XKCD: It's more than a comic

So that's where Earhart went!

I've seen circular rainbows on more than one occassion. They generally require polarized sunglasses, and they are caused by high-altitude ice particles. You can only see them when the sun is relatively high in the sky.

Has xKCD ever had the main comic and the What If? be closely related topics this way before?

Also, what is the video that he vows not to reference?

edited 23rd May '16 6:54:37 PM by Catbert

I think it's not a coincidence. My theory is that Randall got asked the question, did some research on rainbows, learned that there are 5 of them, which inspired him yesterday's comic.

So is there really no name for [the other kind of planet]?

By the by the video he's swearing not to reference can be found by googling "double rainbow". It's a guy freaking out about seeing a double rainbow and was quite viral a few years back.

edited 24th May '16 5:55:49 AM by danime91

The standard term is probably "non-circumbinary".

So I just read about these five rainbows, and I've seen the fifth rainbow a bunch of times. Usually just a segment, but clearer than the photograph suggests. Not through polarized lenses, either. I wear high-index lenses (for nearsightedness), but surely that wouldn't make a difference?

And I swear I've seen more.

#1685: Patch

I'll be quite frank: while I understand the factual thing that Randall is proposing to do here, I do not in any way get why anyone would imagine that to be workable.

I think that might be the joke.

Some eye conditions or glasses can enhance certain things you can see. I have heard stories of people who could discern the refresh lines moving over a CRT monitor (as well as the lines themselves) after having their pupils dilated.

This is one of the times I have to go to Explain XKCD to find out what the heck is going on.

(edit) Aaand apparently the site's down. Can anyone here explain what all this is about?

edited 25th May '16 10:25:17 AM by KylerThatch

Photoshop's Patch tool attempts to paint areas with other parts of the picture based on context. You can see in the comic that parts of the code have been replaced by characters from elsewhere, presumably because the edges matched.

edited 25th May '16 10:27:51 AM by FuzzyBoots

I get it, but I don't find it especially funny.

They can't all be winners.

#1686: Feel Old

I guess this one is mostly true. I turned 18 in 2012, and I sort of remember 9/11; not really the attacks themselves, but our teacher showing us some pictures of planes and explaining what had happened. My mom and dad took me and my brother to the state fair later that day - not as a reaction, but because they'd been promising us for a few weeks that we'd be going then.

edited 27th May '16 2:26:33 PM by Sivartis

I don't remember at all how I learned about it — but I'm not American, and I was a kid, so it probably didn't hit me very hard at the time. I do remember the Toulouse AZF explosion, ten days later, which may have overshadowed it in my memories.

I remember seeing the news on TV, as well as the emergency presidential broadcast. Scary times.

I vaguely remember it. It happened when I was in kindergarten, though.

Can't say I have an issue with it being consigned to history instead of clouding our political views and stances, though.

I had a great day, it was my birthday, AND we went on a watersport excursion for gym that day. We only heard about it on the way back. I was 16 back then, and don't live in the US either.

I was at school when it happened. Went through first period without much fanfare, but my US History teacher in second period had somehow caught wind of it and had set the TV up on a news station, saying it was rather important that we see this since it was history in the making.

He was right.

I was at work, and so was my wife. Someone had the radio on and told us that there were reports of a plane hitting the WTC, but at first we thought it might have been a private plane that had some kind of accident. The news got more and more alarming as the day went on, until everyone stopped working and gathered in our president's office to watch the story unfold. My wife's office worried about evacuations in case there were more attacks; she worked pretty close to D.C. at the time.

I don't remember 9/11, being British and only 7 at the time, I remember 7/7 over here though. I know that my aunt (who lives in the states) would have been on a flight to New York that day if her flight hadn't been grounded for some reason before the attacks.

edited 27th May '16 5:03:34 PM by Silasw

I was in high school, and I got a call from my best friend before I left for school (maybe around 7-8 AM?). He was rambling something about airplanes and buildings, but it didn't seem relevant to me and I late for school so I just hung up on him. When I got to class, the teacher did some kind of moment of silence of something; I don't quite remember. Mostly I just remember thinking "oh, so that's what he was taking about."

I remember 9/11. It didn't mean much to me, though I felt bad for my teacher because her husband was there. He turned out to be okay though.

My family tried nagging me to watch the news when I got home but I wanted to play Harvest Moon instead.