Here are some of the wittiest tech-related comics I've had the good fortune to follow over the years.
1. XKCD by Randall Munroe
This comic strip with the unpronounceable name, is an obvious choice. It's been around since 2005, and is full of tech wisdom and witty (and very cynical) observations about the tech industry.
The art is nothing groundbreaking; it's literally stick figures talking to each other. But somehow the lack of faces on these stick figures add rather than detract from the content. It actually makes the dialogue feel very deadpan, which is absolutely appropriate for the subject matter. The humor is very dry.
Take the above example. It features a typical programmer problem - the tendency to over-engineer things. "It'll save time in the long run!" What a punchline, and how apt.
For tech humor where you need a bit of professional experience to really relate to the content, I can't recommend XKCD enough.
2. Dilbert by Scott Adams
The next item on this list needs almost no introduction. Dilbert has been around since 1989, and its content has been the mainstay of many office workers.
Dilbert does not just deal with tech foibles; in the larger picture, it takes the Mickey out of corporate nonsense. Something that a wider audience can relate to.
The strip above is just one such example. In it, the titular character Dilbert mocks his clueless corporate boss, who in turn is a caricature of the stereotypical corporate stooge driven only by profit and buzzwords.
Its creator Scott Adams has in recent years come under fire for remarks made on YouTube. Which is also why there is no link I can provide to his work. But alas, do you hear that silence? It's the sound of me not giving a rat's ass. His shit is funny AF, and in the spirit of separating the artist from the art, that's all that matters.
3. Help Desk by Christopher B Wright
We follow up with another example of extremely simplistic art. There's nothing elegant about Help Desk - though in all fairness the art is way more detailed than that of XKCD. The facial expressions are still minimal, and as with XKCD, this serves to accentuate the deadpan-ness of the humor.
I've been following this comic since my days in desktop support, and it goes all the way back to 1996. It was huge for me back then. I related so much. Even the character that appears - Binky the Paper Clip, featured below - is an example of something that had relevance back in the day but probably less so now. Still, this does not change the fact that Wright is one hell of a webcomic artist.
Help Desk is actually only one section out of his entire body of work. There are other comics that he draws, of course. The main complaint I have is that the dialogue tends to be a bit wordy, but when it's good, it's good.
4. Toggl by Mart Virkus
Toggl is a tech company with a product, Toggl Track. It's a project productivity tool which - you know what, I'll let them speak for themselves. Go follow that link. I'm just here to talk about their comics. Toggl has a blog that features a lot more than just comic strips, but damn, their comic strips are good.
The comics that are drawn by Mart Virkus, in particular. Virkus has his own site, but its the stuff that appears on the Toggl blog that I like the best. Toggl also has other comics contributors and I'm sure they have their own following, but it's Virkus I want to focus on here.
His stuff mostly focus on the differences between programming languages, software development methodologies and the like.
One of my favorites is the one above, and it's also fairly representative of his content on the Toggl blog in general. The art is cute, and brings the message across quite effectively.
5. Monstika by Monstika/Cheezup/Arseniic
This last one is more of a blog that I found in recent years. I don't know anything about Monstika, whether they're male, female, or how long they've been doing this. Or their real names - the artist goes by mostly by Monstika, but also Cheezup or Arseniic on different platforms. And guess what, I don't need to know. Their shit is side-splitting.
There are no lengthy dialogs. Mostly memes, and visual puns. And if there's anything I'm crazy about, it's puns. Tech puns. Especially the really bad ones. The programmer dad jokes.
Take this one above. It's so bad, it's good.
The puns are mostly tame enough that even non-techies can (mostly) grasp them. The art's pretty good too!
Hilarious!
Humor - especially the visual kind - is a great way to get through the day. And when you can relate to said humor, all the better.programmer.chuckle(),
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