Not sure how much you're kidding, but... that's true for a subtractive colour system, where you start with a white sheet of paper (i.e. reflects every wavelength) and subtract colours (filter out wavelengths) by painting over the paper with crayons. For an additive colour system, where you start with a black monitor screen, and you add wavelengths, the primaries are RGB.

...and, strictly speaking, the subtractive colors that closest match the typical human eye are cyan, magenta, and yellow -- the "CMY" of CMYK printer inks. Using red, yellow, and blue as subtractive colors gets you a big enough gamut for elementary school color mixing, but it won't give you as big a range of colors as CMY.

These kind of comments is why I love this site. The guy was obviously 100% joking but the engineers in us are bound to reply nonetheless.

It reminds me of a classic Dilbert. https://goo.gl/images/7DhC9f

… and we just add K because a separate black ink is cheaper and more precise.

I'm sorry you're incorrect. This paper says Red, Yellow and Blue. Thanks for your time, we'll be in contact.

I legitimately had a huge argument with my (former) roommate over primary colors.

She was more artsy, I was insistent that the primary colors were RGB, she was insistent that they were RYB. We googled. We were both right in some senses.

Good job you didn't have a third roommate who worked in printing...

Hilariously enough, my fiance now works in printing and actually mixes the colors (t-shirt printing).

I haven't brought it up yet because we once had a fight over whether that thing you put outside your shower is called a bath mat or a bath rug (Both are correct in different circumstances)

CMYK would be right. RYB means you can't produce cyan or magenta or vivid purples or pinks.

I had the same argument with my wife (fortunately not huge...)

Those primary colors are real to me dammit!

/colorblind

Totally off topic (except for the fact that "correctness" of an answer can be a deeper problem than checking against a list) but when you look at how the cones in your eyes are connected to the brain to actually transfer color information it's indeed closer to Red-Green/Yellow-Blue (as described in Lab*). That's why we intuitively include yellow as a "primary color" even though you can just use RGB to describe it.

"They told me so in primary school" is clearly anecdotal evidence. You really need a proper citation.

Like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu44JRTIxSQ

wow, there's an entire school just to teach that? (: