I want to say upfront that I have no problem with obscure
jokes, about any subject. If every XKCD
was like this, it could carve out a nice niche in the side of the Internet we’d
never bother each other again. The problem comes when the material is split
between accessible material and things like this. I’d say by this point, most
XKCDs could be considered widely accessible (note: “accessible” and “good” are
two separate categories). And then Randy throws out something like this.
I want to compare this to Irregular Webcomic, which uses science jokes somewhat more
regularly, so you understand what you’re getting into. However, every time the
author (I’ll call him David Morgan Mar, ‘cause that’s his name) uses an obscure
science joke, he uses the annotation to explain the science and such. This is
also used as another opportunity to make jokes. That’s good because it doesn’t
make you look for the punchline, and if you didn’t get the first one you can
get the next.
Compare both of these to QI
and Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal,
which tell you information and then make jokes about it. See, that’s the best
way because it educates you as the setup, then tells you the punchline. XKCD
tells you a punchline and then makes you look up the setup, which has never
been funny and will never be funny.
