1190: "Time"

[azule]

In the new one, the entire castle shifted a bit to the right. Landslide?

It did! Not sarcasm [not much]... it's just that that pulled me a little into the sea of pixel speculation. *confused*

[gumbo]

Did noone open the PNGs in UltraEdit yet? It has dates for each picture that differ!

date:create 2013-03-25T05:46:52+00:00 date:modify 2013-03-25T05:46:52+00:00
date:create 2013-03-25T06:54:32+00:00 date:modify 2013-03-25T06:54:32+00:00

A whole new research area!

I think with this many posts, the answer to "Did nobody [xxx] yet?" is almost always no. Err, yes. Err, too many negatives.

Anyway, yes, someone already did that.

[PinkShinyRose]

Well, it seems the pixel by pixel changes have caused this thread to slow down a little, it seems to be dying.

[ugmhemhe]

it's slowly moving towards the (assumed) water!

[enumerated powers]

Go to aubronwood and use the arrow keys to flip back and forth between frames 127 and 128...

The entire scene is indeed shifting to the right - in other words the view ('camera') is panning to the left. hm8 called it.

If this keeps up something may come into view on the left by the weekend!

::waiting with baited breath::

[mexaboy]

I'm having the urge to just post "Wait for it." as a reply to every message.

Wait for it...

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

Waitception.

Wait for it.

for it Wait.

There is no wait.

Yo dawg, I heard you like waiting, so I put a waiting in your wait so you can wait while you wait.

Oh god you spilled rap on it. Now we have to burn it.

[10thDoctor]

I WAITED A HALF HOUR FOR ONE DARKENING PIXEL.

AND THEN
I DID IT AGAIN.

Don't worry, all of us did it, too.

[higgs-boson]

No hope for tides,
maybe no rain falling,
floodlights left (just outside the visible frame),
Megan and her guy having a good time elsewhere.
This can go on for days. Weeks. Months!

Eroding a sand castle in a black and white pixel world is something even much less gifted people than Randall could do.


And we wait for it.

Yep. On that shirt, I'll leave the end date open.

[fixer]

::waiting with baited breath::

Have you been kissing sea lions again?

[peewee_RotA]

Actually, it got me thinking about why we assume the genders of the characters in the comic. That then broadened to how we know the gender of ANY xkcd character. Hair? Ridiculous. Clothing? Being intimate with another character? Please -- are you paying attention to what's happening in the Supreme Court this week (maybe some of you aren't because you'r'e too busy with this comic)?

So, everyone's assignment between frames is this: pick a regular xkcd character and find the first proof of that character's gender within a comic.

Go!

I call Megan!! http://xkcd.com/631/

Nope! This one is earlier! http://xkcd.com/583/

The "earliest" megan was quoted earlier in this thread and describes her gender in the dialog.
http://xkcd.com/108/

(explain XKCD lists her as having an earlier appearance though)

[micdi]

my two cents on them coming back sometime during the next 31 frames

[morgothcr]

I'm having the urge to just post "Wait for it." as a reply to every message.

Wait for it...

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

Waitception.

Wait for it.

for it Wait.

There is no wait.

Only Zuul

[free-bee]

The first image has creation date 2013-03-25T00:26:49+00:00
The last till now 2013-03-25T06:54:32+00:00

So that's about 3 minutes/frame.

Well there goes my theory of "this had to have taken a while." *flips table*

I shall return. I managed to recover some maps I had from my previous install of Quake 2.

[PinkShinyRose]

The changes could be accidental... We might want to start refreshing daily instead of newpixly, it would also lighten Randalls serverload...

[kaley]

What about 40?
http://xkcd.com/40/

[Wnderer]

If you enjoyed this comic, you will really enjoy the Pitch Drop Experiment.

http://smp.uq.edu.au/content/pitch-drop-experiment

Yes! I wanted to mention this too, but I totally forgot that I wanted to...

Gives 'Wait for it', all new meaning.

[Rivenwulf]

I'm having the urge to just post "Wait for it." as a reply to every message.

Wait for it...

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

Waitception.

Wait for it.

for it Wait.

There is no wait.

Only Zuul

+1 for the random Ghostbusters reference!

[riverssong]

I WAITED A HALF HOUR FOR ONE DARKENING PIXEL.

AND THEN
I DID IT AGAIN.

Don't worry, all of us did it, too.

Well, hello, sweetie.

[dbell032]

The changes could be accidental... We might want to start refreshing daily instead of newpixly, it would also lighten Randalls serverload...

I doubt it could be accidental, when you look at some of the preceding frames the castle is solid and there are no minor pixel tweaks as the past few frames have shown. I conjecture that as long as there is a new file every 30 min there will be some changes even if minor tweaks in each one.

[AluisioASG]

2000!

[patzer]

Spoiler:

MULTI-BUMP (again - feel free to bump this post occasionally if I manage to tear myself away from here!)

Countdown to next update:

http://www.webcountdown.de/?a=gxMXfoy

Latest frame (auto updates):


Live updating GIF:

More complex program (with manual controls and a soundtrack!):

http://xkcd.aubronwood.com/

Explain XKCD (with a little more discussion on the comic, when the servers can take it):

http://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.p ... 1190:_Time

If we're going to do the 915 thing, I suggest we go all the way and group certain frames into periods.
I suggest the following split:

000 - 009 : the debut or what? period: when nobody really knew what was going on
010 - 023 : the dark period: the darkness in the posts of the thread reached heights during these frames
024 - 044 : the sandcastle period: as the sandcastle started to appear, most of the darkness made disappeared.
045 - 074 : the period (second dark period): Initially, this was the 'female period' but I soon realised that would be a pleonasm. Also it was a pretty dark time on the thread.
075 - 087 : the happiness period: the couple is reunited and again the darkness fades.
088 - 105 : the male period: with a climax at frame 103: "the fall of man" frame
105 - 124 : the rebuild period (second sandcastle period).
125 - NOW: the deserted period (?) Still in progress! How exciting!

Discuss!

Bumping links for new page

[SWuh]

I AM BACK. And for once I took a break at a good time to!!

Also my boyfriend thinks I am completely insane and keeps saying "Who cares" and I scream "I DOOOOOO" back in his face. Also when I started talking about pixels he acted interested and then did the whole "Yes, I think it's been shopped, I can tell because of the pixels and I've seen a few shops in my time..." thing. So, basically, fuck him.

SO basically egghead walked away and now the castle is on it's own but still undergoing minuscule changes... and *IS* a different image every time? Nice. Even better way to drive us insane. This *has* to be a social experiment at this stage.

Wait for it my ass!!

[peewee_RotA]

I'm having the urge to just post "Wait for it." as a reply to every message.

Wait for it...

Wait for it.

Wait for it.

Waitception.

Wait for it.

for it Wait.

There is no wait.

Only Zuul

+1 for the random Ghostbusters reference!

Obligatory:

[rbnielsen]

I think there's a change in pixel between the latest and the former, in the water level. But I'm not sure.

[Dracomax]

If you enjoyed this comic, you will really enjoy the Pitch Drop Experiment.

http://smp.uq.edu.au/content/pitch-drop-experiment

Yes! I wanted to mention this too, but I totally forgot that I wanted to...

Gives 'Wait for it', all new meaning.

So, basically pitch is what urban legend claimed glass to be?

[mikrit]

If a tsunami or tidal wave is coming, would Etymology-man return? I miss him.

[PinkShinyRose]

What about 40?
http://xkcd.com/40/

It does not really seem to make any clear statements about either time or the gender/sex of the characters...

[SWuh]

I think there's a change in pixel between the latest and the former, in the water level. But I'm not sure.

We need more people on pixel analysis. I am on my boyfriend's work laptop in incognito mode so my analysis abilities are limited. As long as the pixels *are* changing, I am happy. I just don't want us to be deluding ourselves in a "THE PICTURES ARE STILL CHANGING, THEY ARE" kind of way if it genuinely is over.

I personally don't think it's over, and I love the slow erosion until April Fools when BHG jumps out as if from a birthday cake idea (whoever said that a few pages back?) - or anything even remotely along those lines. For April Fools or not!! But who knows?

If the pixels completely stop changing, I think that is the point I stop watching. I will, however, never stop watching this thread!! (of course) - we have been through too much together!!

[pdg]

Waiting for a giant goldfish to swim past.

[mittfh]

Actually, it got me thinking about why we assume the genders of the characters in the comic. That then broadened to how we know the gender of ANY xkcd character. Hair? Ridiculous. Clothing? Being intimate with another character? Please -- are you paying attention to what's happening in the Supreme Court this week (maybe some of you aren't because you'r'e too busy with this comic)?

So, everyone's assignment between frames is this: pick a regular xkcd character and find the first proof of that character's gender within a comic.

Go!

I call Megan!! http://xkcd.com/631/

Nope! This one is earlier! http://xkcd.com/583/

The "earliest" megan was quoted earlier in this thread and describes her gender in the dialog.
http://xkcd.com/108/

(explain XKCD lists her as having an earlier appearance though)

The Fountain Of All Knowledge claims Megan's first name check was http://xkcd.com/159/ (but also suggests http://xkcd.com/108/ as a possible earlier appearance). It also references Megan's appearances in http://xkcd.com/215/, http://xkcd.com/420/ (both discuss the relationship between her and Cueball) and http://xkcd.com/478/.

Meanwhile, it's starting to look as though those predicting entropy (NB: may not work outside UK) for the post-repair phase of the castle were on the ball...

[AluisioASG]

[Dracomax]

...people on pixel

sounds like very, very geeky porn.

[hm8]

another shift

[riverssong]

We need more people on pixel analysis.

Has anyone tried stringing the image hashes together and treating them like a straightforward substitution cipher?

[rbnielsen]

I think there's a change in pixel between the latest and the former, in the water level. But I'm not sure.

We need more people on pixel analysis. I am on my boyfriend's work laptop in incognito mode so my analysis abilities are limited. As long as the pixels *are* changing, I am happy. I just don't want us to be deluding ourselves in a "THE PICTURES ARE STILL CHANGING, THEY ARE" kind of way if it genuinely is over.

I personally don't think it's over, and I love the slow erosion until April Fools when BHG jumps out as if from a birthday cake idea (whoever said that a few pages back?) - or anything even remotely along those lines. For April Fools or not!! But who knows?

If the pixels completely stop changing, I think that is the point I stop watching. I will, however, never stop watching this thread!! (of course) - we have been through too much together!!

Hm.. Everything shifted to the right, on the new update.

[mscha]

Sliding (or panning) a bit faster this time.

[hm8]

Weird how without the people building it there's no frame of reference....could be a legit castle.

[bugstomper]

So we have gone from frames per hour to pixels per hour. All those estimates of how much time Randall would have to put in to keep thus up forever will have to be recalibrated. Just to get the scale of it, not a realistic estimate, changing 5 pixels a frame would take a bit over two years to touch every pixel of the picture.

[kaley]

Actually, it got me thinking about why we assume the genders of the characters in the comic. That then broadened to how we know the gender of ANY xkcd character. Hair? Ridiculous. Clothing? Being intimate with another character? Please -- are you paying attention to what's happening in the Supreme Court this week (maybe some of you aren't because you'r'e too busy with this comic)?

So, everyone's assignment between frames is this: pick a regular xkcd character and find the first proof of that character's gender within a comic.

Go!

I call Megan!! http://xkcd.com/631/

Nope! This one is earlier! http://xkcd.com/583/

The "earliest" megan was quoted earlier in this thread and describes her gender in the dialog.
http://xkcd.com/108/

(explain XKCD lists her as having an earlier appearance though)

The Fountain Of All Knowledge claims Megan's first name check was http://xkcd.com/159/ (but also suggests http://xkcd.com/108/ as a possible earlier appearance). It also references Megan's appearances in http://xkcd.com/215/, http://xkcd.com/420/ (both discuss the relationship between her and Cueball) and http://xkcd.com/478/.

Meanwhile, it's starting to look as though those predicting entropy (NB: may not work outside UK) for the post-repair phase of the castle were on the ball...

When I said "what about 40?" I meant as a possible first appearance of Megan, comparable to 108. They are both a romantic reference to a possibly female character.

[something_meta]

Seems to have shifted another half-pixel, this time diagonally right and down.