The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Alex

00:00

@Jenayah It sounds like something that could be vaguely biblical, but I've never heard the sentence before.

Jenayah

aye what I thought too but googling doesn't yield much

RDFozz

Out of curiosity - anyone on now order the "Ultimate Space Battle" poster from Egor? I'm getting it for my son, but it wanted me to pay with something called LiqPay - And I couldn't find much of anything that had anything positive to say about them.

Jenayah

Never heard of it. Is that some kind of PayPal ripoff?

RDFozz

It's Ukrainian.

Jenayah

Not that I've used PayPal, but at least I know the name

RDFozz

00:07

Which makes sense, since Egor is as well

Alex

Never heard of it.

RDFozz

I've used Paypal to buy things from European folks before

Jenayah

Hmm... I'll admit I'm not much of an expert in Ukrainian online bank transfer services :-)

RDFozz

I sent in my order asking for an invoice, we'll see what I get from that.

@Jenayah I'm shocked - simply shocked - to hear that!

Jenayah

@RDFozz :P

RDFozz

00:10

I should've acted sooner, while it was still on Kickstarter....

Jenayah

@RDFozz yeah, I guess asking the guy himself is the best way to do

He's got to have a contact form or stuff?

RDFozz

I'm ordering from his site, so....

I also noted on my order that, despite the privacy policy, I would be unable to gift his company my soul.

Jenayah

lol what

is that part of the terms of use or something? :p

RDFozz

@Jenayah Nope, it in the privacy policy. The terms and conditions read as follows:

Terms and conditions

That's it.

Jenayah

LOL

that's gold

RDFozz

00:15

(And it's not the the comment about gifting them your soul is hidden or anything. It's the second of two paragraphs.)

Yes, I complemented them on having the easiest to read and understand such page I'd ever seen.

Site URL is: anomaly-world.com

I think you only see the privacy policy if you register an account on the site.

I can't find a link to it now, or I'd add in a screen shot for posterity.

Or, in this case, maybe "poster-ity"

Jenayah

@RDFozz oh, ok

was clicking Cyrillic links at random until I found one which repeated itself... ahahah

too lazy to Google Translate

RDFozz

OK, they do seem to have stuff besides posters - playing cards, and what appears to be a (presumably unauthorized) version of Hellboy's hand.

@Jenayah Click the flag at the top of the page to switch between Russian and English.

Jenayah

oh... that works too ahah

I didn't even think to check :P

RDFozz

I only noticed because I was looking for a link to the privacy policy.

If the image of the Union Jack was a bit clearer, I'd have probably figured it out faster :-)

And, I did work on websites for a few years, in a previous job.

Jenayah

It's a Union Jack at yours? It's a Russian flag for me

RDFozz

00:23

I like unobtusive but reasonably obvious elements like that.

@Jenayah If you hover over the flag, you can switch to English.

Jenayah

indeed

RDFozz

OK, maybe not so obvious :-)

Alex

00:48

I just realized a new sinister trick that someone with a Gold Tag Badge can employ.

Jenayah

Mh?

Alex

Say someone (e.g. Alex) is constantly voting to reopen a certain question.

When you see the vote, you can vote to reopen as well, and the question is instantly reopened.

Then you can vote to close and the question will be instantly reclosed.

The other user (e.g. Alex) can no longer vote to reopen.

Jenayah

Ah?

Doesn't the newly closed status reset reopen vote?

It's not as if it was voted to "leave closed" in review is it?

Alex

@Jenayah You can vote to reopen infinitely (spaced out every 20 days I think), but once your vote succeeds you can't cast the same vote again even if the question's status is subsequently changed.

This actually happened (though I highly doubt it was with sinister intent).

Jenayah

what can I say, write a Meta post :P

Alex

00:54

@Jenayah Well, it's not really a bug...

Jenayah

Might be a FR

Alex

But what would be the feature?

Jenayah

Changing the current situation

Alex

By the way, in such a situation I believe the Gold Badger would also lose the ability to subsequently vote.

Jenayah

From meta.stackexchange.com/tags/feature-request/info:

> Proposals for new features on the Stack Exchange network, or requests for a change to an existing feature.

Alex

00:57

@Jenayah Ha, I know what a feature request is. There's just not much to change here without fundamentally altering the way votes work. The only simple thing would be to maybe put a delay on the ability to vote against the action you just voted.

But even that wouldn't necessarily prevent the phenomenon.

Jenayah

mh

in any case just don't carry on too much in reopening wars then :p

or get yourself a gold badge

Alex

@Jenayah 90 answers to go.

Jenayah

geez that actually goes pretty fast

Alex

Eh, it'll probably be a few months.

Jenayah

Months?

I'd have thought it'd be pretty much done by the end of the year

Alex

01:03

I'd have to post two answers a day to get it by the end of the year.

Even on Mi Yodeya I'm only averaging ~1.5 answers per day.

Jenayah

we can't possibly be that far in the year already

oh wait, we are

damn time passes fast

oh wait technically speaking there's a bit more than 45 days... Had forgotten about Shabbat

Alex

@Jenayah I wasn't even thinking about that.

@Alex Actually, exactly one and a third, to be precise.

Jenayah

@Alex the math holds, though :P

more or less

Alex

And 1.56 per day here. Surprisingly, more.

Scratch that!

Really bad math by me.

Jenayah

too much JKR rubbing off on you

2

Alex

01:09

@Jenayah Indeed.

Should be .64 per day.

I mixed up the numerator and denominator.

RDFozz

01:27

@Alex Here in the US, we learned a really simple way to keep track of which goes where.

Numerator starts with "n", and if you turn "n" upside down, it's "u", so it goes "up"!

^^ OK, the real one was "d" for "denominator" and "down - but "n"/"u" was much more fun.

Jenayah

there are more letters in "denominator" so it weighs more and goes down...

RDFozz

@Jenayah Ohh, that's a good one - not quite as convoluted as mine, but still!

Jenayah

Works for Arctic and Antarctic too

Alex

@RDFozz Yeah, my mistake wasn't really not knowing which one goes where. It was more of mixing up which number I was dividing by which.

RDFozz

@Alex Any excuse to make a wisecrack!

Jenayah

01:30

@RDFozz it's easier to remember without twisting your mind too much :P

Alex

@Jenayah North Pole and South Pole have the same amoount of letters... so they're both at the equator?

@RDFozz Can't argue with that.

Jenayah

@Alex Hey I'm captain of the orienteering team... I'd be a poor captain if I couldn't distingusih North and South on a map... :)

RDFozz

I'd rather be a smart ass than a dumb ass.

But, I suppose I'd rather be human than any kind of ass, mule, donkey, etc.

Alex

@Jenayah Still?

Oct 11 at 15:01, by Jenayah

The current captain is a guy I coached last year and he does great and man am I proud :D

Jenayah

@Alex well kind of co-captain technically ahah

Guy doesn't have time so guess who took back the role... :P

Alex

01:33

@Jenayah Aha.

I'll freely admit that I had no idea what orienteering was until I googled it.

RDFozz

@Jenayah Just when you thought you were out....

Jenayah

Orienteering is the best outdoors sport you can think of

Alex

@Jenayah Well, it's good that the captain is... enthusiastic.

Jenayah

:D

RDFozz

@Jenayah The outdoor sport I most regularly participate in is "moving between vehicle and building"

Now, I have to go do the second place one - "filling vehicle with gasoline/petrol"

^^ I'm not saying "filling car with gas" with this bunch....

Jenayah

01:36

@RDFozz insert a forest between vehicle and building, take a map, a compass and a tick remover, and you're good for orienteering :)

Alex

@Jenayah GPS on your phone?

Though that actually probably wouldn't help much in a forest.

Jenayah

@Alex that's cheating!

2

@Alex aye especially when your control is WAY off-tracks

and school budget for orienteering club is "wait. There's an orienteering club?" so your maps are 10 years old and in that time span trees have grown, new trails have been made, rivers were drought etc

Alex

Is the point just to get to the destination? Or is it like a race, or something?

RDFozz

@Jenayah Are you sure there's a high-speed roadway here? It's not on the map....

Jenayah

@Alex you have a map with specific spots on it ("controls", which look like orange and white Chinese lanterns) and you have to go through all of them in a specific order

So it's both a race and a mind exercise as not getting lost is sometimes... well... Let's just say all trees look the same in a forest :)

Alex

01:44

@Jenayah Sounds like fun. How do I try out for the team?

Jenayah

Here's part of a map for instance

though it's a meh one... All controls are near a trail

but basically black dots are generally rocks

curvy lines indicate relief

white/pale green/darker green is vegetation density... Basically white you're good, but the greener the more you need a machete

This one's a tad bit better, not all controls are on a trail

Alex

@Jenayah Is there a scale?

Jenayah

#9 in this one sounds like a lot of fun... Lots of relief and re-entrant ahah good luck have fun!

@Alex yup it's in top left, 1/10000

Symbols if you're interested :)

Alex

@Jenayah What's the unit of measurement?

Jenayah

@Alex centimeters, so 1 centimeter on the map is 100 meters on the field

which is sometimes hard when you're not used to it... First runs you go too far by a couple hundred meters sometimes... :)

Alex

01:58

@Jenayah Hard for me to judge on an online picture — I don't know if it's the same size on the physical map.

Jenayah

@RDFozz hey, this one time we were running and it rained like crazy, and we were like "why the frak is there a RIVER there... there's no river on our map... Oh wait..."

It was actually a trench which got flooded :P

@Alex most of the times they're printed in A4 format but I haven't raced that very one so I couldn't say for sure

Alex

@Jenayah As I learn what A4 is.

Jenayah

Paper size, 21 * 29,7 cm

Alex

@Jenayah Yeah, I googled it.

Jenayah

I never thought this'd be localized... feeling kinda stupid now

Alex

02:05

Paper size

Many paper size standards conventions have existed at different times and in different jlm2mfcountries. Today, the A and B series of ISO 216, which includes tcz! used A4 size, are the international standard used by almost every country. However, in many countries in the Americas as well as in the Philippines, the North American series of paper sizes such as 'Letter' and 'Legal' is more prevalent.Paper sizes affect writing paper, stationery, cards, and some printed documents. The international standard for envelopes is the C series of ISO 269 P10 size is the smallest of them all, containing less...

Jenayah

02:23

too many conventions

Alex

@Jenayah Definitely: us.orienteering.org/club-leaders/convention-info

Jenayah

I meant paper size conventions

but that works too

I'm guessing scifi.stackexchange.com/q/19876/98028 needs a something-order tag but I'm no expert on this topic so I guess I'll just cc the local GoT expert I know of... cc @TheLethalCarrot

Alex

02:38

@Jenayah There aren't that many choices for something-order. It's basically either suggested-order or chronological-order, no?

Jenayah

aye

Jenayah

02:56

So would someone with good main Meta-fu be able to find an answer for this?

origins is a syonym of history-of

the first question (scifi.stackexchange.com/q/20537/98028) appears when there's a search with just words but disappears when you try searching with tags

It shows up normally when you try with a non-amiguous tag such as tv for instance

this is funny behaviour

I'm not sure which keywords to search for...

Alex

@Jenayah I can try.

Jenayah

thanks! :)

Meet the newest identification tag, main-meta-post-identification

Alex

03:22

I didn't find anything on Meta.

However...

I experimented with a few others, and I only found the issue with this specific tag.

Which leads me to believe that there might be some issue with this specific tag.

Jenayah

wtf

Alex

Indeed, I see that the tag displayed on the question is origins yet the primary name for the tag is actually history-of.

Thus, something seems a bit off.

Jenayah

@Alex they're synonyms I reckon

Alex

@Jenayah Yeah, but when there are synonyms, one is the main name and one is the synonym.

The main name is supposed to display on the question, not the synonym.

Further evidence:

Jenayah

aye but IIRC if the synonym was synonymized afterwards it might not display woudl it?

Alex

03:26

Every other question with this tag displays history-of rather than origins.

And in fact for the other questions with the tag using a tag search does work.

Well there are a few other exceptions too.

Which further prove my theory.

Because the same problem exists for those few questions as well.

Conclusion:

There is some corruption in some of the questions which are displaying the synonym instead of the real name.

Jenayah

conclusion = it's a mess?

Alex

We can try a little experiment.

Jenayah

mh?

Alex

I edited the question and removed the tag, and retagged it with history-of.

Jenayah

aye

Alex

03:33

Interestingly, the question itself now displays the correct tag, but in search results it still appears with origins.

Jenayah

@Alex probably needs ~10 mn to update

Alex

@Jenayah That could be. Folks, take 10. Meet back here for phase two of the experiment promptly.

There are actually a whole bunch.

And some that display both tags, but for those the searches still work.

Jenayah

@Alex yeah they were made before synonymization I think

Alex

@Jenayah No, it doesn't seem to correlate chronologically.

Alex

04:04

@Jenayah Okay, the experiment worked and the question can now be found with the tag search.

THere are 29 other questions with the same issue.

Jenayah

sigh

Alex

So theoretically they can all be edited the same way to resolve it.

There are also 20 questions displaying both tags. That should probably be fixed just for the sake of it, even though it's not affecting the tag searches.

Jenayah

@Alex just saying but while you bump a post to front page you can edit the answers as well

fixing formatting, replacing HTTP with HTTPS when the target site allows it, etc

Alex

@Jenayah True. I hadn't even looked at the answers.

Jenayah

watch out for dead links, replace them with Web Archive links, etc etc

Alex

04:15

Hm, apparently there is also a limit to how many post names can be displayed in a post.

40 apparently.

After that they just show up as URLs.

https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/86618/what-is-the-origin-of-the-antihero-deadpools-character-name

https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/89977/what-were-sarumans-original-intentions-and-how-did-they-change-over-time

https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/92229/what-was-the-origin-of-the-idea-that-dragons-can-take-human-form

https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/93010/what-movie-was-the-first-to-feature-onscreen-zombie-children

https://scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/93470/what-is-the-first-reference-to-an-internet-of-computers-in-science-fiction

That's the list of questions with the tag corruption.

SQB

08:06

Perhaps we should adopt a scorched earth policy.

Marvin

08:38

0

Q: Why do the Iron-born build ships instead of stealing them?

According to their matra, The Iron-born words are as follows, We do not sow! We are Iron-born! We are not subjects! We are not slaves! We do not plow the fields or toil in the mines! We take what is ours! And the scene from when both Greyjoy...

SQB

09:28

@Alex data.stackexchange.com/scifi/query/924185/…

That's a list of all questions tagged origins. Some are tagged both history-of and origins.

Rand al'Thor

09:54

@SQB @Skooba @Jenayah Seems like we have a good consensus for abolishing water and earth. Here's how we should do it:

1) Edit the tags out of all non-story-ID questions by hand. (That's just 1 for earth and 8 for water, I think.) Remember the 5-in-15 rule for not flooding the front page with old tag edits.

2) Ping me or another mod to merge the tags into story-identification (without synonymising).

Merging is a great tool for abolishing tags that exist mostly together with another tag, as it doesn't involve any manual editing or bumping.

TheLethalCarrot

@Randal'Thor Seeing as there was only 1 for earth I've removed it, and the other pointless tags on that question, can go ahead and merge

Rand al'Thor

> And the earth was no more.

2

TheLethalCarrot

FWIW did you pick story id to merge into because it was the most common tag between them?

So less manual work

Jenayah

I thought you mods had a magic button to delete tags?

SQB

[water] -[story-identification] is:q

TheLethalCarrot

10:04

@SQB Because that's a tag only search you don't need the is:q

Rand al'Thor

@TheLethalCarrot Yep, exactly.

SQB

@TheLethalCarrot maybe it has been fixed, but I noticed it including answers as soon as I exclude a tag.

Rand al'Thor

Usually when getting rid of a bad tag, story-ID ends up being the one to merge it into.

Probably because it's associated with so many other tags, more so than e.g. franchise tags.

@Jenayah Unfortunately not. The closest we have is the magic merge button.

TheLethalCarrot

Aye usually, people use bad tags as descriptors for story ids

Rand al'Thor

CMs have a magic button to burninate a tag, but we don't need to bother them with this.

TheLethalCarrot

10:06

@SQB I believe tag only shouldn't show answers, if you start restricting with keywords and other stuff answers show up

Rand al'Thor

New contender for Worst HNQ Ever?

TheLethalCarrot

I mean it's terrible but there's surely been worse

Rand al'Thor

It's a) misspelled, b) poor grammar and capitalisation, c) SURELY off-topic?!

TheLethalCarrot

Is that on AI?

Rand al'Thor

Yeah.

With its new sponsor and site design.

TheLethalCarrot

10:10

You've got to imagine it's off topic

Oh and it's a sponsored site? That explains a lot

Rand al'Thor

16

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Earlier this year we announced a "site sponsorship" program aimed at bringing in industry and project-team leaders to help support these sites. A lot of your questions about this program can be answered through the posts and comments there: Site Sponsporships — Bringing Resources Back to Stack E...

discussion design sponsored-sites

TheLethalCarrot

@SQB Please watch the 5 in 15. I know you want to get rid of the tag as we all do but we're not exactly drowning at the moment

Rand al'Thor

^

TheLethalCarrot

@Randal'Thor Whilst you're here, you know more about tags than me, what's the deal with origins and history-of? origins still shows on some questions but it's a synonym of history-of, is it down to when the synonymisation was done?

Rand al'Thor

@TheLethalCarrot No, it's down to the fact that it was synonymised without merging :-/

SQB

10:20

@TheLethalCarrot of course.

TheLethalCarrot

@Randal'Thor Ah gotcha, can that not be fixed retrospectively without doing it manually?

SQB

@Randal'Thor can that be fixed?

Rand al'Thor

Because the synonymisation was done by the community rather than by a mod with a mergehammer.

(I proposed the synonym, but I wasn't a mod then.)

(Got me a nice Synonymiser badge though.)

@TheLethalCarrot Umm. Dunno.

TheLethalCarrot

Lol, so went through by community vote? Annoying

Rand al'Thor

I never bothered looking into it, because origins also works well enough as a tag, so it's not really a big problem.

TheLethalCarrot

10:22

If there's a way to un synonym a tag you may be able to do that and then merge and synonym again

Rand al'Thor

There is a "merge" button on the synonyms list, IIRC.

But I recall some horrible malfunction when I was merging marvel-comics into marvel during the Big Editing Event.

TheLethalCarrot

You mean the tools are sensitive and don't work very well? Shocking!

Rand al'Thor

Synonymisation is a mess. Always has been.

The tools are so confusing that often you end up doing the synonymisation the wrong way round.

That's (presumably) why we had marvel as a synonym of marvel-comics for four years even though the old meta consensus said the other way round.

SQB

@TheLethalCarrot also, pun noted and bechuckled.

Rand al'Thor

@SQB Heh! I didn't notice that.

b_jonas

10:25

43

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As our devs continue to work on features like Talent and Channels (now called Teams), I've been anxiously looking for ways to increase engagement in our current Stack Exchange sites to help assure that development RETURNS to our Q&As… as soon as possible. As the biz-dev folks spread the word abo...

discussion announcements sponsored-sites

TheLethalCarrot

Jeez I put all that effort into a pun and it went unnoticed!

@Randal'Thor Guessing ~~we're~~ they're down to sorting out origins manually then? (If they want to of course)

b_jonas

"we are not renaming our current sites like a garish sport stadium to the highest bidder" -- why? renaming the site so it's called, say, "Groupama Arena of Science Fiction and Fantasy" instead of "Science Fiction & Fantasy Stack Exchange" in the site logo and change the small icon of the site, with no actual effect, and getting a ton of money from that, that would be something I'd actually like.

Instead, they are "enabling ads relevant to the subject and affixing a small 'sponsored by...' logo in the upper-right corner". And choosing companies relevant to the site topic. How is that even better?

Hmm. I should try to make a mock-up that replaces the "Stack Exchange" logo and caption in the top bar by a sponsor logo and name.

I wish we had a tag specifically for Harry Potter fan fiction story-id questions, so that it's easier to ignore them.

Currently these are just tagged harry-potter story-identification fan-fiction, and I am interested in Harry Potter questions and story-id questions.

TheLethalCarrot

Are you interested in fan fiction though?

SQB

Does ignore overrule follow?

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot Rarely.

TheLethalCarrot

10:39

@SQB They both apply I think

SQB

@b_jonas harry-potter-fan-fiction-identification?

TheLethalCarrot

b_jonas

@SQB I don't know the details, but that's not the only technical problem. We're also running into tag limits. We're using impossible tag combos like story-identification harry-potter short-story drarmione hermione-granger draco-malfoy.

TheLethalCarrot

Top one has dune watched and technology ignored

b_jonas

Hmm, I could try to ignore drarmione specifically

TheLethalCarrot

10:41

Well that example shouldn't be tagged short story or with the character tags

b_jonas

and drarry apparently

SQB

@b_jonas that could lose the character tags.

TheLethalCarrot

That's 7 @SQB

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot sure, but at least now we have two very stupid shipping tags that I can ignore.

TheLethalCarrot

Oh those shipping tags are horrible

b_jonas

10:43

@SQB Yep, looks like my drarry ignore overrides the harry-potter watch

SQB

@b_jonas see? They're useful.

TheLethalCarrot

@b_jonas When ignore has hidden on I suppose?

b_jonas

@SQB Yes, that's what I was saying. The hermione or draco-malfoy themselves aren't useful, but the shipping tags are.

@TheLethalCarrot No, it's just grayed out rather than yellow.

TheLethalCarrot

It'll be yellow and greyed out I believe

b_jonas

I definitely don't want to unwatch either story-identification or harry-potter.

TheLethalCarrot

10:45

See my example screenshot above

b_jonas

And I don't want to ignore fan-fiction entirely.

@TheLethalCarrot Ah, ok.

SQB

drarry: 9 questions.

dramione: 5 questions

b_jonas

@SQB Yes. Is it just me, or are we getting more Harry Potter fan fiction story id questions these days then we used to? It could be just me because these days I specifically read the list of story-id questions.

I guess I could download the list of dates from data.stackexchange.com and look at those.

TheLethalCarrot

In the past month or so we've had a large uptick in the HP fan fiction ids yeah

b_jonas

I'll look for just [story-identification] [harry-potter], there are very few non-fan-fiction ones in there, but probably some questions not tagged with fan-fiction

TheLethalCarrot

10:51

From what I gather from lurking on the homepage

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot I see. Do they get answer?

I mean, useful answers.

TheLethalCarrot

50/50

Don't know about the quality

@TheLethalCarrot Well a large uptick compared to the past year, and only going from gut feeling

Jenayah

~~mine are of quality~~ </boast>

b_jonas

Yeah... we have 80 [story-id*] [harry-potter] questions, and half of them are since 2018-06

SQB

@b_jonas I can't imagine many questions for story-identification and harry-potter but not fan-fiction. "Is it the first book? No? The second? The third perhaps?"

TheLethalCarrot

10:54

@Jenayah If you strike it out are you boasting that they aren't of quality? ;P

b_jonas

@SQB No, more like the one trying to find the one page story by JKR of young Sirius and the motorbike and policemen. That one is hard to find.

But I was wrong, we don't, in fact, have many questions that aren't tagged with fan-fiction. scifi.stackexchange.com/q/155306/4918 is the only one

"Which Harry Potter novel is the quote 'Things are gonna get serious for you' from?"

And that's the one about young Sirius in fact.

Jenayah

@TheLethalCarrot they're of quality... I think... But y'know still not wrapped my head around the fact that I deliberately went and searched for fanfiction...

TheLethalCarrot

That is a big milestone to overcome

b_jonas

Hmm. scifi.stackexchange.com/q/197911/4918 "Story about a vast, telepathic, amoeba-like creature that covers an entire planet" still has no answer.

That one is featured, and it's indeed a nice question.

TheLethalCarrot

You know if you paste the link it one boxes right?

So you don't need to keep copy pasting the title

SQB

10:59

Shouldn't we just merge mogwai (2 questions total, 1 closed) into gremlins (9 questions total, including the 2 tagged mogwai)?

b_jonas

@TheLethalCarrot Yeah, but I don't always want a one-box.

TheLethalCarrot

Fair enough just wondering

@SQB Just burninate it manually, it might be useful but at 9 Qs for the main tag it isn't really useful yet. And 1 is going to be bumped anyway with the removal of water

b_jonas

38 mins ago, by b_jonas

43

Q: Site Sponsorships — Bringing Resources BACK to Stack Exchange

As our devs continue to work on features like Talent and Channels (now called Teams), I've been anxiously looking for ways to increase engagement in our current Stack Exchange sites to help assure that development RETURNS to our Q&As… as soon as possible. As the biz-dev folks spread the word abo...

discussion announcements sponsored-sites

SQB

Also, I'm thinking about a question that would fit both here and on Movies & TV: "what was the function of the "Santa Clause story" in Gremlins?

I think it might be a better fit over there, actually, since it's not really linked to any SFnal or Fantastical aspect.

TheLethalCarrot

Well it is a SFFnal story so questions on it are on topic here

No matter what part of it you're asking about

Are you wanting to ask how that particular story line fits into the overall plot?

SQB

11:13

Yeah, that's it. And why the creators chose to include it.

TheLethalCarrot

It fits perfectly well on both sites

SQB

It's been a while since I've seen it, but I do not recall it making any sense.

TheLethalCarrot

Up to you to choose whichever really

SQB

11:30

0

Q: Why was "the Santa Claus story" included in Gremlins?

In Gremlins (1984), Kate tells Billy the story of a horrible Christmas, how her father wanted to surprise the family by climbing down the chimney, but slipped, fell, broke his neck, and had his corpse stuck in the chimney, only to be found when the family tried to light a fire. Why was this stor...

plot-explanation analysis gremlins

I chose Movies & TV.

TheLethalCarrot

11:41

There are currently 44,443 reviews all-time for FPs and I'm on 998... that's a shame that I'll miss my 1000th being the 44444th of all time by 1 review

SQB

@TheLethalCarrot then again, you can have your 999th be the 44444th for more monodigital fun.

TheLethalCarrot

Ah true

And all was well again

TheLethalCarrot

12:33

@SQB FWIW I don't think the scene is meant to add anything to the plot, just to be some dark humour

SQB

Two to go.

I'm thinking F it, let's get it over with.

Jenayah

it can wait...

TheLethalCarrot

^

Skooba

12:48

right or wrong it is done.

TheLethalCarrot

You was fine to do it, SQB was at the limit

And has been over it for most of the morning

Skooba

haha

{insert gif push it to the limit}

TheLethalCarrot

@Randal'Thor water can be merged and destroyed now

Marvin

1

Q: How many times has Kirkman outright lied in the "Letter Hacks" section of "The Walking Dead" comics?

At the end of each The Walking Dead comic issue is a "Letter Hacks" section, in which the writers (especially Kirkman) reply to fan letters about how they develop the comic, some worldbuilding, what may happen in the next issues... And sometimes the truthfulness of these statements has to be take...

comics the-walking-dead

Babel fish

0

Q: How did the Voldemort(within Quirrel) came to know that the Philsopher Stone was in harry's pocket?

So, in the last part of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's stone, when Quirrel asks Harry to come in front of the Mirror of Erised and asks him what he can see in it. Then, Harry sees himself picking up the stone from his pocket and obviously he lied BUT Voldemort(with Quirrel) yells that he's l...

harry-potter the-philosophers-stone

TheLethalCarrot

13:06

@SQB mogwai is gone

SQB

@TheLethalCarrot good.

@Babelfish Come on, it's "Quirrell" with double l and "Philosopher" with an o after the l.

TheLethalCarrot

Didn't know the spelling and missed the typo on Philsopher haha

SQB

13:26

I still missed "the" in "the Voldemort".

@TheLethalCarrot Kill it! Kill it with ehr... Oh well.

TheLethalCarrot

Global Warming! Dry up that water...

Skooba

No silly there is going to more water cause all the ice melts!

TheLethalCarrot

Nah it'll evaporate into the atmosphere and the Earth will speed up it's rotation which will "fling" it off into space

Skooba

Earth, now like wet dog.

TheLethalCarrot

With earth being destroyed, all of the water will have gone with it anyway

It happened... nice

SQB

13:43

Good job.

TheLethalCarrot

13:59

Just waiting on the badge to come through :)

Transcript for

The Restaurant at the End of the Univ…