xkcd #3232: Countdown Standard
Title text:
Anyone who is caught counting ‘three … two … one … zero … GO!’ will be punished with a lifetime of eating only ISO standard food samples.
Transcript:
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Source: https://xkcd.com/3232/
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In T2: Judgement Day, when Miles Dyson has to turn two keys simultaneously to open the vault to get the Terminator prototypes, they go
3-2-1-turn and then AFTER that, they turn. How many times would people have messed that up, learning such a weird pattern? That’s totally unintuitive!
Real ones know to go on the “t” of “three”
I’m a theatre tech and stagehand. “Go” is saved for cue calls. It’s always lift on three. One two THREE.
It always tickles me when I come across people with enough comms etiquette to not say “Go” unless they are giving a cue. “I’ll wait for you to say G. O. before I do anything”
My favorite thing is the ability for most if not all hands on comms to have the most random conversations and then stop cold as soon as “standby…” Is heard. Then after all the cues have been given, the conversation picks up exactly wherever it left off.
LX7 Standby
Standing
Se… No !
Has the XKCD guy been nostalgia-watching *Bring It On"?
Or Red vs Blue S1?
“Wait, on three or three and then go?” “On three. It’s always faster to go on three”
I know someone who would always say “we go on three” and then just shout “three!” Without counting or anything. I told him that was super confusing and he just didn’t agree and moved on
Playing Let’s Go Eevee with my 6yo niece the other day, and when I counted trying to time our pokeball throws she would demand to be the one who counts. Her method was to try and surprise me, it seems. She would change the timing between each number independently every time, like “3, … …… 21GO!” Sometimes, she would just throw on 1 but keep counting. Realized it was easier just to watch her arm.
That’s what I do. If you’re ready, you’re ready, no point in counting.
Why use a number then!?
Saying three implies one and two.
Why not say “on my mark” or something?
I think he was making fun of you.
He was an EMT and it was about lifting someone in sync so they don’t fall…
I think it’s so the person being lifted doesn’t tense, when ready for it. So you kind of surprised them but it’s an acceptable surprise, as they are expecting a move.
These are usually either unconscious or screaming people, not the kind to care about what an EMT says.
Pretty good joke, to be honest.
Well, five is right out.
I’ve also heard people do “three… two… one!” and then do the thing on “one”…
Obviously for this case we need to add a signifier for the countdown so it’s clear to the other parties that you are aware of the standard and adhering to it before you even begin the countdown.
Like “ISO three two one GO!”
This is semi-backwards compatible, but still confusing for normies.
Even better, just make up new words where the ambiguity never existed. No numbers at all, just “glarp dook peow” and we always go on “peow” and always have. No backwards compatibility, but you’ll be guaranteed that a person who doesn’t understand will need clarification, and won’t go unexpectedly through imagined agreement.
Or, if backwards compatibility is required, we could count up from 1 to 3… and our signifier phrase could be something like “awnthree”. As a label for the standard we’re using! Like, “awnthree, one, two, three”.
I think that could work 😛
I think you need a fourth word for better timing. A person might misinterpret the duration between glarp and dook, and arrive at peow too early or late. Just one more timing sample is better to reduce human error.
But do you start lifting on the pee or the aow?
I do almost exactly this, but with random digits.
“Eight… Five… Nine!.”
It shows that the language matters less than the delivery.
I’ve seen this a few times and just started at them and told them they were an idiot.
they unironically wanted to go on “one”. dumbasses
Same wifh rock paper scissors
I just say “THREE!”. It’s the “ONE TWO THREE!” variant but I skip “ONE” and “TWO”.
If you’re not ready now, you won’t be after the count down.
In Finnish we typically say "Än, yy, tee, nyt!", because our word for "now", nyt, is composed of letters N, Y and T.
The “y” is pronounced roughly the same way as “ew” in “new”. “ä” in the same as “a” in “cat”, and “e” is the same as “e” in “well”.
How about translating this to English and using the following as the standard?
"Aehn, oh, double you, now!"
🙃
The three syllable ‘w’ kinda ruins it.
Eh everyone says “dubya” anyways
Holy shit, is that why people call george w bush dubya? As a non native English speaker I wouldn’t have thought of that in a million years
Still, all other letters only clock 1 syllable. I vote we just go ahead and change the standard to “dub”.
But if we do that, we’ll need a new alphabet song!
(also, since letters [sorta] contain their respective sounds, I suggest “wub”)
Do we go on one?
Apollo 11 voice goes ‘4, 3, 2, 1, 0, liftoff’.
Liftoff is a non-integral byproduct of the countdown, not an actual canon part of the sequence.
If you don’t say liftoff then the rockets don’t ignite.
You ignite the rocket before liftoff though?
Right, but if you don’t say it, they won’t have ignited.
It’s similar to the reason rain dances work. They don’t stop dancing until it rains.
Playing Chained Together we had so many jumps that a full count was too long, so we took out the 3 entirely and counted fast. “2 1 Go! 2 1 Go!” Very successful. That game even counts for you if you press the hotkey, but it takes five full seconds, and there’s lava rising down there!
“Feel the rhythm. Feel the rhyme…”
