True story: In my visual communications class the other day the professor pulled up #657 as an example of an infographic and it was all I could do to not embarrass myself by referencing this blog. Good thing she picked that one instead of this one, though, because this one sucks.
First off, what resolution is a typical computer screen? That is important information that changes the way the information is perceived. And then it's confusing when the scale changes in the second square. The first square is labeled "actual size" but there's no corresponding "to scale" label on the second.
The information is also hard to understand in general. Assuming all the math is correct, it gives the reader a decent idea of the relative consumption of each thing, but I don't think anyone who reads this is going to come away with any figures that they could state, unlike the majority of the previous infographics XKCD has run. There's the "4 m/s" thing, but can anyone really visualize what that actually means? This comic could have really benefited from extra labels like "4 gallons of spit a second" or whatever.
Speaking of, what does 'consumes' mean when it comes to spit? Like, is that the rate at which we produce spit in our mouths on average or is that when we swallow it or is that strictly when it's sold and purchased? The same questions go for the 'milk (human)' circle.
I also really don't get why solids like glass, meat, and cheese are on here. And since he split milk into two categories, why didn't he split meat and cheese? That would actually be pretty neat, seeing how much more chicken we eat than cow, or vice versa. Especially since chickens are smaller, that would be all like "woah!" if it turned out we eat more chicken than we do cow.
I smiled a bit at this comic, n-not that I think it's good or anything, b-baka! I have totally been in that or similar situations, and I like how the phrase he says aloud is one that I could reasonably expect him to say to a baby under the circumstances. He discounts the other ones because they aren't good, which makes sense and also adds to the punchline, like "that was the best you could do?" and it was!
I'm also going to give it points for differentiating the thought text from the spoken text in different ways, keeping it (if barely) from being CouldBeATweet.
Speaking of CBAT, I kinda feel like that's a bad name now. The point is that it's text-based, with the art not actually adding to the joke. "Could Be A Tweet" makes you think like "oh, it's bad because it's short" which is a bad criticism and if you make it than you are a bad person and I try to be a good person so I don't make it.
Parts of this comic are kinda lame, like the first thing he thinks of, which just comes off as "people who say "it's getting so big!" are stating the obvious and are therefore stupid". It'd be funnier if there was some indication he was thinking it in response to his own thoughts, like if it was written "...unlike other babies, that never grow? You dingus" or something to that effect.
Also, Randy, if you're reading this, the safe thing to say is "Hi, how are ya? I'm (insert name here), I'm your (relative/relative's friend/colleague/cellmate)." real soft like, like you're talking to a baby.
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