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Creator of xkcd Reveals Secret Back-story of His Epic, 3,099-Panel 'Time' Comic
vikingpower writes "Randall Munroe, the comic author best known as the creator of the xkcd webcomic, reveals the secret backstory of his epic, 3099-panel 'Time' strip in an interesting interview with Wired. He says, 'In my comic, our civilization is long gone. Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years; it seems optimistic to hope that the current one will last for 10,000 more ... The Earth’s axis wobbles over the millennia, and some individual stars move visibly, so I used a few different pieces of astronomy software–with a lot of hand correction and tweaking–to render the future night sky. When the Sun sets in the night sequence, one of the first things you see is the gap where Antares should be, which was the first clue that this is taking place in the far future. Later in the night–which lasted for several days of real time–more astronomical details let readers pin down the date more precisely.' The comic can be seen as an animation on YouTube. There is also a complete click-through version available on geekwagon. This comic inspired a dedicated wiki and has its own glossary."
And how long has writing existed for?
Randall Munroe is an embarrassing illustration of the mediocrity of the average modern nerd. He says nothing which isn't either cliche or oversimplified.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks, and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Your personal taste can be different from mass appeal. But, unlike business practice, what harm does it do to simply appreciate the fact that you like things that other people don't like - and they'll like things you don't like?
... but if they're just providing things that others enjoy, why attack it simply because you dislike it?
Just like stand-up comedy, some artists may not do things you like
- Nec Impar Pluribus, or so I'm told.
This critic is overrated.
His clichéd response to this article was predictable and boring. Possibly a troll, but an unoriginal one if so.
In contrast to XKCD's silly simplistic cliches, I'm sure you provide sophisticated, insightful, and compelling commentary three times a week. What's your site, again?
Randall Munroe is an embarrassing illustration of the mediocrity of the average modern nerd.
Sounds like you have trouble with him being successful more than him being mediocre. What's wrong? You sound moderately mad at least, one could go as far to say as that you're fuming in mediocre teenage rage.
He may be overrated, but he's still mildly more entertaining than your mediocre rants about him being overrated.
Now, off you go, go troll 4chan or something. Seems a more appropriate place for the likes of you.
I find many of his comics to be creative in a way that stretches my brain.
For example the recursive WikiLeaks comic, the dnd game with death, "something is wrong on the internet", and others.
I agree that I find some other writers more emotionally effecting (The story of Miko in Order of the Stick literally made me cry-- over stick figures!) or more creative and artistic (Questionable Content) but XKCD is +5 Insightful compared to those. He's a mirror on society- not a story teller so much.
If he wrote SF it would mostly be hard SF I think.
And his illustrations (Cancer, Radiation, Ocean Depths) are spectacular and unique. Here he shows a singular talent.
I think only someone who was in the vast minority or extremely jealous would call Munroe embarrassing. But, as I found in leading MMORGS guilds, there is always "that guy" who will argue with you about anything. Even if you want to give him a $20 bill. I guess you're "that guy".
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Randall Munroe is an embarrassing illustration of the mediocrity of the average modern nerd. He says nothing which isn't either cliche or oversimplified.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks, and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
In my experience, people who like to make claims that so and so is cliche or oversimplified are people who are just not smart enough to understand the art or the topic at hand. They think they understand it, but they don't.
Speaking of understanding things, xkcdsucks is a great example of Poe's Law. I really have no idea if those bloggers actually dislike xkcd or are huge fans making fun of people who complain about it. I mean, they complain about the lack of originality in Randall's stuff by making posts such as:
1224. What is even the point of this? F
1225. What is even the point of this? F
1226. What is even the point of this? F
1227. What is even the point of this? F
1228. What is even the point of this? F
yes you are way off-topic.
Apology NOT accepted.
Well, he's no Ernie Bushmiller that's for sure.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks [blogspot.com], and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this
Trolls are everywhere.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks, and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Hey, look at me! My opinion is valid because I found a website that says the same thing.
The Oatmeal. Also I've written a lot of South Park fanfic, which is a hell of a lot more than xkcd does.
...can someone summarize what is so special/interesting about the 'Time' comic.
I don't have time to look through it myself, and the summary isn't clear on this.
Thanks a lot.
An interview with Randall Monroe by someone who doesn't know we've deciphered Linear B. WTF.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks, and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Hey, look at me! My opinion is valid because I found a website that says the same thing.
I'm making a sig out of that.
and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Nope, there are two of you. You should start a (the?) local chapter.
GStreamer - The only way to stream!
I personally think that xkcd is excellent comic, however something in me constantly rings that it is so reminiscent to Calvin & Hobbes. The pacing, the drawing style, storytelling... I mean, Randall has himself said that C&H is one of his favorites, but it really shines through, maybe bit too much. Ah well...
And how long has writing existed for?
Randall Munroe is an embarrassing illustration of the mediocrity of the average modern nerd.
Long enough that we figured out you don't end a sentence with an unnecessary preposition. Talk about embarrassing mediocrity. You can't even muster a proper sentence with which to condemn your betters.
Are you too stupid to do your own research?
NSA responds to the spying controversy: "How many government organizations have you lead? Huh? [sound of farting into mic]"
Embarassing?
By stating this you agree that there's some guideline or standard that should be adhered or listened to if someone is going to be a "nerd."
By stating this you believe that you, in fact, are a "nerd" and this guy who makes a highly popular webcomic is steadily reducing your credibility among all the other "nerds" out there. You believe that every time someone interacts with you, they are secretly comparing you to one Randall Munroe.
What. The. Hell.
You were never obligated to read the comic, why do you care to even comment about it? Everything you say is nothing but opinion. If you don't like it, go elsewhere. For every time you don't laugh, 5 other people do and they are the people he's catering to.
Let me put this in more explicit terms for you.
Is this enough to understand why his "5,000 years" statement is nonsensical?
Indeed, there is only one way to ensure our civilization survives: we must destroy all written records!
Who wants links to someone's stuff, if they are so unoriginal they have to use characters someone else created?
I can understand liking stories someone writes about characters/stories I like to enjoy. But his claiming he does more than xkcd just because he writes "a lot of" plagiarized stories is just lame.He thinks he does more work than Randall Monroe just because he spews a lot of crap onto pages.
I wonder if a plot point in his work has ever been the future time-frame for a star going nova. Not simply "a star just went nova, here's stuff that happened." But actually figuring out which star that is well known by modern sky-watchers, amateur ones especially, will give the clue necessary to pinpoint the story to 11,000 years from now, and not millions or billions of years, when many stars we know will have ended,.
I doubt any of his shit is that original.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
"...although I don't think I'd be as blunt and unpleasant about it as the OP was"
So you're a kinder, gentler troll?
Fine. What about the comics he makes that have nothing to do with computers?
He did ones about Money, Gravity Wells, and Non-Technical Rockets. He had one you had to mouse through that was a couple miles wide, and referenced many of our favorite geeky cultural icons. So go be a sysadmin because you like computers. We'll go enjoy something we like, such as a webcomic.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
OK, that one made me laugh. Thank you.
He's a blowhard for sure, but you're no better. My advice, find a dictionary and look up "plagiarized." That's your personal Word of the Day.
So, uh, 5500 years then. Sounds like an inconsequential difference to me.
This is the sort of bloody nonsense on my lawn up with which I will not put.
Perhaps because that wasn't IN your post?
xkcd is overrated (Score:1, Insightful)
by Joining Yet Again (2992179) Alter Relationship on Saturday August 03, 2013 @09:32AM (#44465073)
And how long has writing existed for?
Randall Munroe is an embarrassing illustration of the mediocrity of the average modern nerd. He says nothing which isn't either cliche or oversimplified.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks [blogspot.com], and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
and it usually makes you think in order to 'get it'. But this one, I dunno. It was never funny, obviously in the future (regardless what extreme calculations were made for the night sky scene) and ended like a bad movie. There was never an overall point (unless I missed it) and I feel like I looked at it in hopes of something that wasn't. I'll bet many others were like me in that they watched it, waiting (as instructed), only to find out that it was a big fat bitch, sorta like "The X Files". I did think the way the one character's accent (the one that spoke multiple languages), or way of speaking (how he blurred the letters, and added multiple synonyms etched over each other), really neat, and well thought out.
That being said, his comic is really funny, when it's funny.
Fans had already figured out that it's 39,5 North on April 10th 13291.
Randall Munroe is unique because he combines skill in the arts, knowledge, humor and accessibility. In each of these areas separately he might not stand out (for the first two, consider map-making and infographics).
NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
We should carve thisxkcdinto granite tablets so the future can have something to look back on and be amused.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks [blogspot.com], and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Wait a minute... you thought that you were the only person who disliked a particular website?
From the BBC article you linked to ...
The Harappan language died out and did not form the basis of other languages.
Dr Meadow: "The earliest inscriptions date back to 3500 BC."
"So probably we will never know what the symbols mean," Dr Meadow told BBC News Online from Harappa.
What historians know of the Harappan civilisation makes them unique. Their society did not like great differences between social classes or the display of wealth by rulers. They did not leave behind large monuments or rich graves.
They appear to be a peaceful people who displayed their art in smaller works of stone.
Their society seems to have petered out. Around 1900 BC Harappa and other urban centres started to decline as people left them to move east to what is now India and the Ganges.
So in this case, the civilisation lasted for less than 5000 years...
(Just for reference, here's the original quote you had an issue with: Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years.)
He said that " Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years". He didn't say that no writing had lasted for more than 5,000 years.
The article doesn't note whether the civilization that created the writing is still around or if it lasted 5,000 years,
Trick question!
Chefs don't eat out!
When I first saw the comic progressing, I thought of this book by Kim Stanley Robinson. A couple meets on the beach, explores a strange world, and discovers who they really are.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
but omitted to address the question I posed which shows why his "5,000 years" argument is nonsense.
He wrote "Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years"
Which civilization with written records has existed for more than 5,000 years?
but Randall's Time comic was a lame waste of time, not much depth there.
Also amusing yet sad Munroe, who has studied physics, would believe the lame nonsense that we've stripped all easily retrievable hydrocarbon fuel so could not reboot with an industrial revolution again. Besides the fact we have coal supply sufficient for millennia, there are at least two other ways civilization can be powered up again. Materials and energy, the two things that drive technology forward, we won't lose either one even if civilization falls.
First, not everyone is rushing to defend him. Some don't like the comic either. Most of those people make better points than you could.
As to your "question I posed which shows why his "5,000 years" argument is nonsense."
And how long has writing existed for?
You must not be able to read correctly. His quote is:
Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years;
He isn't saying that no one ever made a mark on a stick to keep track of how many sheep he has. He is specifically saying "written records", meaning things the civilization is keeping from generation to generation. Whether heroic stories or family inheritence or tax receipts.
Now looking at Wikipedia's "History of writing" article, it points out the invention of writing at 3200 B.C.* So maybe Randall should have rounded differently, or said "about 5000 years" rather than "less than 5,000 years". But that is more a rounding error than your proof of his mediocrity.
*Note: I don't use BCE in place of B.C. As a non-religious person, I don't care which church made the calendar I am used to using. They can peg 'Year 0' at whatever point they want. Labeling the years before that as 'Before (our messiah)' is not offensive. What I find unacceptable is scientists who won't use B.C, because that implies a religious influence which they can't accept, but whose solution is is to change it to BCE and keep the dates exactly the same.
If you don't want to use B.C. because it stands for "Before Christ", and as an atheist that offends you, fine, you have the right to make whatever calendar you want. But be more original that simply removing the periods and adding the letter E, and calling your result "Before the Common Era". You are still saying the Common Era starts with the birth of Jesus, and your calendar starts with (or near) that event. You are agreeing to tie yourself to the church, while acting like you won't stand for it. (Does this offend Muslims as much as it does me?)
I would be fine if the authorities created a new calendar numbering plan that started at the dawn of civilization. Unfortunately, the only time I saw that plan, it was to pin 'Year 0' at 10,000 B.C. So then, to convert from today's date, you would simply add a '1' to the front, and go from 2013 to 12013. So they are still making what they claim to be scientifically valid choices based on the church's calendar.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
That's not even remotely the question. Writing is a red herring - it is just a qualifier to the assertion that civilizations appear to have a limited shelf life. Maybe the current global civilization will exceed that, but one out of the many that have existed, is optimistic.
Every civilization [with written records] has existed for less than 5,000 years; it seems optimistic to hope that the current one will last for 10,000 more .
While everyone else hates on your for your personal taste, I merely want to point out how you failed to parse grammar.
Too bad isn't it that Randall doesn't share your particular irrational hysterias? I can manage even when people don't agree with me 100%, but I guess some people are more delicate.
As to Randall's nuclear apology chart, you can find it here.
I'm using the word "plagiarized" in the sense that the names and places he uses are not his own. Everyone who uses a line like, "You bastards. You killed Kenny!", is plagiarizing South Park.
Going to http://www.merriam-webster.com/ it gives the definition of "plagiarize" to be:
to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own
He certainly is using someone else's creation, and claiming his fanfic as his own.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
I'm going to blow your mind right now. I mean seriously mind-fuck material. Want to know how to earn a bazillion dollars? I'll tell you. It takes work, and it won't happen overnight, but it is like printing your own money, only legally.
Take one idea that seems to have a fan base. One single thing that a large group of people agree is a good thing. Any group of people, any object of affection.
Make a web site dedicated to pointing out all of the flaws, inconsistencies, errors, fails, and general pointlessness of that thing. You don't even have to agree with yourself. Just hate something - vehemently and consistently, except for a few occasions when you pay a back-handed compliment.
And the magical part - allow comments.
People who don't agree will post raging apoplectic fits on how wrong you are. Your fans will post raging apoplectic fits on how wrong your haters are. Non-participants will hit your page daily just to see their "avatars" fight, regardless of their chosen side. Through all of this, you will get PAGE VIEWS which turn into ad revenue. You will have eyeballs, and dollars.
Cafe Press will have "Joining Yet Again is retarded" coffee mugs, and "Joining Yet Again is the new Christ" napkin holders, under your control and out of your control. You will be the messiah and the anti-christ, and rich beyond your wildest dreams.
And you don't have to be honest once.
Here's another tip that will blow your already blown mind. Other people have figured this out already.
And finally, since I'm basically retirement planning for you now, doing it on Slashdot earns dollars for Dice, not for you. How did you earn two replies today? You are a spectacular idiot - a shining example of how not to think, and how not to post. The rarest of the rare, a genuine failure pile. And I stopped to help you be less failtastic, or at least encourage you to be failtastic somewhere else, like in a closet with no internet connection.
Perhaps it's due to the interference of a tinfoil hat, but we cannot read your mind. You must actually write down any questions you wish to pose.
Christ on a stick. See above.
He certainly is using someone else's creation
Where does standing on shoulders of giants (as Bernard of Chartres put it) end and misappropriation begin? Where should it?
So is it a red herring, or a qualifier to the assertion?
Humans haven't been forming civilisations with written records for more than five thousand years, so of course none has existed for more than five thousand years. Clear enough, ya oik?
Christ on a stick. See above.
Sorry. That's just a pet peeve of mine. Since the article I mentioned used the "BCE" tag, I didn't want to change it without explaining why. It did go longer than I planned at the start.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
I highly doubt you author The Oatmeal; you have too high an opinion of yourself for that to be plausible.
I found XKCD in the mid thousands, and am always amazed at the various topics.
The "Blow-Dryer in a Box" What-If was a major point of discussion between the Engineers and Physicists, but everyone agreed with Monroe in the end, lol.
Finding the tiny velociraptor profile in my Monday morning slide is a regular contest now...
I hope XKCD lasts another few decades, at least. :)
Truth isn't Truth - Guliani
Trick question!
Chefs don't eat out!
not what your mama said!
Which civilisation involving bipeds has existed for more than 50 million years?
You appear to be confusing "civilization" with "species".
A human civilization is vaguely defined as people living in a place (in city or larger states), with a language and system of writing, set of beliefs and culture.
Taking the long view of human history civilizations get wiped out all the time, and none of the previous civilizations have lasted all that long.
Every civilization with written records has existed for less than 5,000 years; it seems optimistic to hope that the current one will last for 10,000 more ...
I have a few quotes to share about that.
"Not for the first time I felt myself confronted by the dizzying possibility that an entire episode in the story of mankind might have been forgotten." -- Graham Hancock
"In short, we appear to be approaching the end of the line. We cannot expand; we seem unable to intensify production without wreaking further havoc, and the planet is fast becoming a wasteland." -- James Serpell, In the Company of Animals: A Study of Human-Animal Relationships
"Evolution has developed (or the Creator created, as you will) millions of species of organisms on the globe. They all have their own culture, business life, love life, joys and sorrows. The swelling mountain, at this moment already of three hundred billion kilos of human flesh, is suffocating all these sisters and brothers underneath it - and choking itself only among the last. What is the ratio of matters and meanings, what is the ratio of mishaps?
Yet a little detail: what is the part of someone who is a friend of nature? Does he first suffer the tragedy of his own species in his mind, and then a tragedy a million times larger?" -- Pentti Linkiola, The World's End Knows No Mercy
âoeThe coming years will prove increasingly cynical and cruel. People will definitely not slip into oblivion while hugging each other. The final stages in the life of humanity will be marked by the monstrous war of all against all: the amount of suffering will be maximal.â â Pentti Linkola, Can Life Prevail?
"To date, the hunting way of life has been the most successful and persistent adaptation man has ever achieved. Nor does this evaluation exclude the present precarious existence under the threat of nuclear annihilation and the population explosion. It is still an open question whether man will be able to survive the exceedingly complex and unstable ecological conditions he has created for himself. If he fails in this task, interplanetary archaeologists of the future will classify our planet as one in which a very long and stable period of small-scale hunting and gathering was followed by an apparently instantaneous efflorescence of technology and society leading rapidly to extinction." -- Lee and Devore, Man the Hunter
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks, and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Hey, look at me! My opinion is valid because I found a website that says the same thing.
His opinion is as valid as yours.
Sheesh, xkcd is just a web comic. Some people like it, some don't, some (like me) find it hit or miss. But why can't people just disagree and leave it at that? It's a freaking comic.
#DeleteChrome
I'm making a sig out of that.
Make sure it links to a website that says the same thing.
And nobody figured out the hashes he used. Were they a hashed form of the date? The frame number? A combination of both?
One of my favorite books is Gibson's pattern recognition. The footage is being released in spurts, tracked by a community of people who want to know what's going on, who have their own theories, who love the work and its creator.
I think Time is as close as anyone has come to replicating that.
Which civilisation involving bipeds has existed for more than 50 million years?
I think all y'all are gloriously missing the point.
That's because even with 10 or so posts
you have so gloriously failed to make it.
I wrote most of it.
the preposition rule is often trotted out by dumbfucks who never learned anything beyond 3rd grade grammar. that is, it doesn't actually exist. unless maybe you're speaking oratorial latin from centuries ago. which we are not doing.
all the easily accessible copper, iron, oil and coal are depleted. We can get at relatively inaccessible sources, however, starting from stick and stoned ,,, forget it. Don't like xkcd? Don't read it. I and others will keep reading it whether you llike it or not. Sorry to burst your grandeur bubbles.
I think you found the wrong site. The better one (with real content, real commentary) is at http://xkcd-sucks.blogspot.com/ (note the hyphen).
Looks like it has gotten a different writer, though. It used to be much better in 2011 and 2012.
I thought I was alone in this until a few weeks ago I found a site called xkcdsucks, and it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Hey, look at me! My opinion is valid because I found a website that says the same thing.
I'm making a sig out of that.
I want a t-shirt that says that.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
No! He can't do that. Can't you see? Someone on the internet is wrong!
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
> Long enough that we figured out you don't end a sentence with an unnecessary preposition.
Fuck you, and the horse on which in you rode!
I adore the way people abuse meta-moderation by marking several unmoderated posts in a row as Overrated when they don't like someone.
And you know this because...?
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
His opinion is as valid as yours.
I'm not so sure, there wasn't a reference to a website.
It is what it is.
And yet you find it worth your time to tell other people that xkcd isn't worth your time. Funny, that.
You are a sysadmin and you don't like xkcd? I'm guessing you missed this one, because all the sysadmins I know have printed it to their doors/walls:
http://xkcd.com/705/
Sheesh, it's an argument, some points are insightful, others are a little over the top and baitish. But why can't people just let each other discuss why they have differing opinions and attempt to enlighten themselves?
Marking an unrated post as overrated is a nonsense, isn't it?
oblig: http://xkcd.com/386/
I'm using the word "plagiarized" in the sense that the names and places he uses are not his own. Everyone who uses a line like, "You bastards. You killed Kenny!", is plagiarizing South Park.
Good luck making that claim hold up. The line you quote has for a long time been a standard parodic cliche. The thought that anyone would fail to recognize the source is laughable. You might as well claim that writing "Veni, vidi, vici" without attribution is plagiarism.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
seems p.clear to me
as far as we know, humans havent been writing for more than 5000 years
so it would be unlikely to find one example of a civilisation which writes lasting more than 5000 years
it would be like using the first million years of earth's existence to argue that no way could evolution create something as complex as the human brain
hth
it appears I'm not alone in thinking this.
Well, yeah, the vast majority of people just think it's yet another webcomic and don't care.
Randall Munroe is an embarrassing illustration of the mediocrity of the average modern nerd. He says nothing which isn't either cliche or oversimplified.
He is extremely good at reciting conventional wisdom, and is often very quick when the issue is topical. For instance, after Fukushima, he very quickly had a comic comparing levels of radiation.
That's why I liked it at first as a rather clever webcomic, but then fans started posting "obligatory XKCD" everywhere. Discussion on SQL tables? Here's strip 1234 about Bobby Tables. Talking about encryption? Sure enough, here's 2345 about how someone could just beat you up and steal your password.
What's embarrassing is the responses to your post: all the defenders keep claiming that XKCD expands their mind or is very challenging to read... it's all stuff they already believe, and almost always already know! He's just extremely adept at putting what they want to hear in a nice comic-y bullet form.
It's probably a bunch of meaningless gibberish but I don't think we can afford to take any chances. I'm going to accept it as my new religion and id suggest you all do the same.
More offensively, it suggested that the preposition was "unnecessary", i.e. that "exist" is transitive.
+5 for a mistaken correction, and (0, Troll) for me for pointing out that the correction was wrong: xkcd fanboys are almost perfectly delusional.
I have to agree. This is a 3 minute cartoon that was stretched out over much longer for no particular reason. Nothing that would be considered 'epic'.
I'd buy it!
I'm dismayed to see how many comments on the Wired piece and here on Slashdot say such shallowly bad things (it is not criticism, so I won't call it that) about xkcd and this particular project. Do these commentors not know how hard it is to make a thing? Art? Computer programs? New ideas? Try it. Dedicate yourself to something for days, weeks, years. You will see. Never mistake the common phrase "they make it look easy" with "what they are doing is easy". Try to learn and always remember that things that matter are always way harder than they look like they'll be, and the disparity between these two is sometimes the greatest for the very best things.
xkcd and the 'Time' project are not perfect because perfection is unattainable. But I submit that Munroe is a serious artist: he is impressively prolific, and his creations are often deep, thought-provoking, and simply beautiful and fun to look at. Just look at some of the time slices on their own merits, independent of what you think of the story. Are not some of the silhouetted scenes simply wonderful to explore with your eyes?
Now be inspired and create something of your own.
Led. The past tense of 'lead' is 'led.' HTH, HAND.
I find that The Oatmeal is even worse than xkcd at talking down at me, and takes weird viewpoints on stuff and then expects everyone to agree as it's "a universal truth."
Unity? Screw that: XFCE. Slashdot Beta? Screw that: SoylentNews. Australis? Screw that: Pale Moon. UX developers DIAF
This is coming from the guy who has several clauses lacking verbs in his response...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_Law
Unity? Screw that: XFCE. Slashdot Beta? Screw that: SoylentNews. Australis? Screw that: Pale Moon. UX developers DIAF
Oh wow, you're right! There is an XKCD comic with that as its punchline. Imagine that!
In several of Isaac Asimov's stories, he used a dating system measured from the first nuclear test: years were measured in the "Atomic Era" (presumably A.E.). That's probably as good a measure as any, and at least it can be precisely placed.
In at least one of Vernor Vinge's stories, when humanity has spread out over multiple stellar systems, and there's no longer anything special about the Earth year, they still all measure time with the basic counter returned by time(): in seconds in the Unix epoch, although they've lost track of exactly how the counter started, believing it to be the date of the first moon landing.
In any case, I agree that changing A.D. to C.E. is trivial and pointless.
I don't want to piss on your unusually coherent and impacting rethoric but "ranting because I feel like it" is as valid a thing as "eating donuts because I feel like it". Some people feel the need to do that for whatever reason. You seem to imply that the service provided by a person facilitating that is somehow valueless when the value of that service rests entirely in the minds of the user.
"Loving computers for being computers" without becoming mystical seems hard to me. The whole point with computers is that they compute, which is an activity with many yet to be developed applications. Computers have also transformed society. If you can't see the mystique in that, perhaps you need to remove your tie and partake of drugs.
So, a script which lasted for 3500 years, stopped being used, and is undecipherable because it did not survive is the basis for arguing that written languages have survived longer than 5,000 years? Show me a written language that is/was still in use 5,000 years after its creation.
Bitter and proud of it.
So, you're offended by "BCE".
Ha.
He isn't saying that no one ever made a mark on a stick to keep track of how many sheep he has. He is specifically saying "written records", meaning things the civilization is keeping from generation to generation. Whether heroic stories or family inheritence or tax receipts.
Also, if we were 5000 years into a 123,000,000 year civilization, The current observation would be the same, but imply the opposite of reality. Thus the observation, no matter how accurate, is meaningless.
Learn to love Alaska
But the existence of someone else with a different opinion means someone thinks I'm wrong. That's insulting. If they were as smart as me and knew what I know, they should have the same opinion. Fuck you and your "tolerance". We don't allow that on the Internet.
Learn to love Alaska
There is no year 0. You've got a starting point, from which you proceed timewise to reach a full year. The period from start to end is year 1. 0 is a point, not a duration. This is very, very, simple counting, not even rising to arithmetic, really. Arithmetic can, and is, used for doing calculations - "I'm two years older than you." and the like.
Think of a calendar as a measuring stick, such a yardstick or ruler that just gets longer. The end of it, from which you read off to get to 3 1/4, is your 0. If you want to go backwards from an event, in this case the reference event, take another ruler and abut it to the first. Again notice there is no distance of 0, it's just a reference point, the end of the stick.
How all those folks ended up saying 2000 was the end of the 20th Century was simply because they couldn't be bothered to think about counting but got hung up on trying to fancify it with arithmetic; that, and the fascination with big round numbers - same thing happened in A.D. 1000. (It bothered me a bit at the time, still does in some ways, but then I figured that I had two millenium parties to attend, and I became less bothered;-)
Another quick way to illustrate this: give someone a bunch of pebbles or whatnot, ask him to count out aloud ten into a separate area. Most people will say "One, two, three," etc. How many people do you know will well and truly pick up the first object and say, "Zero"? None, unless maybe he's the sysadmin detailed in the old joke from rec.humor.funny. Ergo, no year 0. Again, the years are counting, not math. Calendars are all just and only about counting the tick tocks of the existence and duration of something.
(That's another thing: if one wants to get really pedantic about it, dates ought to be given as [year]B.C. before the birth, and A.D.[year], since A.D. is Anno Domini - "In the year of Our Lord." Very old texts get it correctly; I haven't looked into it but guess it changed over the past couple hundred years.)
Precisely. And a punny reference as well into the bargain.
Re:xkcd is overrated , posted to Creator of xkcd Reveals Secret Back-story of His Epic, 3,099-Panel 'Time' Comic , has been moderated Overrated (-1).
Beautiful :)
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
Even at -1, it is too high...
Learn to love Alaska
Yeah, the Cole was never attacked because the surveillance caught them.
Learn to love Alaska
Chill out, man. The original point is not that it's "unlikely" that humans will sustain a civilization for 10,000 years more, only that that's "optimistic". The (admittedly pessimistic) idea that the current civilization will collapse was used to write a story about the hypothetical civilization that will come after this one. That's all.
(By the way, "civilization" usually implies "having a writing system", so it's weird to say "civilization that writes". In the same vein, you should understand "every civilization with written records" in the author's quote to mean "every civilization that we know about because we have records about them", not "every civilization that had writing").
There are some pictographs that convey language and knowledge which are older than 5,000 years. The oldest writing of any kind dates back to about 40,000 years ago (admittedly not really writing in the sense of a Charles Dickens novel, but knowledge preservation none the less).
I'd agree with you though in general terms that written language is a comparatively modern accomplishment (compared to how long mankind has been on the Earth) and coincides with the construction of permanent cities. 5,000 years (give or take a few thousand in either direction) is nothing compared to over five million years or the nearly 5 billion years that the Earth has been around.
OK, I see what you meant. I forgot the 'overrated' tag bypasses meta-moderation. I thought you meant the abuse happened during meta-moderation, which didn't make sense to me.
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
I was tolerant of your posts until you started changing other people's words in your quotes so as to attack them. I gave you the benefit of the doubt on the trolling accusations, but you slipped up pretty big once you went down that road. The sad thing is that once you're outed as a troll, you lose your troll powers (at least, for the current thread.) Looks like you lost this one. Better luck next time, I guess.
For a dollar?
His opinion is as valid as yours.
I never said it wasn't. I was simply making fun of OP for attempting to make it appear as if his is somehow more valid than mine simply because he found a website.
..yeah, nah, you're an oozing pustulous cunt, plain and simple. Let's see what you've written/created, I'll bet you create nothing, so how about you shut the fuck up?
wow - you are claiming everyone's work now? What is your byline on that forum?
Do you really believe that nonsense?
That you can not infer things by observing them?
That proposing a straw man non-sensical future fantasy can make actual learning and knowledge "meaningless"?
What a bunch of tripe.
If the comment was we can unequivocally state that no civilization will ever last more than 500 years, then you
could make your juvenile retort, but since it wasn't, you fail at logic and science.
Either y'all lack wordplay humour, or you genuinely haven't figured out what I was saying. Yesterday I was giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, but today I'll talk in slightly more.. err.. straightforward terms.
mopower70 was making an unnecessary (or, strictly, wrong) proposition about an unnecessary preposition, because:
1) There is nothing wrong with a dangling preposition. English isn't a Romance language; and
2) The preposition is in fact necessary because "to exist" is not a transitive verb, to wit: one cannot say, "Writing has existed x years," but must say, "Writing has existed for x years."
So, it would have been a syntax error to remove the "for".
Is this sufficiently clear? The post wasn't a troll at all. It was correcting an incorrect correction.
That anyone would feel the need to "moderate" a discussion on a web comic is a simultaneously hilarious and horrifying illustration of the human condition.
Neither my dislike for this keloid on popular culture, nor the anguish felt by a whirlwind of fangirls hyperventilating that someone on the Internet is wrong, will amount to anything. Round the decay of our colossal wreck, boundless and bare, the lone and level sands stretch far away.
Ah, someone's awake this weekend - excellent :).
If you don't want to use B.C. because it stands for "Before Christ", and as an atheist that offends you, fine, you have the right to make whatever calendar you want. But be more original that simply removing the periods and adding the letter E, and calling your result "Before the Common Era". You are still saying the Common Era starts with the birth of Jesus, and your calendar starts with (or near) that event. You are agreeing to tie yourself to the church, while acting like you won't stand for it.
Except our best thought at the moment is that Jesus Christ was born in ~4 BC due to a cockup by Dionysius in 525 AD when he invented the whole BC/AD thing - the accepted range is 2 BC to 7 BC.
'Common Era' uses the same dates as the Gregorian Calendar because it was already in common use as a standard. We have two whole months added by the Romans, the whole calendar has been messed with something chronic repeatedly, and the days of the week are largely named after pagan Gods, yet that doesn't stop the Christians using them, nor does the fact that Jesus was already a small boy when Christ was 'born'. Our calendar is absolutely a mongrel of many different cultures and civilizations, and the Christians don't get to claim it as solely their own.
Some people just don't like putting 'in the year of our Lord, Jesus Christ' at the end of the date, given they may well not be Christians and Christ isn't actually their Lord. Thus Common Era - usage of which incidentally dates back to 1615 at least. Complaining about that seems about as worthwhile as complaining that people dare to use the Gregorian calendar without also personally celebrating Easter, given that's what the whole purpose of the many christian revisions of that calendar was for in the first place.
Remember kids, it's all fun and games until someone commits wholesale galactic genocide.
Or maybe they've seen enough of your posts to just single you out. Your misogynous slurs may not go unnoticed.
Learn to love Alaska
Misogynous? *scratches head*
Ooh, wait, is it "fangirls"? I had the option of "fanboys" or "fangirls", and I guess you're arguing that using feminine rather than masculine nouns when gender is irrelevant is misogyny? In your world, men the norm, and women are the special case, right? Sorry, bud, you've just drawn back the curtain to your own prejudiced thinking.
Or just "fans". Making the feminine the insult is common and misogynous. "Man-up" is also misogynist (implying a man is better than a woman). http://news.sky.com/story/1122559/liverpool-fans-banned-from-saying-man-up
Learn to love Alaska
1) "Fan" is neutral, while "fanboy" and "fangirl" are derogatory, reflecting the immaturity of the person to whom the label is being applied. "Fan" would have conveyed my message incompletely;
2) It is not "misogynist" to have chosen "fangirls", just as it would not have been misandrist to choose "fanboys". This notwithstanding, the habit of arbitrarily choosing male nouns/pronouns is far more of a problem in writing than that of choosing female nouns/pronouns. "He/she" is clumsy, so mix 'em, I say;
3) Not sure why you're talking about "man up", although I've always understood it to mean "don't act like a boy" rather than "don't act like a woman". "Woman up!" will also do, though it would be odd to say that to a man, because they don't identify as a woman. And, like the old saying goes, better to grow a vagina than a pair of balls, because balls are weak and sensitive, whereas vaginas can take a pounding.
As an aside, I have spent the last few months assisting someone who is writing a PhD thesis on the use of language related to mental health, and one of the important lessons which has come out is the extent to which particular groups (often but not always with good intentions) like to police language. In attaching unique derogatory meanings to words or phrases, they marginalise the groups they purport to help by painting a particular individual as the frequent target of insult/stigma when usually no attack is being made. Language is rather more complex than "that word always conveys that meaning so STOP USING IT NOW I SAY".
Interesting... I'd never seen that before.
He did screw up on the item in the green chart labeled "Extra dose to Tokyo in weeks following Fukushima accident". He wrote that as 40 mSv, while the graphic depicts 40 uSv, which, based on context, is probably the correct unit.
Oblig: http://xkcd.com/386/
Normal people worry me!
You just plagiarized every english text book there is. Idiot.
Seriously, it's a web comic, and it's not a very insulting one, so how can anyone hate it like that? What the hell is the matter with you? You are just a sheep looking to justify your weird ass fixation.
What did you bring that old quotes book you know I don't like to be read to out of up for?
[
But the existence of someone else with a different opinion means someone thinks I'm wrong. That's insulting. If they were as smart as me and knew what I know, they should have the same opinion. Fuck you and your "tolerance". We don't allow that on the Internet.
Best 5-sentence summary of the internet right here. Well, the part that isn't porn or cat pictures. 75% porn, 20% cat pictures, 5% this ^^^.
But in all seriousness, if people could understand that their life experience was not the authoritative example of the human condition and that therefore everyone who disagrees is wrong/stupid/evil, the world would be a better place.
Dear internet: don't take yourself so damn seriously. Look at some more cat pictures.
my, your, his/her/its, our, your, their
I'm, you're, he's/she's/it's, we're, you're, they're
Sorry, you are simply too dumb to understand the fine irony and humor of XKCD.
If you need a book of quotes to learn about that one, you should get out of the basement more.
You. Topical joke. Whoosh.