | https://www.xkcd.com/228 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/228:_Resonance | [Cueball is sitting at a desk, which is vibrating.] clatter clatter [He leans back and turns to face someone sitting at another desk behind him.] Cueball: Excuse me--you're jiggling your leg up and down. It's traveling through the floor and making my desk resonate. Friend: Oh, I didn't even realize! I'll stop. [Cueball... | Resonance is the tendency for an object to oscillate when energy is transferred to it at a specific set of frequencies known as harmonics of the natural frequency of the object. A simple example of this is pushing a child on a swing: by pushing the child at the right moment, more and more energy is transferred to the s... | |
229 | Graffiti | Graffiti | https://www.xkcd.com/229 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/229:_Graffiti | [Cueball sits on a toilet in a bathroom. The stall sidewall next to him is covered in graffiti: "you suck," "Mike sucks cock," "CUNT," "fuck," "BITCHAS," "dane was here" struck through and "dane is a fag" written under it, a crude pictogram of a penis, and various other unreadable scribbles.] [One block of graffiti is ... | The humor in this comic comes from the irony of a deep philosophical musing on the nature of individuals sharing a private space in a public place, unknown to one another and separated by time. The graffiti text is juxtaposed with more common bathroom stall scrawlings - insults, slurs, and "[Name] was here."
This comic... | |
230 | Hamiltonian | Hamiltonian | https://www.xkcd.com/230 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/230:_Hamiltonian | Lecturer: And therefore, based on the existence of a Hamiltonian path, we can prove that the routing algorithm gives the optimal result in all cases. Cueball: Oh my God.
[Close-up of Cueball.] Offscreen: What? What is it? Cueball: A sudden rush of perspective. What am I doing here? Life is so much bigger than this!
[Cu... | Cueball , presumably in class, decides that the subject of optimizing routing algorithms is not important in the larger context of life and love. However, he later realizes while in bed with Megan that there is a flaw in the proof presented, and suddenly wants to focus on the mathematics again, in a humorous reversal o... | |
231 | Cat Proximity | Cat Proximity | https://www.xkcd.com/231 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/231:_Cat_Proximity | [A graph with the x-axis labeled, and the scale indicated from left to right:] Far Human proximity to cat Near [Two curves are drawn and labeled, first the one starting on top, which then veers downwards and crosses the other as that curve veers upwards.] Intelligence Inanity of statements
[Below the graph, Cueball is... | This comic refers to the use of " baby talk " when speaking to pets, especially cats . A person's voice becomes falsetto and cooing , vocabulary becomes simplified, and phrases are repeated, such as "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty."
The chart shows that a person's apparent intelligence decreases, and that the inanity (i.e. ... | |
232 | Chess Enlightenment | Chess Enlightenment | https://www.xkcd.com/232 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/232:_Chess_Enlightenment | [Cueball and Megan are playing chess; Cueball is leaning forward over the chessboard.] Cueball (thinking): Why is chess so hard? Maybe the answers lie within me. Maybe I just need to let go, relax, and let my instincts and subconscious speak.
[Cueball leans back and places his hands to his head.] Meditate
Cueball's sub... | In this comic, Cueball finds his game of chess against Megan to be too difficult, and he attempts to tap his subconscious to find his next move. This is a common technique used in more physical competitions like baseball or golf, where overthinking can interfere with one's motion and thus "clearing one's mind" and rely... | |
233 | A New CAPTCHA Approach | A New CAPTCHA Approach | https://www.xkcd.com/233 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/233:_A_New_CAPTCHA_Approach | To complete your web registration, please prove that you're human: When Littlefoot's mother died in the original 'Land Before Time', did you feel sad? [radio button.] Yes [radio button.] No (Bots: no lying)
| A CAPTCHA is a verification system to stop automatic submissions to web forms by asking the user to do something a computer program could not do, such as type a distorted word into a box.
But here, the author has a new CAPTCHA, in which it references a sad event in the children's movie, The Land Before Time . It asks t... | |
234 | Escape Artist | Escape Artist | https://www.xkcd.com/234 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/234:_Escape_Artist | [Cueball sits before a computer on a desk while another man stands behind him.] Man: I was fascinated by locks as a kid. I loved how they turned information and patterns into physical strength. Cueball: Why does my script keep dying?
[Closeup on Cueball sitting at the computer.] Man: And a lock invites you to try and o... | Harry Houdini (born Erik Weisz/Ehrich Weiss) was a famous escape artist, whose more famous routines included escaping straitjackets and switching places with an assistant while locked inside a box.
The word "escape" also has a meaning in computer science . To "escape" something in programming means to replace a charact... | |
235 | Kite | Kite | https://www.xkcd.com/235 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/235:_Kite | [Cueball readies a kite.] [Cueball starts to fly the kite.] [Cueball continues to fly the kite.] [Cueball ties the kite string to a tree.] [Cueball grabs the string.] [Cueball starts to climb the string.] [A scene showing Cueball holding onto the string at a high altitude, against a colour backdrop of the ground, cloud... | This comic presents, through a surreal scenario, one of Randall's recurring themes: that it is better to take a chance and make an interesting choice .
Cueball flies a kite, then fixes it to a tree and climbs its string. In real life, of course, the string would not be able to support the weight of a human. [ citation ... | |
236 | Collecting Double-Takes | Collecting Double-Takes | https://www.xkcd.com/236 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/236:_Collecting_Double-Takes | [Cueball is standing in the middle of the produce aisle in a supermarket, holding a tube of K-Y Jelly in one hand, the other on his chin. The signs read "Bananas" "Apples" "Oranges" and "Zucchini" from left to right.] MY HOBBY: Standing in the supermarket's produce section holding a tube of K-Y Jelly, looking contempla... | There's a fairly well-founded meme that singles looking for other singles ( mostly that being men for women, and vice-versa, but not exclusively) can make connections with others in the fresh produce sections of a supermarket. From a single lady's point of view, men who are buying such goods are more likely to be unatt... | |
237 | Keyboards are Disgusting | Keyboards are Disgusting | https://www.xkcd.com/237 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/237:_Keyboards_are_Disgusting | [Hairy sits at his computer, chatting with another person.] Chat: Wanna see an optical illusion? Chat: Hold your keyboard up in front of you and look at the home row.
[Hairy holds the keyboard in front of him.] Chat: Now cross your eyes a little so the 'g' and 'h' overlap.
Chat: Keeping focus, lift the keyboard over yo... | Ever cleaned a leopard? They're filthy.
This comic refers to the fact that many keyboards, especially desktop keyboards, gather large amounts of crumbs and are rarely cleaned. In the comic, a person (probably Black Hat ) tricks an unsuspecting character into lifting his keyboard up so that all the crumbs fall down onto... | |
238 | Pet Peeve 114 | Pet Peeve #114 | https://www.xkcd.com/238 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/238:_Pet_Peeve_114 | [Cueball reading a book in a chair.] Pet Peeve #114: Voice on the phone: Really? What are you doing reading ? It's Saturday night!
| A pet peeve is a minor annoyance that an individual identifies as particularly annoying to them, to a greater degree than others may find it. Cueball counts his pet peeves; this is number 114.
Cueball's friend calls him and finds out that he is reading a book on a Saturday night. Saturday night, or the weekend in gener... | |
239 | Blagofaire | Blagofaire | https://www.xkcd.com/239 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/239:_Blagofaire | Man in Red Cape and Goggles: Hey, it worked! Cueball: What? Who are you? Man in Red Cape and Goggles: I'm from the distant future. Cueball: Wow. Hi!
Man in Red Cape and Goggles: Are you a blogger? I play one of you at our festivals! Cueball: Huh? Man in Red Cape and Goggles: Like the Ren faires of your time — I do reen... | Facts become distorted as time moves forward. What do we know about the Elizabethan times? They spoke strange English. What will 400 years from now think of the first twenty years of the Internet? Crazy people said crazy things online. Will we even say "online" 400 years from now? Won't the internet be everywhere, and ... | |
240 | Dream Girl | Dream Girl | https://www.xkcd.com/240 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/240:_Dream_Girl | [Cueball and a friend are talking.]
Cueball: I had a dream that I met a girl in a dying world.
[In the next frame, Cueball's words fill the entire frame.]
Cueball: It was all coming apart. Hairline cracks in reality widened to yawning chasms. Everything was going dark and light all at once, and there was a sound like b... | This comic is a commentary on people who dream, daydream, and wish for things to happen, commonly in a romantic context. Cueball dreams of a girl who gives him a time and a place, and the last panel implies that he went to that place at the given time, but did not find the girl. The strip builds up hope and anticipatio... | |
241 | Battle Room | Battle Room | https://www.xkcd.com/241 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/241:_Battle_Room | [A scene is depicted from the Battle Room of the novel Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. The boys are floating in a room with random cubes.] Dink: Sorry, Ender — seems like there were some system crashes. The battle's gotta be cut short. Ender: The lasers still work. Dink: Yeah, but the enemy's gate is down.
| The book Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card is about Ender Wiggin , a boy of extraordinary intelligence, which means he is recruited to be trained to be one of the commanders of Earth's "Defense" Fleet should the Buggers invade again (future books renamed the Buggers to the Formics, to be more politically correct, since ... | |
242 | The Difference | The Difference | https://www.xkcd.com/242 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/242:_The_Difference | [All the panels are circular.]
[Cueball pulls a lever.] Pull
[Lightning hits Cueball.] ZAP
[Cueball still stands, obviously battered.]
[An arrow labelled "normal person" points to a panel of Cueball thinking.] Cueball (thinking): I guess I shouldn't do that.
[An arrow labelled "scientist" points to a panel of Cueball a... | Cueball pulls a lever. A bolt of lightning comes down and strikes him.
After being dazed for a moment, the comic then takes one of two routes; the first is that of a normal person, the second that of a scientist.
In Randall 's example, the normal person would decide not to pull the lever anymore, because it seems to ca... | |
243 | Appropriate Term | Appropriate Term | https://www.xkcd.com/243 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/243:_Appropriate_Term | [A diagram of a TrackPoint pointer on a keyboard, under which is a continuous line labeled "Tone of Conversation-Formal to Informal." There are four boxes under this line.] How to refer to the pointer thing on laptop keyboards: Very formal: TrackPoint™-style pointer Formal: Nub Informal: Nipple mouse Very informal: Cli... | This is a simple comic offering increasingly not-safe-for-work names for a laptop's pointing device . This stick was an alternative to a mouse, but has largely been supplanted by the touchpad.
"TrackPoint" is the trademarked term used by IBM (and later Lenovo) for the pointing stick implemented on ThinkPad laptops. The... | |
244 | Tabletop Roleplaying | Tabletop Roleplaying | https://www.xkcd.com/244 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/244:_Tabletop_Roleplaying | [Four people sit around a table. Megan has an open gamebook in front of her.] Megan: Your party enters the tavern. Cueball: I gather everyone around a table. I have the elves start whittling dice and get out some parchment for character sheets. Megan: Hey, no recursing.
| Four people are playing a role-playing game . Megan is the game master (GM), describing the events of the adventure and what happens. The other people control imaginary characters in the game. Cueball attempts to have his character lead other characters in the imaginary construction of dice and gaming sheets. This woul... | |
245 | Floor Tiles | Floor Tiles | https://www.xkcd.com/245 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/245:_Floor_Tiles | [Two characters walk on a floor tiled in black and white.] Friend: Why are you walking funny? [Second panel consists of Cueball's thought cloud in which he points to an easel mounted diagram of the floor tile pattern.] Cueball, thinking: Well, my instinct is to step only on black tiles, but they're too far apart. So I'... | Cueball is walking according to a certain pattern of floor tiles, which makes sense to him in his head (the same pattern was first introduced in 207: What xkcd Means ). But as his friend asks him why he is walking funny, he realizes that the algorithm he is using for walking on floor tiles would be so tedious and time-... | |
246 | Labyrinth Puzzle | Labyrinth Puzzle | https://www.xkcd.com/246 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/246:_Labyrinth_Puzzle | [Three guards with spears stand in front of three doors. Black Hat and Cueball stand in front of the guards.] Black Hat: And over here we have the labyrinth guards. One always lies, one always tells the truth, and one stabs people who ask tricky questions.
| This comic alludes to a famous Knights and Knaves logic puzzle, and specifically to the version featured in the Jim Henson movie Labyrinth , with two doors and two guards. One guard always lies, and the other always tells the truth. One of the doors leads to freedom, and you can only ask one guard one question. The sol... | |
247 | Factoring the Time | Factoring the Time | https://www.xkcd.com/247 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/247:_Factoring_the_Time | [One man is sitting at a computer. Cueball sits at a separate desk. There is a clock that reads 2:53.] Cueball: 253 is 11x23 Man at computer: What? Cueball: I'm factoring the time.
[Zoomed in on Cueball, who explains himself.] Cueball: I have nothing to do, so I'm trying to calculate the prime factors of the time each ... | In this comic, Cueball is bored, so he is calculating the prime factors of the time shown on the clock. Cueball has been doing this for almost two hours (from 1:00 pm to 2:53 pm). The number 2 is the smallest prime but is not a factor of 253, which is an odd number. The smallest prime factor of 253 is 11, which makes t... | |
248 | Hypotheticals | Hypotheticals | https://www.xkcd.com/248 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/248:_Hypotheticals | [Cueball is holding up his hand towards Beret Guy, who talks to him. From Beret Guy's head go three bubbles to a big thought bubble, where the next part of the comic takes place.] Beret Guy: What if I had some ice cream? Wouldn't that be awesome? Cueball: No, stop-
[The comic continues inside Beret Guy's thought bubble... | The comic is, in short, a new take on the common comedy trope in which characters in a thought bubble will sometimes look out of the bubble and talk directly to the person thinking it, another person nearby, or even the viewer. In this comic, however, it features Cueball and Beret Guy in a conversation together, in whi... | |
249 | Chess Photo | Chess Photo | https://www.xkcd.com/249 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/249:_Chess_Photo | [Cueball sits at a desk with glue, chess pieces, and a chessboard, while his Cueball-like friend looks over his shoulder.] Friend: What are you doing? Cueball: Gluing down chess pieces. Friend: Why? Cueball: Because there's a picture I've always wanted... I'll need your coat to sneak this onto the ride. [A photograph o... | A roller coaster is a kind of thrill ride where a small train carries people through a number of twists, turns, and hills at a high speed to the occupants' great delight. Such rides are popular at amusement parks, where people have to wait in long lines to get on a ride that can last less than two minutes.
Many amuseme... | |
250 | Snopes | Snopes | https://www.xkcd.com/250 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/250:_Snopes | [Two Cueballs sit at a table across from each other, typing on their laptops.] Cueball: Another urban legend? You should check out Snopes before sending me this stuff. Friend: Oops; yeah. Cueball: Man, Snopes is really great--independent fact-checkers trawling our collective discourse, filtering out misinformation.
[Th... | Snopes is a popular website for checking the validity of urban legends . Here, one Cueball asks the other to check before sending him urban legends. Cueball replies with another urban legend saying that Snopes, the website the first Cueball asks him to check, uses spam to keep their audience.
Naturally, it didn't take ... | |
251 | CD Tray Fight | CD Tray Fight | https://www.xkcd.com/251 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/251:_CD_Tray_Fight | [Cueball is standing, holding a CD tray that is half-in his computer. There are other CDs on the floor.] Cueball: Hey. Hey! Stop retracting my CD! I feel uncomfortable when my computer physically struggles with me. Sure, I can overpower it now , but it feels like a few short steps from here to the robot war.
| This comic refers to the behavior of a tray loading optical disc drive of a desktop computer. When the tray is opened and the user is reaching for the disc, a process or task on the computer can, at that exact inopportune time, request that the disc drive close its tray. Alternatively, accidentally bumping the open tra... | |
252 | Escalators | Escalators | https://www.xkcd.com/252 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/252:_Escalators | [A graph with y-axis titled "Urge to try running up the down escalator," with "weak" by the bottom and "strong" by the top. The x-axis has every two years labeled and every year signified by a smaller mark, which stops at 24. A red line with "What I was supposed to feel" with points at every line rises, peaks at 7 year... | This comic shows two simple line graphs on the same chart. One shows society's expectations, the other what Randall actually felt. The visual joke is that the societal expectation graph is treated like an actual down-moving escalator, with people on it.
An escalator is a continuously moving mechanized stairway that tra... | |
253 | Highway Engineer Pranks | Highway Engineer Pranks | https://www.xkcd.com/253 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/253:_Highway_Engineer_Pranks | [Each panel depicts a highway intersection.] The Inescapable Cloverleaf: [Roads lead onto the rings for each leaf, but then are trapped in the circles. Minor roads also allow travel between the rings.]
The Zero-Choice Interchange: [On- and off-ramps exist, but they lead back to the same lane they disconnected from.]
Th... | Some classical but inaccurate interchanges are shown. In general, these interchanges are designed to allow the traffic to flow without directly crossing any other traffic stream. But here we can see some different approaches:
In the title text, Boston is mentioned, a slightly more complicated prank in itself. A common ... | |
254 | Comic Fragment | Comic Fragment | https://www.xkcd.com/254 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/254:_Comic_Fragment | Editor's note: Mr. Munroe has been missing for several days. We have recieved no submissions from him for some time, but we found this single panel on his desk in a folder labeled 'MY BEST IDEA EVER'. It is clearly part of a work in progress, but we have decided to post it in lieu of a complete comic. [Single panel ill... | In this comic, Randall has gone missing from the office, and his 'editors' have found only this panel from an unfinished project (of which he has labeled 'best idea ever'). The panel depicts an amalgam of science fiction disasters.
Janeane Garofalo is an actress and comedian associated with strong feminist roles and op... | |
255 | Subjectivity | Subjectivity | https://www.xkcd.com/255 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/255:_Subjectivity | [A tall slide, seen from the ground.] When I was a kid, my school playground had a really tall slide that always made me nervous.
[A tall slide, seen from the side.] We moved away, but the slide stuck in my memory, becoming a skyscraping monster.
[A car and a sign pointing to school zone.] Years later, I was passing th... | Parodying the experience of finding that things you saw as a child are much smaller than you'd perceived them to be, Cueball is convinced that this will be the case with his childhood slide, only to find that it is indeed quite large. (As a child, it's roughly nine times his height; as an adult, it's only about triple.... | |
256 | Online Communities | Online Communities | https://www.xkcd.com/256 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/256:_Online_Communities | [Hand-drawn fantasy style map with land and sea areas representing populations of online communities. Each area or item is labeled.] Map of Online Communities and related points of interest Geographic area represents estimated size of membership
[Land Area Labels:] The Icy North (Yahoo, Windows Live), AOL, Chat Rooms R... | Note: This comic dates from Spring 2007. The internet has changed a lot since that time.
This is Randall's first map of online communities, with a successor (showing some zoomed-in highlights of the map) at 802: Online Communities 2 . As Randall says on the map, the area of each "country" is roughly proportional to its... | |
257 | Code Talkers | Code Talkers | https://www.xkcd.com/257 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/257:_Code_Talkers | [A man is looking at a computer monitor and speaking into a microphone.] Code talker: A'la'ih, do'neh'lini, do'neh'lini, a'la'ih, a'la'ih, do'neh'lini, do'neh'lini, do'neh'lini, a'la'ih, a'la'ih, do'neh'lini, a'la'ih, do'neh'lini,do'neh'lini, do'neh'lini... [Two men are talking nearby.] Cueball: For added security, aft... | Code talkers are people who communicate using their native language not known by the enemies. The most well-known code talkers were the Navajo-speaking Marines serving during World War II.
This comic shows a Navajo code talker transmitting an encrypted binary file by speaking "one" and "zero" (actually "neutral," as ex... | |
258 | Conspiracy Theories | Conspiracy Theories | https://www.xkcd.com/258 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/258:_Conspiracy_Theories | Hairy: The official story of 9-11 is full of holes. Take the— Cueball: Please, stop, because seeing this happen to you breaks my heart.
Cueball: Conspiracy theories represent a known glitch in human reasoning. The theories are of course occasionally true, but their truth is completely uncorrelated with the believer's c... | A conspiracy theory purports to explain a social, political, or economic event as being caused or covered up by a covert group or organization. A typical example is the moon landing conspiracy , which asserts that no human has ever reached the moon.
Once a conspiracy theory starts, it often grows stronger. Facts agreei... | |
259 | Clichéd Exchanges | Clichéd Exchanges | https://www.xkcd.com/259 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/259:_Clich%C3%A9d_Exchanges | My Hobby: Derailing clichéd exchanges by using the wrong replies
Friend: O RLY? Cueball: O RLY? I 'ardly know 'er!
| Another entry into the My Hobby series.
" O RLY? " is an Internet meme typically used to express sarcastic agreement with or feigned surprise at a statement. The typical response to "O RLY" is usually "YA RLY," "NO WAI," or "SRSLY?" These exchanges are memetic variatons of "Oh really?", "Yeah really," "No way!", and "S... | |
260 | The Glass Necklace | The Glass Necklace | https://www.xkcd.com/260 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/260:_The_Glass_Necklace | [There is only one large panel in this comic, but it is still divided up into 19 individual scenes, one following the other, but of very different size and details. In every scene, there is at least one word noted, mainly just stating what Cueball does. The first row has four scenes (1-4), the second row only two (5-6)... | This is one of the most romantic comics published in xkcd.
The heat from a lightning strike can fuse sand into glass . When this occurs in nature, hollow tubes called fulgurites are formed. Cueball uses this knowledge and a spark of handiness and ingenuity to create an entirely homemade glass necklace for Megan . Here ... | |
261 | Regarding Mussolini | Regarding Mussolini | https://www.xkcd.com/261 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/261:_Regarding_Mussolini | [Three people are standing around a map. One of them is pushing something with a stick.] [A messenger arrives.] Messenger: General, Italian forces have entered Egypt. General: As I expected. This is a foolish move by Mussolini, but like Hitler he will no doubt force his commanders to— Messenger: Hey. Godwin's Law. Gene... | Godwin's Law states that all debates on the Internet, given enough time, will devolve into ad hominem attacks in the form of comparisons of one's opponents to Hitler or the Nazis. A common expansion on this law dictates that, when such a comparison is brought up, the debate immediately ends and the person who made the ... | |
262 | IN UR REALITY | IN UR REALITY | https://www.xkcd.com/262 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/262:_IN_UR_REALITY | [Black Hat is holding a cat and a piece of paper. Cueball has raised his arms. There are three cats with captions stuck to them.] Black Hat: Oh hi; I'm here from the Internet. Cueball: What are you doing!? Black Hat: Gluing captions to your cats. Cat: RRRR
| The LOLcat meme genre involves pictures of cats in various poses and facial contortions accompanied by deliberately misspelled captions. Black Hat claims to be from the Internet and is thus creating LOLcat memes by literally gluing captions to Cueball's cats.
The title text suggests that Black Hat is using glue only be... | |
263 | Certainty | Certainty | https://www.xkcd.com/263 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/263:_Certainty | [A door seen from a hallway, with "Teachers' Lounge" on the glass, next to the door is a sign reading "Award." Inside the door are two teachers talking.] Megan: My students drew me into another political argument. Cueball: Eh; it happens. Megan: Lately, political debates bother me. They just show how good smart people ... | Megan and Cueball are teachers in this comic, talking about their students and the political discussions with them. They outline that it's not possible to find the real truth. But then Cueball, interrupted by a harrumph of the mathematics teacher Miss Lenhart , states that Mathematics is an exception (because math can ... | |
264 | Choices Part 1 | Choices: Part 1 | https://www.xkcd.com/264 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/264:_Choices:_Part_1 | [Megan sits at a desk, using a computer, refreshing the page.] *Refresh* Click [She sits back and looks at the monitor.] [She refreshes the page on the computer.] *Refresh* Click [She sits back and looks at the monitor.] [Megan leans forward and clicks the mouse.] Click [A hole opens up in the panel. It appears to be t... | Megan is sitting at her computer, not waiting for a particular mail, but still refreshing every few seconds. This is an illustration of boredom and pointlessness in life. But suddenly the wall in front of her is opening. She considers running for the door, but curiosity overtakes her. She enters the hole, closes it beh... | |
265 | Choices Part 2 | Choices: Part 2 | https://www.xkcd.com/265 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/265:_Choices:_Part_2 | [Cueball is doing some exercises in a book. The clock on the wall says 12:50.] Chapter 15: Special Relativity Problem 1: Two spacecraft transmit messages to each other while passing at constant velocities of... Cueball: sigh
Meanwhile: [Megan in a bubble and a spacecraft are moving towards each other. Each one has a ve... | The "Choices" series was released on 5 consecutive days (Monday-Friday). It explores and marvels at human freedom. This is, however, a little sidetrack from the "Choices" narrative. Cueball is studying special relativity . The speed of light in a vacuum (299,792,458 m/s) is denoted as c . Megan and the spaceship are sh... | |
266 | Choices Part 3 | Choices: Part 3 | https://www.xkcd.com/266 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/266:_Choices:_Part_3 | [A white Megan floats in a bubble against a dark blue space backdrop. She is at the top of the bubble. Her thoughts (not connected to her by a speak line) are shown above her in white.] Megan (thinking): I should feel scared.
[She falls from the top of the bubble, the bubble rises, or both.] Megan (thinking): But I don... | Megan is very unsure about what to think of her situation. Is it a dream? Is she in danger? She should be scared but isn't, and it does not feel like a dream, i.e. it feels real even though she suspects it is a dream. This would usually never be the case. If your dream feels realistic, you do not usually consider that ... | |
267 | Choices Part 4 | Choices: Part 4 | https://www.xkcd.com/267 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/267:_Choices:_Part_4 | [Megan in a bubble is floating in outer space (on a dark blue background) next to her clone outside the bubble. Megan is simulating sitting down in the middle of the bubble. The clone reaches one arm out toward the bubble. There is no line from the first part of the clone's text to the rest of the text. It is given fro... | This is the existentialistic climax of the Choices series. It takes up the recurring xkcd -theme how people tend to be blind towards the staggering amount of possibilities that each day holds, with routine and boredom as a result. (See e.g. 137: Dreams and 706: Freedom .)
The Megan -clone implies that Megan has been ta... | |
268 | Choices Part 5 | Choices: Part 5 | https://www.xkcd.com/268 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/268:_Choices:_Part_5 | [Megan is walking towards the right of the panel.]
[Cueball wearing a backpack is walking towards the left of the panel.]
[They walk past each other.]
[Megan has a sudden thought, in a drawing without a frame between two panels.]
[Megan turns, lifts her arm, and calls out to Cueball, who then turn towards her.] Megan: ... | In the final part of Choices , Megan is back to real life, and has forgotten about her trip, as afterlife-Megan said. However, she has an epiphany , and in the spirit of what she told her, she talks to the stranger on the street. The stranger is likely Cueball who studied the physics problem she encountered from part 2... | |
269 | TCMP | TCMP | https://www.xkcd.com/269 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/269:_TCMP | [Cueball stand with a keyboard next to a bed. The keyboard is connected with a wire to a computer on a desk to the right. He talks to Megan and a Cueball-like friend.] Cueball: Hey, help me test the Trans-Consciousness Messaging Protocol. Friend: What's that? Cueball: I've been training myself to keep my fingers moving... | Cueball trained himself to type while asleep, so he could communicate from inside his dreams. He calls this Trans-Consciousness Messaging Protocol , or TCMP . He succeeds in using this system to send a message from inside his dream, but his friends, Megan and another Cueball, are disappointed when that first message is... | |
270 | Merlin | Merlin | https://www.xkcd.com/270 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/270:_Merlin | [Cueball and Megan standing by a train on a platform.] Megan: I'm bad at goodbyes. At some level I never think they're for real. Cueball: They make me think of T. H. White's Merlin.
[They are still standing at the edge of the platform, but the train is no longer in the frame.] Megan: Oh? Cueball: He lived backwards, re... | Merlin is a wizard who features prominently in various retelling of the legend of King Arthur. The Once and Future King by author T. H. White is one of the most popular versions of the legend, and in it, Merlin is described as living backwards through time, as Cueball and Megan discuss in this comic (this is also brief... | |
271 | Powers of One | Powers of One | https://www.xkcd.com/271 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/271:_Powers_of_One | Powers of One A mind-expanding look at our world [A sequence, presumably continuing endlessly in both directions, of identical images of a couple lying on a chequered blanket, with a picnic basket, on grass. Each image has a rule at the bottom giving measurements in meters, with the scale in terms of 1 to a particular ... | This is a parody of the short documentary "Powers of 10," which can be found here .
As in the documentary, the comic features a man and a woman having a picnic on a blanket. In the documentary, the apparent distance from the scene, and thus the zoom level, gradually changes by a factor of ten every ten seconds (hence t... | |
272 | Linux User at Best Buy | Linux User at Best Buy | https://www.xkcd.com/272 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/272:_Linux_User_at_Best_Buy | Salesman: Interested in updating your antivirus software? Cueball: Oh, I wouldn't need any of that.
[In a spiky speech bubble.] Cueball: I run Linux.
[Cueball does a backflip onto a motorcycle.] Flip
[Cueball performs a wheelie on the motorcycle.]
[Cueball does a hard, donut turn on the motorcycle, kicking up dirt into... | Best Buy is an American chain of electronics and media stores. As with many such big box shops, they only sell pre-bundled software and boxed pre-built hardware, where the computers on offer are either Macs or other PCs , usually pre-installed with some variant of the Mac OS X or Windows NT operating system families. M... | |
273 | Electromagnetic Spectrum | Electromagnetic Spectrum | https://www.xkcd.com/273 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/273:_Electromagnetic_Spectrum | [Everything is one big panel.]
The Electromagnetic Spectrum
These waves travel through the electromagnetic field. They were formerly carried by the aether, which was decommissioned in 1897 due to budget cuts.
Other waves: Slinky waves [Cueball and Megan hold the ends of a tangled slinky.] Sound waves [There is a snippe... | This panel is a play on the Electromagnetic spectrum , showing a large piece of the spectrum and examples of phenomena that absorb or emit light along the spectra. Such spectra are commonly used in physics or astronomy education contexts when discussing the nature of light. This comic extends it to absurd lengths by in... | |
274 | With Apologies to The Who | With Apologies to The Who | https://www.xkcd.com/274 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/274:_With_Apologies_to_The_Who | [Cueball is sitting at a desk with a computer, typing.] Monitor: People try to shut us d-d-down just 'cause our music gets around [Cueball is standing on his chair and typing with his keyboard across his hip.] Monitor: Old folks act like total noobs get off our net; you block the tubes [Cueball is really wailing on the... | This comic refers to the song " My Generation " by the British rock band The Who , which was released in 1965. The song is about intergenerational conflict and has been regarded as a very decided proclamation of youthful rebellion. Cueball adapts the lyrics to describe his own generation, the Millennials . As people bo... | |
275 | Thoughts | Thoughts | https://www.xkcd.com/275 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/275:_Thoughts | [Cueball talking with his girlfriend's parents represented by Blondie, holding a hand up in greeting and a larger version of Cueball. Above them there is a caption:] When meeting a girlfriend's family, I have to suppress the weirdest thoughts. Cueball: Hi! Blondie: Hi! It's so nice to finally meet you! Cueball: I have ... | This comic relates to the situation of getting introduced to the parents of one's girlfriend, which is often felt to be rather awkward. The parents tend to scrutinize and question the aspirant in order to find out if he is a good catch. A particularly delicate issue is the fact that the suitor may have had sexual inter... | |
276 | Fixed Width | Fixed Width | https://www.xkcd.com/276 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/276:_Fixed_Width | [A man, Rob, is sitting at a computer. The text is an IRC-style transcript of a conversation, in a fixed-width font. He is text-messaging a girl he slept with named Emily; their messages read as follows:]
| Fixed width or monospaced font refers to the font used in old teletype terminals and some instant messaging clients (often Courier ).
For two text lines to have the same length, it's easier if they are in a monospaced font. For example, the following sentences are the same length in a monospaced font, but since we are ... | |
277 | Long Light | Long Light | https://www.xkcd.com/277 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/277:_Long_Light | [Cueball in a car, sitting at a red light.] Cueball: This light always takes forever. I'd like to smack the idiot who designed this intersection. [An engineer steps up onto the hood of Cueball's car.] Engineer: Hi. Cueball: Who the hell are you? Engineer: I designed this intersection. Engineer [arms spread outward]: Yo... | This strip depicts a common experience to most people - becoming frustrated with a device, system, or rule that appears to be badly made or have no purpose other than to frustrate the user (in this case, a traffic light that seems unreasonably, inexplicably long). One temptation we might have in these cases is to blame... | |
278 | Black Hat Support | Black Hat Support | https://www.xkcd.com/278 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/278:_Black_Hat_Support | [Black Hat is sitting at his computer, wearing a phone headset.] Black Hat: Thank you for calling the Black Hat Support Line, your first source for Linux support. How may I assist? Phone: Hi. I'm running an Apache server, and the load keeps climbing out of control. Black Hat: Okay. First, click on the Start Menu. Phone... | This strip portrays Black Hat providing support for Linux , but in fact he provides only annoying and unhelpful advice just for his own personal amusement.
The support line is clearly for Linux, as stated in the introduction, and the client on the phone clearly has a Linux problem. However, Black Hat is intentionally g... | |
279 | Pickup Lines | Pickup Lines | https://www.xkcd.com/279 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/279:_Pickup_Lines | [Cueball at a bar.] Cueball: If I could rearrange the alphabet, I'd put your sister and I together. Cueball: Is your father a thief? Because that's totally my Jetta you parked outside. Cueball: You must be tired, 'cause you've been running through my mind all night. Cueball: Screaming.
| This comic adds strange twists to some classic abysmally cheesy pickup lines . Warning, terrible puns ahead:
Cueball is making a "your sister" joke. A different variation of this line is featured in 1069: Alphabet .
A Jetta is a car, and Cueball is implying that the father is an actual thief.
He adds the word "Screamin... | |
280 | Librarians | Librarians | https://www.xkcd.com/280 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/280:_Librarians | [Caption at the top:] Advantages to dating librarians.
[Megan and Cueball are standing together; Cueball is reaching inside a paper bag:] Megan: We're stopping in Baltimore to visit my family, and that's final. Cueball: Oh yeah?
[Cueball is upright and is holding a book.] Cueball: Hey, look, it's a new hardback book! M... | Cueball is pressing on Megan for stopping her idea to visit her family. While Megan is fully convinced that this visit will happen, Cueball takes advantage of her love of books. He starts to open up a brand-new hardcover book much farther than it was made to open, ruining the spine, and then mistreats it some more. Meg... | |
281 | Online Package Tracking | Online Package Tracking | https://www.xkcd.com/281 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/281:_Online_Package_Tracking | Online Package Tracking: Pros: Convenient, Useful Cons: Makes you crazy
[Megan is sitting at a computer.] *refresh* Megan: Aww, still in Memphis. *refresh* Megan: Aww, still in Memphis. *refresh* Megan: Aww, still in Memphis.
| Randall notes that package tracking, as provided by many shipping companies like UPS and FedEx Express , is helpful, as customers can see the status of their package delivery, and most people are very excited in the expectation of a package as shown in comic # 576 . However, Megan refreshes the package tracking page ev... | |
282 | Organic Fuel | Organic Fuel | https://www.xkcd.com/282 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/282:_Organic_Fuel | [Cueball at a computer and a friend standing nearby.] Cueball: Wow – Engines can burn vegetable oil. Friend: Well, sure. You can burn most any organic matter. Corns, leaves, spices... Cueball: Spices? Really? Friend: Sure – Mussolini made the trains run on thyme. Cueball: ... Cueball: We are no longer friends.
| Cueball is fascinated about engines that can burn organic matter. But in fact, biofuel is a big industry today. It is criticized now and then, because it can affect food prices and is believed to exacerbate world hunger.
Next comes a reference to the famous quote, "Mussolini made the trains run on time," an oft-quoted ... | |
283 | Projection | Projection | https://www.xkcd.com/283 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/283:_Projection | [Cueball and Megan are seated on a couch, watching TV.] Megan: Argh, movie pet peeve- Someone sitting at a computer in the dark with the screen projected on their face. Monitors don't work like that!
[Cueball and Megan face each other on the couch.] Cueball: Right - that only happens if you're in the way of a projected... | Cueball and Megan are watching a movie on a couch. During the movie, a scene features a character's face with legible text projected by the monitor. Though commonly depicted for dramatic effect, this phenomenon does not actually occur with conventional monitor technology. Megan is annoyed and agitated by the inaccuracy... | |
284 | Tape Measure | Tape Measure | https://www.xkcd.com/284 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/284:_Tape_Measure | [Cueball finds a tape measure.] Cueball: Hey, a tape measure.
[Cueball extends the tape measure.] extend extend
[The tape measure falls.] clatter
[Cueball tries again.] click schwoop
extend extend
extend
Cueball (thinking): Ooh, eight feet. I wonder if that's a record.
[Cueball imagines an olympic stadium, with three p... | Cueball acts like a small boy, finding a tape measure and then playing with it. He then extends it to 8 feet (approx. 2.5 meters), wondering whether or not that was a record, which makes him imagine a sport where extending the tape measure as far as possible was the goal. (Tape measure strips are bent upward lengthwise... | |
285 | Wikipedian Protester | Wikipedian Protester | https://www.xkcd.com/285 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/285:_Wikipedian_Protester | [A man with dark flat hair is standing at a podium. He is speaking to a crowd while standing behind a lectern. The lectern has a microphone on the top and sports an American flag in color on the side. He holds an arm on the lectern and the other arm is held up in front of him with a finger pointing upwards. There are f... | Cueball holds up a sign reading "[ Citation needed ]" during a political speech. The sign text is based on the Wikipedia template that can be placed next to statements that need citations, (that look like this [ citation needed ] ) usually because of questionable validity. Cueball is using this template to challenge th... | |
286 | All Your Base | All Your Base | https://www.xkcd.com/286 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/286:_All_Your_Base | [A section of a Linux terminal window is shown.] Text from window:
[Ponytail is at a computer.] Ponytail: What's with the All Your Base stuff? Didn't that die like five years ago? [From off-panel]: Yes.
[Cueball enters the panel.] Cueball: It was my first internet meme, and my favorite. Others tired of it, but I never ... | The comic refers to a popular internet phenomenon ( meme ) called " all your base are belong to us ." This catchphrase originated from the arcade shooter game " Zero Wing " and is a popular example of a poor translation into the English language. The phrase was popularized throughout the Internet and referenced in vari... | |
287 | NP-Complete | NP-Complete | https://www.xkcd.com/287 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/287:_NP-Complete | My Hobby: Embedding NP-Complete problems in restaurant orders [A menu is shown.] Chotchkies Restaurant Appetizers Mixed Fruit 2.15 French Fries 2.75 Side Salad 3.35 Hot Wings 3.55 Mozzarella Sticks 4.20 Sampler Plate 5.80 Sandwiches Barbecue 6.55 [Megan, another person, and Cueball are sitting at a table. Cueball is ho... | Another entry in the " My Hobby " series of comics. Cueball is embedding NP-complete problems in restaurant orders. Specifically, he is ordering appetizers not by explicitly stating the names, but by the total price of them all. This is a simplified example of the knapsack problem . This is a problem in combinatorial o... | |
288 | Elevator | Elevator | https://www.xkcd.com/288 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/288:_Elevator | [Elevator panel, with a Certificate of Inspection and five floor buttons, numbered 1–4. The fifth button is unlabeled.] [Cueball thinks.] [Cueball writes something on a small piece of paper.] Write Write [Cueball tapes it onto the panel.] [Elevator panel, with the same Certificate and buttons, and with the piece of pap... | Cueball is in an elevator, and notices that, beneath the certificate of Elevator Inspection , mandatory in all U.S. elevators at least, there are buttons for Floor 1, 2, 3, and 4, and then a mysterious unlabeled button. Possible logical conclusions he might have made include (1) there is a fifth floor reachable by push... | |
289 | Alone | Alone | https://www.xkcd.com/289 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/289:_Alone | [Megan crawling on bed toward Cueball.] Cueball: It's not something you can turn off. [Cueball pulling Megan, bedspread, and pillow off of bed onto floor.] Cueball: A part of me is always detached. Abstracting, looking at numbers and patterns. [Megan on top of Cueball, both under bedspread, on floor. Megan looks to be ... | Cueball is making love with Megan but, like many highly introverted people, his attention is split between his inner and outer worlds. Part of his mind is counting her touches, and another part is wondering why his brain does these things, automatically and without his wanting it to. This worries him, and he feels guil... | |
290 | Fucking Blue Shells | Fucking Blue Shells | https://www.xkcd.com/290 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/290:_Fucking_Blue_Shells | My Profanity Usage By Cause: [A pie chart is shown.] [Injury is about 2.5% of pie chart.] [Irony is about 2.5% of pie chart.] [Misc is about 2.5% of pie chart.] [Segfaults is about 10% of pie chart.] [Mario Kart is about 82.5% of pie chart.]
| Sometimes, something suddenly goes wrong, and you can only shout obscenities at it. For instance, when the dog bites, when the bee stings, something unexpected happens, or a program crashes (e.g. a segfault ), the victim often reacts by swearing.
For Randall , however, profanities are caused mostly by blue shells in th... | |
291 | Dignified | Dignified | https://www.xkcd.com/291 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/291:_Dignified | [Beret Guy swinging upside-down from a tree branch talking to White Hat walking by.] Beret Guy: You were once shoved headfirst through someone's vagina. Why are you acting so dignified?
| Beret Guy is hanging upside down in a tree, usually something you might have done in your childhood. As an adult, it is not considered very dignified. Most likely, White Hat made a comment on this and the fact that Beret Guy has his head down. But then, Beret Guy gives him an answer, regarding where White Hat's head on... | |
292 | goto | goto | https://www.xkcd.com/292 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/292:_goto | [Sideways view of Cueball sitting at computer, thinking.] Cueball: I could restructure the program's flow - or use one little 'GOTO' instead. Cueball: Eh, screw good practice. How bad can it be? Text on computer: goto main_sub3; *Compile* [We now have a view from behind Cueball. Cueball looks at the computer.] [A rapto... | Goto is a construct found in many computer languages that causes control flow to go from one place in a program to another, without returning. Once common in computer programming, its popularity diminished in the 1960s and 1970s as focus on structured programming became the norm. Edsger W. Dijkstra 's article "Go To St... | |
293 | RTFM | RTFM | https://www.xkcd.com/293 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/293:_RTFM | [Cueball with a knife sticking out of his heavily bleeding face stands in front of a toaster on a counter, which has an arm extending from the top of it. He is holding a telephone to his ear.] Cueball: Hello, 911? I just tried to toast some bread, and the toaster grew an arm and stabbed me in the face! 911: Did you rea... | The title RTFM is an acronym for " read the fucking manual ," which frustrated software manufacturers tell users when confronted with a simple question (most likely answered in the manual).
However, Cueball encounters a similar situation with a 911 call (the emergency number in the US), in which the first question the ... | |
294 | Bookstore | Bookstore | https://www.xkcd.com/294 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/294:_Bookstore | [Cueball is standing in a bookstore, looking at a book.] Cueball [thinking]: This book looks interesting. Maybe I'll buy it.
[Cueball reads the book; a clock appears above.]
Cueball [thinking]: Oops, I read the whole thing. Cueball [thinking]: I'll just quietly put it back and go.
[Cueball walks through a security scan... | Cueball starts reading a book off the shelf as he considers buying it, but gets so engrossed in it that he accidentally reads the entire thing, eliminating his reason for buying it in the first place. He quietly puts it back and turns to leave the store, only to have the book (which exists in his brain as information) ... | |
295 | DNE | DNE | https://www.xkcd.com/295 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/295:_DNE | [Cueball is in an empty classroom writing on the whiteboard. In the top right corner in large print is written "Fuck This Place!". It is circled, and underneath he is writing "DNE".]
| DNE stands for "do not erase," and is commonly used on school whiteboards to let the sanitation staff and other teachers know not to erase that particular area of the board. DNE circles often encompass important information such as test dates or the teacher's name.
It is easy to see how leaving things marked with DNE c... | |
296 | Tony Hawk | Tony Hawk | https://www.xkcd.com/296 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/296:_Tony_Hawk | My Hobby: Doing skateboard tricks in Tony Hawk while also doing them in real life. [Cueball moves towards a quarter pipe on his skateboard while manipulating his PSP.] Beep Click Beep
[Cueball is in mid air having performed a Frontside 360°, both literally and on the PSP.] ♪ Frontside 360°! ♫ Frontside 360°!
| Cueball is seen using a hand-held game system, while on a skateboard. He is playing one of the many Tony Hawk titles in which you control a skater and perform tricks to gain points and achievements. While playing the game, he wants to simultaneously perform the trick in real life, both because it is exceptionally diffi... | |
297 | Lisp Cycles | Lisp Cycles | https://www.xkcd.com/297 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/297:_Lisp_Cycles | [Cueball is sitting at a computer, and Megan is standing behind the desk.] Cueball: Lisp is over half a century old and it still has this perfect, timeless air about it. Cueball: I wonder if the cycles will continue forever. A few coders from each new generation rediscovering the Lisp arts.
[Man in Jedi robes carrying ... | Lisp is one of the oldest high level programming languages . Despite being significantly ahead of its time, it never got enough traction outside of academia, and has never been widely used. However, it is considered to be a very powerful language even in the present day. Quotations regarding Lisp show that several big ... | |
298 | Tesla Coil | Tesla Coil | https://www.xkcd.com/298 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/298:_Tesla_Coil | [Cueball and Black Hat stand near a tesla coil mounted on a table.] Cueball: I finally finished my Tesla Coil!
[The room is dark; the characters appear as faint blue outlines on black background. Cueball turns on the Tesla Coil and it sparks white static electricity.] click Black Hat: Cool, but—
[Lightning shoots out o... | Cueball diligently creates a Tesla coil , a device that produces high voltage alternating currents.
After that show by Cueball, Black Hat magically shoots electricity from his fingertips. When Cueball asks how he did that, he says that science doesn't really work, then hovers in mid-air, further proving his point. Ther... | |
299 | Aeris Dies | Aeris Dies | https://www.xkcd.com/299 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/299:_Aeris_Dies | [Two men are talking. The second man is sitting on the ground, hugging his knees to his chest.] Cueball: Maggie's gone. You can't bring her back. Friend: But I have to, she's a part of my life. Cueball: *sigh* Cueball: Okay, let me put this in your terms. Cueball: Remember when Aeris died in FFVII? It was sad, but you ... | From the looks of this comic, there is a friend here who had a loved one (named 'Maggie') who died. Maggie is likely a spouse or girlfriend, but could also be a mother or another significant relation. Cueball tries to help him by comparing his plight to a significant plot point in the popular game Final Fantasy VII for... | |
300 | Facebook | Facebook | https://www.xkcd.com/300 | https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/300:_Facebook | Mildly sleazy uses of Facebook, part 14: Looking up someone's profile before introducing yourself so you know which of your favorite bands to mention Cueball: Favorite bands? Hmm... Cueball: Maybe Regina Spektor or the Polyphonic Spree. Megan: Whoa, those are two of my favorites, too! Megan: Clearly, we should have sex... | This comic approaches how Social networks have changed the ways of human interaction. With everyone placing their personal interests on their Facebook profile pages, it has become fairly easy to gather a lot of information about people. In the comic, Cueball uses this information to his advantage: He ascertained Megan'... |
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