2501 Soundcore.

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If a solar flare happened that was big enough to ruin electronics my entire life’s work would simply cease to be. It really drives home the frailty of our existences when you think about something like that. I should see about getting some kind of shielded system so I can dump the files and an old computer that can read them into it. That way if society survives the disaster I can load it up to whatever form the internet takes. It might be one of the only surviving examples of the trivialities of daily life.

I guess I could potentially print the pages out like some kind of cavemen too…

I dunno, I’m gonna have to do something about it soon. We’re overdue for a big solar storm. If you’d like to help me prepare for the collapse of our modern age, and be ready to step into the future, that more or less exactly looks like the world of Visionaries, please use the links above. I hope my magic power is cool. I don’t want to have snail powers or some dumb shit.

44 Comments

Nah your power will be immortality with the stipend that it stops when you stop making comics so that you have an out and not an ‘OMG still here!’ till heat death of universe.

Actually Ive already got a handful of your strips written to Mdiscs, so you’re good for about a thousand years assuming they aren’t physically broken. (solar flares don’t affect them)

Hey, you know, this is the first time I’ve seen anyone with my particular stupid party trick. People act weird when you say you can hear everyone all the time, but it’s really just a combination of spacial awareness and ADHD.

Anybody with data of any value should use the 3-2-1 data backup strategy. I’m a hardcore data hoarder so it’s difficult to get a 100% implementation. I just do my best and prioritize the really important stuff. BTW FYI you can store 25gb on a single Blu-ray and a burner cost about $100.

A solar flare?
If it’s big enough to affect electronics that bad *directly* we’ve got other problems to worry about, like parts of the atmosphere being stripped away and other Unpleasantness..

Most of the problems from those flares come from having continent-wide conductive antennas that are already used at or beyond design spec, with maintenance and failsafes being an expensive “investment” that hurts shareholder revenue and management bonuses. *Particularly* in the northern end of the american continent.

People commonly refer to this as “the Grid”.
If you know a big one is coming ( it *is* watched out for…) you just… unplug stuff you don’t want to fry, *including* the network cable if you still have a copper business end…
Same as with thunderstorms, which tend to happen slightly more frequently..
A decent surge protector helps in both cases. And a proper modem or fibre for your Internet.

Honestly, if things get bad enough to neccessitate spinning rust stashed in a properly earthed faraday cage, preferably underground, you’d be dodging lightning strikes every other second.

I keep hearing fearmongering about solar storms every several years or so and nothing every comes out of it. It’s on the same level as us being “overdue” for a volcanic eruption in the middle of Yellowstone National Park that will block out the sun for many years or a pandemic that will wipe out humanity within months. If something like that is imminent, I think even mainstream news can’t keep silent about the issue. Why mutually exclude such views?

We are on the upward trend of sunspots currently — there’s an 11 year cycle of sunspots. The last cycle was not a particularly active one, but there’s already some evidence that this cycle (number 25, for those playing at home) will be very active.
All of this is of more direct concern to astronauts on the ISS (outside of earth’s protective atmosphere) and to those of us who use long-distance radio communication.

All due respect Mark, I would rather hear more about the issue from multiple sources than from a single post on a webcomic.

BlokeinClogland already debunked my Doomsday Theory, but I still subscribe to the idea that a massively destructive solar flare will happen and it’ll be the fall of society. Unless AI takes over and we succumb to SkyNet, of course.

Your Subscription is very valid regardless of the nay-sayers objections. The Massive solar ejection you’re talking about has happened before. At least 7 times in the past, There’s actual physical evidence to support it (some of the evidence has been found in petrified tree rings). And each time it has happened humanity’s civilization was blasted back to the stoneage along with the majority of humanity dying off. We’re due for another hit very, very soon.

Has happened before. Look up “Carrington event”. The damage then was limited to a few telegraph offices because that was all the high-tech we had then, and we weren’t as dependent on it as we are now.

Gotta love hearing like a bat. I can do the same thing as Nina most days. And sneak around like Brooksie XD

Back them up to a tablet and put that in a foil wrapped box. Hell,, a cheerios box would work for my phone and tablet. If needed, use multiple back ups. Dvd burner, memory stick, multi card reader/usb… and when you get your cpap supplies, wrap it with foil and put in some old plugs and bricks. Someone is going to rewind copper coils sooner not later. I’m not sure, but wouldn’t unplugging everything do most of the work since it’s the electrical grid that is the antenna?

I think printing your pages would be a great idea! Making a whole ass book is hard as shit, but it’s a little easier to self publish comics in small batches than you’d think. I have the same fears about my own work, especially since I work on iPad, so if that thing gets run over, everything I’ve ever cared about artwise is just toast. Worse than toast, it’s Panini Pressed.

To be honest if there’s a solar flare like that you’d probably be more concerned with not being able to use money than with your comics surviving. After all, you can reproduce the comics. The digital economic system we currently use couldn’t be reproduced, and a lot of basic concepts we take for granted would suddenly cease to function. Like banks. Or credit cards. Or fiat currency in general. Suddenly we’d be back to the barter system and barbarism for our economic model as people realize green paper and shiny rocks are worthless unless someone says they have worth.

I would bet against that. Recreating art requires the skill and memory of an artist. Few artists know the sequence of events in this comic by heart, who could work on the restauration. More than one person could work on it if the script is preserved and graphics only used for illustration, but that’s not how it works as the images also drive the story and responses.
By contrast, if computers are back, setting up some billion provisional accounts for people to get by until the exact amounts are retraced, is fairly easy. There are many backup copies of accounts, treaties often printed.
Else, you’d run the provisional accounting system by paper-pencil books, which is a long throw from bartering. You don’t need a top-down guarantee, you need people to agree on the worth of a piece of currency. Then you need folks to secure against cheating, stealing, forgery. You’d probably fall back to most recent pre-computer systems from the 20th century, and only if all digital tech is bust.

Anything can be considered a form of currency. The question is, how much worth can you give to that particular thing to the point that it’s worth exploiting the common man over?

The wonderful memories and bits of wisdom I’ve gained from BF over the years won’t die until I do. ;)

And here my hearing is just stupid good thanks to the autism. (0dB @ .5k Hrtz to 10dB @ 8k Hrtz according to my last work hearing examine, and that’s with the hearing loss associated w/ factory work.)

If it weren’t for chronic ear infections as a baby and young child, I probably wouldn’t be able to leave the house without earplugs in.

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