this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2025
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xkcd #3186: Truly Universal Outlet

Title text:

Building Inspectors HATE This One Weird Trick

Transcript:

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Source: https://xkcd.com/3186/

explainxkcd for #3186

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[–] mlg@lemmy.world 10 points 3 days ago

I actually have a really annoying problem in that I cannot find any universal adapter that has a real ground pin.

All of them only have prongs for the hot and neutral wires, and sometimes a dummy plastic ground to grip the socket better.

I understand that 99% of the time, modern electronics don't need a ground cable and its only there for safety, but it would still be a lot more comforting knowing the ground is actually connected.

I even considered modifying an adapter with a ground cable I can manually insert into the socket.