the XKCD you can see is not the true XKCD

[khedron]

I read XKCD on Monday morning. Of course I did, I always do; it's a daily habit. And I saw the title, and I saw the hover-over text, and I thought, hm, that's mildly curious, but I didn't look further.

Apparently I was missing out.

The hover-text read:Umwelt is the idea that because their senses pick up on different things, different animals in

Comments

[reesei]

Huh. Since geographic location didn't significantly change, and I didn't change my browser window size, I didn't see those aspects. I did see it in multiple browsers and thought it was neat, but you were a bit busy over the last few nights so I didn't call it to your attention.

[khedron]

Aww, thanks. Yeah, I'm going to try to go to sleep earlier tonight. Honest. (And I don't mean that "fell asleep in recliner due to cat & toddler" sort of sleep.)

[harimad]

Thanks for pointing this out - it didn't RSS into Livejournal, so not only did I miss the comic I didn't know about the variations.

[khedron]

I even read over the hover-text two or three times on Monday, but just came away thinking, "Hm, I don't get it." And I didn't. I could have at least tried to change the browser size, but it never occurred to me.

Meta-wise, it reminds me a little of an mid-90s videogame rt_hon_rackman told me about once. The bad guy taunts, "haha, you can't defeat me, I can read your mind!" And sure enough, every swing is dodged, every bullet misses. To overcome this, you physically walk up to your game console, unplug the controller, and plug it into the alternate port. I have no idea if this was telegraphed sufficiently well in-game, but it's the same sort of out-of-the-box; who thinks about browser width driving content, not form?

[reesei]

That always reminds me of the Fool's Errand puzzle that only worked in Finder - the one where you have to click on the fast-moving number, and you do so by hovering outside of the game window, holding down I think a shift key, then moving your mouse to the now-frozen number?

[harimad]

I just came across my copy of Fool's Errand, buried in a box of Random Office Stuff that I forgot to move from the old office (now #2's bedroom) to the new office. It was a great game ... I wonder if there's a version for my Mac.

[moominmolly]

Oh WOW.

OK, I just checked from work, and I got one that... well, that clearly showed that I was reading from a Huge Corporate Empire.

[khedron]

Yet in Safari it tosses me into a big black hole!

Using Chrome, I got the earthquake - Ohio - tornados one, but there's nice detail in the art that changes depending on browser width.

[disbandedtoastr]

Cool! I had no idea!! =o)

[khedron]

Too subtle for a Monday morning!