Randall Munroe

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Randall Munroe (born October 17, 1984) is a self-described "pen/pencil operator" and programmer best known for creating the webcomic xkcd. Formerly a roboticist for NASA, in 2006 Munroe left his job at NASA to write xkcd full-time, supported by the sale of related merchandise.

He is also the creator of the websites BestThing, The Funniest, The Fairest, and The Cutest, which present users with two options and ask them to choose the one that is better, funnier, prettier, or cuter respectively. A scoring algorithm is then used by each site to rank the options over time, based entirely on choices made by the users, to determine the best thing, the funniest image, or the prettiest image. All of the options presented to users are provided by other users. A sub-project of BestThing is BestDate, which uses the same principle to determine what is the best possible date to go on.