Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

Great, now Xerxes looks like a moron since I didn't know something my character most likely did. :(

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

Don't worry about it. Orville is not well suited for his job. He thinks anyone who would pay to travel in a starship is nuts. They pay him to, after all.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

So, he'd most likely treat any question as if the asker were a particularly slow five-year old.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

I'm going to assume that you can connect to the equivalent of the "internet", and thus personal message programs (such as e-mail programs) easily enough... and with an in-built computer, you can do it while looking like you're just dozing off.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

Yes. Any computer-like device -- and anything more complicated than a
pencil is likely to be a computer-like device -- will have a radio
transmitter in it. It talks, over something that's the rough
equivalent of Bluetooth, to a repeater. (There's one or more in every
room of a civilized house or space ship; outside, there's one on
every street sign, parking meter, street light, etc. In an urban
area, you're never more than a couple meters from one) The
repeater talks to the building or ship net, and the building net talks
to the planet net. That gives you good high-speed connection to what
we'd think of as the "InterNet", yes. To send a message interstellar
distances, you pay a courier service (GalTel is a big one, there are
others). They beam it over radio to wormhole on that route. It
gets jumped through, and beamed to the next wormhole, and so on. This
is cheap, pennies to send a megabyte, though messages don't always go
directly from A to B, they may go through a relay station or two.
If you've got a computer implant, you can deal with text while doing
something else, with about the same difficulty as you (the players,
not the PCs) have talking on the phone and typing a different
message at the same time. If you're good at it, people will never
know. Dealing with voice or video takes more attention, and real-time
phone calls even more so.

Most people have a computer NAI minion that deals with routine matters
for them. It'll let you know that you've got important messages, and
summarize others for you, so you don't have to deal with them. It'll
also do all the other mundane things you tell it to do -- balance your
checkbook, make an appointment to take the dog to the vet, call the
phone company to see what this charge is, etc. If you've got an
implant, it runs on that. If you don't, it runs on the pocket
computer everyone else carries.

Note that while it's not actually intelligent, it does get years of
training on what sort of messages that you think are important, what
news you want to see, what movies you like, etc. It gets really good
at it.

In some circles, it's a status symbol to not have such a gadget. If
you an afford to have an actual minion, or better, a staff of them, to
do these things, it shows off wealth and power.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

dscheidt if the briefing is over can we write IC descriptions of what we're going next? Or are you going to write another scene before then?

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

I'm done with the briefing, unless there are questions.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

The exercise machines are designed to be used in free fall. Clearly, they're not free weights, but things like stationary bikes, rowing machines, and other things that you can strap yourself in, and which an use springs or rubber bands for resistance.

Painting in free fall is probably a bit tougher.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

Okay, I'll edit my IC post.

(sigh) I've got some bad news dscheidt. :(

I've been going to a physiotherapist for months for various problems. One of these is pain in my upper back, elbows, and right hand. The physio has basically told me one of the contributing factors is all the time I spend on the computer, especially using the mouse. As well as telling me to use a wrist splint at night and a gel pad, he's told me to take a break from using a computer, any computer, for a week. After that I can go back to using one maybe an hour a day, which will allow me to keep up to date with all my pbps. Until then, however, I won't be able to participate in this game.

I'm planning on starting my week in about eight hours, which will allow me to let everyone know about this. I'm really sorry about this, guys.

Re: [OOC] The Catacombs, hard SF
 

Reading Fleckenzwerg's last IC post made me wonder... is whispering ever necessary with a computer implant? Could you just have a quasi-telepathic conversation with someone if they're in range of your transmitter and accept the call?