q_id stringlengths 6 6 | title stringlengths 4 294 | selftext stringlengths 0 2.48k | category stringclasses 1
value | subreddit stringclasses 1
value | answers dict | title_urls listlengths 1 1 | selftext_urls listlengths 1 1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
o7t507 | Why couldn’t Movie company’s use the movie character’s models in their video games based on the Movie? (Like Dreamwork and Disney Games) | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
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"text": [
"It is a thing in games where they say they’re using “movie quality assets” but that doesn’t really mean much, more of a buzz word. The problem with games is you have to render them in real time, so there’s constraints there movies don’t have. Pixar can ta... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o7tnpj | Why are commercials SO much louder than the program which the channel is airing? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h30wvyd",
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"text": [
"An explanation I heard is that commercials can be as loud as the loudest part of the show you're watching. So if you're watching a show where the volume fluctuates all over the place, occasionally punctuated by exceptionally loud noises like gunshots or c... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o80hn1 | Lasers and TVs | Why do laser pointers not work on TVs? Is it just that the TV is a light source or does it have something to do with the LED’s? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h325808"
],
"text": [
"TV screens, especially LED and LCD screens, have a thin layer between the screen and the LEDs/LCDs designed to absorb external light to minimize glare. Monitors and TVs are designed to be non reflective, which has the effect of also absorbing the laser pointer. The only... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o84kvs | How does hitting a tv that has been damaged fix the screen? | I’ve seen a lot of videos of tv’s with vertical lines or have been damaged being fixed by hitting it in the right spot. How does this work? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h32v1jn"
],
"text": [
"This worked better back in the days of analog TV and tubes. Over time corrosion would build up on the contacts. Hitting the TV would shake it enough to knock some of the corrosion off, giving a better contact and fixing the problem. This is the same effect of hitting yo... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o85qf6 | How do owners/creators of memes make money from them and how does a meme NFT buyer make money from their purchase? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h331z2k"
],
"text": [
"Imagine you own a piece of land. How do you sell that land to someone else? You can't take the land and put it in a bag and give it to someone. Instead, you write on a piece of paper: I sells this land to Susan. If Susan needs to sell the land, she shows the paper to th... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o8aj2j | . Why is it that most video games today push you to play online? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h33qmwu",
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"h33ufjb",
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],
"text": [
"To make more money off of you. To be able to have ads, tracking and in game purchases. There’s the other side of making games better with multiplayer and patches and updates to a game. But mostly it’s to make m... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o8eoev | Why can't we use an a.i to improve current products. | Like for example batteries, could you not give a supercomputer sterile physics information with boundaries mean for making batteries. Of course a lot of ludicrous and mundane stuff would come out but also many interesting ideas people haven't thought of right? That could spark a new revolution in the department it's re... | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h34gjln",
"h35spcv"
],
"text": [
"Ultimately, it's because true A.I. doesn't yet exist. The technology that people now call \"Artificial Intelligence\" is mostly just super-fast computers with access to a lot of data. They lack individual creativity. In essence, you'd still have to provid... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o8eq4c | Is it hard to make "dark mode" for apps? | I am not a software dev. I have noticed that it takes a long time (sometimes even months) for new apps to release a "dark mode" theme. Just curious if it was a tedious task for the devs. Isn't there an option to invert only selected elements of the app (such as the background, text, etc.) and be done with it? I know it... | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h34k8ux",
"h34gmyf"
],
"text": [
"It's not enough to just reverse all the colours. Companies have brands and reputations on the line. The new look has to still get the OK from the people who deal with that sort of thing. It has to look good, the company logo has to work with the new colou... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o8ppii | When one call 911, how is the call automatically local? | Hypothetically speaking, if someone is living in New York and they call 911, how does the call not go through a hospital in Los Angeles or other city from another state? How does the call automatically transfer to a local hospital in the area one lives in? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
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"h36of8j",
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"h36s1rf",
"h375qnd"
],
"text": [
"I feel very old having to explain this. In the 1950s-1970s, there was no 911. If you didn't know the phone numbers to your local ambulance service, police department, and fire department, you wer... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o8uy68 | how aeroplanes can stay in the air without falling? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h378xyi",
"h37a8n9"
],
"text": [
"By moving forward really fast. The forwards movement and the shape of the wings has two effects: 1. The air travels faster over the top of the wing which, in accordance with Bernoulli's principle, causes a lower pressure over the wing. This pushes the win... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o8wew9 | How and where are my pictures stored in real time, if I take out the battery and electricity for my PC/Phone? | Assuming a modern SSD/Phone. If the hardware doesn't physically change and I can't open it and see 1's and 0's, then how does the device know the state before the electricity went off? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h37gwkf",
"h37z0h7"
],
"text": [
"ELI5 answer. The hardware actually does physically change. When a picture is saved to memory, the phone does a \"write\" command to the drive. This means the data for picture is physically written on the drive. It no longer needs electricity to maintain t... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o8wobv | Why can't Electric Vehicles charge themselves while in motion? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h37hzdk",
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],
"text": [
"Physics. Conservation of energy. All the methods you described would take more energy than they would produce",
"Where would that energy come from? With a turbine, the additional drag would consume more energy than the turbine could generate"
],
"... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o8xf95 | Why do apps for Android/iOS/Windows/MacOS exist? Why aren't all apps just simply "web apps" that run in browsers? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h37p5bm",
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],
"text": [
"As a developer, I can tell you that a web app is not always a good idea, and even a stupid one as even the weakest computer can handle many thing. You don't need Internet for a calculator for exemple",
"There are two key reasons. Reason... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o8xmj8 | How do animal documentaries manage to capture the closeup shorts of animals without interrupting them? | So I was watching animal fight club, I see various camera angles captured. Is it CG? Or how do they manage to capture the action with them stopping the fight or knocking away the cam? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
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"text": [
"They wait with high-tech zoom cameras under a tarp for days at a time to avoid being detected by animals.",
"I have not seen this mentioned yet but, depending on the size of the animals, they... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o96msf | how are VPNs so widely accepted and not frowned upon considering the distribution limitations they so easily byass? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h399wfz",
"h3994lk",
"h398z6i"
],
"text": [
"Trust me, corporations and government agencies *do* frown on them. A *lot.* (Along people who kiss the asses of said corporations and government agencies.) But they're utterly powerless to do anything about it. Doesn't stop them from trying... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o96wpr | Why are the phone networks so awfully insecure? | There is only a handful of big players in each country/region. Can they not institute control of who gets to enter their networks? Why do we have so much spamming and scamming on our phones? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h39asfc",
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],
"text": [
"Pretty simple, there are no financial incentives to improve the systems and no financial risks to not improving the systems.",
"Scam and span calls have nothing to do with security Thats like saying roads are insecure because criminals ... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o9bxme | How do ultra high speed cameras (such as the Phantom cameras) work? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3anqjz"
],
"text": [
"There are some types of memory which can be filled up very fast, but like RAM in a PC, they are only temporary. So a high speed camera records a huge number of frames per second for a very short burst, then you need to transfer that data off the camera memory before rec... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o9exw3 | How does "touch screen" work? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3ap1ha",
"h3aprcm"
],
"text": [
"If memory serves the screen is made up of thousands of little Dots that, when pressed, make an adressable electrical connection. To over simplify it think of a grid system like the Battleships game, you press somewhere on the screen, the software in your ... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o9fajq | Why cant we use touch screens in regular gloves? | I've read in other eli5 post that touch screens work by you pressing on special dots and creating connection between them, so why do we need gloves w/ special conductive materials. | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3aqq1k",
"h3astzt"
],
"text": [
"Because there needs to be a way to READ the connections. Your screen is flat and rigid, so it isn’t actually based on pressure. There’s a slight conductivity to skin, which is what allows the phone to detect contact. That’s why it also works with pencils ... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o9gfkm | Why does water ruin machinery and circuits? | i listen to music from my phones in my shower, and today a bit of water got into my phone speakers, which I then tried to dry quickly. I then thought, how does water getting inside my phone ruin my phone? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3awl8e",
"h3b7agr",
"h3crrvi",
"h3awgcb",
"h3awod3"
],
"text": [
"It is the impurities in the water that connect to contact points within a device. If the device is on, the electric current can be sent to places that it shouldn’t go and that causes damage. If those impurities... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o9gr4s | Why electronics need resistors? | Why are resistors used in electronics? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3blsy3",
"h3az5pv",
"h3bap54",
"h3ayogd"
],
"text": [
"People here are failing to address the main issue - explaining resistors assuming everyone already knows everything about a circuit. Imagine a circuit like a bunch of pipes with water flowing. The water pressure is voltage, a... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o9jcph | How does computers restart themselves without any physical trigger, do they not shut completely down to retain the memory of restarting again? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3bcjzb",
"h3bfdlz"
],
"text": [
"At the end of a shutdown process, your operating system sets an ACPI command indicating that the computer should reboot. In response, the motherboard resets all components using their respective reset commands or lines, and then follows the bootstrap proc... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o9m3qz | - What is the static that plays when a radio is tuned to a number without a radio station? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3btejo",
"h3cmf7i",
"h3cwdno",
"h3bubdw",
"h3btfw2"
],
"text": [
"The entire radio spectrum is \"noisy\"--there's interference in it from both man-made sources and natural ones (e.g. lightning strikes). If you tune the radio to a dead channel then all it will be picking up is... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o9n9a3 | how’s does my brain recognise “fake” computer graphics which are intentionally designed to not fall within the “uncanny valley?” I’m watching a movie action scene which I know is unreal yet it’s perfectly “real” at the same time? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
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"h3c22qv",
"h3cl5au",
"h3cj1jw",
"h3d6i4c",
"h3d3ozc",
"h3ciuh9"
],
"text": [
"Generally the difference is light. If the light is hitting objects at different angles, or if it’s not passing through partially transparent objects like skin, your mind will see that something i... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o9qdj3 | How does the logical operator xor work? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
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"h3cn4oq",
"h3cowzk",
"h3cldc3",
"h3d7ibm",
"h3coyd8",
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],
"text": [
"“One or the other, but not both” True XOR True - > False True XOR False - > True False XOR True - > True False XOR False - > False",
"The best advice that I ever got in math is: when in doubt... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
o9sv2s | Why was the Y2K issue such a big deal, causing all those tech companies to spend billions of dollars trying to fix? | This topic is really confusion to me, how dates could be such a big deal. | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3d4n55",
"h3d47ty",
"h3d58xq",
"h3dd5yr"
],
"text": [
"The problem was that people didn't think far enough ahead. Many early computer programs only used two digits for the year. For example, *1976* was just *76*. However, once you hit 2000, two digits aren't enough. When the data... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
o9x95m | Are NFTs forever? | What happens when someone mints an NFT without having a right to the artwork for instance? In the case of an artwork by Basquiat I think the respective NFT was removed from the market. But what happens to the blockchain if errors like this occur? Can the information in the ledger be erased or changed and if so, how? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3dx8ie"
],
"text": [
"> What happens when someone mints an NFT without having a right to the artwork for instance? Then they created an NFT and control it, until potentially selling it to someone else. The NFT does not confer ownership of the original work, just control of the hash of... som... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
oa6gea | The constant forward force of Windows updates has me wondering: Why do some PC games work on Linux and not others. | And, why still do some games work via Proton and Steam Play even when they aren't designed to, albeit with graphical hiccups and performance issues? It seems to have little to do with the age of the games as well. | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3flna5",
"h3fhbu5",
"h3fm45e"
],
"text": [
"Let's think of operating systems as human languages. You write a book in English and you want a Swahili speaker to read it. What do you do? Translate the book to Swahili. This is analogous to game available to both Linux and Windows. What a... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
oaaqfc | How does noise cancellation software work? | Hi, you have noise cancellation apps on laptops like Krisp. I'm curious about how they work. I know about Active Noise Cancellation on headphones and how it works, but could the same be achieved by this software. And how does the app know which part of the sound wave is noise and which is useful audio? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3g7gal"
],
"text": [
"So there are microphones on the outside listening to what's around you. Sound waves behave like other waves, if two of equal and opposite size meet, they interfere with each other and cancel each other down to zero. So the software listens to the environment around you,... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
oacein | How was the first TV made? | When I think about how TVs work now, it seems to make much more sense than when I think about how the first one was made, and even how the idea of them was conceived. How did the inventor(s) know that X could lead to Y and Z? How did they coordinate all the audiovisuals? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3gk0wf",
"h3gkp0m",
"h3glk0z",
"h3gos87"
],
"text": [
"An invention like the TV sounds like it had to have been made deliberately, but in reality, for the most part, these things end up with someone wanting to do something, and looking for what parts they know they might need, an... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
oagt8c | There are tons of phone messages (calls texts etc.) going through the airways at any time, how does your phone pick out the specific signal coming to it and how is there no interference from other signals? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3hs45l",
"h3hdoqf",
"h3hphac",
"h3hsqj0",
"h3j6nty"
],
"text": [
"This is probably the biggest problem that thousands of engineers have been working on the last few decades, with the resulting improvement from GSM connections to incredibly slow internet, to 1GBps on 5G. There... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
oah68p | How can we stream HDTV through a service like directtv with no problems but satellite internet is often slow and a horrible delay making it basically worthless? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3hfv2y",
"h3hgbyx"
],
"text": [
"When you have the HD movie coming your way, you aren't able to detect the latency, being the time it takes for the signal to travel from the ground to space and back down to you. You just detect the incoming stream, and show it as it flows in, like if you... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] | |
oaktov | In TV & movies, how do they sync up the animation with the music? | This seems so hard. In reading stuff about The Simpsons, they write the episodes, then the impression I get is that they send it to Korea for animation, and like 8 months later, the animation is done. Where does the music come in? In watching tons of animated stuff with my young kids, I'm still amazed and can't figure ... | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3i3ukc"
],
"text": [
"Whoever is directing the animation chooses people to write music, create sound effects, and of course voice characters. This is generally done in a series of meetings very early on in the process. Voice acting happens before the animators start key framing in most cases... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
oal1qq | What is physically making the sound that comes out of a speaker? | Technology | explainlikeimfive | {
"a_id": [
"h3i4l66"
],
"text": [
"The surface of the speaker that you see, if you take the mesh cover off, is what is physically making the sound. A coil and magnets push the front of the speaker back and forth and that creates sound waves you can hear. Picture your hand in the water and you push it for... | [
"url"
] | [
"url"
] |
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