Author Topic: Future history  (Read 9615 times)

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Offline Dave Chase

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Re: Future history
« Reply #30 on: March 05, 2011, 02:59:36 PM »
"League of Aliens" is what English speaking Humans call them. The propwr English translation is much longer and the real name is all but unpronouncible.

After 7 days of attempting to translate the actual name given to the LOA, most of the human translators had several headaches and dizzeness (and those were the mild cases.)

The first syllable (of 247) translated into something close to this according to what notes could be coherently read

wewhoareallthatlive ofdifferentnamesare oneoftheuniverse

After hearing this, One of the British Generals commented that sould like a politicians explaination for a League, and so born was the name

League of Aliens.

;)

Dave Chase
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Offline Clark

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Re: Future history
« Reply #31 on: March 05, 2011, 08:58:08 PM »
As per the basic rules, the organization is called the "Interstellar League for Mutual Homeworld Defence From Intergalactics".

The word of the day is "plenipotentiary".  :D

In German, the organisation name would be: Inter-Sterne-Liga für Gegenseitige Vater Welt Abwehr von Inter galaktisch

Of course, the Germans just love their compound words so that would be one long, frickin' word.

(When Marco and I were at Gen Con we met a guy from a German distributor who gave us his business card.  His title was  Handlungsbevolensma chtiger (or something very similar) When we asked what this meant he paused and hmmed and then said "manager". )

So, what cool acronym (because Germans love those too) would they use?

And if anyone is actually fluent in German, please correct me (I did one course in grade 10 and otherwise rely on Google Translate)
« Last Edit: March 05, 2011, 09:18:23 PM by Clark »

Offline Clark

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Re: Future history
« Reply #32 on: March 05, 2011, 09:26:45 PM »
On a different bend, sticking to a time a century from now sort of sidelines any other media references.  In particular is music.  Predicting musical tastes in a hundred years is mugs  game but it is nifty to to enjoy the soundtrack to your characters. . . .

OR how many light years are the Fantsians and Infranites from Earth?  What do Paache Raiders and Privateers boogie to?

Offline Dave Chase

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Re: Future history
« Reply #33 on: March 05, 2011, 11:56:25 PM »
On a different bend, sticking to a time a century from now sort of sidelines any other media references.  In particular is music.  Predicting musical tastes in a hundred years is mugs  game but it is nifty to to enjoy the soundtrack to your characters. . . .

OR how many light years are the Fantsians and Infranites from Earth?  What do Paache Raiders and Privateers boogie to?

Or you can pull a Buck Rogers in the 25th Century and say that current music is vogue (or in fashion because people long for the days before the LOS situation.

Dave Chase
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Offline Clark

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Re: Future history
« Reply #34 on: March 06, 2011, 10:47:08 AM »
It's plausible that popular music goes in cycles but we don't know for sure with only 60 years of rock 'n roll.

I'm not a music guru, but is there anything really "new" out there that is not a derivative of the last 40 years of the 20th century?
« Last Edit: March 23, 2011, 11:54:37 PM by Clark »

Arfiel

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Re: Future history
« Reply #35 on: March 07, 2011, 07:45:01 PM »
Inter-Species Union (ISU) can't be used.

That is a form you have to fill out when you want to marry a species other than your own.
You can't get those forms in the USA.


Offline Dave Chase

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Re: Future history
« Reply #36 on: March 22, 2011, 01:08:47 PM »
Well, with the additional new things happening around the world, I think it is even more important to pick a date and assume that the world as we know it changed into the LoS world.


Dave Chase
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Offline Clark

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Re: Future history
« Reply #37 on: March 24, 2011, 12:04:35 AM »
My leanings now, after reviewing the discussions, is to stick to plan A and keep the LOS time line in the early 22nd century while composing a narative that smooths out 9/11 and such to get to where we want to be.  It's a bit of a mugs game to speculate on what will happen with the rate of technological advance given Moores Law and such but the general attitude has to be that it all asymptotes by about 2050 when we reach ZPG and get AGW under control (*cough*).

Right now I am teaching a course in World Issues and the wonderful thing about teaching is that it forces you to learn stuff so you can pass on that knowledge.  Population projections are that China will max out, India will keep growing, and the USA will top 400 million. Meanwhile, some figure Canada could take agressive measures to get our population up to 100 million (ie. triple current numbers!).

The list of possible game changers is too long to contemplate.

I figure we stick to the plan for game purposes.

Offline grendeljd

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Re: Future history
« Reply #38 on: March 24, 2011, 11:48:45 AM »
Speculation on tech is always tough - you could easily date yourself prior to some big invention that changes things [internet, wireless tech?] or look amazing for predicting in a vague way something that actually comes down the pipe as an extension of current tech.

I just found the classic cartoon Robotech on Netflix this morning, and had to giggle a little as I watched the first episodes of Macross for the first time in maybe 15-20 years... the SDF-1 crashed to earth in 1999, and the  rest of the story takes place in 2009. It's so weird that that is in our past now, lol! Regardless, the story still works because they picked a date as a start point - if an alien ship really crashed in our world in 1999, it would change everything from then on [though being more conscious of technology as an Industrial Electrician, I personally think it might take more than ten years to crack and start reproducing alien tech with no aliens to teach it to us...].
I hate people generally, but I like them specifically - John Malkovich

Offline smokingwreckage

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Re: Future history
« Reply #39 on: April 18, 2011, 09:24:28 AM »
Picking demographics is a mug's game, too. The UK for example apparently recently went from death-spiral (population decline that historically would have been irrecoverable, given smaller populations and poorer tech) to maintenance.

I wouldn't pick on any one ecological bogeyman either; Paul Ehrlich for example has been proven wrong pretty much every decade since the late 60's.

But, if Earth is in decline at the point the aliens show up.... then it is. If that's a requisite of the fiction, you write it in. Certainly having the world about to collapse into multiple war-fronts as hungry but well armed dogs scrabble for the meatiest energy and ore bones adds to the "Earth Dogs" attitude and gives a solid reason why the probable superpowers of the time; say US, India, China, someone in Europe (France, more likely Germany or the UK?), maybe Japan, maybe an SE-Asian or South American economy or bloc, would submit to an overarching quasi-federal political umbrella. 

"Hey look! ALIENS!" is a great way to back out of a no-winners 5-way without losing face.

Offline grendeljd

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Re: Future history
« Reply #40 on: April 20, 2011, 09:40:58 AM »
Some tech would be an absolute game-changer too. Has anyone here ever read The Diamond Age by Neil Stephenson?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Diamond_Age

Incredibly intelligent sci-fi concepts on nano-tech. I love this book. If that kind of tech came into being, it would alter everything we currently do. Of course, I don't think it's worth worrying over as related to LoS - it just re-enforces the idea that if you pick a time and stick to extrapolating from that point on, the world you create will feel cohesive.
I hate people generally, but I like them specifically - John Malkovich

Offline smokingwreckage

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Re: Future history
« Reply #41 on: April 20, 2011, 10:16:45 AM »
Yeah if you go too far into analysing the tech it turns into long-form hard sci-fi, wherein the question is about a particular technology.

LoS is about humans from a brink of collapse earth getting thrust onto a galactic stage to shore up a brink of collapse alliance war.

Offline Vok Ytalinov

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Re: Future history
« Reply #42 on: April 22, 2011, 04:34:15 PM »
I guess you can't really ignore 911, but we already have China, or the Sino Nipponese power bloc active, powerful, and pursuing its own agenda with ETs, more specifically, the Zoyone hive...I think the Internet free world of UNE earth is a neccessity given, if nothing else, the Runaway.  Besides, the lack of the internet might illustrate the sheer gravity of the LOS threat to the wired youngsters of today.  And, who knows, the military need for computer security vs the public and corporate desire for freedom and ease of commerce, respectively is not without post 911 parallels...

Offline smokingwreckage

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Re: Future history
« Reply #43 on: April 26, 2011, 09:35:29 AM »
I can see Runaway type attacks ending the full sensory immersion idea pretty quickly. If you read some of the side-stories in a series I don't recommend (Rifters by Peter Watts) the Internet is already being overrun by "wildlife" by the early 2030's; artificial life and genetic algorithms driving the "evolution" of a whole pseudo-ecosystem of spambots and viruses...

Just so you know, Rifters has a lot of really nasty stuff in it: child abuse, rape, and extreme sadism are just some of the things characters suffer or inflict in the fiction. "Blindsight" on the other hand is freaking brilliant and explores ideas of consciousness, intelligence, and evolutionary fitness versus extinction that all go nicely with Legions of Steel.

http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm The whole novel online for free.

Offline Nukelavee

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Re: Future history
« Reply #44 on: April 26, 2011, 10:07:14 AM »
Starfish was iffy, Maelstrom actually reins things back in a bit...

Blindsight rocked.

But, yeah, I can see any kind of informational tech being SO security concious with something like the Machines around.

In turn - I could see a tendancy, at least on Earth, towards giving internal security departments way too much power...