I thought the difficulty regarding the USB Type-A plugs was traditionally the alignment when making the connection. And that disconnecting is, if anything, a bit too easy — as the post title notes, it doesn’t take much.
Side questions: Is the Spanish text somewhat antique, as the English is? And, in the middle panel do we see more of the sword that doesn’t quite match the reveal of the last panel?
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Comics I Don't Understand 
The third panel doesn’t match either of the first two given what we can see of the sword.
Well, now he has all the data he needs to be king…
The problem with USB A connectors is that you had to try them at least 3 times in different orientations before they would mate. Something about 4-dimensional space, I think.
Some online friends used to mock back at complainers like me (and Mark H), and insist that it’s really very easy and those of us having difficulty with matching up the Type A plugs must be very dense. The simple principle, they would say, is that the solid side (of the insert able metal portion) or equivalently the logo-printed side (of the plastic grip) should be facing UP.
“But this port where I’m attempting to insert it is vertical!” we complainers reply. No matter, say the apologists, you chose to stand up your computer, the underlying REAL ORIENTATION would have the motherboard lying flat, parallel to the table top, and relative to that configuration the marked side of the Type A plug will be facing UP.
Google says:
Whoever draws the sword from this anvil and stone is the true king of England
so not too antique really
Mitch4: That’s a crock. I’ve seen devices where what was clearly “up” was down. I have many cables with a sticker or dot on one side so I know what goes up.
Now, these apologists may be talking about the “standard” use of USB-A, but as ever, https://xkcd.com/927/
I had supposed that the humor of the comic, derived not from the difficulty in pulling forth the sword (which presumably is enchanted to allow only the proper heir to do so), but from the anachronism of the sword being a USB jump drive rather than the more traditional cutting weapon.
All I know is that I have a tablet with a USB-C socket for charging, but because I got a substantial protective case for it, the socket is buried quite deep from the outside edge of the case, so I STILL have to peer in to get the plug in the right place, while holding open the little flap in the case that covers it.
No hablo español, but even I can see that the Spanish text in the cartoon says “the sword” not “this sword”, an even though I knoweth not the word(s) I can see that “rightful born” is also missing.
As for whether there is spoof español antiguo like the spoof olde Englysshe one sees, IHNI. But then the Arthurian legend is dated 5th/6th century, and the “English” spoken here then would be unintelligible today, and the “Spanish” spoken then was probably closer to Latin than modern Spanish.
So, historical verisimilitude aside, this is what Mr Google has to offer us.
Quien saque la espada de este yunque y piedra es el verdadero rey de Inglaterra
translates as
Whoever draws the sword from this anvil and stone is the true king of England
And entering that to do English to Spanish gets almost the same.
Quien saque la espada de este yunque y de esta piedra es el verdadero rey de Inglaterra.
Translating
Whoso pulleth this sword of this stone and anvil is rightwise king born of all England
gets
Quien saque esta espada de esta piedra y este yunque es, con razón, rey nacido de toda Inglaterra.
and flipping that:
Whoever draws this sword from this stone and this anvil is rightly born king of all England.
My guess is that Google translate is likely pre-processing to turn that “olde Englysshe” into contemporary and then doing the translate thing.
USB-A is bad enough, but at least you had a 50-50 chance. It’s the microplugs at the other end that irritate me. They are close to, but not actually, symmetrical. Long live USB-C!
zbicyclist, since there are still only two possibilities with mini- and micro-USB, I’m not sure why they’re worse than USB-A? Agreed, USB-C is the standard we all wanted from day 1!
Time was, the functions of a USB cable, for an ordinary end-user, would be for connecting a computer and a peripheral. In the case of mouse, keyboard, camera maybe, etc, typically the end at that peripheral was hardwired to the thing, and the other end was a USB-A that went into the computer. But it might not be hard wired at that end, and for something like a printer it generally was not. So that end would also have a detachable connection, and that would be a USB Type B. Those were (are) 5 sided, but not a regular pentagon – more like three sides of a little square with a pointed roof. Usually it was simple to see the alignment of these.
Just a little later it became common for devices to use USB cables for charging up a battery without always having any data exchange going on. So the charger cable had a Type A at the end that goes into the power source – which could be a computer or a tiny transformer that came with the device and plugs into the wall outlet or a power strip – while the end going into the device might be all sorts of things, like even a straight 1/8 inch pin, or a magnetic gimmick, but often those variants called mimi-USB and micro-USB, or Apple’s versions thereof. Which had only two ways to try inserting, but not easily distinguishable by sight. Which I think fits with Zbicyclist’s complaint.
Then came USB Type C, and things were really pretty good, with devices using a cable that was Type C at the small device end and still Type A at the computer or charger end. This was not just computation-related devices (and phones would be in that), but any old electrified gizmo. Fans, lamps, drills, pet water fountains.
All was well. You might want a data-capable USB hub to expand your computer’s meager set of USB ports; this would have a bunch of Type A ports that peripherals would plug into (and still the peripheral ends might be Type B or hardwired if not yet made for Type C). And there would be one connection from the hub to a Type A slot on the computer. But also, for the fans and water fountains… and phones when all you needed is a charge… you can have a non-data USB multi charger. The ones I have provide only Type A slots, though newer ones I think have some A and some C; plus of course an electrical cord and household power plug. So this is like a power strip, but for USB level DC currents.
But now that Type C is so popular, there are devices which ship with a courtesy cable but it turns out to be Type C at both ends, so no joy connecting to my Type A non-data hub. But not so much of a problem, as I can hook it up to one of the A-to-C cables sitting in the hub, say the one for charging my phone if not in use.
If Arthur was even real at all he would have been a post-Roman British opponent of the new Anglo-Saxon-Jute aka English invaders and so would have been speaking Brythonic, a Celtic ancestor of Welsh, among other languages, and king of the Britons, not of a not-yet-existent England.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Arthur
https://theweek.com/articles/545166/what-english-shakespeare-beowulf-king-arthur-actually-sounded-like
Okay, someone finally figured out why it takes so many tries to plug in a USB cable.
In short, the sockets tend to be slightly loose fits for the housing. They get misaligned pretty easily, so you can’t get the plug in on the first try. But trying tends to realign the socket, so on your second or third try it goes in.
That said, while it’s a little of a perspective cheat, what little we see of the sword blade prior to the last panel IS consistent with the final reveal.
Yes, Arthur, if he existed was a late 5th to early 6th century Romanized Celt or maybe Celticized Roman. BUT, the text here, including the use of England, is straight from the standard modernization of Sir Thomas Malory (although I just checked,and the version I have says “Brytaygne”). The English stole Arthur from the Welsh starting around the time of Henry VII and that has been the common perception ever since.
And don’t forget Mini A and Mini B. And Micro A and Micro B. And the different A/B/Micro B used by USB 3.
The great thing about standards is that there are enough for everybody to have their own.
The first device that I had with a cable to connect to the computer was the digital camera I received as an anniversary gift from Megacorp (the third most useful one) in 2006. It has I believe a USB 2.0 micro B.
The current desktop has four USB A connectors on the front, which is convenient these days. The mouse and the external drive carrier plug into the back. I have learned that the type A connectors generally have two small holes on either side of the metal connector housing. One side the holes are hollow and the other filled, as that side has the plastic connector internal. Also the hollow side often, but not always, has a USB symbol on the cable farther down. Anyway, the hollow side needs to go to the left of the vertical ports. It’s cut down on fumbling, as when you are certain the orientation is correct you don’t give up so easily.
My phone came with type C, but with only a C to C cable and no charger. I decided to get an A to C cable rather than buy a C charger. The cable is more versatile, as I can connect to the existing charger or to the desktop with it.
And here’s another approach–
CIDU–Caption I Don’t Understand: what’s the “feline attack” bit about?
One of my charger hubs sits in a vulnerable position , where cat #1 will fiddle with it as part of a campaign to get me out of bed.
I suppose cables getting pulled out. I’ve never had a cat.
I still use my Palm Centro as I like it and also Lotus Organizer with which I sync it. I use the Centro as PDA around the house. It connects to my computer with a USB A plug on the computer end and a different type of plug on the end which goes into the Centro – it snaps into same with 2 wings holding it in place in the Palm. The Centro is basically used as a PDA while home. My desktop computer which is Win 7 and my current laptop which is Win 10 each have a Win XP virtual machine in them (added by Robert) so that the Lotus Organizer will work with them and the Palm will sync with the desktop computer. (Back in college he used to copy my computer programing homework and now he is the one who knows what to do with computers.)
(I do have a Moto phone - which I absolutely hate – worst cell phone I have ever had – which I use to receive spam text messages from “the other political party”, send a text message to R upstairs when dinner is ready, and telephone my mom once a week – and clients maybe a total for all of them of 20 calls a year.)