The Omega Essays Part 1: GOOMH

XKCD is a comic for nerds, written by a nerd. So what is a nerd?

To be a nerd is, apparently, to have: a love of sci-fi and fantasy and a blindness to the trash that permeates so much of both genres;  an almost fanatical appreciation of the scientific philosophy; a fondness for technology, even in its most worthless and wasteful forms; social awkwardness and poor hygiene; and an immature, sometimes almost dysfunctional, view of sexuality.

But these characteristics can be regarded as symptoms of two more fundamental traits, namely physical cowardice and intellectual egotism. This synthesis should not be particularly surprising - it remains the standard portrayal of a nerd in virtually all media. It is why you will hear nerds complain that all sports are a waste of time, but debating Joss Whedon trivia is not. It is the basis of the 'nice guy dilemma', where a lack of courage, confidence or assertiveness is viewed not as a failing, but as some form of intellectual and moral high ground. It is why anonymous debates on the internet inevitably spiral toward attempts to prove intellectual superiority, where the shit-flinging antics of status-challenging chimps seem like a Galilean dialogue by comparison.

Nerds are, in short, fairly contemptible, and it is for that reason that GOOMH-baiting in XKCD is so offensive.

Pandering to a particular demographic in and of itself is not annoying. PhD comics is quite well regarded, despite the fact it specialises in drawing out the laughter of recognition from post-graduate students. Penny Arcade and a thousand other webcomics are aimed solely at those who play video games, and it is not a matter of contention that they pander to the sensibilities of their audience. Stephanie Meyer, however, attracts veritable hurricanes of scorn for fulfilling the wishes of impressionable teenage girls, a social group that is considered misguided at best, and the cause of all cultural ills at worst.

And like the Twilight author, Randall compounds this problem by being so blunderingly cack-handed. To pander to the egos of nerds, he must make his comic obscure and difficult to understand. The difficult, but more elegant and artistic way to achieve this would be to make comics that are clever, and require some thought and understanding to unlock. The far easier way is to throw in references to things that are considered the domain of 'clever' people. We all know which method dominates xkcd.

Remember though, when you next complain about GOOMH-baiting - it is not so much the references, but the audience at which it is aimed that bugs you so much. You hate nerds, maybe you even hate the nerdish qualities in yourself, and that is why you hate xkcd. After all, if pandering itself were offensive, you would find the overwrought, pedantic and frequently inaccurate reviews found on this and other, similar blogs equally annoying, wouldn't you?

Comic 917: Cockroach exasperation

Sorry guys, no review today. The blog got hacked. :-(

Comic 916: Cockroach inconvenience

Alt-text: The safe is empty except for an unsolved 5x5 Rubik's cube.

If you have a really hard-to-break safe, people will assume that's where you keep your valuables!

Where's the funny, you hack! (SEE WHAT I DID THERE?!?!)

xkcd Forums Bingo: Week 4

#911 - Magic School Bus

This comic was late, but that didn't stop the forumites. The first fourteen replies were made before the comic even went up. Some people complained that this comic ruined a childhood memory. But our best C1 came from this post.

We even had C2 from when some people said the rocket in panel 3 reminded them of the rocket from Tintin's Destination Moon / Explorers on the Moon. I am now counting non-xkcd comics for the C2 square, just because.

We were so close this time. The only thing missing was the usually frequent B2 square.

#912 - Manual Override

A somewhat less enthusiastic effort that last time. We had a full-on explanation for A1 though. And E4 made its second consecutive appearance, with this guy complaining about people complaining about Fernie (aka Sirmustapha) complaining about the comic.

#913 - Core

E4 made its third appearance. Oh my, the trolls are popular this week. The joke was explained, Randall was in someone's head. Does this count as a quote pyramid. All sources point to: yes.

I'm still waiting for Leahcim to create a post that simultaneously marks off every square on the board. We can only wonder why he is keeping us waiting. Maybe one day he will tell us why.

Comic 915: Cockroach disaster

Alt-text: Our brains have just one scale, and we resize our experiences to fit.

This comic is pretty good, and if you don't like it there is something wrong with you.

Comic 914: Cockroach apocalypse

Alt-text: On the plus side, she wrote 'Welcome to the AAA Club!' in lipstick on the bathroom mirror, and left me a membership/roadside assistance card on the counter.

World's worst party. Reversal of urban legend ('kidneys gone, in tub of ice' becomes 'ice gone, in tub of kidneys'). Terrible parody of 'HIV club' urban legend in alt-text. Appalling artwork in last panel (bloody ice cubes?). Continued use of colour (minimal). Why beret guy? Character growth? Hahaha.

Maybe one day he will tell us why.

xkcd Forums Bingo: Week 3

#908 - The Cloud

Boring.

#909 - Worst Case Shopping

Boring...

#910 - Permanence

Boring!

You may have noticed the score cards are not in PNG format like I promised. Instead I uploaded them as super-compressed JPEGs, just because.

Maybe one day I'll tell you why.

Comic 913: Cockroach genocide

Alt-text: If you're a geologist or geophysicist and you don't introduce yourself by saying your name, then gesturing downward and saying "... and I study that", I don't know what you're doing with your life.

This comic contains mediocre artwork (how difficult is it to connect a head to a stick body?) and a bunch of mediocre jokes ham-fistedly jammed together. The last two lines are pretty much unnecessary, although removing them only marginally improves things.

More disturbing is Megan-o'-the-milky-nipples' role in all of this - her reactions seem highly unlikely given the creepy, stalkerish vibe, and the whole thing seems to suggest Randall is in dreamland again, wiling away his time thinking of his hot porn-star daughter and his lactating wife.

At least he didn't mention Wikipedia.

Comic 912: Plane wrong

Alt-text: I think you mean 'GNU Info Override'.

Randall has written a comic marrying a tasteless joke about the Air France crash with his inability to understand GNU packages. Unfortunately, he did not put this out as comic 911 and thus add an oblique reference to the 9th November attacks on the World Trade Centre, which could have alienated a much larger proportion of his audience.

Maybe one day he will tell us why.

xkcd Forums Bingo: Retro Edition 1

Since bingo seems to be the main thing that happens on this blog now, I'd like to bring you these occasional special editions covering older comics.

#610 - Sheeple

Yeesh, a 13 page argument veering off into politics. This sounds familiar. Yes, 603 (Idiocracy) produced a similar reaction on the forums. And that was only seven comics earlier. It was also my first bingo. No such luck this time.

The D2 box was mentally ticked off many, many times. I skimmed past most of the thread. One wonders why they bother to write such long posts if no one will read them. Then again, I am doing this during my holiday, so…

There may have been an A1, A4 or B4 during all that mind-screw, but it wouldn't have made a difference to the overall bingo-ness. The only single square that could have made a bingo was D3. And whilst a lot of the discussion was prompted by the alt text, no one came out in absolute adoration for it.

And speaking of comics from the 600s, let's have a look at the famous one, yes that one.

#631 - Anatomy Text (Warning: NSFW, especially page 6)

631 was a little before my time, so all of this discussion was brand new to me. I've decided this can be like a forum-watch for those who don't remember it either.

Thankfully there was no D5. We did get a B3 however:
"I have travelled from 1952 to tell you that it's a reference to a picture in one of Kurt Vonnegut's books."

E3 was more disturbing than usual:
"Hi joee. Wanna go to TGIF's? I'll bring the camera ;)"

This is just… what? I'm counting this for E4
"I do believe we have here a return to form for Randall. I wonder how the haters will try to justify their feelings now."

And with regards to A5, someone did actually say 'ever'.

This here is just a funny quote (assuming they were joking):
"FINALLY! An xkcd I can masturbate to. The Internet has came full circle at last!"

Ah, gotta love the conspiracy theorizing:
"Oh hey, what if Randall is planning on redesigning his site and this is his sneaky way of stopping people from viewing his site at work so he can drop IE6 support?"

We almost had a D2 from Fernie, but his reply was only 499 words.

And now to complete our retro edition with one of my favourite threads from when I used to be a fan.

#695 - Spirit

Hmm, closest we've had in a while. But no one felt the need to explain the joke, so that line will never be reached.

A5 was thoroughly covered, as was B4. A lot of people posted replies simply to say that the comic made them sad.

Our regular C1 slot was filled by Fernie. D4 happened because Randall accidentally a verb in the alt text. And A4 happened when someone couldn't believe no one had mentioned Asimov yet. And ooh, we haven't seen E2 in ages.

I still like this thread, which is why I'm not linking to the bad parts. Instead I'll link you to some of the remix comics people made.

Also, this fanfic (a late addition to the thread), was lovely. The xkcd forums aren't all bad.

Comic 911: Wikipedia again

Alt-text: At my OLD school, we used Microsoft Encarta 2005.

Randall has written a comic about an old TV/book series, and compared Wikipedia to flying around on a magic school bus that is capable of many wondrous, impossible feats. Unfortunately for us, Wikipedia does not have genitals, so Randall cannot use oral sex to express his appreciation and keep us out of the loop altogether.

Maybe one day he will find a way.

xkcd Forums Bingo: week 2

I love posting these on a Friday, right after Kitten(s) posts his meagre phoned-in review. That way they stay at the top of the blog for the whole weekend.

#905 - Homeownership

This post, just this post.

"I read that as "This house is a mine?" and was disappointed by the lack of Minecraft references."

B5 has hit a new low.

#906 - Advertising Discovery

A pitiful two pages worth of discussion, if that. And four squares is our lowest score ever. Should I be pleased?

#907 - Ages

C3 wasn't being serious, but I included it anyway. Am I desperate? And I was expecting 907 to be a high-scorer. Maybe the xkcd forumites have given up trying to annoy us, who knows. Maybe one day they'll explain why.

PS: after a comment left by Anonymous on Xkcdsucks main site, bingo next week is switching back to PNG format. I've found a better way to compress them.

Comic 910: Naming conventions

Alt-text: This hostname is going in dozens of remote config files. Changing a kid's name is comparatively easy!

Randall has written a comic detailing his cowardly inability to make decisions that are not easily reversed. Unfortunately, this has not stopped him from becoming a successful webcomic author.

Maybe one day he will tell us how.

Comic 909: Tat

Alt-text: Wait a minute. If I'm escaping from a submarine at 50 meters, then I'll *definitely* need a flashlight to find air pockets for gradual decompression on the way up. Time to start shopping professional dive lights.

Randall has made a disgusting, almost illegible comic mocking his readers' predilection for buying worthless, 'feature'-laden crap. Unfortunately, the mockery is given as empathetic camaraderie, rather than the vicious assault on stupidity it should be.

Maybe one day Randall will explain why.

Comic 908: Internets

Alt-text: There's planned downtime every night when we turn on the Roomba and it runs over the cord.

Randall has made a comic based on the IT Crowd episode about the internet. Unfortunately, he forgot to include an actual joke, or anything amusing at all.


Maybe one day he will tell us why.

xkcd Forums Bingo: week 1

It's the weekend, and you know what that means - more bingo!

#902 - Darmok and Jalad

Excellent work! It got a bingo in page one! I don't think this has happened before! We so excited!

Here's how it happened:

D4 - okay, this isn't technically referring to a typo, but pedantic - yes, and pointing out a word Randall did wrong - yes.

"At the risk of sounding like the Star Trek fanboy that I am, it's "Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra" not Kalenda's."

B2 and C3 in the same post - I'm quoting it here in its entirety, because it's so cute.

"I've just registered here, only to say the following:
I finally had my 'get out of my head' moment.

Several months ago, I started watching all the ST:TNG episodes, as I only ever saw the last two seasons. Today I have arrived at season 5, episode 2.
Then I opened xkcd.com.

I had shivers running down my spine. And spent the next three hours looking for any bugs or hidden webcams. Thank you, you've turned me into a basketcase. I await the kind white men.
I am serious. As much as the internet is filled with boasts and trolls ... I'm staring at the highlighted folder item right now ... It... Knows I'm here …"

E5 - several posts had this, and I chose this one.

"I... I don't think I quite understand the joke here."

A1 - I almost skimmed past it the first time, but this post has it. :-)

"Darmok and Jalad at Kalenda's is part of Randall's joke setup - the computer explains it as an after-party they had."

#903 - Extended Mind

Ughh, why did I read this. So many people posting lists of Wikipedia articles. Yes, we know 93% of Wikipedia articles have a chain of links that ends up in 'Philosophy'. You don't have to show us every time it happens, yeesh. And so, I just had to tick off D3, even though no one actually said 'I love this game', but since it motivated about 75% of the discussion, so yeah.

#904 - Sports

Boring! Although the quote pyramid was rather spectacular. Here's how big it got in the end.

Just to note, I've changed the squares A5 and D5 to better reflect what the forums have to say. The board's still skewed towards the left side. Maybe one day the forumites will explain why.

Comic 907: Sitcoms

Alt-text: Every age: "I'm glad I'm not the clueless person I was five years ago, but now I don't want to get any older."

Randall has succinctly captured the essence of every shitty, family-based sitcom in existence. Unfortunately, he has done so without a hint of irony.

Maybe one day he will tell us why.

Comic 906: Wikipedia

Alt-text: When advertisers figure this out, our only weapon will be blue sharpies and "[disputed]".

And again with the Wikipedia. Has he forgotten that other websites also contain information? That there is a whole internet's worth of flaky knowledge to check out? He probably does check numerous websites, but he has decided to focus on Wikipedia in his comic.

Maybe one day he will tell us why.

Comic 905: PPD

Alt-text: New research shows over 60% of the financial collapse's toxic assets were created by power drills.

Randall once again tells us that he is a child stuck in a adult's body. It's hardly news at this point.

More grievous is the final panel – I know and you know and everyone else knows that the final two lines of dialogue completely ruin the joke. I assume Randall knows as well, but he decided to put them in anyway. Maybe one day he will explain why.