kousha's blurblog

TV Problems
Wednesday November 16^th, 2016 at 1:25 PM

xkcd.com

Certified skydiving instructors know way more about safely falling from planes than I do, and are way more likely to die that way.

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kousha

2926 days ago

The hover text is icing on the cake.

Palo Alto, CA

3 public comments

emdeesee

2925 days ago

Live by the [noun], die by the [noun].

Sherman, TX

zwol

2926 days ago

I'm gonna blow up that last panel and put it on my office door.

Pittsburgh, PA

kousha

2926 days ago

I need a poster sized version...

taddevries

2926 days ago

Just Yes!

alt_text_bot

2926 days ago

Certified skydiving instructors know way more about safely falling from planes than I do, and are way more likely to die that way.

Datacenter Scale
Friday September 23^rd, 2016 at 5:19 AM

xkcd.com

Asimov's Cosmic AC was created by linking all datacenters through hyperspace, which explains a lot. It didn't reverse entropy--it just discarded the universe when it reached end-of-life and ordered a new one.

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kousha

2980 days ago

"Google Scale"

Palo Alto, CA

4 public comments

kazriko

2980 days ago

Great reference in the hover text.

Colorado Plateau

Covarr

2980 days ago

This makes me feel less bad about replacing my watch instead of replacing the battery.

East Helena, MT

JayM

2980 days ago

Ha! Hover text is funny.

Atlanta, GA

skittone

2980 days ago

Can't hover on mobile. EDIT: Thanks!

austinstorm

2980 days ago

On mobile you can long-press the image.

alt_text_bot

2981 days ago

Asimov's Cosmic AC was created by linking all datacenters through hyperspace, which explains a lot. It didn't reverse entropy--it just discarded the universe when it reached end-of-life and ordered a new one.

Marriage
Wednesday October 8^th, 2014 at 1:32 AM

People often say that same-sex marriage now is like interracial marriage in the 60s. But in terms of public opinion, same-sex marriage now is like interracial marriage in the 90s, when it had already been legal nationwide for 30 years.

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kousha

3697 days ago

The data tells an interesting story.

Palo Alto, CA

PeterParslow

3696 days ago

What story do you see?

thelem

3696 days ago

I see that ~10% of Americans don't approve of interracial marriage. As a brit born in the 80s, I didn't realise anyone still objected to interracial marriage.

jhronline

3696 days ago

Even more interesting is that the English language still uses terms like "interracial" to describe two humans (i.e. two beings of the same race) being married who happen to have differing skin color.

jad

3696 days ago

In 2012, 21% of polled British citizens agreed with a statement that said the growth of interracial relationships is a bad thing. (The language and tenor of the statement is significantly different than those asked in the US Gallup polls, but still "tells an interesting story" about ongoing British attitudes to mixed-race relationships.) http://www.britishfuture.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/British-Future-Polling-Charts.pdf

bcs

3696 days ago

The term "race" refers to subcategories of "spices" (at least with respect to the human species). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(human_classification)

kousha

3696 days ago

It's interesting that new laws in the 1960's were more progressive (with respect to popular opinion) than the laws now.

PeterParslow

3696 days ago

I speak only from GB. I see a story of conformity: when same-sex marriage came up here, it had the support of the media & top policitians. Anyone wanting the law to remain the same was effectively labelled a criminal, and in some cases excluded from 'the debate'. Faced with a rhetoric of hatred & violence, people quickly conformed to the new normality. I wonder if people would express reservations in even in a secret poll. Regarding inter racial marriage, there wasn't a law to change, but inter racial relationships seemed to become more common through the 90s. I'm a bit surprised by the poll jad reports, but then my samples never seem to be representative.

6 public comments

zipcube

3692 days ago

lol @sjk being an arch conservative idiot on yet another feed

Dallas, Texas

dukeofwulf

3696 days ago

Suggesting that gay marriage will lead to marriage with children and animals is patently ridiculous. Children and animals don't have the legal standing to enter into a marriage contract, full stop.

chillybasen

3696 days ago

yes, it's a classic slippery slope argument and is absurd. It was also used during interracial marriage and they all look like idiots now.

dukeofwulf

3696 days ago

Chilly, I'm sure they point at the current gay marriage trend as proof of the slippery slope. "See! We let the blacks murry our girls, and now the gays are getting uppity!" To some people, perverts are just perverts, whether your "fetish" is interracial, intra-gender, or inter-species. But the last time I checked, the one group most often associated with paedophilia is the clergy.

mvanzante

3696 days ago

I don't think animals and children are the next step, but I think there will be something. Close relations (siblings or first-cousins) marriages? After all, if you don't have to facilitate procreation to get married, then what's the problem? There was also an interesting This American Life recently where they talked with an individual who was struggling with a fetish for children and knew/admitted it was wrong. As a part of the story TAL mentioned that there are already folks calling for the lowering of the "Age of Consent" laws.

dukeofwulf

3696 days ago

Fair points. Cousins: that's more of a Western cultural taboo than a religious one; cousin marriage is fairly common (and even preferred) in other parts of the world. Age of Consent: there's hardly agreement on that topic, even in the US, where state laws vary from 16 to 18. Still, sexual consent is clearly different from marriage. But you're right, the separation of marriage from procreation will have HUGE (and long overdue, IMO) implications on our culture.

mvanzante

3696 days ago

I was addressing "moral decay" more so than marriage, hence the reference to age of consent laws.

sjk

3696 days ago

Where's the line depicting "marriage" with children and animals? That is the next step after "marriage" of one man and one woman being redefined as one human and one other carbon-based lifeform.

Florida

rraszews

3696 days ago

I hope this is heartening to people who feel like the progress of civil rights has been too slow or backsliding. I can't think of any time a major social issue like this turned around this quick without it involving a lot of bloodshed.

Columbia, MD

natw

3696 days ago

does DVD vs VHS count as a social issue?

rraszews

3696 days ago

We lost a lot of good men fighting the Format Wars

rtreborb

3697 days ago

Seems like an odd choice of content for an XKCD comic in that it's not tech related or really a "joke" but rather trying to get a message across. Just an observation.

San Antonio, TX

peterrecore

3697 days ago

It's data plus analysis. That is not a first for XKCD. There are plenty of non joke XKCD's in the archives - the "visualizing radiatation doses" one, the visualizing money one, the vertical measurement one showing how deep stuff is in the ocean, etc.

rtreborb

3697 days ago

@peterrecore True--good point.

tedder

3697 days ago

"People often say that same-sex marriage now is like interracial marriage in the 60s. But in terms of public opinion, same-sex marriage now is like interracial marriage in the 90s, when it had already been legal nationwide for 30 years."

Uranus

Regex Golf
Monday January 6^th, 2014 at 1:21 AM

/bu|[rn]t|[coy]e|[mtg]a|j|iso|n[hl]|[ae]d|lev|sh|[lnd]i|[po]o|ls/ matches the last names of elected US presidents but not their opponents.

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kousha

3972 days ago

Alt text: "/bu|[rn]t|[coy]e|[mtg]a|j|iso|n[hl]|[ae]d|lev|sh|[lnd]i|[po]o|ls/ matches the last names of elected US presidents but not their opponents."

Palo Alto, CA

2 public comments

mrobold

3971 days ago

I call problems like this "rabbit holing"

Orange County, California

tedder

3971 days ago

I love regexes.

Uranus

$99 ARM-based PC runs either Ubuntu or Android by Jon Brodkin
Sunday July 28^th, 2013 at 6:02 AM

A new ARM-based Linux PC with a host of capabilities—including Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, two Gigabit Ethernet jacks, and five USB ports—goes on sale next month starting at $99.

"Utilite," offered by Israeli company CompuLab, won't be as cheap as a Raspberry Pi, but the specs justify the cost. With dimensions of 5.3” × 3.9” × 0.8”, Utilite comes with a Freescale i.MX6 system-on-chip with a single-, dual-, or quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor (which uses 3-8 watts of power). It will have up to 4GB of DDR3 1066MHz memory, up to 512GB of SSD storage, and a microSD slot allowing another 128GB.

The PC can be purchased with either Ubuntu Linux or Android.

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