Pure geeky goodness

[nancylebov]

It seems to me that xkcd had been marking time for a while, but now we have




I suppose it makes sense in a way that the one about bra size is bimodal, but I have no idea what the cause might be.

Comments

[arashinomoui.livejournal.com]

My guess - C & D cups are ideal - if you have an A cup you are googling to find ways to increase your bra size, if you are E-F cup, you are googling to either find bras in your size or breast reduction surgery.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

My guess: the writer of xkcd thought it would be funny to make it look like breasts :-)

[lizw.livejournal.com]

Yes - there were in fact only 3,910 Google results for "I'm an E-cup" and 1,410 for "I'm an F-cup" when I tried just now. The numbers for A, B and C-cups are very broadly correct on the graph.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I'm going to post this to the xkcd comments.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I just checked, and I got 85k for "I'm an E cup".

It seems unlikely that the results are skewed by people checking on the cartoon.

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

Well, you could check on that by using the Date thingy on Advanced Search.

[lizw.livejournal.com]

Odd - I tried again and got 3,850. I don't have SafeSearch on or anything like that.

[siderea]

I'm getting 105k for "I'm an e-cup". Capitalization and punctuation don't change the results.

[richardthinks.livejournal.com]

I have no idea what "there are x lights" is supposed to refer to. Nor "I got 99 problems". Idiom fail?

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

It's a Star Trek Next Generation reference-- I wouldn't have gotten it except that I read the comments to the xkcd lj comment thread.

In other words, a lot of people got it, and a lot of people didn't.

Is there any sort of unitary culture any more?

[avram]

I don't really know that the US ever really had any sort of unitary culture.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Not completely, but it had something more like one when there were only three tv networks.

It's all be growing fragmentation since then, not that that's a bad thing.

Still, I would have thought that Next Gen was pervasively geeky enough that I'd be the only one who didn't get the reference.

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

Well, I think we're much better off than with the three networks. There are a lot of fragments, no, a lot of new starts, most of them authentic, homegrown. As they grow they or the best parts of them converge. No, not converge, but the bits of cream rise to the top and get shared by all.

We don't need to know where 'don't need no stinking /noun/' came from, it's got a life of its own now, from the many contexts it gets quoted in. Same with 'All are /adjective/ but some are more /adjective/ than others.' 'How many lights' may get that way too.

Heh, I'd like to see 'I'll draw the crossfire' get that status, among people who never even heard of Walton's HALF A CROWN, or even of Godwin.

G,D,R. Too much caffeine. I should log off.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I think we're better off on the whole. There are some advantages to a shared culture, though.

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

Shared as in 'A, agree about, take for granted as true' -- or shared as in 'B, know about, know what the person is talking about'?

Imo we have or are on the way to having a high degree of B with not so much A required. P2P -- people on all sides communicating directly with each other, rather than through gatekeepers. We can have informed disagreements and distinctions -- hopefully growing into worthwhile new (and continually updated) agreements.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I meant B.

I think B is declining. While there's more access to past video and music than there ever was, there's also just plain tremendously more stuff.

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

More stuff -- and more channels for P2P communication, without no stinkin gatekeepers. ;-)

[lizw.livejournal.com]

"There are x lights" is probably a reference to the ST:TNG episode "Chain of Command", in which Picard is shown four lights, but then tortured to try to get him to say there are five. That itself presumably draws on Orwell's 1984, where Winston Smith undergoes something similar with fingers rather than lights.

"I got 99 problems" is a line from a single by Jay-Z, which also draws on one by Ice-T.

[dcseain.livejournal.com]

"I got 99 problems and the bitch ain't one" from Jay-Z

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

Xkcd is always brilliant horror -- mixing Thing and People in the wrong way.