XKCD

[MathGirl277]

XKCD by Randall Munroe, is an incredibly funny and interesting webcomic that updates Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. It coins itself as “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language,” and delivers on its promises. What I really like about it is that it features humor on both a level that an average high-school student could understand, and it features humor that requires some more in-depth knowledge (or a quick Google search) to get. It appeals to a large portion of nerd culture, and is quite witty and engaging.

The comic is set up as a series of individual comics with no underlying plot (although there are several recurring characters). It is not uncommon for people to read the whole archive, but it is by no means necessary to get any of the jokes. If you haven’t read it yet click here for the most recent strip.

[rj lake]

fuck xkcd

i've no problem with people liking it, but randall munroe is a lazy, complacent asshole. and that is my opinion about things.

first 200 strips are good, though

[MathGirl277]

I will agree that the quality may have decreased over time, but I think that the jokes are quite clever and the material is interesting. My sincerest apologies for having unintentionally offended you.

[Drillgorg]

I can always count on XKCD to give me something to go "heh" about (on good days.)

[ragmaan]

If you're talking about lazy, you best be talking about VGCats. Most anything else can't be called lazy in comparison to it.
And there are consistently funny comics, although not all are funny. But many are witty, and that's close enough in my expectations for the webcomic.

[Kazerad]

XKCD is pretty hit-or-miss with me. I really like the strips where he kind of pokes fun at his own interests, but in some of the others I just feel like he's trying to show off things he knows or believes in. Too much reliance on the "smart/right" character revealing something to the more "common" person, who's then like "huh, guess I was dumb".

Like, take this strip for instance. Why does the light-haired woman have to be like "huh, guess I was wrong"? Doesn't she know about things like liquidity, or how her rate compares to other savings accounts? At least in my opinion, the joke would've been funnier if the light-haired woman's reaction was to point out the naivety of the other girl's statement. A too much of the time it feels like Randall is idolizing people who try to "beat the system" when he should really be making fun of them.

[Avi]

What kind of sucky second-rate Avatar doesn't even know how many elements he's got?!

[ragmaan]

Well it can't be helped that the kid has only been alive for 12 years or so, and hasn't even had a regular education! I mean, he was practically raised by hippies. It's not his fault for his lack of knowledge!

My favorite strip is the one with the Emily Dickinson poem crossed with Grand Theft Auto. http://xkcd.com/788/

[MathGirl277]

I like the subtle and not-so-subtle recursion in this one. http://xkcd.com/688/

[Miff]

I'm probably one of the few people who honestly likes XKCD. http://xkcd.com/838/ is probably my favorite.

Also, has anyone else checked out Making XKCD Slightly Worse?

[Esrever]

the only thing xkcd is good for is getting you to google shit you don't care about

[SleepingOrange]

I used to utterly loathe the comic with a burning passion; it was so offensively mediocre that I could spend hours extolling the sins of individual strips and the comic as a whole; I could froth endlessly about exactly WHY putting a heart under a radical was such trite garbage and why any individual should feel bad about appreciating it; I would eagerly await new comics simply so that I could be angry at them and wax vitriolic. Now though, I simply can't muster the energy or the desire. It's been bad in exactly the same way for so long that there's no point in it anymore. All the punchlines are the same. All the strips are the same. There are three or four premises that Munroe has, and he's realized that people will eat them up forever and there's no reason for him to ever try new things. So he doesn't! I would have a difficult time deciding if "complacency" or "mediocrity" would be the one word I'd use to sum up the entire comic, but either one would fit.

xkcd is like the opposite of the theoretical joke postulated in this Dinosaur Comics strip: its appeal is that it's such bland, relatable pablum that it can be successful despite never achieving actual hilarity because everyone can read it and say "Okay sure". Its most insidious tactic is how consistently it puts the "smart", "nerdy" character on a pedestal and lets them shame the silly normies; everyone likes to think they're a cut above other people, and by appreciating all these math "jokes" and science quips and cult culture references people who read xkcd are suddenly better in their minds than the hypothetical people who just don't get it. I never thought I would see a project in any medium that was so ubiquitous and yet instilled in its readers such a sense of eliteness as xkcd. If I were the kind of person who believed in conspiracy theories, I would think xkcd was intentionally designed to maximize its appeal to the lowest common denominator and convince them that reading it made them smart, but as it is I simply think Randall Munroe is a spectacularly untalented man who manages to strike a chord with a lot of people and update consistently. Mostly.

In short, this is xkcd. It's desperately trying to pander to a nebulous group that a lot of people want to think they're part of, and in doing so it becomes cheap and bland.

[Wesley Foxx]

So what you're saying is its the Garfield of webcomics?

Personally I still find it enjoyable. *shrug*

[Triangle Man]

I mostly visit the site for the forums; the discussions conducted on them can be incredibly interesting and I figure I learn a bit from reading them.

The comic is also somewhat entertaining in my opinion, although it's decision to target a niche audience and then apparently go a little crazy over time means that it is...

...Well, based on this page it's going to piss some people off.

[Kazerad]

but as it is I simply think Randall Munroe is a spectacularly untalented man who manages to strike a chord with a lot of people

Striking a chord with a lot of people is a talent! Some might say "Pft I could do that", but they don't come to appreciate the nuances until they actually do try themselves.

I totally get what you're saying, though. Many of the strips seem like they're just trying to convince the readers that they are smart. The comic tries to make people feel good for knowing 2% compound interest doesn't amount to much more than 2%, or for using the word "element" to refer to modern physics rather than Aristotelean. Eventually you reach the age where being told you're Better Than Everyone Else just isn't as exciting as it used to be, and a lot of the strips lose appeal.

I like the subtle and not-so-subtle recursion in this one. http://xkcd.com/688/

I've always loved the last panel of this one though. Like usual, the best strips are really the ones where he shows how stupid and meaningless his own interests can be, rather than idolizing them.

[PetPeeve]

If you have to google the stuff in XKCD to understand it, then you're not the target audience.

[Walliard]

A sizeable chunk of xkcd is unfunny nerd-pandering, but there are a few good ones from time to time. I personally tend to like the strips that are graphs or charts of some sort (big surprise), not because they're funny but because they show an interesting point. And sometimes they can be funny regardless. But I feel like the ideas he has would be more suited to a blog than a comic.

Does Randall make a living off xkcd? Because that would definitely lower my opinion of it.

[tynic]

has done for some years, I believe.

[Walliard]

Welp, guess I have a lower opinion then. :/\

[Triangle Man]

Meh. It turns out that science-y people like science jokes and Randal is good at appealing to this audience. Although I'm not sure why he's choosing this comic as his primary source of income; maybe it's because of his ability to appeal to the audience that this is a feasible option, even though he strikes me as being more a scientist than a cartoonist...

And for some reason I'm reminded of another webcomic that provides the authors with enough income to survive. It's called The Wotch and depending on your opinion it is either worse than or on par to XKCD in terms of quality.

I'm sorry, why am I rambling again?

[-Benedict]

And I had such hopes that the authors had run away in shame, but nope, they hired another artist to do it for them. (Incidentally, City of Reality was actually pretty decent when it wasn't shoving its weird morality down your throat or indulging in creepy TF stuff.) Which, uh, kind of puts the colorist guy out of a terrible job, doesn't it? I never thought I'd say it, but that comparison is kind of an insult to XKCD. Worse than the actual insults to XKCD people spend their time making. Like it's been said: Munroe is an interesting and witty guy. What he isn't is a funny guy, nor is he a cartoonist. Which makes his decision to express himself through sequential art with punchlines completely baffling. He can't use his "minimalist" art to decent effect, harming what decent jokes he does have, and in trying to come up with a punchline three times a week he gets himself stuck in a corner on the opposite side of the room he needs to be on.
None of that, however, justifies comparing it to the fucking Wotch, holy shit. I mean, damn, dude, I didn't even want to remember that thing even existed.

[Triangle Man]

Oh Fuck Me.

Yeah, making that comparison was stupid of me. I actually think XKCD is okay and spend time on the forums so comparing it to that comic was just 100X stupid of me. I just brought it up because I remembered the comparison and used the language I did in a fucking misguided attempt at being 'neutral neutral' which I have got to stop doing.

Stupid, Stupid, Stupid.



Is there any way that I may restore my honor aside from apologizing?

[-Benedict]

Gahahahahaha, oh man, dude, I pretty much never stop laughing when people apologize for stuff they don't need to apologize for on account of it was a joke.

but yeah seriously never mention the wotch again or i will hunt you down and kill you ok

[Wesley Foxx]

Maybe a closer (but still unfairly insulting to xkcd) comparison would be Dominic Deegan. Supports the author, laughably stagnant & mediocre art.

[PetPeeve]

Of all the reasons to hate a comic, I think hating it because the author supports themselves with it is just about the worst possible reason. Seriously guys, what the hell?

Also, it's not nerd-pandering when you're an actual nerd. Using that "thinking", you should never write about anything you yourself know lots about.