Pyramid Chat 03/29/00: Dr. Kromm and David Pulver

David Pulver (GURPS tech-book and science-fiction author extraordinaire) and Sean Punch (GURPS Line Editor) will discuss GURPS Transhuman Space. Transhuman Space is an upcoming line of hard-SF worldbooks, set in the Solar System, which will feature biotech, black-hole mining, and pirates . . . and no aliens or FTL travel. The first releases will be in early 2001, but plans are being made now. Come to the chat and be among the first to hear about them!

MadDanEccles . o O ( I will have the spam, spam, spam, tea and spam )

Vaxalon . o O ( Spam, eggs, sausage and spam. )

Michalak [to daiv]: Need any advice? I kept bees for a while.

coyote6 sits back to "listen"

lapdog says, "Spam Egg, Bacon and Spam"

Dataweaver waits a bit less patiently...

Martinl . o O ( spam, spam, scones, spam, kippers and spam )

JFZeigler has connected.

VirtualPaul says, "Man! DP and SP can sure pack 'em in!"

starmage says, ""Michalak, my butler is a demon, who knows where he shops.""

azathoth has connected.

clangador says, "Cool."

Parakeets appear at all corners of the Pyramid Lobby and collect into one large, hovering flock.

Kromm says, "There is it, then. Well, good night! It's been real."

bobzilla has disconnected.

Roxy says, "Wooo!"

Kromm smirks.

Kira rolls eyes.

MikeLee grins

Curtiss waves to Kromm.

Anthony waves to Kromm.

taschoene vanishes into nothingness.

taschoene materializes out of thin air.

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Arrgh! Mindspring in Denver must die."

Kira will leave yall to it. page me when it's over. :)

Kira steps into the elevator.

dlpulver says, "Thanks Kira! Hi Jon!"

Vaxalon says, "When men were REAL men, women were REAL women, and small furry creatures were, well, still on Alpha Centauri."

clangador says, "This looks "interesting.""

JFZeigler says, "Evening."

Kromm says, "Right, so that is the nutshell version -- the blurb associated with the first book and to an extent the line."

James has connected -- and there was much rejoicing.

Martinl . o O ( Gas mines of Uranus? Is he *serious*? )

There are strangers on the MOO.

Parakeets say, " You gave me a heart attack Kromm. Luckily, I had a spare."

azathoth says, "Hi people."

Chadu says, " Whoa"

Roxy [to dlpulver]: How big is the first book, are how many are planned?

dlpulver says, "Yep. The United States National Atmospheric Helium Gas Initiative"

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Would you mind repeating that? My hotel kicked me off-line."

artee has connected.

dlpulver says, "176 pages is the first book. Six in the series."

Chadu says, "Gas mines of Uranus, right."

starmage says, ""will the older solar sail space ships be detailed. I can think of sci fi ghost ships.""

daiv [to Martinl]: thanks, I would not have seen that otherwise....

cmdicely says, "Primordial black holes? What do they do with them?"

Anthony assumes one minds for 3He on the outer planets

dlpulver says, "Some will be around."

Curtiss says, "How many books per year?"

Anthony says, "uranus is as good as anywhere"

A ball of fluff condenses out of the carpet. Whatsit is here.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Arvada/Golden.

Kromm says, "OK, first the line specifics."

Vaxalon says, "Primordial black holes are TERRIBLY useful."

SMarsh says, "Is that a six book guaranteed? Six maximum? Six minimum?"

Kromm says, "We are looking at a minimum of five books."

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Cool.

Whatsit listens intently.

dlpulver says, "NAGHI was set up to break the backs of the lunar helium 3 collective. Less processing. Jupiters and Saturns gravity wells are too deep."

clangador says, "Well, I didn't expect the Spammish Inquisition..."

Roxy [to dlpulver]: Will the space combat rules that SJ has the rights to see the light of day in this project? I can't remember the name, sorry....

Kromm says, "Six we hope: three by first quarter 2001, three by last quarter 2001/"

Hildaur says, "How big are these black holes... I want to build a mass conversion drive..."

dlpulver says, "I'd like SJ to consider Triplanetary for it, but it will up to him. NO plans at present."

Vaxalon [to Roxy]: Triplanetary

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Roxy]: Triplanetary?

MadDanEccles asks the serious questions : What are terrestial and space nations like, and will small countries like Australia, South Africa, Saudi Arabia et al be a part of it?

Sauronth says, ""Six books! Whoa! YOu plan on being busy!""

bigjon says, "Yi! There goes the TL9 hard sci cyberpunk I was thinking of doing. Be easier just to wait for this to come out."

dlpulver says, "Billion ton minimum."

kiwiduck says, "TRriplanatery (damn keyboard""

Kromm [to MadDanEccles]: Good question.

Roxy says, "That's it!"

Martinl says, " The GMOU is just a really bad joke. Even if it's serious. I bet the miners just hate it..."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "GMOU=?"

dlpulver says, "GMOU?"

Whatsit says, "is transhumen space related to the world background explored in BIOTECH?"

Chadu [to Kromm]: What factors went into making this six book deal?

Vaxalon says, "Gas Mines of Uranus"

Roxy says, "gas Miners of Uranus."

Kromm says, "We are postulating a transhuman Earth. National survival amounts to memetic successfulness."

dlpulver says, "Yes. "

Dataweaver [to Kromm]: OK; can you give us a scorecard?

Dolarre says, "Question. Are you folks at all worried that you'll be self competing with Traveller?"

Kromm says, "So some nations will exist . . . some will not."

Whatsit says, "Wooooo..."

Anthony says, "hm...yup, billion-ton black holes could still exist from the big bang"

dlpulver says, "It is derived from BioTech. And gas mining on Uranus is done by drone scoop."

dlpulver says, "Captured inside asteroids. "

Curtiss says, "Sort of like the Earth in Bear's Moving Mars?"

Martinl says, "Sorry, GMU = Gas Mines of Uranus"

starmage says, ""In most sci fi the Asteriod Belt is the Old West redone. Can we hope for something more like renaisance Italy in this setting?""

Kromm says, "And yes, this setting will be transhuman in philosophy. It won't just be weird tech with today's humans -- like, say, Star Trek is."

Vaxalon would choose GT if there came a time when he wouldn't buy EVERYTHING Pulver wrote.

CraigR . o O ( "Are those the gas miners from Uranus Terrence?" "I believe they are, Philip." )

Dan1 says, "what tech level will the world be"

dlpulver says, "Maybe ancient greece... "

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "How fast is technology progressing? A TL every 2d years like UTT's nanotech revoltution?"

Chadu [to dlpulver]: I found Terradyne sleep-inducing. What whiz-bang, golly-gee funky weirdness can I look forward to in Transhuman?

azathoth says, "So you're saying that only the most popular countries are still around? Do nations market themselves? :)"

Roxy [to starmage]: Not enough trade going through them, I think. Too widely separated.

dlpulver says, "Depends on what authors are involved (:"

Anthony says, "you could go down to the surface of uranus well enough...look at Saturn Ruhk"

SMarsh raises hand. "Retailer-type question: What books are required to play this new setting?"

Anthony says, "unclear why you'd want to, but you could."

Curtiss says, "How do you plan to handle super intelligent PCs?"

Kromm [to Dan1]: TL9 base, TL10-12 biotech, but in both cases everything will be mitigated by real science.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Chadu]: Terradyne was awesome, IMO, if to-low-tech for 22nd century.

MadDanEccles says, "So, this represents a huge change in human fealings on Eugenics and Genetics (from active mistrust of today) into a world where the most addapted survive?"

Martinl says, "Any chance for Canadian World Domination (TM)?"

dlpulver says, "Whiz-bang funkiness. Martian Triads. The Helium 3 pirates. Blackjackers who steal black holes. A war under the ice in Europa between transhuman advocates and preservationists."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "What is average lifespan & life expectancy at birth?"

Whatsit says, "I wouldn't say it's that dramatic. After all, the corporations seem quite in favor of biotech..."

Curtiss says, "Will there be personality engineering? For example the stuff in Vacuum Flowers, the daemons in Aristoi, etc?"

Chadu [to dlpulver]: Alrighty, you've got my attention. :)

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "It'd also be nice to know what demographics to expect among the various worlds?"

dlpulver says, "Conflicts in space between the People's Liberation Space Navy, Royal Navy Space Service and USAF Deep Space Command. "

Roxy says, "So what _was_ found on Europa?"

cmdicely says, "Wouldn't black holes inside asteroids cause some damage -- from the energy release? And what do you do with them?"

dlpulver says, "Furry bioroids."

Kromm [to Curtiss]: Definitely.

Dataweaver says, "How many points would the average character be built on, roughly?"

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Is earth all old people?"

MadDanEccles says, "Not with the US govt banning cloning and a public backlash on GM food"

Whatsit says, "what is the place of plain old homosapiens in this new world?"

dlpulver says, "I would expect a unique approach to character points."

Anthony ponders money-based points.

Roxy pumps her fist, "Bioroids! All-right!"

Kromm says, "Core concepts here are genemod humans, memetic engineering, energy economies, etc."

bobzilla has connected.

Vaxalon says, "I like memetic engineering."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "'unique approach' means what, exactly?"

dlpulver says, "THis is 2100. Expect initial movement off shore of human bioengineering, growth of 3rd world biotech in developing worlds - -China NEEDS those GMOs and -- consequent changes in internatioanl political relations."

MikeLee . o O ( memetic engineering? hmm, BioReligions :) )

Vaxalon says, "Tell me more about it. Marketing Science?"

Kromm [to Dataweaver]: Points are out the window. These are transhumans. Point cost becomes mutable and largely irrelevant.

Anthony grumbles.

starmage says, ""explain Memetic engineering. Is it social idea engineering?""

Anthony waves.

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Sort of like Stateless Island in Egan's Distress?"

Anthony must go.

MadDanEccles says, "Energy economics? Surely if the economy is space based, energy would be almost unlimmited"

Ralzakark disappears suddenly for parts unknown.

Vaxalon [to Kromm]: WooO! Point cost irrelevant!

Martinl says, "What about Uplifts?"

Anthony has disconnected.

Whatsit [to dlpulver]: is being a normal human a Second Class Citizen? Minority? Shunned monsters?

cmdicely says, "Why would energy be unlimited?"

dlpulver says, "The average human on Earth is genetically enhanced."

Curtiss thinks, "Could you run a party that shared a body? Each 'PC' a personality? And this isn't a test Kromm question. I think it would be fun it the setting could handle this.

Roxy says, "Or is it a ruthless meritocracy? May the best genetic structure win!"

MadDanEccles says, "Solar energy, you dont pay the sun. Hydrogen grows on planets."

daiv says, "my wife is casting "summon husband: she got a crit. I am out of here. be well. thanks for the scoop, folks!"

dlpulver says, "Energy is NOT unlimited. Its use expands as people find more uses for it."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Curtiss]: Good question.

dlpulver says, "LIke massive desaliniation projects, for example."

Kromm says, "Okay, folks. There are more question here than David and I can take at a time. How about we ask one, answer one?"

daiv has disconnected.

JFZeigler [to Curtiss]: Very Minsky-ish. . .

Parakeets say, "I suppose I missed the explanation by coming in so late...but what is a transhuman?"

lapdog has disconnected.

cmdicely says, "Yes, and you have to pay for the power plants, which have finite lifespans. *Cheap* power, sure, but not free -- and there is plenty to spend it on..."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Yes, but which has a steeper first derivative: energy consumption or production?"

Whatsit [to dlpulver]: Well I understand that biomods are the norm, but I would expect some normal humans to still be around. If not, why?

Roxy cackles and ponders the energy barons of Mercury.

Curtiss grins, "I've had my gamer partial running question sims all day."

dlpulver says, "Kromm, are we answering in order or what?"

Kromm [to dlpulver]: Let's start.

dlpulver says, "Okay, people, one at a time:"

cmdicely raises his hand

SMarsh raises hand.

Kromm says, "'Cause Dave and I *aren't* superintelligent AIs."

Curtiss takes a number.

Whatsit raises hand.

dlpulver says, "Firt, cmdicely: question:"

starmage starmage raises his hand

Chadu raises his hand.

Til_Eulenspiegel raises his hand

Martinl scratches himself

MadDanEccles raises his knotted string, so there is a purpose

Kromm [to cmdicely]: OK, shoot . . .

cmdicely says, "On black holes -- power? or something else"

Michalak keeps track of who is raising hands.

Curtiss raises his hand.

Roxy [to Parakeets]: I think it's anything that been modified from base human stock. Cybernetics, genetic modification, nano-tinkering, etc.

dlpulver says, "Okay, black holes for power. Dump matter into a black hole, out comes energy. Kromm?"

Dolarre raises his hand

Kromm says, "Exactly. The idea is that they are tiny, inside asteroids, and sustain themselves by gradually coring the rock."

dlpulver says, "SM Marsh, question?"

Kromm says, "You crack 'em open and get 'em out."

SMarsh says, "What books will be required? GURPS Basic? Space? Others? Or will it be self-contained, ala Discworld? (I'm asking from a retailing standpoint... asking new customers to buy six books to start a new system may be unreasonable...)"

artee has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "Kromm, want to take that?"

Kromm [to SMarsh]: Steve Jackson has *specifically* asked us to keep it down to BASIC and COMPENDIUM I.

Whatsit says, "owch."

SMarsh weeps with joy.

Dataweaver raises his hand.

Kromm [to SMarsh]: SPACE and BIO-TECH will be useful, but we will be developing concepts from those books in the TS books.

CraigR gives a low whistle...

Til_Eulenspiegel wishes for GURPS CD-ROM.

Kromm [to SMarsh]: And note that I did not say 'reprinting,' but 'developing.'

Whatsit wishes along with Til. :)

dlpulver says, "Okay, who was next?"

starmage says, ""Please explain Memetic engineering, how does it differ from social engineering?""

Michalak says, "Curtiss"

dlpulver says, "Curtiss?"

Curtiss says, "How much personality engineering is possible in this setting? Can you buy a new personality? Have sub personalities like Aristoi? Plug ins like When Gravity Fails? For an extreme example could a part of players share a body and each run a 'personality' of the body?"

JFZeigler . o O ( I *like* that last concept. )

dlpulver says, "Yes, like aristoi. The cocnepts for that are already in BioTech. This will be somewhat rare, but will exist. "

CraigR [to Curtiss]: Like in "Vacuum Flowers" by Michael Swanwick?

bret has connected.

dlpulver says, "Stuff like Vacum Flowers will be reasonably common."

Kromm says, "See 'wet-ware subpersonalities in BIO-TECH."

dlpulver says, "Okay, Michalak... who was next?"

Vaxalon . o O ( This is going to be a strange place to play... )

CraigR will check when he gets home. :)

Vaxalon puts in his card for a question.

dlpulver says, "We will have guidelines on playing in a strange setting, yes."

Michalak says, "Whatsit"

dlpulver says, "Whatsit?"

Michalak says, "was next."

Whatsit [to dlpulver]: I understand that biomods are the norm, but I would expect some normal humans to still be around. If not, why?

Whatsit quotes itself.

Whatsit says, "what is the status of a normal human in this setting?"

Kromm [to Whatsit]: Some humans will *want* to stay unmodified. For a number of reasons: religion, politics, etc.

Whatsit says, "Exactly."

MikeLee [to Michalak]: slip me next in que, if you would be so kind :)

Kromm [to Whatsit]: Those are strong memes that will not just vanish in the setting.

dlpulver says, "They still exist. `Enhanced' means, say, that the genes governing many inherited defects are removed. But not every nation can afford this. And religious groups, etc., may avoid it. Normal humans are sort of like people who deliberately avoid blood transfusions."

Michalak [to MikeLee]: No prob.

Curtiss says, "Homo sapiens as a lifestyle choice."

taschoene raises hand

Kromm [to Curtiss]: Essentially, yes.

Vaxalon says, "By one's parents...."

Whatsit says, "aha. Sounds interesting. A quirky sub-group, but not discriminated against? what about insurance?"

Kromm says, "It won't be your daddy's Gamma World, though, with 'pure-strain humans' occupying some odd niche."

MikeLee [to Michalak]: actually, take me out. It's already been answered :)

thedarkfnord has connected.

JFZeigler [to Vaxalon]: Or by one's self, with a proteus nanovirus.

Dan1 says, "I raise my hand"

dlpulver says, "I'd say easily 33% of the population are normal."

Curtiss [to CraigR]: Thanks

dlpulver says, "Maybe 20%"

Whatsit says, "I'd think a plain-vanilla human would be next to impossible to insure."

dlpulver says, "Michalac, who was next..."

Michalak says, "starmage was next after Whatsit."

Drey has connected.

dlpulver says, "Starmage?"

starmage says, ""Please explain Memetic engineering, how is is different than social engineering? Are the menes contageous?""

SMarsh raises his hand again.

Kromm says, "A meme is, in essence, a thought structure."

Curtiss raises his hand again.

bret says, "Are you going to include warnings about the dangers of reduced genetic diversity? Tailored viruses would also be easier to target for a particular gene mod."

Kromm says, "A religion is a meme. So is liking chocolate. So are instinctive hunting skills in predators."

VirtualPaul raises hand

Whatsit says, "isn't that confusing learned behavior and inherited genetic tendancies?"

Kromm says, "In theory, memes have a 1-1 correspondence with neurological structures in the brain."

Dataweaver [to bret]: we're taking turns.

Sauronth raises his claw

Kromm asks for peace while he types.

Michalak [to Kromm]: I think you mean non-instinctive. Learned behaviores.

Whatsit says, "sorry."

stonethrow has connected.

triad has connected.

cmdicely . o O ( instinctive behaviors are memes too... )

bret says, "Sorry, not the familiar with chats."

Steve says, "Behavior can be inherited"

Vaxalon sorries... this is getting too crowded, and I'm RPing elseMUSH. Bye

Vaxalon leaps back to Lemuria.

Steve says, "It happens all the time in nature"

Kromm [to Michalak]: They jury is out on that, actually.

Hildaur has disconnected.

Whatsit says, "Behavior can be inherited, christianity cannot, christianity must be transmitted."

starmage says, ""Would Memetic Egineers be hired to make religions more popular?""

dlpulver says, "general comment: I'll be on for quite a while, so don't worry, we'll have time to answer everyone's questions!"

Curtiss says, "But behavior can be transmitted as well"

Steve says, "Trasmittanc is very much like inharitance"

Whatsit says, "Which one is a meme? the tendancy to seek religion, or a specific religion?"

clangador Clangador raises his axe.

Michalak says, "Oh and Chadu is up after this question is done."

cmdicely says, "Both"

Whatsit says, "Transmittance is "catching" it from soneone."

JFZeigler says, "The key to a meme is that it can be copied. It defines a learned behavior."

azathoth says, "Both."

Kromm says, "In any case, if specific brain structures are associated with specific thought structures, you can hypothetically study the structures and learn how transmission cocurs, perpetuates, etc."

coyote6 is reminded of certain Neal Stephenson novels

Kromm says, "Suppose you want to teach people not to smoke."

bigjon raises his hand w/ a GURPS Space question if they're being taken tonight.

dlpulver says, "especially if you have advanced neural probe systems"

Kromm says, "The simple, sympathetic approach is to say, 'Hey, thats bad! Don't do it!'"

cmdicely says, "...and, either through genetics or manipulating the environment it forms in, cause it to be "transmitted" under control""

Whatsit says, "hm. perhaps i"m not phrasing this right; Better mark me down for a hand raising, and extensive ranting in the playtest."

Kromm says, "But a memetic engineer might say, 'Actually, the smoking meme is associated with X, Y, and Z, and we can foil it by showing this kind of TV and putting that nutrient in the diet."

CJBurke has connected.

cmdicely . o O ( I expect TS to redefine high-volume playtests... )

Kromm says, "Which may have nothing to do with smoking."

Whatsit says, "That's entirly learned behavior then."

Roxy . o O ( Nothing obviously.... )

JFZeigler [to Whatsit]: A specific religion is a memetic complex. So is the religious impulse.

Drey [to coyote6]: Ditto

Martinl . o O ( sounds like psychohistory, or at least "hard" psychology )

Til_Eulenspiegel [to JFZeigler]: I hardly think the latter is proven.

Michalak says, "For anyone new, raise your hand or otherwise indicate that you want to talk and you will be put in the que to ask a question."

Roxy [to Whatsit]: Some memes might find certain genetic types more fertile ground. Behavior is a combination of genes and memes.

Whatsit [to JFZeigler]: I beg to differ. But this is not the time or place to argue.

CapnQ says, "The Feb2000 Analog had an editorial called "Applied Memetics". One of its points was that tryubg to suppress a "bad" meme is a form of censorship."

CraigR thinks about Chalker's "Identity Matrix"...

dlpulver says, "If I may interrupt Meme discussion... we might want to quickly sumarise the working titles of the five or six books. Then get onto Chadu."

Kromm [to Whatsit]: Yes, memes are transmitted horizontally, not vertically. But bear in mind that so-called 'instinct' may be extremely early learned behavior. The jury reall is out on that.

cmdicely says, "Its the *opposite* of psychohistory, really."

Roxy raises her hand.

starmage says, ""Would this sort of thing lead to memetic wars? Or have we already had those?""

Kromm [to starmage]: It could, yes.

Whatsit pokes at "Snow Crash", in which physical structures were horribly confused with learned alterations.

Curtiss nods to Pulver, "Please tell us the titles. That might help focus some of our questions.

Kromm [to starmage]: PR agents, priest, poets, . . . all are memetic warriors today.

Roxy [to starmage]: coke vs. pepsi

Til_Eulenspiegel [to starmage]: What do you mean? Ad campaigns?

JFZeigler [to Whatsit]: How about: the belief that it's desirable to be religious is a meme.

cmdicely says, "Memetic engineering would seem to raise serious questions in free societies. Freedom of thought?"

SMarsh says, "PEOPLE!!! Let's go in order, please... :)"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to cmdicely]: C.f., _Manufacturing Consent_, Noam Chomsky

bret raises his hand.

Kromm [to cmdicely]: We're not going to go as far as NLP with this. Memes, like genes, pertain to tendencies. They are not purely deterministic.

Whatsit says, "Chomsky's credility is a little unstable."

Whatsit says, "credibility, pardon."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: I agree.

dlpulver says, "Okay: the titles of the books are: Deep Beyond (focus on the asteroid belt and beyond). Mars (guess). High Frontier (focus on L4/L5/Moon). Two books on Earth (titles in flux). Blue Shadow (underwater)."

Michalak says, "If Chadu is not active then MadDanEccles is next."

coyote6 says, "perhaps the arguments over the premises should be saved for another time and place?""

Curtiss says, "I suggest Kromm and Pulver only go a round or two per question. Otherwise not everyone will get to ask a question."

Chadu [to Kromm]: I don't know if anyone's been following my 'hard sf' discussions on the message boards, but will G:TRANSHUMANS be Cinematic? Often, hard sf seems to sacrifice plot and drama for scientific plausibility. What are your thoughts?

MadDanEccles says, "What are the source materials (sci fi books and TV, or even current scientific theories). Are we talking about Bujold genegineering and its social reprocussions or other sources"

Chadu [to Michalak]: I was just patiently waiting.

MadDanEccles sorry, got ahead of myself

dlpulver says, "GURPS Transhuman will be very cinematic in its action. It will be as cinematic as a swashbucklers, which is hard science."

coyote6 woo-hoos.

dlpulver says, "as well"

Kromm [to Chadu]: Point costs will be almost open. Weird abilities will be there for the taking. I think it can be as cinematic as you want it to be.

stonethrow raises hand

dlpulver says, "At the same time, we will try and not violate any physical laws."

Michalak [to Chadu]: Not a problem, this is not officially organized. Just something had to be done since things are rather more active than normal.

Kromm [to Chadu]: Is not pirating black holes truly cinematic? ;-)

Chadu [to Kromm]: So what's opted out, then? Just hand-waved technology?

dlpulver says, "You don't see psionics in Erol Flyn movies."

Joven has connected.

dlpulver says, "Next question?"

azathoth says, "What about the Singularity? There are technosocial considerations here as well as physical.""

Kromm [to Chadu]: No psi. No aliens with unexplainable powers. Etc.

Kromm [to MadDanEccles]:

Chadu [to Kromm]: Alrighty. Thanks, Doc & Dave.

MadDanEccles says, "What are the source materials (sci fi books and TV, or even current scientific theories). Are we talking about Bujold genegineering and its social reprocussions or other sources"

CraigR raises his hand, not for a question but rather a suggestion for a sidebar. :)

dlpulver says, "You can consider GURPS BioTech and its bibliography a good idea of source."

Michalak says, "Curtiss raised his hand after MadDanEccles"

cmdicely says, "The only problem with Black Holes is that I've seen an argument that it is demonstrated that there are an average of less than 300 per cubic lightyear of the universe. Of course, they could be particularly dense in our solar system"

Drey [to Chadu]: Actually, you never see psionics anyhow ...

Kromm [to MadDanEccles]: David has to take this one. I get my sources from science only, not SF.

Chadu [to Drey]: Speak for yourself. I see psionic people.

Chadu is goin' for the SIXTH SENSE schtick.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: I believe you skipped me.

Whatsit noticed. It grins at CHadu.

azathoth raises hand

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Possibly. Let me check.

dlpulver says, "If you are curious as to our sf influences: works by Michael Swanwick, Bruce Sterling, MacLeod, Iain Banks, John Varley, etc."

Drey [to Chadu]: I meant you don't see the psionics, just the psionic effects. Now, if you're calling psionic people

Drey [to Chadu]: 'psionics', i stand corrected

Curtiss says, "Skip me for this round. I wasn't sure if you picker up my 'takes a number. I'll be after Smarsh"

Joven has disconnected.

MadDanEccles has to read biotech, as he is ashamed in not owning all Davids works

dlpulver says, "Curtis?"

MadDanEccles says, "passes the talking stick"

dlpulver says, ""Okay, who next, Michalak?"

Curtiss says, "Oh well, what are the titles of the books?"

Parakeets pat MadDan on the shoulder. "There, there."

Michalak says, "Put in Til_Eulenspiegel, I skipped him by accident earlier."

cmdicely says, "Didn"

cmdicely says, "Didn't we just do the book titles?"

Curtiss looks around, "Who's got the conch?

dlpulver says, "Titles: The Deep Beyond, Mars, High Frontier, Earth Plus, Earth Minus (working titles only), Blue Shadow"

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "I'll wait until you answer Curtiss."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, ""Please describe the settings' demographics and lifespan among the major powers' population. How does technological progess affect this? Have the first immortals been born?"

dlpulver says, "Til?"

Dolarre waves hand at Michalak wildly (am I soon? I thought I was one of the first to raise.)

Chadu suddenly turns an opaque black and becomes two-dimensional! This shadow without a caster quickly fades away to nothingness with a jolly laugh.

starmage Starmage has the demon butler give MadDan a large brandy.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Thank you.

Daimon has disconnected.

Michalak [to Dolarre]: You are right after Curtiss.

Kromm says, "Immortality is a work in progress. But if you can upload/download thoughts and get in-situ tissue replacements, it is possible in theory."

dlpulver says, "I can't answer that in the space listed, but there are people born in 2030 who are still alive in 2100. Lifespan now seems infinite if you can afford it... as people expect to die, new advances are made..."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Thanks."

Til_Eulenspiegel raises his hand.

MadDanEccles drinks brandy with a gulp. What is brandy? It taste like alcahol, but it is not beer. Much to ponder

JFZeigler says, "I suspect the major powers are experiencing a lot of greying."

dlpulver says, "This will have major social issues, yes."

dlpulver says, "Michalak, who next?"

dlpulver says, "(and thanks...)"

Drey says, "A la "Holy Fire""

dlpulver says, "Yes, exactly as in Holy Fire Drey."

starmage Has the demon butler give MadDan a tapped keg of good beer.

Michalak puts in a trigger to make sure he does not miss any more hand raisings.

Kromm says, "Next question?"

Dolarre says, "Will there be any problem with self-competiotion? Will TS affect Gurps Traveller? Planet of Adventure? Immram? So much sci-fi might stretch the consumer base."

JFZeigler takes a note. Read _Holy Fire_.

dlpulver says, "Kromm?"

dlpulver says, "Bruce Sterling, JFZ... Good book."

starmage Raises hand.

azathoth says, "So Earth is retirement home? Visions of CodgerSpace fill my eyes."

Dan1 says, "people born in 2030 alive in 2100, thats only 70 years"

Kromm [to Dolarre]: Not really.

Michalak [to Dataweaver]: You are next after Dolarre.

Kromm says, "TRAVELLER is almost the opposite of TS."

Dolarre says, "I only ask because the variety is what first drew me to GURPS and keeps me coming back for more."

dlpulver says, "Planet of Adventure is very different as well. "

Kromm says, "PoA and Immram are specific settings with different premises."

dlpulver says, "Dataweaver?"

Kromm says, "SF is *not* really a homogeneous market."

Dolarre says, "and there are only so many slots as well"

Roxy [to azathoth]: I think the implication is that EVERYONE, barring accidents, that was born in 2030 is still alive in 2100.

CJBurke has disconnected.

Dataweaver says, "What are the major political powers in Transhuman? I assume that Mars won't be a unified whole..."

Kromm laughs. Good question!

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Did you get my hand raise before that disconnect?

dlpulver says, "No, a lot of people won't be able to afford it, Roxy..."

Michalak [to MikeLee]: Get ready for your question after Dataweaver.

Sauronth says, ""DOH! that was my question...""

Whatsit says, "But that's only 70 years!"

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Yes I did.

Roxy [to dlpulver]: Heh. An accident of income?

Kromm says, "Factionization is elemental to transhumanism. Don't like some group? Make yourself your own, different species."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Thanks. Curse be this hotel phone!

MadDanEccles is happy with his keg. Life would be over if they start producing genericly modified beer.

dlpulver says, "I will only talk about the Deep Beyond at the moment. That is, the space beyond Mars. The big powers there are China, Great Britain, South Africa, the United States, the Duncanites, and a couple of transnationals. China is big on Mars, but not the only power."

MadDanEccles raises his string again

dlpulver says, "Minor powers are many... "

coyote6 raises hand

dlpulver says, "MikeLee"

Roxy groans at the thought of Red Mars. =)

brotherbattle raises his hand

Kromm says, "I think it is safe to assume that the further you go from Earth, the bigger the power base behind your movement. The orbitals will be full of strange arcologies."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: You're in Littleton, right?

dlpulver says, "L4/L5 is, steroetypically, multi-factionialized. Sort of like Wizard, as suggested."

Dan1 has disconnected.

Michalak [to taschoene]: Get ready for your question after Mikelee's.

Kromm says, "Wait for THE HIGH FRONTIER."

dlpulver says, "MikeLee?"

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: That is right.

MikeLee pass

dlpulver says, "Okay, taschoene?"

MikeLee says, "Sorry, I messaged Mich to pass my question on :)"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: Whatsit?

dlpulver says, "well, Mike or taschoene, then..."

taschoene says, "You mentioned Sterling as an influence. Any analog to the Mechanist side of Shaper/Mechanist? Or did the Shaper approach win completely?"

Dataweaver raises his hand.

Whatsit [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: nope, not actually. :)

Michalak [to MikeLee]: I forgot to write it down. Sorry.

clangador says, "My question was already answered."

MikeLee [to Michalak]: no prob :)

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: Oh. I don't remember who said they were, and my scrollback dies everytime I disconnect.

Toadkiller_Dog raises a hand

dlpulver says, "Cybernetics are there, yes. But there is no one society that is so dominantly cybernetic. Basically, there is no stigma about downloading your consiousness into a machine -- in fact, that sort of "cybershellshell" is cutting edge "fifth wave" technology. "

Kromm says, "I think both approaches will be there. We've been talking about machines at least as much as biotech."

Michalak [to VirtualPaul]: And you are after taschoene since Dan1 appears to be gone.

FRANCOIS has connected.

dlpulver says, "There's a line somewhere that says `China's PLA Marines were still 4th wave military, relying on bioroids...""

azathoth says, "Fifth wave? As in Tofflerian waves?"

Kromm [to azathoth]: Yes.

clangador has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "Yes, as in Tofflerian"

taschoene says, "ugh, more theory to read :-)"

cmdicely . o O ( Tofflerian? )

Kromm [to cmdicely]: Alvin Toffler, author of _The Third Wave_, etc.

azathoth says, "Ooh. So what was the Fourth? For that matter, what's the Fifth?"

SJ materializes out of thin air.

dlpulver says, "you might say the 4th wave is biotechnology..."

JFZeigler has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "hi Steve"

MadDanEccles grovels at SJ. The messiah has come at last :-)

Kromm says, "At least, we plan to say that . . ."

Roxy waves at SJ! SJ is waved at!

Drey says, "Evening SJ."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to SJ]: Keep up the good work, and thank you.

SJ says, "Hi, Dave, Kromm, everyone. Don't let me interrupt."

Kromm waves to his boss.

azathoth says, "And Fifth I'm guessing is energy economics."

MikeLee [to SJ]: greetings :)

clangador has connected.

Martinl says, "Yo"

dlpulver says, "the 5th would include technologies like uploading one's consiouness into a computer"

Kromm says, "As well as nano and the like."

Whatsit waves at SJ! SJ is waved at!

CraigR [to SJ]: I was just saying earlier tha I want you to write GURPS LEGOS, so I could get stats for a B.U.R.P. :>

dlpulver says, "legobots, that sort of thing"

dlpulver says, "next question?"

cmdicely . o O ( Energy economics seems overrated )

azathoth says, "Ah, so how do you guys plan to handle the way that messes with scarcity? Or is it still too rare?"

sspiroff has connected.

Kromm says, "But don't get too obsessed with discrete waves, since the reality is a continuum. Evolution, not revolution."

dlpulver says, "buzzwords"

Michalak [to Sauronth]: Get ready with your question for after VirtualPaul.

dlpulver says, "virtualpaul?"

VirtualPaul says, "Where is nanotech in all this? (and High Fronter is the title of C.Claremont's SF novel, BTW)"

dlpulver says, "Lots of people use High Frontier"

Kromm [to azathoth]: We are talking to real nanotechnologists about the real limits on nano, as opposed to Drexler's religious vision.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to VirtualPaul]: Paul Gerard K. O'Neill, for example

JFZeigler has connected.

Michalak [to dlpulver]: "He appears to be idle. We can come back to him."

Michalak says, "Never mind."

Kromm [to azathoth]: I think scarcity will still be an issue in any kind of realistic nanotech setting.

dlpulver says, "Essentially you'll see major concentration on bio-nanotech, and a lot of things that look like nano but result from MEMS and top-down microbots"

JFZeigler . o O ( One disconnect for the night and counting... )

azathoth [to Kromm]: I was talking more about the economic implications. Starting wealth must be astronomical if nano is cheap and common.

stonethrow changes to a chair

Kromm [to azathoth]: We're talking viral nanotech and mechnical microtech, so the most optimistic economic repercussions of nano will be somewhat attenuated.

Kromm says, "Er, mechanical."

azathoth [to Kromm]: Ahah. Gotcha.

coyote6 [to azathoth]: If points are no big deal, then Wealth will be easily available. :)

Kromm [to coyote6]: Very true.

dlpulver says, "however, indivdiual characters in Deep Beyond may own a spaceship. "

dlpulver says, "or at least be leasing them."

Roxy . o O ( or BE them... )

Kromm [to Roxy]: With the right place to upload to, sure.

cmdicely says, "With all the "personal engineering" available, Wealth would seem to be the main limiting factor..."

azathoth [to dlpulver]: Kinda like the monopole prospectors from Niven's early Known Space stories?

Dolarre has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "Yep"

Kromm [to cmdicely]: Remember that you might not be paying dollars for this stuff, too. Some of it might find you, whether you want it or not.

SJ . o O ( Wealth will mean something else when the whole solar system is wealthy. We might, for instance, see characters who have (by modern standards) remarkable possessions, but who would still have to work for 20 years to earn possessions THEY would consider remarkable and desirable. )

Roxy [to SJ]: Exactly so. Wealth is relative.

VirtualPaul raises his hand

dlpulver says, "exactly, SJ... when characters are homesteading asteroids or prospecting black holes..."

dlpulver says, "One faction, the duncanites, makes blackmarket money selling fusion bombs."

Kromm says, "If your goal is your own species, you need a lot of money . . ."

dlpulver says, "``perfect for terraforming asteroids or home defense against dinosaur like National Governments"

cmdicely Boggles at the thought of blackmarket fusion bombs

Kromm says, "Merely owning a few asteroids and spaceships might not be enough to create a self-perpetuating genetic, memetic image of yourself."

Parakeets raise a hand.

Dataweaver . o O ( eww... )

dlpulver says, "was it sauroth next?"

Sauronth says, ""Are we likely to see Uplifted critters in space? Or is this strictly going to be human (+ variants) societies""

Kromm says, "Uplifted critters have been part of all of our discussions to date."

clangador says, "look Kromm"

dlpulver says, "Yes, you will see uplifted critters. NOt as many as in Uplift, but BlueShadow on the ground, and yes, in space also there is a regular market for them."

Roxy says, "It would be very odd if they were NOT there."

Sauronth says, ""how will they integrate? are they equal to huans?""

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( At last! I can play an octopus. )

Michalak [to clangador]: You are after Sauronth, and has he said anything yet? I lost the thread of conversation recording some new people in the que.

dlpulver says, "Not equal to humans. And you can play an octopus. And groups agitating for uplift rights are important."

cmdicely wonders if *down*lifted (?) humans might be around too...

As Steven vanishes, the room becomes noticeably colder.

dlpulver says, "Clangador did..."

Steve says, "I raise my hand"

JFZeigler is amazed at what characters people find interesting.

dlpulver says, "Sauronth did, I mean"

dlpulver says, "Clangador, I think...?"

Kromm [to cmdicely]: 'Downlifted' humans are likely, yes.

dlpulver says, "downlifted?"

Your subconscious informs you that Steven has manifested himself.

JFZeigler . o O ( Neanderthal rights NOW! )

Sauronth raises a claw

SJ . o O ( It's GOOD to be a Delta! )

bret . o O ( fallen might be better than downlifted. )

dlpulver says, "okay, who next?"

Kromm [to dlpulver]: Genegineered workers. Not unlike those in PARANOIA . . .

Michalak [to SMarsh]: And you are after Clangador.

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Roof! Oh joy, Roof! )

dlpulver says, "Clangador?"

cmdicely says, "Yeah, but fallen doesn't convey the fact that someone did this deliberately..."

dlpulver says, "You can get quite a lot of info by checking out the biotech vignettes..."

Kromm . o O ( Downgraded, then. )

Kromm [to clangador]: You still there?

stonethrow says, "Did I get skipped?"

Roxy . o O ( Not primitive... think of them as 'classics'! )

cmdicely . o O ( Downgraded. Right. )

bret . o O ( Wilf version 0.8? Is it compatible with Mistress 7.2? )

dlpulver says, "There was one society -- the TSA -- who attempted to get rather nasty with biotech. Lost a war with China, but their refugees from their outlaw gene engineers are in the belt..."

dlpulver says, ""Clangador, please come out!"

Michalak [to Whatsit]: You are up again after the noble Seven Marsh.

coyote6 pokes clangador! clangador ouches!

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Trans-Siberian Alliance )

JFZeigler . o O ( TSA? )

azathoth [to dlpulver]: Yeah, but those are scattered in space and time. I mean, where does the nanoclypse (sp?) fit in?

Kromm says, "OK, I think clangador has been downgraded. Next?"

SMarsh says, "Is there a recommended/assumed camapaign focus? Space exploration, trading, Shadowrunning :), or the like? Or is the setting going to provide a framework universe with proposed campaign foci?"

dlpulver says, "Transpacific Socialist Alliance, I vaguely recall."

Michalak [to stonethrow]: If I skipped you I am sorry. Let me try and check.

cmdicely . o O ( Seven of Marsh? )

Kromm [to SMarsh]: Finding your own path is a big part of the extropian worldview, but of course we will give suggestions.

clangador has disconnected.

Toadkiller_Dog will brb. Don't skip him, Michalak.

dlpulver says, "We will support everything. Focus will depend on the book. In TS: Deep Beyond, focus is on espionage, piracy and counter, asteroid mining, exploration, and special ops"

dlpulver says, "and crime"

clangador has connected.

MadDanEccles . o O ( and near c rock throwing? )

SMarsh says, "Is it an optimistic setting? Pessimistic? Neutral?"

dlpulver says, "you can easily do a space patrol..."

Michalak [to Roxy]: Actually you are after Whatsit.

dlpulver says, "optimistic setting"

Kromm [to SMarsh]: Iimportantly, we plan to give *meta* suggestions on 'How to use this book' -- basically, ways to make the game feel transhuman via the mechanics as well as via background elements. This will flavor what you will/won't do.

Roxy is eerily reminded of the micro-nations in Snow Crash.

dlpulver says, "clangador, you had a question?"

Curtiss raises his hand.

JFZeigler [to MadDanEccles]: And feline bioroids in comfy shoes?

JackShadow disappears in a puff of logic...

clangador says, "having computer problem right now"

Toadkiller_Dog is back.

clangador has disconnected.

Kromm says, "Next question, I think."

Martinl . o O ( comfy shoes? )

dlpulver says, "okay... next?"

Whatsit sympathises with clangador.

Whatsit drops a pin.

Martinl scratches himself

ding!

Whatsit pokes Michalak! Michalak appears to be nothing but ideas and evil plots in clothes.

Kromm says, "Did our speaking list get dropped?"

MadDanEccles looks at pin. Say, isnt that the creative staff of In Nomine?

Michalak says, "Did Steven go? If so Whatsit is up again."

CapnQ says, "I heard that."

dlpulver says, "Whatsit?"

Kromm says, "Steven went, yes."

bret raises hand again.

Whatsit says, "Ahah. Okies. I hate to beat on the meme thing, but how central is it tot he setting?"

Kromm . o O ( Note to self: Talk to Kira about scripts for huge chats . . . )

Whatsit says, "Cuz I'm having Issues about the way it's being expressed right now..."

Martinl wonders if Mrs. Kromm knows hubby talks to other women about their huge chats....

Kromm [to Whatsit]: Well, you can leave it out, but it will cut out a lot of interesting social elements that are more-or-less part and parcel of the transhuman vision.

Michalak [to stonethrow]: You are up after Whatsit so get ready with your question.

Whatsit says, "Confusing genetic tendancies and cultural tendancies in a setting that is supposed to be scientifically accurate, when we're having problems separating th two now..."

Whatsit says, "... just seems dubius and sloppy."

Whatsit says, "Sorry."

Steve has disconnected.

Drey . o O ( ...billions and billions of chats... )

Kromm [to Whatsit]: IMPORTANT NOTE: We will not be drawing crazy parallels between genes and memes. We will take the analogy as far as it goes logically.

Michalak [to stonethrow]: I'm pretty sure I missed you so that's why you are after him.

dlpulver says, "it is not very central to Deep Beyond. But it will be more central in other books. "

Michalak [to Roxy]: Then you get your turn Roxy.

Whatsit says, "Hm; so we're *not* doing a Snow Crash?"

dlpulver says, "Such as one of the Earth books, which we hope will be written by JF Zeigler..."

Kromm [to Whatsit]: No, not at all.

Whatsit says, "Whoopie!"

Whatsit does a little dance of fuzzy delight.

JFZeigler shudders. Snow Crash was a neat story but the science was lousy.

Toadkiller_Dog pads out silently, leaving nothing but a sense of disquiet.

MadDanEccles . o O ( and I so wanted a Pizza delivery skill in GURPS. Oh well )

CraigR suggests the following Pulverized crossovers detailed in sidebars: TRANSHUMAN TECHNOMANCER, TRANSHUMAN REIGN OF STEEL, and TRANSHUMAN TECHNOMANCER REIGN OF STEEL. ;>

Whatsit loved snow crash; it was great fantacy.

dlpulver says, "JF -- feel free to jump in and answer any questions..."

Kromm [to Whatsit]: That book is fun, but the 'structures' discussed there are so-called 'deep structure' in the neurolinguistic programming sense, and we plan NOT to go there.

dlpulver says, "We will NOT have magic memes!"

Martinl . o O ( TS TM ROS...<shudder> )

DRH has disconnected.

Kromm [to Whatsit]: As I said earlier, we are not viewing memes as determiners, but as influences.

dlpulver says, "or magic beans"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to CraigR]: AMEN!

CraigR cackles evilly!

dlpulver says, "After whatsit?"

taschoene has disconnected.

coyote6 says, "What! No magic beans?!?!"

coyote6 grins

There are strangers on the MOO.

Whatsit suddenly disintegrates into a huge pile of lint. Oooooh, are the cleaners going to be miffed about *that*.

dlpulver says, "well, okay, a fair number of genetically enhanced food crops, yes."

Martinl says, "Magic Beans would bakrupt the GMoU"

Toadkiller_Dog is back. JavaChat threw him off.

JFZeigler wonders about Beanstalks.

Kromm [to coyote6]: Genemod beans, sure. They will grow lots more beans. Woohoo. With antibiotics inside.

coyote6 is mollified

dlpulver says, "One on Mars, JFZ. If you like, I suggest one be in progress on Earth... perhaps also Fountains."

azathoth or skyhooks in the stratosphere. Much easier to build.

dlpulver says, "who is next?"

MadDanEccles [to JFZeigler]: Beanstalks are a must. There is sooo much fun with them

azathoth says, "Oops. Wrong tag."

clangador has connected.

Kromm awaits the next question.

dlpulver says, "Clangador?"

JFZeigler [to MadDanEccles]: Fountains. Riding to space on a shower of bullets. . .

Michalak says, "I though stonethrow."

FunkyT has connected.

stonethrow says, "What is the TL? and how is Relativistic Physics being used?"

clangador says, "I have returned. Yes I have a question."

Michalak says, "Then Roxy."

dlpulver says, "Please go ahead Clangador. "

Kromm [to stonethrow]: TL is 9 base, 10-12 biotech, with real science in all cases (no dubious power cells). Relativity will work as it does in the real universe.

clangador says, "Will the spacecraft use the vehicles system or the traveler rules?"

dlpulver says, "Incidentally, the book we hope JFZ will be writing is Earth Plus, on high-tech earth."

MadDanEccles [to JFZeigler]: Or the ferris wheel of death. Actually Niven and Barnes have some goofy ideas in one of their dreampark books

Kromm [to clangador]: This is not part of TRAVELLER. We will use the SPACE system, ported to THE DEEP BEYOND and optimized for the setting.

JFZeigler says, "I'm starting to compile notes for a proposal."

dlpulver says, "The spacecraft will use a variant of GURPS Space 3rd edition, which is a syntehsis of Vehicles and Traveller. The rules will be included in the book. As they cover a single tech level and setting they won't take up that much space."

clangador says, "Space as in GURPS SPace?"

Kromm [to clangador]: Yes.

dlpulver says, "GURPS Space 3rd Edition"

Roxy says, "Two questions, but short ones. What is the current status of frozen people? Are some still around from the 20th century? Plus, are there any high-tech groups that are bizarre and mysterious with Strange Powers like the Technomages in B5? Specifically, those that mimic psi or magic powers..."

CraigR [to MadDanEccles]: You think that's mad, check Forward's Terrivator, in the book Timemaster.

Drey walks out the glass doors to the north.

Kromm [to Roxy]: Frozen people will exist. We have not discussed thawing *today's* frozen people yet.

stonethrow raises hand then jumps up and down

Kromm [to dlpulver]: How do you feel about that?

dlpulver says, "Some cryonic people are still around. We have one group in Deep Beyond, Valkyrie Rock, that specializes in the issue. Some have been declared legally dead and are available for information salvage. Some are still revivalble."

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Bear's _Heads_ )

Michalak [to stonethrow]: You did get your question, right?

stonethrow says, "yes"

Michalak puts Stonethrow in the que again.

MadDanEccles . o O ( Futurama's Heads? )

cmdicely has disconnected.

Roxy grins, "Information salvage... I like that."

Kromm [to Roxy]: I think the setting might be too rational for people to view any tech as 'weird powers.'

dlpulver says, "I can see some minor factions doing the TEchnomage thing. I think that a space colony (L4/L5) habitat in High Frontier (the book on L4/L5) may be involve d in that."

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: And you are up next in the que after Roxy.

Kromm says, "Well, people might choose to see them that way in the colonies, yes."

bret . o O ( Some people today think that computer programmers have weird problems. )

dlpulver says, "There are some L4?l5 colonies that are socially very isolated, that have used the setup to isolate themselves from society. Fringe groups, religious groups.A few of these might be vulnerable. "

bret . o O ( s/problems/powers/ )

Crissa Kentavr trots in, yawning.

Kromm says, "Or might welcome the belief . . ."

SMarsh raises his hand.

JFZeigler raises his hand.

dlpulver says, "Til...?"

CraigR [to Crissa]: Hey! You made it. ;)

Michalak writes two more names into the que.

Roxy snugs Crissa! Crissa smiles shyly back.

azathoth raises his hand again.

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "How much does it require to set up your own colony? Could a typical group of players do it without designing special purpose characters?"

MadDanEccles [to Michalak]: Where art myself in thy ponerous list?

Michalak [to starmage]: And you are after Til_Eulenspiegel.

Kromm [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: My take on it is that setting up a colony is not exactly routine. PCs could do it, but they would have to be specifically cut out for it.

dlpulver says, "A small colony like an asteroid... yes. Building a big L4/L5, rather than a can...well, you can work out costs from GURPS Space 3rd now, with the habitat modules. I don't think a small group of players would have the resources. After all, you'd need about 100-1000 people, maybe more..."

JFZeigler wonders if the "set up your own society" campaign isn't a good overall theme.

Michalak [to MadDanEccles]: Next after Starmage.

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Ah, but can you buy artifical wombs and standard genotypes?"

dlpulver says, "PCs could do a swiss family robinson, but not found an L4/L5 cylinder habitat."

Crissa says, "Maybe if the players had a profitable company, with several hundred employees..."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Too bad. Thanks."

Kromm [to JFZeigler]: I think so. Definitely a uniquely transhuman possibility.

trowe has connected.

MadDanEccles . o O ( You have L4/l5 colonies, how soon will they be dropped on earth al la GUNDAM? )

dlpulver says, "Yes, you could do that... with wombs and so on. The Duncanites did it, but it took about 30 years to get gong."

Roxy says, "Taking over a 'failed' arcology might be the most fun way."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Roxy]: Too much initiative for my players.

dlpulver says, "There are at least one failed colony that was taken over in the setting. "

dlpulver says, "After Til?"

Kromm says, "In any case, in a setting where characters might have rather a few points, nothing stops players from agreeing to take lots of Wealth and making 'found a colony' the campaign goal."

JFZeigler says, "You could also have separatist communities even on Earth. Hmmmm. . ."

dlpulver says, "That would be a lot of fun. It's in sf genre as well."

Michalak [to starmage]: You're up.

starmage says, ""You spoke of a second age of sail, solar sails? Would some space sail ships still be around? Would they be described? You could have some interesting settings in Low G Tramp cargo ships. That monestery on a Solar sail ship from Vehicles was lovely.--- Also, what ideas could have been lifted from 'Transmetropolitan,' any of that weirdness in these books?""

Til_Eulenspiegel [to JFZeigler]: You could have separatism sans isolation. See the voluntary autists in Egan's Distress.

bigjon says, "Been interesting. Gotta run to a Trek sim. Should be fun with a head full of hard sci-fi. :-P"

dlpulver says, "in fact, I can imagine with fear of viral agents and so on, some earthside separtists actually sealing themselves off with life support... never know if those neural viruses will coming in the ducts"

Roxy raises her hand politely.

bigjon has disconnected.

Til_Eulenspiegel raises his hand.

starmage sends the demon butler around to freshen people's tea.

CapnQ . o O ( Ooh, dungeon-crawling thru the ruins of Arcology 1" )

dlpulver says, "some solar sails will be around. I haven't yet read transmetropolitan, it's something i mean to."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to starmage]: Thank you.

Kromm [to starmage]: I think old tech will still be around. Whether we explain it or not depends on space concerns.

dlpulver says, "most ships are fusion or antimatter catalyzed microfusion pulse drives."

coyote6 suggests Designer's Notes. ;)

coyote6 suggests Designer's Notes. ;)

Curtiss says, "Transmet drips with mutant neuro plagues full of ideas for a setting like this. I highly recommend it."

Michalak [to MadDanEccles]: Are you ready with your question? You are up next after Starmage.

MadDanEccles says, "The growth of eugenic and genetic modified people, what is to stop a eugenic war al la starttrek?"

dlpulver says, "Because you modify your children"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to MadDanEccles]: Stapledon's _Last & First Men_ has lots of eugenic wars. Check it out for ideas.

Kromm [to MadDanEccles]: I think the short answer is: "Nothing, really." Wars will happen. That's one reason why you might have one.

MadDanEccles says, "Especially if the enhanced people are limited at the start. People are really paranoid of this technology today"

azathoth [to MadDanEccles]: I'd assume that any attempt to create a cadre of supermen would result in a biogenetic arms race.

Michalak [to coyote6]: And you should get ready for after Mad Dan.

A ball of fluff condenses out of the carpet. Whatsit is here.

Whatsit revives it's internet connection just for the jat.

Whatsit says, "chat. damn."

Kromm [to MadDanEccles]: But if they are not separatists with their own colonies, just rich people within existing nations, there won't really be wars. Discrimination and crime, yes. Wars? Not really.

JFZeigler says, "There will be too much diversity. No one Master Race to cause global war."

MadDanEccles says, "and what do the supermen think, They know they are better then thier unenhanced leaders. It could be messy"

starmage leaves in a cloud of mist and stars looking like a Vess illustraition.

dlpulver says, "The long answer is that genetic modification is driven in the first world by a desire to be healthier and live longer lives. And in space, by a need to adapt to enviroments."

Kromm says, "Eventually, they will break off and colonize, but that implicitly assumes that they have achieved sufficient power and wealthy to accomplish this."

clangador has disconnected.

stonethrow says, "by that point they are a seperate culture?"

brotherbattle has disconnected.

MadDanEccles says, "thanks, pass the talking stick"

coyote6 says, "How about braintaping, a la "Voice of the Whirlwind"? Can all the players play multiple versions of one character? :)"

starmage has disconnected.

Kromm [to MadDanEccles]: Super-smart does not necessarily mean super-motivated. A lot of geniuses *today* have no respect for leaders, but they don't try to take over.

Whatsit says, "or the Four Lords of the Diamond..."

azathoth says, "So we're looking at an Earth populated by healthy, long-lived -- but still essentially human -- beings, and space crawling with divergent hominid derivatives."

CraigR [to coyote6]: ...or the Ophiyuki Hotline, for that matter.

JFZeigler says, "I think Earth will be pretty genetically diverse too."

Dataweaver [to azathoth]: Too simple...

Kromm [to coyote6]: We are looking into variant braintaping technologies.

Whatsit tries to raise a hand, and discovers a lack of appendages.

Michalak [to Dataweaver]: Brotherbattle appears to be gone so you are up nex.

MadDanEccles says, "Quaddies? "

Kromm [to coyote6]: I think the 'multiple versions of a character' approach is valid, although perhaps a bit cute for most people. Maybe a sidebar idea for a campaign?

An indescribably horrible abomination carries CapnQ off screaming.

sspiroff has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "It's a gradual process: in 2015 it is controversial to edit out diseases. In 2040 it is controversial to improve memory. In 2070 it is controversial to give birth to a kid with four arms adapted to zero g. In 2099 it is controverisal to download oneself into a spaceship or transform your children into killer whales. "

JFZeigler . o O ( Law of Conservation of Controversy. )

dlpulver says, "Did we see dataweaver?"

A bat-winged monstrosity unceremoniously dumps CapnQ on the floor.

coyote6 [to Kromm]: Or one player playing multiple versions of one character, or just having "extras" as NPCs

Dataweaver says, "Stand by..."

An indescribably horrible abomination carries CapnQ off screaming.

Kromm says, "The cool thing about controversy is that the NEXT one generally obscures the last one and lets whatever was being disputed pass because it is not controversial enough . . ."

azathoth [to JFZeigler]: Earth really can't be too free-wheeling. One of the drawbacks of the transhuman worldview is it's tendency toward atomism. An extropian Earth would be prone to genocidal confrontations between autarkic micro-communities.

Dataweaver says, "What's the plan for playtest schedules? Six books in a year doesn't give much time..."

MadDanEccles . o O ( The party are clones, numbered 1 to 6, wearing red jumpsuits... )

A bat-winged monstrosity unceremoniously dumps CapnQ on the floor.

Curtiss says, "In the 1950's cornea transplants were so contreversal they were banned in the UK."

dlpulver says, "The other thing about the Deep Beyond is that the micro-communities have generally fled offworld and that those have prospered have them become respectable, carrying their ideology back to the plaent."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Curtiss]: You're kidding!

Kromm says, "I think we have overlapping questions here. Who is at bat?"

dlpulver says, "Don't worry... we are scheduling a lot of time for each book."

dlpulver says, "Next?"

Michalak [to Kromm]: I'm not sure.

Sauronth says, ""You've mentioned the term 'colony' a few times now. How big are settlements in space, on other planets? Does anything approach earth population? How much self-reliance will exist? 'cause fusion bombing the homeworld seems highly likely...""

Michalak [to Kromm]: Who was last.

MadDanEccles . o O ( There was massive uproar with the IVF program in australia, and we where one of the world leaders... )

Michalak says, "?"

JFZeigler [to azathoth]: Unless there are social trends which push a liking for diversity.

coyote6 says, "Dataweaver just asked""

Kromm says, "I want to address Dataweaver quickly . . ."

Michalak says, "Then Toadkiller_Dog."

coyote6 pokes Toadkiller_Dog! Toadkiller_Dog snarls and bites as you attempt to close to grappling range.

Kromm [to Dataweaver]: There will be playtest time. However, multiple books are being developed nearly in parallel, so there may be more than one in testing at a time.

azathoth says, "Okay, so let me revise my model. Earth is a bastion of monolithic memetic constructs (nation-states, traditional religions, etc.), while space is home to sundry micro-communities and tailored societies."

Whatsit says, "Is it going to be as bad as FALKENSTEIN?"

coyote6 raises a hand

Michalak [to VirtualPaul]: And you shoudl get ready for after Toadkiller_Dog.

triad has disconnected.

Fixer has connected.

dlpulver says, "Uh, who is next?"

bret still has his hand raised.

Curtiss still has a hand up.

SMarsh still has his hand raised.

Fixer says, "Coll, everyone is still here!"

Whatsit says, "toadkiller is way AFK."

dlpulver says, "Toadkiller is it?"

JFZeigler is in the queue too. Somewhere.

Sauronth Sauronth patiently waits his turn...

Whatsit has a fuzzy appendage in the air. Or it could be a lint-ball.

Fixer says, "...er, I mean cool."

Toadkiller_Dog says, "Okay, so what is weapons technology like? What is the upper limit of human destructive weapons and armor?"

azathoth can't feel the fingers in his upraised hand.

dlpulver says, "Toadkiller please... "

stonethrow says, "Michalak is another chat with kromm and Pulver scheduled?"

dlpulver says, "The most advanced weapon is the black hole dropped into a planet."

Michalak [to Curtiss]: You are still in the que.

Kromm says, "Yep."

Toadkiller_Dog says, "Er, man portable, then?"

dlpulver says, "The most advanced practical weapons are x-ray lasers pumped by nuclear bombs."

Curtiss says, "Not a black whole dropped into the sun?"

Kromm says, "After blackballing, there's fusion bombs, nanoplagues, neuroviruses . . ."

Michalak [to Parakeets]: You are after VirtualPaul.

Martinl . o O ( Attack Memes? )

Kromm says, "But personal rayguns will be kept down, by virtue of realistic power cell tech."

dlpulver says, "GURPS power cells do not exist, therefore the standard way to shoot someone is with either a spray of nasty microbots or a projectile weapon. "

Whatsit makes a quiet 'yay' noise.

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Fighting spaceships in the sun. Lensman never had so good! )

Michalak says, "Oh, and there are 16 people in the que."

Dataweaver groans.

Kromm says, "Guns will be cool, have on-board computers, etc., but still be guns."

dlpulver says, "In general, in space I would go with a gyroc-type weapon."

azathoth says, "Oh crap. How do you plan to deal with biocide? That kind of weaponry can sterilize a continent."

Whatsit says, "no hoaming bullets?"

dlpulver says, "With a homing bullet, sure"

Whatsit says, "coooooool...."

Kromm [to azathoth]: Countermeasures will exist. You can immunize a continent with the right tech.

CapnQ says, "Oh, boy! I once tried to figure out game mechanics for a planet-eating black hole, but got bogged down trying to do the math."

Curtiss says, "How do you counter measure a black hole?"

Whatsit envisions guided 'batarangs' and shivvers, sending up a little cloud of dust.

Michalak pokes VirtualPaul! VirtualPaul ouches!

VirtualPaul says, "If you can upload a skill via meme or personality mods, and advantages w/gen-mods, how do you control game balance?"

dlpulver says, "In general, there is a nice balance of terror. The last war was in 2085 where things got very nasty. "

bret . o O ( I wonder who is going to immunize the critters. )

dlpulver says, "Lasted about five days."

coyote6 [to Curtiss]: Preemptive strike. ;)

dlpulver says, "China and Australia vs. the TSA, I believe"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to bret]: Evolution in action; sad but true.

SMarsh . o O ( "Egad! I hope they don't detroy the Earth! That's where I keep all my stuff!" )

Martinl says, "Re: Balck holes in planets - Smack another one into it with sufficient momentum to knock the combined BH out..."

Curtiss [to coyote6]: That's what I'm thinking. But that makes for an empty solar system.

dlpulver says, "Cruise missiles dispensing microbot killer swarms, stuff like that"

azathoth [to Kromm]: What kind of countermeasures are there against the radiation burst from an antimatter explosion? We're talking pure radiation of a very hard variety.

dlpulver says, "Shoot the missile with a laser"

Kromm [to azathoth]: None.

JFZeigler [to VirtualPaul]: I think the idea is to not worry about game balance too much.

Kromm [to azathoth]: Just like there are few countermeasures against nukes today.

azathoth says, "Hah. You still lose containment on the antimatter and BOOM!"

Kromm [to VirtualPaul]: You learn to deal. We do not plan to limit the wonder of the setting -- freely available mods, etc. -- by requiring point balance.

dlpulver says, "I hope the setting will support fun space battles."

dlpulver says, "Small scale space combat -- pirates and blacjackers vs. the Space Dominance Vehicles of the USAF, things like that"

Whatsit ponders the character creation chapter in this one.

Kromm [to VirtualPaul]: This is in part why it will be its own line. It will have a different philosophy in many senses.

azathoth says, "Nukes, when you shoot them down, do not spontaneously detonate."

Whatsit [to azathoth]: but surprisingly many people think they *do*.

Curtiss [to Kromm]: Sort of a sub brand of GURPS?

dlpulver says, "Nuclear war is not happening everyday. This is not GURPS Ogre."

Kromm [to azathoth]: Nope. But you also fire enough that shooting them down is really moot.

Whatsit [to Kromm]: it *is* going to be GURPS, right?

dlpulver says, "Parakeets?"

Parakeets say, "Who are the Duncanites?"

dlpulver says, "It is GURPS."

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Oh! There's a crossover. )

Martinl Raises his hand

Michalak [to Sauronth]: You are after Parakeets so get ready.

Kromm [to Curtiss]: It is GURPS. In GURPS, GMs and players are encouraged to think in-setting. Here, in-setting means people can be modified in ways that cost lots of points.

Fixer [to Michalak]: How do I join the que?

CapnQ says, " A separate line as GTraveller is a separate line. "

Curtiss [to Kromm]: Excellent

Whatsit [to Fixer]: raise your hand.

Michalak [to Fixer]: You just did.

azathoth [to Kromm]: So we have a civilization whose constituent parts are routinely armed with WMDs. Yikes. I hope the international organizations are stronger than today.

dlpulver says, "The Duncanites are a group that were exiled from Mars after a failed Terradyne-style terraforming plot. They fled to the asteroid belt and founded Silas Duncan Station. Later, duncanite bioengineers developed the Tenjin space adapted genome (people able to live in zero gee without calcium depletion and other natsinesss. ANd began to colonize the belt. Therea re various factions."

Kromm says, "Keep in mind that 'You have N points and Q disads' is not a rule of GURPS. It is a campaign suggestion. Here, N and Q are variables with a large standard deviation."

dlpulver says, "Green duncanites are into bioengineering and terraforming; red duncanites live in the trojan clusters. Many are liberatarian; there are dozens of duncanite microstates. The helium pirates of minerva are the most notorious duncanites."

stonethrow has disconnected.

Whatsit says, "Cool. Will the "point levels" be worked out somewhat like the G:IN reccomended point values?"

FunkyT has disconnected.

Whatsit says, "ie pick a package and get 100 points to fiddle with?"

dlpulver says, "We won't devote a lot of space to professional templates. We have a fair number of racial ones."

James has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "Okay, who next?"

Sauronth says, ""You've mentioned the term 'colony' a few times now. How big are settlements in space, on other planets? Does anything approach earth population? How much self-reliance will exist? 'cause fusion bombing the homeworld seems highly likely...""

A bit of darkness detaches itself from a nearby shadow, expanding to become Mordekai, wearing his black cloak.

CraigR . o O ( as many as 38 people online... )

Kromm [to Whatsit]: Perhaps. We have to discuss this still. I think starting points will exist, but after the start, totals will jerk around violently. David emailed me an excellent example today. Too long to share here, but that's the gist.

VirtualPaul has disconnected.

Michalak [to Curtiss]: You are after Sauronth.

coyote6 [to CraigR]: There were at least 49 at one point

Whatsit [to Kromm]: that sounds so cool.

dlpulver says, "There are about half a million duncanites. The populations is small compared to the larger L4/L5 colonies which may have a million each. We're looking at something like 100 colonies."

FRANCOIS has disconnected.

Kromm says, "It'll be 100s of millions in space vs. 10s of billions on Earth, most likely."

Sauronth says, ""how much do they rely on external resources though?""

dlpulver says, "Sauronth, the colonies are mostly part of Earth governments. So Mars is not `Mars, an independent state' it is China's Mars colony. LIkewise, all the major earth nations have LOTS of orbital SDI style weapons systems. And with fusion power, there are plaenty of groudn based defenses."

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Haldeman's Worlds series )

dlpulver says, "Nasty fusion bomb war stuff is mostly likely in the belt, away from prying eyes."

Kromm says, "We're taking the 'The resources of an entire world can defeat those of a mere fleet' attitude toward defenses."

Sauronth says, "Ok, I was wondering just how isolated they could get."

Whatsit puts a second question in the Queue.

SirViss has connected.

dlpulver says, "Oh, and they don't call 'em ships... the USAF beat the navy into space."

Whatsit says, "what do they call them?"

coyote6 quirks an eyebrow

Crissa says, "Craft?"

GraysonThorne has connected.

azathoth says, "Platforms?"

MadDanEccles says, "expensive?"

Dataweaver chuckles.

Til_Eulenspiegel adjusts his dunce cap.

dlpulver says, "Well, space vehicle for the USAF. As in "Archangel-class Space Dominance Vehicle."

Whatsit woos.

dlpulver says, "Or Heavy Space Towing Vehicle"

thedarkfnord walks out the glass doors to the north.

Whatsit wants a Space Dominance Vehicle.

Kromm says, "With pilots, not captains, and no naval traditions."

bret . o O ( The rich drive their SUV into their RSV... )

thedarkfnord walks in from the Pyramid Plaza North.

Whatsit says, "how big a crew?"

Sauronth thanks everyone for the chat and waves goodbye while searching for the exit.

Sauronth has disconnected.

Kromm says, "A real flyboy mecha pilot attitude will prevail, most likely."

dlpulver says, "The rich drive Executive Space Vehicles."

DocCross has connected.

bobzilla . o O ( cool Air Force in Space )

Andurion has connected.

MadDanEccles says, "that has got to suck, hopefully the RN or some britiish decended force (canada , Australia) manages to set thing right"

Kromm says, "Among military types, that is."

dlpulver says, "About the only folks not calling them Vehicles are the US Army, with things like Lakota Warrior-class gunships."

azathoth says, "So does the President fly Space Vehicle 1?"

Roxy waves at DocCross! DocCross is waved at!

dlpulver says, "Yep, the Royal Navy operate ships."

Whatsit says, "are the space vehicles small enough for like 4-man crews?"

dlpulver says, "Damn brits..."

Kromm laughs.

Whatsit grins at Pulver. Go canuks!

dlpulver says, "The big ships are quite heavily automated. Sort of like in Aliens, where a large cruiser can carry a big crew, but can operate with only 2-3 people."

DocCross waves at Roxy

Kromm says, "I'll tell Phil Masters. He'll learn you . ."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: Gender is probably irrelevant in this setting.

coyote6 wonders if the Lakota Warrior is the most badass vehicle in space. ;)

Michalak says, "Well I think Curtiss is up."

Curtiss says, "Here's a computing power question. How computing power does it take to run an AI, and how fast do they run? Can I upload myself into a PDA, run myself at 100 times real world speed and develop all sorts of cool plans? Or do AIs/uploads run at close to, or slower than, real life?"

dlpulver says, "Again, this differs culturally: the British use more crew, the US use more machinery, the Chinese use more bioroids...U"

Whatsit grins at Ti.

Whatsit grins at Til.

Kromm says, "Whose question are we on, Michalak?"

dlpulver says, "Curtis, there are some limits on processing power. The big, fast AIs are very new. Jon Z, Kromm and I are working out the limits now."

Whatsit [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: pardon, 4-being crews. :)

coyote6 does an impersonation of the Dark Lord: "Curtiss, I think."

Kromm [to Curtiss]: We have a lot of discussion on this -- too much to spell out here. Maybe in a chapter of the book . . .

Michalak [to bret]: You are up after the answering Curtiss is done.

Curtiss nods, "A chapter sounds reasonable. :)"

dlpulver says, "Full uploading is very much a macguffin that the wealthy characters can shoot for,... it will be cutting edge. Braintaping is mostly `low-res'."

CraigR grins

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: Not being P.C. here, just pointing out that gender probably has as much to do with reproduction here as favorite color.

JFZeigler says, "I suspect uploading will be possible, but expensive and inconvenient."

Kromm says, "But we are looking at +2 Complexity/TL in current GURPS terms, not the traditional +1, and we are talking about quantum comps, biocomps, DNA comps, etc."

azathoth [to dlpulver]: How to you plan to restrain AI. Most transhumanist projections expect that the development of superior AI will lead quite rapidly to the Singularity.

Curtiss says, "Are their AIs?"

Whatsit [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: it's a valid point. I'm just being silly.

dlpulver says, "There are AIs."

Whatsit says, "Singularity?"

dlpulver says, "AIs are, generally, property. "

dlpulver says, "And people are worried about control."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: Long topic, email me for an URL

coyote6 [to Whatsit]: The technological singularity.

Whatsit says, "I see."

Curtiss [to Whatsit]: Vernor Vinge term. Tech accelerates so fast we can't understand the future past a certain point.

JFZeigler [to Whatsit]: Term coined by Vernor Vinge. AIs improve themselves exponentially...

dlpulver says, "And there are groups like thedigital creationists, who believe that AIs are angels, and should be freed and allowed to develop..."

Whatsit [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: what's your email?

Kromm [to azathoth]: We have a singularity, too, but it is asymptotic the other way. Advances come fast, but the incremental size of each advance gets smaller faster than that.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: til_e@hotmail.com

Curtiss raises his hand.

DocCross says, "Hmmmm...tech singulairty...wonder if that is like an OGL/D20 singularity?:)"

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( S-shaped curves are dull... )

Martinl says, "Bounded?"

Michalak [to SMarsh]: YOu are up after Bret is done with his question.

bret says, "How dark a setting are you intending this to be? Right now it sounds like Illuminatti in space with elements of Logan's Run. Very dark, little hope for the common man."

dlpulver says, "We intend it to be very optimistic. It is not dark -- it is intended to be very bright. The common man is triumphant."

Dataweaver balks; that's not the impression he got...

Curtiss [to bret]: The common man has the opportunity to become immortal. That's pretty good IMHO.

Kromm [to bret]: Au contraire! We're aiming for optimism here.

coyote6 says, "Hmm, it didn't sound that dark or Illuminated to me?"

dlpulver says, "The common man evolves toward the godhood (:"

azathoth [to bret]: Are you kidding. An extropian future is all about building new modes of existence.

Curtiss grins.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to coyote6]: That's because you're not cleared for it.

MadDanEccles says, "Shades on NG Evangellion?"

coyote6 says, "Weird & alien from our POV, maybe, but not "dark"."

Whatsit says, "however, the whole Meme-mind-control angle is very dark and distopian from here, as is growing people for jobs..."

JFZeigler says, "The setting is one of extremely rapid change. But much of it is positive."

Kromm says, "We really want to avoid the totally overdone cyberpunk stance on biotech, nanotech, etc., where everyone has a cruddy life."

Dataweaver . o O ( the danger is in painting it _too_ optomistically... )

Michalak says, "Yeah, I think I would like it there. For all the problems most of mine would go away."

Whatsit says, "from here == from my chair"

bret says, "Sorry, the meme discussion along with both voluntary and involuntary gene manipulation made it sound dark. Add to this the ecological problems from nanos and viruses."

dlpulver says, "The deep beyond is a new frontier. Many of the slightly poverty stricken L4/L5 colonies have sent people out into the belt, and the big winners who bring back black holes can use the income to improve their colonies...."

dlpulver says, "We are, today, at the mercy of common viruses. "

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Space--Life's biggest step since crawling out of Ocean )

Curtiss says, "And common memes."

Whatsit says, "exactly.*Common* viruses."

coyote6 sniffles. "We certainly are."

Kira steps out of the elevator.

Kromm [to Curtiss]: And wild memes.

Whatsit says, "As opposed to the designer-kills-all-lagomorphs versions."

bret says, "Add to this that there is possible stagnation as the older maintain their position in society, making change harder not easier."

JFZeigler says, "There will certainly be conflict, though. Otherwise there'd be no story."

Parakeets say, "Wild memes?"

Rekker has connected.

Curtiss says, "Ya know, party all night memes."

dlpulver says, "People in 2100 live in a world without hunger. A world where they can look forward to lifespans of 100-200 years even if not wealthy. A world of unlimited resources and energy, thanks to the mining of gas giant helium and the primordial black holes. And the main conflict is what do we do with that? Who sh apes this world?"

bret says, "We have better genetic diversity now than what you are describing. A targetted virus at a particular gene mod is going to be very successful."

Kromm says, "Keep in mind that there are bad things now that would terrify someone from Victorian England into an early grave, never mind a Neandertal. We just live with them. Ditto in TS. And the good things are much better."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to bret]: That's an unwarranted assumption.

thedarkfnord has disconnected.

Curtiss [to bret]: Everyone could have their own unique ecology. I think potential biodiversity is much high in this setting.

MadDanEccles says, "Lemmon Sherbert?"

Roxy would LOVE to live in TS! No joke... I'd go there now if I could take my loved ones as well.

dlpulver says, "Remember, genetic engineering is not in the hands of two big corporations. At the basic level, it's in the hands of thousands of indivdual gene hackers, etc."

Parakeets raise another hand.

dlpulver says, "Okay, psot-bret?"

Michalak [to SMarsh]: You are up I think.

CraigR [to dlpulver]: Maslov's Pyramid. Take away hunger, and people just try to find something else to search for...

SMarsh says, "(Perhaps Steve can answer this better...) Are there plans for anything other than GURPS books? Novels, Cardboard Heroes, etc.?"

Kromm says, "The sheer drive to build new genomes would mean that -- if anything -- diversity would be getting out of hand, not stagnating."

bret says, "So the people in favor of freedom of information finally win?"

MadDanEccles [to Kira]: How long do we have?

dlpulver says, "Triplanetary for Transhuman Space?"

Kira . o O ( all night. )

azathoth says, "Back to computers, if I may. Are you guys going to upgrade the extremely conservative projections for computer tech in standard GURPS? I mean, do we get to play with petabytes of data, or just a few lousy gig at a time?"

bret . o O ( psot? )

dlpulver says, "Kromma nd David Chats tend to go on for LONG times..."

Michalak [to Parakeets]: So noted.

Curtiss [to SMarsh]: Ooooh, cool idea. I want the Jupiter Brain fold out cardboard hero...

MadDanEccles [to Kira]: Cool, it is 13:49 here :-)

Mordekai fades to black and is with you no more.

dlpulver says, "Hey Michalak, did JFZ cue coming up?"

Kromm [to SMarsh]: That is a SJ question, but we have been discussing the cross-marketing possibilities as a core part of the line plan.

GraysonThorne would like some Horror and Black Ops Cardboard Heroes

CraigR oooooos. :)

dlpulver says, "JFZ and I both like to write fiction. Whether it is a good idea marketing wise is up to SJ and company."

Kromm [to SMarsh]: We have to see if we can sell these first 6 books before we get too fancy, though.

Michalak [to dlpulver]: JFZ? JFZeigler is after Steven Marsh.

SMarsh nods.

Whatsit simply wants Carboard Heroes of any stripe.

DocCross says, "Any new Cardboard Heroes would be good."

dlpulver says, "JFZ?"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: How far done does my question lie on your list?

MadDanEccles . o O ( Cardboard commies are the way to go )

Kromm [to SMarsh]: Phase 1: Write Books. Phase 2: Phase 3: Profit. Only we have a Phase 2.

GraysonThorne agrees with DocCross

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Down, darn-it.

Dataweaver . o O ( TS cardboard heroes would be _wierd_... )

SMarsh says, "For folks wanting Cardboard Heroes, Pinnacle has released a couple of CH-like sets for Deadlands & Hell on Earth."

JFZeigler says, "Now that I'm outed :-). . .who else is a possibility for one of the books?"

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Azathoth, Roxy, and then you.

Kromm [to JFZeigler]: That's my job to set up. Right now, David, you, and me are for certain. After that, who knows? The Ususal GURPS Suspects are all possibilities.

dlpulver says, "I'd love it if Phil Masters wrote one, but he is busy with many projects."

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Thanks. I'll leave after that.

DocCross says, "Yeah, but the art of the Pinnacle cardboard characters is not all that great."

Rekker has disconnected.

Kromm says, "Usual, even."

MadDanEccles raises his string again. The knots must have a mid of their own

JFZeigler says, "Bien. Just curious."

Andurion has disconnected.

DaveBrooks hasta go and waves bye.

The housekeeper comes to cart off DaveBrooks, but realizes he's not an employee and unceremoniously sweeps him under the carpet.

JFZeigler passes the stick.

Kromm says, "Shucks, we only have 32 people now."

Curtiss says, "GURPS Transhuman Weapon Memes by Kaiser Soze..."

MikeLee . o O ( the usual GURPS suspects..:) interesting phrase :) )

dlpulver says, "We hope that High Frontier, the book that will cover the many space colonies of Earth-Lunar space, will be an anthology work that can showcase several different authors, ala Y2K, with each doing a colony."

Roxy says, "Judging by the response to this chat, there's more interest out there than first suspected..."

MadDanEccles . o O ( It is nicer than "usual gang of idiots" )

MikeLee grins

SMarsh [to DocCross]: Well, no one said anything about GOOD Cardboard Heroes... :P

Kromm says, "In fact, the current line plan shows HIGH FRONTIER as a definite anthology at this stage. We might get Hite, Masters, etc., to write colonies of their chosing."

Whatsit grins. It has a friend that can't believe that there are this many gurps nuts on the entire planet. :)

coyote6 remembers the thread on .gurps that probably started this, and isn't surprised at the interest.

GraysonThorne raises his hand

Kromm says, "So bug your favorite authors. Tell them they have to write for HIGH FRONTIER or they will be downgraded to Cro Magnons."

Michalak [to GraysonThorne]: Okay, you are at #13 now.

Dataweaver says, "You hear that Pulver? Oh, wait..."

Whatsit [to coyote6]: I remember a similar thread on f.g.r.gurps too. I posed a question to Pulver himself and he made mysterious noises....

MadDanEccles . o O ( The GURPS authors are allready cromagnons )

Martinl says, "Kromm and Pulver, write for High Frontier!"

Kira steps into the elevator.

Roxy [to Kromm]: Hey, if they are already published, wouldn't they be Pro Magnons?

dlpulver says, "Another issue I'd like to bring up. This will also be a solar system book, using state of the art NASA data on what the worlds and so on are like. As the series emphasizes biological alterationation of people to fit the environment over terraforming, it will be very useful as source material for people who want to use it for other backgrounds."

azathoth remembers that thread too -- great stuff (motivated to query Kromm about a setting similar to this)

GraysonThorne . o O ( My Lucky Number (: )

CraigR [to coyote6]: Pulver had said that that partially did it, but he's wanted to do something like this since he wrote BIO-TECH.

JFZeigler throws a sharpened yarrow stick at Roxy.

Kromm says, "Is Roxy next? Or is Jon just being mean?"

coyote6 nods to CraigR.

dlpulver says, "So you can use this as a solar system resource book."

Roxy picks her teeth with the stick and grins widely.

Whatsit [to Michalak]: where am I on the queue? I gotta go sleep soon...

Parakeets say, "Woo hoo!"

Roxy says, "I'm after Azathoth."

Dataweaver [to dlpulver]: cool...

dlpulver says, "Humans have gotten out as far as the kuiper belt."

Toadkiller_Dog pads out silently, leaving nothing but a sense of disquiet.

Whatsit says, "jupiter I presume..."

dlpulver says, "the farthest settlement is Oberon and Minerva."

bret raises hand.

dlpulver says, "Around uranus"

Whatsit says, "Or what in the stary stary heavens is a kuiper?"

dlpulver says, "Whow as next please?"

Michalak [to Whatsit]: Who is up now? If it is Azathoth then you are three away.

azathoth says, "Comet rustlers, hehe."

dlpulver says, "Cloud of comets and such."

Kromm says, "And the setting's 'Big Mystery' will be the Oort Cloud expedition: what will they find?"

Whatsit says, "okies."

Whatsit [to Michalak]: thankx.

MadDanEccles says, "Vilani?"

azathoth says, "Erk."

Whatsit says, "Aliens!"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Whatsit]: Kupier was a Dutch(?) astronomer, who suggested a group of weakly attracted bodies far past Pluto.

dlpulver says, "Azathoth?"

GraysonThorne has disconnected.

JFZeigler . o O ( The Vilani would run screaming from *this* Terra. )

dlpulver says, "He was american"

Parakeets say, "A Starbucks?""

Kromm waits for Az to speak.

Whatsit waits.

Curtiss says, "The Vilani would get eaten up and spat out by this Terra."

dlpulver says, "If we lost Az, who is next?"

azathoth says, "Ok, what about computer tech. Do we have to make do with GURPS' somewhat wimpy"

Hundreds gather to hear Az speak.

Roxy says, "I've had a vision: The New Evolution Church of Transcendence where they promise to be able to convert you entirely into memetic information. The founder survives to this day in that format! But on to my question: Any big churches? How about the old ones?"

dlpulver says, "No. As Kromm already stated, we are upgrading computer tech."

Kromm [to azathoth]: No. It was lost in earlier chat, but we are revising that.

trowe has disconnected.

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Curtiss]: Terra did eat up Vland. They just choked on that big bite.

dlpulver says, "+2 complexity per TL for example, and possibly some other new interpretations"

Roxy says, "Or are they just another fringe faction making their way in an arcology?"

JFZeigler [to Roxy]: I take it you've read Tipler :-).

Kromm [to azathoth]: We will not have exponentially increasing Complexity that is itself geometric, but we will boost the basic progression from +1 Complexity per TL to +2, and we will introduce tech that might give special capabilities that fall outside the Complexity system.

Roxy [to JFZeigler]: Actually, I haven't, but not I might have to!

MadDanEccles . o O ( The Catholic Church. Influencing Minds for 2100years. They would love mene tech )

Whatsit woooooos...

Whatsit *likes* computers...

Whatsit patpats its computer and begs it to be nice for ten more minutes.

Roxy [to JFZeigler]: ...NOW I might have to, that is.

Kromm says, "For instance, DNA computers might get +1 or +2 Complexity for gene coding, since they ideally model the problem."

azathoth says, "What about storage capacity? Standard GURPS only allows for a few hundred or thousand gig by TL9, when it looks like it could go into the petabytes."

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Sterling;s Holy Fire has religon-enhancing drugs )

dlpulver says, "Roxy, there are weird fringe religions aswell as the main ones. New Covenant and Seventh Heaven are the big Christian transhumanists into that sort of thing, with their own L5 colony (Seventh Heaven), but there are many, many others. You can expect Moslem, Jewish, etc. colonies and so on. And Indian is a major power, etc."

dlpulver says, "And religious radicals using memes, neuroviruses, et al"

dlpulver says, "Or atheist radicals."

Michalak [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Okay you are after Roxy.

Roxy waves, "Night!"

Til_Eulenspiegel [to Michalak]: Thanks.

Whatsit waves at Roxy! Roxy spots the waver and blows it a kiss!

dlpulver says, "Til?"

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Two quick questions, and then work beckons. Any meta-plots through the books? Any variation from the usual submissions and proposals procedure for TS?"

dlpulver says, "Sean?"

Kromm [to azathoth]: Given that I personally have contacts at IBM who are working on tunnelling-tip probe-based storage tech that will boost densities by ~5000 within our lifetime, I think you can expect to see realistic densities if I have any say in the matter.

Roxy jumps up, hugs everyone (taking special care with beings of less than three or more than five dimensions), and leaps into a place that is both here and not-here.

Michalak [to Whatsit]: Okay after the answer to Til's questions are finished you are up.

Kromm [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Meta-plots: Probably not.

Whatsit thanks Michalak

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Thank God! )

Kromm [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: Manufacturer-pushed plotting is evil.

azathoth [to Kromm]: Goody. I think I'll go vegitate in my fully immersive Virtual Reality now.

CraigR huzzahs. :)

Whatsit . o O ( E-VIlle! )

DocCross Agrees with Kromm.

dlpulver says, "There may be, however, some plots that carry through the books, but the entire setting follows the model of `this is a snapshot of 2100 AD -- the rest is up to you guys!'"

Kromm [to Til_Eulenspiegel]: However, there will be a body of canon and we do plan to support on a schedule, so we might suck in writers rather then wait for nice submissions, and we will plot out the books ahead of time.

Michalak says, "I have the monopoly on EE-VILE here."

Whatsit says, "that's fine, that's TWO ees, not one."

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Do you plan to accept new authors for any of this?"

Whatsit says, "and only one ell :)"

CraigR [to Michalak]: No, only in .chatter. :)

dlpulver says, "We may mention a few things in one book and not develop them until later, but that is only due to space concerns -- for example, details of the nations of Earth will be only sketched in Deep Beyond, the asteroid belt book."

Michalak grins at CraigR.

Kromm says, "Rather *than* . . . my typing meme appears to be losing out to a twitching meme."

efud has connected.

Til_Eulenspiegel . o O ( Reasonable to stay focussed on topic )

azathoth [to Kromm]: So there's no room for outsiders? Too bad, this meshed very well with the setting I queried you about a few months back.

Michalak [to coyote6]: And you are up again after Whatsit.

Kromm says, "We have to see what we shall see."

Kromm says, "The story is this:"

Kromm says, "We are pitching not one but six books."

Kromm says, "Failure means a big failure; therefore, we will do what it takes to ensure success."

Kromm says, "That means name authors until the setting has a following."

Dataweaver . o O ( like it doesn't already? ;) )

Kromm says, "Once the setting is strong, we will indeed consider proposals."

JFZeigler is mildly surprised to think that this includes him.

coyote6 says, "Jon asked my question - what authors - so I'll pass for now. "

LongStrider has connected.

Til_Eulenspiegel says, "Looks good. A little conservative, but better than the market average. Thanks and goodnight."

dlpulver says, "And of course, there is always room to impress us with a Pyramid adventure or article in the setting."

Kromm says, "The line plan we have does in fact allow for other types of books."

Til_Eulenspiegel has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "JFZ should not be surprised given the quality of First In..."

Kromm says, "Needless to say, Pyramid support for the setting would be wild, and a sure way to score points for later consideration."

Michalak says, "Okay... Bret is up again."

bret says, "How does downloading a personality fit with hard sf? I'm wondering what you have as a scientific basis for this."

dlpulver says, "Bret?"

Whatsit [to Michalak]: what about me?

Kromm notes that JFZ turns in good material on time. 'Nuff said.

azathoth says, "Oh-boy, oh-boy."

Michalak [to Whatsit]: Didn't you ask your questiong?

Michalak says, "Sorries."

LongStrider has disconnected.

Whatsit says, "sokay. Question is quick: is this a Human-varient only setting or will there ber oom for aliens?"

dlpulver says, "The short answer is that personality is not magic, but electrochemical, and thus it becomes a matter of sufficiently advanced sensor systems."

Dataweaver [to Whatsit]: No aliens.

dlpulver says, "No aliens."

Whatsit says, "None? at all?"

Whatsit says, "gah."

coyote6 says, "the humans will be alien enough"

JFZeigler [to bret]: Current thinking in AI is that mind and personality are computational...

MadDanEccles . o O ( Humans as aliens??? )

coyote6 [to Whatsit]: Where would they come from?

Whatsit adjusts its world view a little. "Okies."

dlpulver says, "The humans will be more alien than those in many science fiction settings."

JFZeigler [to bret]: in nature, and so could be implemented on a computer.

Michalak says, "Okay if Whatsit is done then Bret and then Steven Marsh."

Kromm says, "On personalities: what David said. We are unabashed rationalist scientist types. We don't plan to tangle with spirits and pseudoreligious fear of admitting the personality is a code."

azathoth says, "What about primitive alien life on other planets in the solar system? Say bugs in the Europan oceans."

Whatsit says, "I was thinknig Methane breathers like Cherryuh had in the CHanur series."

Dataweaver says, "Don't forget the AIs and the uplifted animals..."

JFZeigler [to bret]: Whether the upload is really the person is another issue.

Kromm [to JFZeigler]: Mais oui.

bret says, "I was thinking that the three-dimensional (at least) nature of memory is going to present a LOT of problems."

dlpulver says, "Think about bioengineered cyborg intelligent octopus modified to survive in zero gee with built-in nanotech colonies in its blood stream, which is a member of a christian transhuman space colony."

Kromm says, "On aliens: No aliens. They'd be boring next to some of the transhumans we're thinking of."

Whatsit [to Dataweaver]: I was thinking that the multitude of pseudo humans would open up true aliens to being more than men in furry suits.

Whatsit says, "plot devices and NPCs essentialy."

MikeLee has got to go.

MikeLee waves

dlpulver says, "For more on plausibility of uploading, check out BioTech."

MikeLee flies off to better archeological places...he never _did_ like the sand anyway...

coyote6 got a question from a friend, and so raises his hand again

Kromm [to bret]: Given that the next generation of storage and data encoding tech that IBM Zurich is developing *right now* is three-dimensional, I'm not worried.

Whatsit also has to go.

Dataweaver [to Whatsit]: That's what AIs are for...

bobzilla . o O ( Wondering about intersteller probes )

dlpulver says, "It may be that the only way to get a full upload is to destroy the brain."

Whatsit says, "AIs are designed by humanity; this makes them a *LOT* more familiar than something that evolved on Pluto."

Kromm [to dlpulver]: Peel the onion.

MadDanEccles . o O ( Why do I just get immages of Project Ako? )

dlpulver says, "If this sells, we'll think about a sequal set 100 years later."

bret . o O ( O.K. )

dlpulver says, "With aliens."

azathoth says, "Are there quantum computers?"

dlpulver says, "Otherwise, there's plenty in Traveller."

Whatsit says, "With that, I must leave you. (and MadDan, I have no idea. :)"

CapnQ . o O ( The Fungi from Yuggoth! )

Dataweaver [to dlpulver]: And with a Local Stars map, I hope...

Whatsit waves to all.

coyote6 [to Whatsit]: Let the AIs evolve.;)

Dataweaver waves at Whatsit! Whatsit rocks slightly in an attempt to wave.

dlpulver says, "Uh, what was the last question?"

coyote6 waves at Whatsit! Whatsit rocks slightly in an attempt to wave.

Kromm [to azathoth]: I think just this afternoon David, Jon, and I agreed there is QC in this setting, yes.

JFZeigler [to Dataweaver]: If *I* have anything to say about it :-).

MadDanEccles waves at whatsit

Whatsit suddenly disintegrates into a huge pile of lint. Oooooh, are the cleaners going to be miffed about *that*.

dlpulver says, "There is QC"

CraigR [to dlpulver]: Destroying the brain for a braintape, sort of like the Boppers, in Rucker's "Software". :)

Curtiss says, "Quantam based AI should be interesting."

dlpulver says, "It's all the rage in GURPS books these days"

JFZeigler [to Curtiss]: We need to be careful about that.

Kromm [to Curtiss]: The QC and AI may not be the same gizmos.

Michalak [to dlpulver]: I'm not sure either. I'm pretty sure that Bret went. I'm not sure that Steven Marsh has gone.

DocCross says, "Quantum computers, eh?"

SMarsh says, "Devil's Advocate question: How do the GURPS gurus feel about stretching a lot of the standard GURPS definitions? Not needing (or using!) a lot of 'standard' books, no energy cells, not adhering to point totals, etc.?"

JFZeigler [to Curtiss]: The AI community sneers at theories about QM and consciousness. . .

Parakeets say, "Hmmm."

Kromm [to Curtiss]: It could be that QC doesn't model heuristic thinking well.

bret . o O ( Yes, I was done with my question. )

dlpulver says, ""All of those apply in the this book, SMarsh."

dlpulver says, "And apply specifically"

Kromm says, "I am the GURPS Line Editor and I feel pretty good about that."

Kromm says, "I don't see it as stretching (as in: approaching breakage) but as growth."

Michalak [to Martinl]: YOu are up after his editorship.

DocCross says, "One scientist had a theory that a quantum computer would be linked to all other QCs in the multiverse."

Kromm shuts up.

Curtiss nods, "But even vaguely turing testable psuedoAI based on QC could be fun. Could become a transhuman version of the psychic friends network.

CraigR says, "It's stretching, but just to limber up. :)"

DocCross says, "therefore, it would contain all knowledge."

dlpulver says, "It should actually make it easier to do much of the design work"

coyote6 [to CraigR]: What is it limbering up _for_? :)

Kromm says, "I know that my quantum computer is really helping ME with this project."

bret . o O ( Eliza could be rewritten to do Psychic Friends Network. )

azathoth says, "Hehe."

Kromm . o O ( No! Jojo as an AI! Arghh . . . )

CraigR [to coyote6]: Role-playing gymnastics (and I *ain't* talking acrobatics) :P

dlpulver says, "Did we have another question?"

Kromm says, "Next question?"

Curtiss [to JFZeigler]: I think they more sneer at Penrose specifically.

Kromm is redundant.

Michalak pokes Martinl! Martinl ouches!

dlpulver says, "Martin?"

dlpulver says, "Hey Michalak -- did you have any questions?"

JFZeigler [to Curtiss]: With good reason. . .

dlpulver says, "(:"

Martinl says, "oops"

Michalak [to Fixer]: And you are after Martinl.

Kromm [to Martinl]: Go ahead ;-)\

Dataweaver [to Michalak]: How long is the que now?

Martinl says, "Ok - what about interstellar probes? And Canada?"

Michalak [to dlpulver]: Not really. Most of mine have been answered.

Curtiss [to JFZeigler]: Agreed.

coyote6 [to dlpulver]: Michalak asks, "Can I get playtest credit for keeping order?" ;P

dlpulver says, "Interstellar probes... I am certain they've launched some."

MadDanEccles . o O ( Blames Canada? )

JFZeigler [to Curtiss]: Although Penrose seems to have discredited the whole idea. Too bad.

Kromm [to Martinl]: There will be probes, but light won't move any faster.

Kromm [to Martinl]: And Canada will be blamed for everything, yes.

dlpulver says, "Canada. I'd like to avoid the stereotypical Quebec Independence, but it's not my book. I'd prefer to see a Rocky Mountains Republic with both British Columbia and the western US states breaking away to form their own mini-super power."

Michalak [to Dataweaver]: Six right now. Do you want on next?

Kromm says, "Actually, although I am a patriotic Canadian, I have to say that 'Canadian patriotism' is not a strongly expressed meme. It might not be around."

Martinl says, "Not "blame Canada" but "Where is Canda in 2100? Are is the the "Roycal Candaian Space Farce?"

dlpulver says, "Guardians of Order will, however, continue the Patriotic Canadians In Space meme, so don't worry."

Dataweaver [to Michalak]: No, just curious.

Michalak shows off his Coloradan patriotism.

Steven . o O ( Of course Canada will be blamed. "This Hour Has 22 Minutes" has a corrosive effect on American memes. )

Kromm [to Martinl]: No, but every space vehicle will have a really cool arm . . .

MadDanEccles . o O ( Canada patritism is better than Australian, as that meme is confused with alcaholism and sport watching )

dlpulver says, "In general, the fine details of Earth politics are still under development, as initial work has focused mostly on Space "

Martinl . o O ( Candaian Patriotism is confused with beer and Hockey )

coyote6 [to MadDanEccles]: I think those last two are transnational memes

DocCross prefers Californian patriotism:)

dlpulver says, "Alas, the 21st century did not belong to Canada"

Martinl says, "Iniut would be savvy spacefarers"

coyote6 hi5s DocCross! DocCross is hi5'd!

SirViss has disconnected.

Dataweaver raises his hand.

Martinl says, "Eskimes in Space!"

azathoth [to DocCross]: Californian patriotism? Tan-lines and mallwalking?

dlpulver says, "Oh keeper of the flame, who is next?"

Fixer says, "I missed a bit of the chat, so forgive me if this has been covered already: any mecha?"

Kromm says, "Perhaps we can have Troy Hurtubise revolutionize biotech with hibernating bear plasma."

dlpulver says, "Is it fixer?"

Michalak [to Curtiss]: You are after Fixer and I'm not sure if he's gone.

Fixer says, "Just asked it. :-)"

dlpulver says, "Fixer, there will be mecha in the sense that mecha is japanese for machine."

dlpulver says, "There will NOT be Giant Robots."

DocCross says, "no, avocados and white Zinfandel:0"

dlpulver says, "There will be battlesuits and small spacecraft."

dlpulver says, "And very small robots"

Fixer says, "But no robot war machines? :-("

Dataweaver says, "How about leggy vehicles?"

dlpulver says, "And killer cyberswarms and humans downloaded into combat cybershells and so on."

CraigR [to Fixer]: Check IMMURAM :)

Fixer says, "I'm thinking the more realistic Heavy Gear type mecha."

Kromm [to Fixer]: If you mean AI-driven fighting vehicles and swarms of microbots, yet.

azathoth says, "What about warbots of the variety seen in, say, the Chtorr series?"

dlpulver says, "Legged all terrain vehicles may be practical in some very rough terrain, yes. Most likely they would be somewhat insect like."

dlpulver says, "With four or more legs."

Kromm [to Fixer]: If you mean big walking monsters with shoulder-mounted missiles, no.

Martinl puts up his hand again

dlpulver says, "Warbots are relatively common, although the cutting edge ones have humans uploading into them."

Fixer [to Kromm]: Gotcha. I'm just a sucker for the 'walking monsters with missles' type. :-)

dlpulver says, "And in many cases, modified bioroids are cheaper."

Kromm says, "Bear in mind that with sufficiently cheap energy, it might be simpler and easier to use vertols and just not bother using wheels, legs, or tracks."

DocCross has disconnected.

Michalak [to Parakeets]: You are up after Curtiss.

dlpulver says, "Curtis?"

Parakeets [to Michalak]: Question withdrawn, already answered.

Curtiss says, "How smart is software in this setting? Can a character ask his computer to redesign a device to new specs and then have a minifactory make it? Or would the character have to have engineering skills and work with the software? Basically how much can progrqams do?"

Michalak says, "Okay.. then MadDanEccles is up after Curtiss."

dlpulver says, "Kromm?"

dlpulver says, "Want to cover that?"

Fixer says, "G'nite all!"

CraigR raises his hand...

Michalak waves at Fixer! Fixer is waved at!

coyote6 waves at Fixer! Fixer is waved at!

Dataweaver says, "Bye, Fixer!"

Fixer has disconnected.

Kromm [to Curtiss]: We have been discussing that. Most gadgets will contain computers. They will have expert systems at skill 12-14 to do all routine tasks.

Michalak makes sure that MadDanEccles is awake.

Kromm [to Curtiss]: We plan to explain to GMs how the boring stuff can be left to the machines, making room for PCs who are really heroes.

bret . o O ( Combo gadgets should just be a licensing issue. )

JFZeigler . o O ( Ubiquitous computing. )

MadDanEccles says, "What is the effect of meme programming on learning. Will everyone who can afford it have edetic memory level 2?"

dlpulver says, "Kromm and JFZ cover that one?"

JFZeigler [to MadDanEccles]: That probably goes well beyond what memetics can do.

Kromm agrees with JFZ.

JFZeigler . o O ( Although with an implanted minicomputer. . . )

MadDanEccles passes the talking stick. Thanks for the answer

Michalak says, "Well GraysonThorne seems to be gone so coyote6 is up again after Mad Dan."

Kromm says, "The real impact of meme programming will be overcoming obstacles to learning."

Kromm says, "I mean, the real *desirable* impact . . ."

Curtiss says, "What about speed of learning? Can a character learn a new language in a day ala EON?"

Kromm says, "Once you know how people learn, you can educate them far more efficiently. They don't have photographic memory, but they don't go 'duh' as often."

MadDanEccles says, "actually, that was my thought. What if it was thought patterns that effect memory retention, and the game effectwould be the same (more skills for the points)"

dlpulver says, "In game terms, rather than using mechanics like Eidetic 2, I feel it would be cleaner to simply increase the number of skills characters can start with above 2 x age, or allow GMs to allow extra points. Less crunchy, more natural."

JFZeigler hates Eidetic Memory anyway. Especially in high-point-count campaigns.

dlpulver says, "There are some mechanics for that already in place. Check out the rules for bioroids in GURPS."

Dataweaver says, "Also, reduce the hours needed to learn skills..."

coyote6 [to JFZeigler]: It could definitely be tweaked, yes. :)

SMarsh raises his hand.

Kromm says, "We will likely (1) give out lots more points, (2) waive age limits on skills, and (3) reduce the 1 point = 200 hours formula by compressing the 200 hours part."

Michalak [to coyote6]: Are you ready now?

Kromm adds his 'I hate EM' vote.

coyote6 says, "A question from someone sort of reading over my shoulder -- what are the primary forms of personal defense in combat? How do PCs _survive_ all that high-tech ordnance?"

azathoth says, " And why even bother to learn a skill when you can have a computer do it, or plug in a skillchip?"

dlpulver says, "Me too"

coyote6 likes EM, as a player. ;)

CraigR likes EM, period.

Dataweaver [to azathoth]: that's been answered in Cyberpunk.

dlpulver says, "Well, the thing is, the ordance is not that high tech in face-to-face. And treaty will restrict use of nukes including nuke pumped x-ray lasers to major situations. So in most cases, the lethality is going to be LESS than , say, Traveller."

coyote6 says, "So spray cans of disassembler goo aren't going to be common?"

Kromm [to coyote6]: Materials advance on both sides of the macroscopic offense-defense line. On the microscopic side, you can get defensive viral infections, defensive memetic structrues, native micromachine colonies, etc.

JFZeigler says, "I suspect there will be lots of sensor jamming and stealth around."

dlpulver says, "And characters will have more biotech enhancements that let them survive. Hell, a +1 to +3 to Health and things like a level or two of hard to kill representing backu p organs will do a lot. "

Michalak [to Dataweaver]: You are up after Coyote6.

JFZeigler . o O ( Hide and seek with bazookas. )

Kromm says, "And of course you might just be able to come back."

dlpulver says, "Remember, power cells at realistic levels will remove most of the overkill railguns and lasers and plasma beams."

Kromm says, "If you have uploaded recently, and your estate can pay for a body . . ."

coyote6 . o O ( "Damn! Dead again. Somebody wakeup my backup! )

Dataweaver [to coyote6]: Have you gone yet?

azathoth [to dlpulver]: Do terrorists sign treaties? (This is actually a halfway serious question: The pirates in Schismatrix were their own nation and could -- and did -- sign treaties.)

CraigR hmms

Curtiss says, "How fast can you grow a backup? Normal GURPS fast growth rates?"

dlpulver says, "Terrorists don't sign treaties, but as real life shows, they have yet to engage in mass destruction either. It's a threat and some disasters have occured... and attempting to stop them leads to good adventure plots."

Kromm [to Curtiss]: You might prefer to build a backup from cells.

dlpulver says, "Who was next?"

Kromm [to Curtiss]: Build it as old as you want.

Dataweaver says, "What were the major events of the twenty-first century?"

Michalak [to dlpulver]: Dataweaver and then Martinl.

Curtiss [to Kromm]: But how long does it take to reach maturity? A few months? Bio tech mentioned how implauable this was and I'm wondering what the TS take will be.

azathoth [to dlpulver]: Well, some peope consider the PLO to be a terrorist group, and yet the Israeli government deals with them as a nation.

CapnQ . o O ( Publication of the GURPS 4th Ed. CD-ROM :-) )

coyote6 [to CapnQ]: This is _plausible_ SF. ;P

Kromm [to Curtiss]: No, you aren't growing it. You are building it. You start with buckets of stem cells, you physically glom them together into a critter, and you cause different genes to express where and as needed. This takes as long as it takes to solve the computing problem.

MadDanEccles says, "Yes PLO is a terrorst Group, Just look at the Shey use in Australia (oops, thats P&O)"

dlpulver says, "Dataweaver, that is a matter of perspective. I'm sure someone did a really nice artistic thing. Perhaps the creation of the first AI in the 2060s. "

dlpulver says, "Or the first offworld colony to make a profit -- that's Luna in 2032 with the helium 3 mines."

dlpulver says, "Or the settlement of Mars in the 2050s."

Kromm notes that there is a timeline, but it's big and he isn't going to post it here and now.

dlpulver says, "Or maybe the founding a religion that is taking off. Like Digital Creationism."

Curtiss [to Kromm]: Got it.

ouroboros has disconnected.

Dataweaver says, "OK."

ouroboros has connected.

JFZeigler says, "I think one facet of this setting is that it's going to be *diverse*."

Kromm [to Curtiss]: Depending on how we finally model computers, it might not be worthwhile. Or it might take hours. We haven't done that math yet.

Michalak is sleepy, "Where are we?"

JFZeigler says, "Big and messy and hard to characterize large trends. Like real history."

dlpulver says, "Dataweaver just answered"

coyote6 says, "California."

coyote6 grins.

dlpulver says, "Who is after Dataweaver?"

coyote6 says, "martinl I believe"

Michalak says, "Martinl is up."

Martinl says, "What's going down on Mercury and Venus?"

dlpulver says, "That will be up to whoever writes the Mars book."

MadDanEccles raises his knotted string, getting tangled by the gm knots

dlpulver says, "Which will also cover these two. "

Michalak says, "Then CraigR."

dlpulver says, "My belief is that Venus is still hell, and humans are not there. Plans to terraform, but nothing firm."

Michalak says, "THen Steven Marsh and Mad Dan."

dlpulver says, "Robot exploration"

Kromm says, "Clarification: MARS is really INNER SOLAR SYSTEM. More than just Mars. Everything in the inner system except the Earth-Luna system."

Dataweaver says, "Hmm... So Deep Space will be the Outer system, and Mars will be the inner system...?"

dlpulver says, "Mercury is populated, some mining stations, and in orbit, some big solar power factories and antimatter factories."

dlpulver says, "Mars -- Inner SOlar System -- will also cover parts of the asteroids, the sungrazers."

azathoth [to dlpulver]: If you've got comet ranchers in the Kuiper Belt, there's the potential for terraforming projects insystem.

Kromm says, "We might rename MARS if it's really unclear to people."

coyote6 [to Kromm]: Slap a subtitle on it

dlpulver says, "The main thing preventing major terraforming on planets is the Preservationist lobby. The other main thing is the millions of people living on Mars. This does not exactly stop some of the radical Green Duncanites. D"

Dataweaver [to azathoth]: IIRC, it's more a case of 'Marsiforming' the colonists...

JFZeigler . o O ( In The Well. For "in the Sun's gravity well." )

dlpulver says, "Sunward Bound!"

Kromm says, "You could have some nice wars: terraformers releasing viruses, preservationists blackballing comets, etc."

azathoth [to Dataweaver]: I got that, but without some kind of terraforming, nothing is going to live on Venus

CraigR says, "Head to the light!"

Martinl says, "Sungrazers?"

dlpulver says, "This is a major, major conflict ... Europa is a big battlefield, but the threat of radical Green terrorists (green = terraformers these days, in a nod to everyone's favorite Mars author) is one taken very seriously."

MadDanEccles says, "Blined by the light"

Ragnar has connected.

dlpulver says, "And it is biotechs vs. cataclysmic terraformers vs. preservationists."

JFZeigler [to Martinl]: Asteroids with orbits that approach the Sun closely.

Michalak [to CraigR]: I would get your question ready.

CraigR [to Michalak]: All set. :)

coyote6 watches CraigR assemble a question.

dlpulver says, "Is it craigr?"

CraigR says, "The talk of smart software, made me wonder if anyone has engineered a dedicated slave race (LIke the Truul from GURPS ALIENS). Is it possible (have any plans been made) for a race like that to exist?"

Michalak says, "Yep. The cue is only three long."

Martinl hand

bret raise hand.

Michalak says, "Argueee!!!"

dcarson has connected.

dlpulver says, "Yes, dedicated slave species are floating about, to one degree or another."

coyote6 raises a hand

Kromm says, "I think that comes back to the downgraded humans from earlier on."

dlpulver says, "THey are controversial. In a slight nod toward history, Hir Majesties government does not approve. You can buy slave dolls from the Red Duncanites, though."

CraigR says, "Okay, just curious. All my other questions were answered earlier."

Curtiss says, "Heck the rich could enslave themselves. Upload self, alter personality to protect original, and voila. Perfect AI slave guardian."

dlpulver says, "In general, see also GURPS Cyberpunk Adventures `the medusa sanction'"

CraigR nods

bobzilla says, "good night everyone"

JFZeigler makes a quick note. That's too good an idea to pass up.

Michalak says, "SMarsh is up again after CraigR."

dlpulver says, "Smarsh?"

SMarsh says, "Two things, one short, one long: One (short): How realistic or cinematic is this world? Is it 'One bullet, you die? and 'tin cans in space?' Or 'Another dose of healing elixir! And TO BATTLE!' :) Two (long): Isn't the timeline AWFULLY optimistic? I'm not sure if we can have a NON-profit moon colony by 2050, let alone a profitable one and a Mars colony..."

CraigR grins at JFZ

Seabolt has connected.

bobzilla has disconnected.

Seabolt says, "Howdy."

Martinl says, "Yo"

ouroboros raises hand (thanks to a software change, after an enforced silence)

MadDanEccles bows to Seabolt. All the GURPS gods have graced here today

coyote6 waves at Seabolt! Seabolt is waved at!

dlpulver says, "First, the realism/cinematic level is kind of up to the GM. I've addressed combat lethality already. We will not do anything that does not seem plasuible, and instant healing potions aren't."

Kromm [to SMarsh]: Fairly cinematic, I think. All the usual GURPS combat woes, but with some fine tech that can patch up nearly everything. Not quite at the level of TL13 chrysalis machines, though.

Michalak [to MadDanEccles]: You should get easy for after Steven Marsh.

bret . o O ( All the gods? Where is Sean Barret? )

Kromm says, "I.e., no instant healing."

Kromm says, "Oh, David said that :P"

coyote6 [to bret]: Fallen, I think.

SMarsh nods.

dlpulver says, "Second, the time line is a bit optimistic by some standards, but less so by others such as those who feel we'll have a singularity in 2040."

Parakeets . o O ( get easy? )

SMarsh [to Michalak]: "Get easy?!?"

Kromm says, "Keep in mind that we are being deliberately optimistic, though."

Michalak [to SMarsh]: Hurm?

SMarsh says, "Hm. I guess I just remember too many 'Space: 1999' reruns. :)"

dlpulver says, "Basically, once we get fusion power, space travel tends to become more useful. Once we find we need Helium 3, you NEED to go to the moon. Once black holes are found in the belt, people will GO there."

CapnQ [to SMarsh]: I think Michalak had a major typo on "get ready"

dlpulver says, "Currently there is no need to be in space and no way of sustaining ourselves. But biotech will make it possible to live in space, opening up real estate. "

Kromm says, "What's 'hard' about the setting is that all the tech and science will be plausible given current understanding. Basic plot assumptions, however, will still be wholly fictional. Are there primordial black holes in the Asteroid Belt? Who knows? Will the moon prove worthwhile? Anyone's guess!"

azathoth says, "What's really slowing us down now is the need to lift all our materiel up the gravity well. Once we have an industrial infrastructure in orbit, the rest of the inner system is our playground."

SMarsh shrugs "I guess I just see too much similarity between 1980 and today to think too kindly about 2020. :)"

dlpulver says, "We could set it in , say, 2150 or 2140 or whatever, like Babylon 5... but I find it unrealistic to believe that we willbe that recognizable by then."

Seabolt says, "How are y'all planning on addressing what happens to all this infrastructure during a particularly nasty solar flare, staying within the plausible?"

Kromm says, "Well, we are talking about 2100 . . ."

dcarson says, "see http://www.asi.org/ for a group I'm involved in that thinks it can be relativly soon"

JFZeigler . o O ( Lots of water tanks and Moondust shielding. . . )

azathoth [to dlpulver]: Then how do you expect to do a sequal set 100 years later?

Ragnar says, ""But the clonemasters are around in 2100! :)"

Curtiss says, "There are really nasty solar flares going on in the next few months. TL7 sats seem to do just fine."

Kromm says, "Thick slabs of crud."

dlpulver says, "Because we will have established an infrastructure through six books that will enable us to be plausible."

Martinl says, "Layers of playtesters"

bret . o O ( Faraday cages are pretty effective protection too. )

DaveBrooks crawls out from beneath the carpet, warily looking for the housekeeper.

dlpulver says, "And more like 2150"

Kromm says, "All this industry will create waste. Nothing is wasted in space. Ergo, the dross becomes a shield."

azathoth [to dlpulver]: Plausible, but not recognizable?

Curtiss says, "Personally I'm a Vinge type. The tech mentioned here seems rather pessimistic for 100 years. But it makes for a good setting."

dlpulver says, "You'll recognize it if you read the first six books"

dlpulver says, "It's a balance. Some say pessimist, others optimistic."

dlpulver says, "Effectively, compare space travel between 1950 and 1970."

DaveBrooks . o O ( Geez, this must be the Energizer Chat...it keeps going and going... )

CapnQ raises his hand.

Kromm [to Curtiss]: Well, the Vingean approach is one approach. There are vertically asymptotic approaches like that. There are linear ones. There are horizontally asymptotic ones with upper bounds on knowledge. There is no good theory to predict which is correct.

dlpulver says, "Uh, who was next?"

Martinl . o O ( who's on first? )

Kromm says, "We are trying to keep away from the total extremes. Vinge's case *is* a polar extreme case."

azathoth says, "Well, you kinda need a bounded progression if you're going to stay within the realm of mortal man."

Kromm says, "Yes."

dlpulver says, "I don't know how many people we have now, but if it's down to a manageable amount and Mich is getting tired, we could go back to open forum..."

coyote6 says, "MadDan was next, I think"

MadDanEccles says, "What is the production schedual. That is, is these books been sold, written, or still being pitched, and if sold , what timeframe can we expect. Also, arnt black holes energy sinks? Energy goes in, nothing out."

Curtiss [to Kromm]: Agreed. My gut feelings just say lots of change.

azathoth says, "Er, semi-mortal man."

Kromm says, "This book is very specifically *trans*human and not *post*human."

Seabolt says, "Sounds likes I butted in out of turn. Apologies."

dlpulver says, "Kromm, want to cover that?"

Kromm says, "On the line:"

Michalak [to MadDanEccles]: Have you gone sir?

Curtiss says, "And I'll add I think the assumptions for this setting are great. Post*human would be rather hard to game in."

MadDanEccles says, "I am here sir"

coyote6 [to Michalak]: He just did

Kromm says, "The line plan has been drawn up. We are close to signing the deal for Book 1. Books 2-6 are planned. We have two authors lined up for some of those."

CraigR [to MadDanEccles]: Read A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME by Stephen Hawking.

Kromm says, "This is beyond the 'Should we?' stage and on to the 'How will we?' stage."

CraigR . o O ( for how black hole aren't so black )

Michalak [to Martinl]: You are up for the next question then.

Kromm says, "On black holes:"

Dataweaver waits for the que to empty.

Kromm says, "You toss in matter, you get energy. Some 30%+ (or is it 40%+?) of the mass is converted to energy. "

Martinl says, "Tell us more on Black hole tech. Just BH generators & BH Bombs? or BH drives, bullets, and beuty contestants as well?"

dlpulver says, "In the setting, black holes were discovered about 10-14 years ago."

Martinl says, "Well, that was seridipitous"

Kromm says, "The catch is (1) containing the hole, and (2) extracting the energy safely. That's a lot of energy. "

Parakeets say, "And now, the accretion disk competition..."

dlpulver says, "As such, they are mainly used for power... but they are being studied for all kinds of other things, primarily to provide incite into exotic physics"

MadDanEccles says, "I must be behind on BH tech. How can energy escape the gravity pull, if light can not. So you have this big thing eating matter, which you can not tap because the gravity well created sucks the enegy back"

Michalak [to bret]: You are up after Martinl.

JFZeigler says, "IIRC the idea is that you throw the matter in so that it spirals in slowly."

Curtiss says, "The energy comes from the spin of the black hole. I think."

azathoth [to Kromm]: The only BHs that should be usable are the rotating variety with charge, so you can move them around with EM fields. So only a fraction of BHs discovered will be useful.

Curtiss says, "Like a cosmic flywheel."

JFZeigler says, "It emits energy which (since it's not in the event horizon yet) gets out."

JFZeigler says, "You catch the energy and make use of it. Somehow."

CraigR [to MadDanEccles]: Read A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME by Stephen Hawking for a good dissertation on how power flows from mini-black holes. Seriously.

dlpulver says, "On serindipty: they were looking for them from 2050 on, but it took a while to get the funding set up. People were busy settling Mars, for one thing."

Martinl says, "I assume most BH tech is in deep space? I bet planetary pops don't want it near them."

MadDanEccles says, "So , in simple talk, it is an overglorified hydroplant, using gravity not water to spin it."

dlpulver says, "Deep space, yes."

dlpulver says, "Some in orbit. Most of the holes are atom sized"

Martinl says, "On serindipity, I meant someone asked the question spontaneously 10 lines before my turn. :)"

Kromm says, "Basically, the thing is constantly evaporating energy proportional to its lost mass. You keep feeding it mass to sustain it at some size, and it keeps radiating at a rate consistent with its mass. "

CraigR says, "It'sd a long and complicated process, written in an entertaining fashion there, dealing with the interaction of zen particles and the hole's event horizon."

JFZeigler [to MadDanEccles]: Kind of. But very efficient and very powerful.

kiwiduck has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "No one is seriously deploying black hole bombs... that anyone knows of."

MadDanEccles says, "Thanks. Passing the talking stick"

Curtiss raises hand.

JFZeigler makes a note to re-read Robert Forward.

Martinl says, "Why havn't roid impacts in the past fed BHs into all the planets?"

bret says, "You mentioned the Preservationists. Who are they, a fanatical offshoot of ecologists without a clue?"

azathoth says, "The infalling matter gets blueshifted to infinity, though. Are the facilities completely automated to prevent human exposure to all that radiation?""

dlpulver says, "We could say that most asteroids that are likely to impact are probably fragments of other asteroids (i.e., younger ones) while the asteroids likely to have black holes are the ones in stable orbits that have been around for billions of years."

Michalak says, "Okay, has Martinl asked?"

Martinl says, "yep"

coyote6 says, "yes, bret just asked his question"

CraigR [to azathoth]: they get re-red-shifted coming back out.

Michalak says, "Okay then bret is definately up."

dlpulver says, "Bret... Preservationists are people who want to keep planets like Venus and Mars in a reasonably pristine state."

azathoth [to CraigR]: Then why do we look for anomalous X-ray sources when searching for black holes?

JFZeigler . o O ( Like Kim Stanley Robinson's Reds. )

dlpulver says, "Some are fanatics, others just prefer a more orderly development, or even see Venus (say) as a useful resource for future eons (we might want to dismantle it later to build something) rather than whilly-nilly terraform it."

bret says, "I see ecology as attemting to make sure that humans are still part o"Why? At least Ecologists have a valid reason in that we can make the earth so it doesn't support human life."

CraigR [to azathoth]: I don't know, man. I didn't make it up. :)

Kromm says, "Not necessarily for the purest reasons, though . . . they might just want to protect the natural-state-optimized infrastructure they put in place before terraforming became a real option."

dlpulver says, "Some preservationists are interested in preserving the human genome."

Michalak [to ouroboros]: You are up after Bret.

CraigR [to azathoth]: I was thinking you were talking about something else. Sorry. :)

dlpulver says, "Ouroboros?"

bret passes the stick.

dlpulver says, "The most fanactical preservationists in space are the Europa Defense Front."

The stick drops with a clang.

bret says, "Preserving a power base makes sense to me. Preserving a planet because that is the way it was created doesn't."

Kromm says, "Well, it has been three hours, and there will be another chat . . . or three."

ouroboros picks up the stick

Michalak says, "If Ouroboros is not ready then perhaps CapnQ should go."

Kromm says, "How about we answer the queued questions and call it a night?"

SMarsh says, "Thanks for taking sooo much time talking to us! :)"

dlpulver says, "sure..."

Martinl says, "JJOP, this has lasted a while"

James has connected -- and there was much rejoicing.

azathoth [to bret]: This is getting into deep ecology, which is not entirely rational.

JFZeigler rubs his eyes.

Kromm has been at work for 14 hours . . .

dlpulver says, "Uh, who is next?"

dlpulver says, "Anyone?"

Curtiss [to Kromm]: Have you thought about a general TS discussion group? Not a playtest group for each book but a place to discuss the line?

CraigR says, "Yeah. Great chat, guys! Thanks for the information. :)"

Dataweaver says, "Ouro was, I think."

Michalak pokes CapnQ! CapnQ pops like a soap bubble, then reforms.

Martinl says, "Good Job, DK, DP, and JFZ!"

bret . o O ( ouroboros was next. )

Kromm [to Curtiss]: Once TS is a line, it will get a group just like GT has, sure.

dlpulver says, "I would rather not see a discussion group until after a book is out."

dlpulver says, "Too tricky for me to keep track of ."

CapnQ says, "[probably to Kromm] Do you have projected page counts yet?"

dcarson says, "thanks, looks like great books"

dlpulver says, "176 pages for Deep Beyond, 144 for others, probably"

Kromm [to CapnQ]: 176 for the core book, 144 for most of the others. Much like TRAVELLER.

ouroboros says, "At the risk of asking a mundane question -- how much space in each book can I expect to see racial templates, spaceship designs, etc., in?"

Michalak says, "Go with CapnQ, Ouroboros may be having connection problems."

Curtiss nods.

Kromm says, "In general, as GURPS sub-lines go, TRAVELLER is a good model for the general approach we will take to producing TS. "

Michalak says, "Sorry. Appears he is here."

CraigR can't help but feel that some of these statement are out of order. :)

Kromm says, "That's two generals in once sentence. Definitely a sign of fatigue. Or a war."

SMarsh . o O ( The entire main book is a reprint of Arabian Nights, with an extra 32 pages to explain what's different about the game world. )

Dataweaver [to Michalak]: How's the queue doing?

coyote6 [to SMarsh]: LOL

dlpulver says, "I expect about 100 pages at least of non-rules in the core book. More in others. "

Curtiss blinks at SMarsh.

JFZeigler says, "Anyone going to answer Ouroboros?"

JFZeigler subsides, seeing that someone has.

Michalak says, "We're down to Ouroboros, CapnQ, and Curtiss."

dlpulver says, "So that means about 76 pages of templates, rules, etc."

Kromm [to ouroboros]: Racial templates will be a big chunk of the book.

dlpulver says, "CapnQ..."

CapnQ says, "I already went."

Martinl says, "Tis late, gotta work tomorra, so I'm off. Y'all have fun."

Martinl isn't here anymore. You're almost sure.

dlpulver says, "Okay, Curtis"

Kromm [to ouroboros]: Not career templates, though, since careers are pretty tenuous in this setting.

CraigR says, "Well, guys, I'm going home. Kromm, David, thanks for the chat. Goodnight."

coyote6 waves at CraigR! CraigR activates his politeness subroutines and waves back!

MadDanEccles must leave as he feels the spirit of Strephon tapping his sholder. Thansk for a great chat and hopes for the best for all involved

Michalak [to CraigR]: See you.

Kromm waves to the departing.

dlpulver says, "Bye!"

ouroboros says, "So setting info is the big thing, with races a distant second? Sounds good to me."

MadDanEccles has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "Lots of stuff on planets, organizations..."

Kromm . o O ( Wonder if anyone here plays stupid shooting games late at night . . . )

Curtiss says, "This might be more of a suggestion. How do you prevent a person from replicating and becoming a vast multitude, either physicall or via uploaded selves? I could see people trying to make their own armies if it's easy to build clones."

CraigR hugs Kira! Kira dances about gleefully and hugs CraigR back!

dlpulver says, "bang, bang!"

Kira hugs CraigR! CraigR hugs her back. It feels nice. He must have his plush circuits activated...

Kromm [to ouroboros]: And a ship-design chapter optimized for the setting.

dlpulver says, "Simple. Anything after the first is an NPC."

A great number of mechanical arms and waldoes extend from the walls and ceiling, quickly breaking CraigR into his constituent parts and removing them.

ouroboros says, "When is the first book likely to reach playtest?"

dlpulver says, "Otherwise, no fast-growth cloning."

dlpulver says, "Probably in September"

Curtiss says, "Sure, but this seems like it would still be a factor even for NPCs."

Michalak says, "Okay, with sixty one questioners we are done with the cue."

Kromm says, "Yes, September or so."

ouroboros says, "Very cool. I'll be looking forward to it."

Curtiss says, "Plenty of PCs would settle for an ever growing Ally Group based on their PC..."

dlpulver says, "Cool. Thank you VERY much Michalak, for keeping track and moderating that!"

ouroboros defers to whoever else has questions

bret says, "Thanks for the chat!"

Parakeets say, "Cannot wait...must build time machine..."

Kromm says, "Well, that was a great chat, even though I'm pooped."

Curtiss says, "Great chat guys."

dlpulver says, "Good night Kromm!"

Kromm says, "I appreciate the turnout, really!"

coyote6 says, "Sean, David -- sounds like great fun"

coyote6 says, "And thanks for the chat...""

Curtiss says, "We appreciate the TS line!"

azathoth says, "Thanks a lot guys. Very informative."

coyote6 thanks Michalak for the queue keeping

Kromm says, "Needless to say, we'll be combing this log for weeks, looking at ideas . . . registering preferences . . . "

Dataweaver says, "This will be fun..."

Michalak [to dlpulver]: Not a problem. As usual I took on responsibilities I had not right to and ran with it.

dlpulver says, "After official log-off, I can stick around for another 5-10 minutes, as I'm not as tired, and answer a few more questions off the record."

dcarson says, "you people really hate me having money don'y you"

ouroboros is looking forward to the TS line, and grateful for this chat

dlpulver says, "But only about content, not the line as such."

Kromm [to Michalak]: Thanks A LOT for the help!!

JFZeigler [to Michalak]: Agreed. That was service above and beyond the call.

Michalak [to Kromm]: You are welcome. Glad I could help in my clutzy way.

coyote6 [to Michalak]: Verily, you kept chaos at bay.

Kromm will stay logged on, but is going to go get something with electrolytes in it for his brain just now . . .

Michalak gets a big head.

Michalak grins.

Curtiss will stick around for a few. Damn few opportunities to discuss transhuman speculations these days.

SMarsh hands Kromm and dlpulver a coupon for a beer or whatever equivilant they prefer.

coyote6 . o O ( Must be some kind of transhuman adaptation... )

dlpulver says, "Apple juice!"

Dataweaver . o O ( sounds like we can kill the log now? )

Michalak says, "I think so."

Curtiss nods.

Kromm says, "I have salt, I have tyramine. Who am I? (Munch.)"

bret . o O ( Dead wood? )

coyote6 picks up an axe.

bret . o O ( Does a log that commits suicide suffer from paper cuts? )

Michalak gets himself a slice of lemon and munches happily.

Dataweaver steps into the elevator.

coyote6 wanders off for a pepsi

dlpulver says, "A few other off-the-cuff comments. The other book I'd like to do is Blue Shadow."

SMarsh says, "Well, in MY time zone, it is now THE FUTURE!!! :) So I need to go to bed now..."

azathoth says, "What is that one about again?"

Kromm [to azathoth]: Scary squid.

Michalak [to SMarsh]: Have a good night.

azathoth says, "?"

ouroboros says, "How much room for humans-as-we-might-recognize them would there be in Blue Shadow?"

Curtiss says, "What's the specific appeal of Blue Shadow David?"

coyote6 [to dlpulver]: So, what about intellectual property -- can you copyright/trademark a meme or genetically engineered lifeform?

SMarsh waves to all. "Good night!"

Michalak says, "I think I should call my proto boyfriend and see how he is."

CapnQ gets some M&Ms.

dlpulver says, "I want to do underwater stuff!"

coyote6 waves at SMarsh! SMarsh is waved at!

SMarsh has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "It will be fun to research."

dlpulver says, "Bye SMarsh"

bret says, "Good night all!"

dlpulver says, "Bye Michalak!"

Curtiss [to coyote6]: Probably depends on who you ask. I doubt the WTO is going strong in this setting.

Curtiss says, "Night"

Kromm [to Michalak]: Proto? You growing him in a vat?

coyote6 recommends Blue Planet to David, if he doesn't have it already

bret has disconnected.

dlpulver says, "Well, I think you can trademark a meme in one sense... after all, that is what is done now, eh?"

azathoth says, "We already have copyrighted genemod animals."

dlpulver says, "Most of the meme material will be in the Earth and High Frontiers books, though."

Kromm says, "We already have copyrighted memes, too."

dlpulver says, "Books"

coyote6 [to azathoth]: But will TS have them? Specifically, copyrighted human variants?

Curtiss says, "Slogans."

dlpulver says, "Yes."

Dataweaver steps out of the elevator.

JFZeigler says, "Well, I've got a busy day ahead of me tomorrow. Good night, all. Was fun."

Kromm says, "Just ask Coca Cola . . ."

dlpulver says, "Good night JF!"

azathoth [to Curtiss]: Actually, unfettered international trade is probably a prerequisite for the kind of technosocial atomism common to extropian fiction.

Kromm waves at JFZeigler! JFZeigler is waved at!

CapnQ says, "Aren't genemod animals patented rather than copywritten?"

Kira steps out of the elevator.

Curtiss says, "IS there any sort of unified agreements between nations/colonies/etc in the future?"

Kira says, "yall done?"

dlpulver says, "Sure"

dlpulver says, "Yep, we're just kibutzing now."

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