From: jet.jaguar(a)friggarock.fen
To: local-call.residents(a)friggarock.fen
subj:State of the Rats #9
Another month, another message.
On the table today. Our reactor Reactor 'accident'. Motorcon done. Why we can't have nice things. Now Arriving at Platform 1. Lun crew qual boards. Disturbing. Y U No Kofen. Zenith Questions. Baron Von Frigga and the Poor Hamsters.
Anyway, we've been busy, so without further waffle....
1: Not even A mere Three-Mile-Island
So, the second biggest thing in my inbox this month is the incident with Unit 4. To all the people who insisted we were morons for even trying to run the test, or 'monkeys fucking around like hicks making moonshine with the most intense man-made radiation source known' as someone online put it, I defer to the Lensherr Heavy Power Systems PLC. They know far more about d/t-fuelled stellarators than me. The ultimate cause appears to have been a small hydrogen explosion in the de-aerator assembly, leading to a coolant spill. That sounds alarming, but it's not. Since 'Just trust us' isn't good enough, the Engineer's preliminary report will be on the public bulletin-board in a week.
Before anyone manages to have a panic attack, try to remember that incidents like this are exactly why these tests are run. This wasn't even an accident. We knew it could happen when we started the test and had taken steps. Had we been in an actual emergency situation with the core, and had similar explosion, the results would've been STALKER, Shadow of Frigga. As it is, it happened in an environment we had control over, so it was managed fairly quickly.
The reactor will be out of commission for about 6 months. We may get emergency funding to either repair or replace, this hasn't been decided.
The other three units are in no danger.
2: Motorcon.
This year we had a grand total of 5 accidents with 7 serious injuries, 4 cases of wankel-induced deafness and the usual minor cuts and scrapes, con-creepers and thefts. Not bad. Will be running next year. Which just goes to show that it doesn't matter how many people your con nearly kills, so long as everyone has a good time.
The Clarkson crew cancelling on short notice was a bit of a pain, but you can blame the insurance company for that. After last year they threw a bit of a wobbly. Still, the actual original Mad Max War Rig more than made up for it. Driving that thing is a challenge. That one Mustang owner, however?... Mediocre.
I had a lot of fun at the Wankel roundup. Thanks to the good people of Mazda for bringing out the 787b all the way here. And the always elegant Sylia Stingray's talk on how to start your own automotive business was especially informative, especially with regards to American Unions and bringing Fentech to mundanes..
After the response we got, 'There will be a rule' run-what-you-brung drag racing will be back next year. Additions to the rulebook will be pushed six months in advance of the next event. Suffice to say Rocket-Turbine differentials, liquid oxygen injection and 8 wheel drive will be banned next time around. The Yunick Memorial Trophy has gone to Korolevgrad for the next 12 months.
The Former British Leyland factory team from Guestton won the 24 hour Le-Mons event with fine lack of style in an open-piped SD-1. They will be back to defend their honour next year.
We also had a number of interesting talks on subjects ranging from restoration of classic muscle cars, looking after your dinosaur in space, making your own fuel 'from shit lying around', The Wasteland Review with Immortan Joe, Rally Mars, The Armstrong Classic, and the future of Formula One.
The committee are looking at proposals for events for next year. Given the setup time involved, you have six months to propose.
3: Why we can't have nice things.
I shouldn't need to have to say this. But the last 4 weeks have told me that I do. Especially those two catgirls getting run over after the BBQ last week. We were lucky both of of them survived. One broke his neck, but homeostasis ensured he'll make a full recovery. The person responsible left in irons on the JMC transport yesterday.
I don't care what gobshite excuse you come up with, if you're drunk in a car, you're done. Gone.
If you kill someone while drunk in a car. I will kill you. That is not a threat. It is a promise.
4: Now arriving at Platform 1...
Our new train has been bought and paid for, and will be on its way inside a week. With a little luck, Fenspace' largest indoor trainset will be running before November. We will have two passenger cars, a container freight car, and a train of ore carriers which should up throughput through the mine by 20%. Our locomotive will arrive unwaved, and general consensus spears towards keeping it that way unless required otherwise.
Name's suggested for the Locomotive are as follows:
1: Planetes
2: Lady Mars.
3: Mirai
4: Starlight Express
5: Rattle and Hum
Or a write-in candidate. I'm for not naming it after something U2.
As for the defence spending referendum. Tachikoma won hands down. We come up short on some security requirements so we can't go ahead with that - but we're only about ten points short. Second preference was to assign a technocrat to make a decision. Daryls considered opinion is to invest in an battleteam with motoroids. It won't have near the same capabilities out of the box, but we can do a lot of the work in-house, I can handle training, and it'll push our security rating up to the point where:
A) We can defend this place when I'm away from home
B) We can order the good toys, rather than GJ-era third tier stuff.
It's a simple yes or no vote whether we want to accept her recommendation.
5: Lun's Qual Board. Titanic and Arcadia missions.
Final qual boards are coming up, Monday next week. If you don't pass, you don't go on the test flight to Titanic, which means no Arcadia trip. No chainiks allowed. Final crew selection for the Titanic mission and then Arcadia will be the day after, posted to the Local bulletin boards under Frigga.Local.Lun.
Since we plan to dock in Detroit/New Jersey, anybody going who's from a free country will need to be America-legal, with valid passports, travel authorisations, identity suppliments, proof of employment (Ship's articles will count) and medical certificate. Remember, you can arrange all this through Port Luna if needed. Americans can return on a valid US passport.
Permission to dive the Edmund Fitz' is slow in coming, but we expect it'll arrive before departure. The Ballard institute has specifically requested we raise samples of material from Titanic to measure the effects of the preservation process on the ship's hull. This will be some real, useful science. And also the first time anyone has physically boarded the Titanic in 112 years.
Beyond that, Arcadia's going to be a tough mission. This is not a holiday. We're doing legitimate, accredited science here. Whatever we find will go to Artemis. And anyone who goes will be part of the very first deep exo-ocean survey mission in history. We're doing more than a few genuine firsts here
Anyone wishing to book Lun, check the ships schedule under Frigga.Local.Lun.Schedule. Don't just assume it's available.
6:Anika at Cybercon.
Anika succesfully presented her paper 'Reduction of latency through Use of Interwave signalling between processing Nodes in a multiple-core distributed processing system' at this years Cybercon to plenty of acclaim. I'm sure everyone will forward their congratulations to our little cyberpunk. Even if they don't understand what exactly that means. Suffice to say, it's something good. It means Good Things for the MAGI project. It also means Really Good Things if the same technique and protocal can be shrunk to a smaller form factor.
6: Disturbing.
Alright. It's time to be disturbing for a minute.
The circumstances of my creation are well known. I got drunk, drank some wave, then stepped into a hardsuit built with the same wave. That's the short form.
Please, for the love of all that is good and decent, do not try this at home. It is a catastrophically dumb thing to do.
The long and the short of it is this.
If you want to be a cyber, go through the proper channels. Talk to a qualified cyberdoc. Talk to me even, to get an idea of what life is actually like and see if it's actually all you think it's going to be because I guarantee it isn't. Remember, I've had 12 years of dealing with this for it to become normal. And if you still want to go for it, go the surgical route. I can handle the interview and character references you need for a reputable doc.... don't go for one that'll just take your cash and jam it in because you'll either pay far too much for basic gear, or end up living with kludgeware of the worst kind, either cobbled-together second hand junk, or worse.
You're asking someone to build the rest of your life, remember that.
Kiko is doing well. But it'll still take a few months of therapy to clean up the mess she made of herself. You'll have to use your imaginations to provide your own deterrent.
7: Y u No KoFen?
I'm still getting asked this question. Usually from the same group of people.
There're two big reasons.
First, our interwave transmitter probably predates the Boskone War.
Second - so does the rest of our network infrastructure. But it's a bigger a more complex issue than that. The real reason, is TITANIC. And MAGI when it comes online.
Both are distributed computers - they have no single core processing node. Which means the entire network is required to handle all sort of inter-processor communications that would normally be dealt with by a PC motherboard. And, to make sure that TITANIC is able to run at real-time speeds, all of that data is being shuffled around at absolute priority to get the latency down. It's why our ping-times for gaming and messaging are so high- most normal network traffic is scheduled at an unusually low priority. Even with a full network upgrade, to the latest fibre with ulrafast optical switching, it wouldn't work. TITANIC will always take priority to the point where everything else gets pushedout of spec.
From a raw technical standpoint, the network might be able to handle the overhead of a single set. From a practical standpoint, this would involve shutting down the entirety of our automation. Maintenance. Defence. Environmental. Landing Control. Reactor Control, Power Systems.... All of it.
To install a functioning KoFen set, we would need to fit a dedicated transceiver with it's own dedicated fibre-channels. This was on last month's referendum, as a stretch on the network upgrade options. And nobody voted to pay for it.
So please, stop constantly adding it to the Agenda. Bloody demagogues.
Also. On an unrelated note, November 22nd. Watch.
8: Zenith of Things Tournament Questions.
I'm amazed at how few people know what Battle Angel Alita is. Have Alita and the Gruppe been around so long, we've become more famous than our source?
The full details will have to wait until december, but the general format will be as follows:
Round one will be Live Fire Team against Frigga drones with sim-rounds. Maximum of 5 people per-team. Minimum of 1. Hacking of the drone controls will be forbidden for safety reasons.
Round two and subsequent will be team on team using simmunition weapons.
Top Three teams get a trophy and a prize.
That's the jist of it. We're working with our sponsors to figure out what the exact details are and what they'll accept - both from an entrant safety standpoint, an inclusiveness standpoint and a practicality standpoint. And also to figure out how to fully fund this thing. Maybe some sort of premium streaming option, or the like.
The most important Rule of Zenith will be that it's all real. Not simulated. Injuries, fatigue, wear and tear - it all carries forward to the next round. Survival Shot was founded on that principal. The downside of doing it live... it's a lot harder.
Oh, and we have Kishiro's permission to use the name.
--
9: Barony of Frigga
The Parliament, in a bid to encourage someone to actually win the election, have decided that whoevers comes in #1 will earn the title of Baron of Frigga. You'll have to provide your own Fokker Triplane, I'm afraid. They're a bit tight on the expenses after the Denise O'Brien corruption scandal.
After that, if nobody's election is forthcoming, some poor gobshite's getting appointed to the role. My sympathies. Cortana has offered tips on herding cats to the unfortunate victim.
---
10: Poor Hamsters
Finally. I think We have the rat problem under control. Putting Zapp-Guns on the exocomps worked. Apologies for the hamsters, Denon, I know you were attached to them.
In b4 'Mission Accomplished'.
--
Until Next Month. When we'll be renaming New Birmingham to something a little nicer, Lun'll be back from America, We'll know if Daryl won for Asagiri, and maybe we'll get lucky and have someone else doing these bulletins.
-Jet.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
To: local-call.residents(a)friggarock.fen
subj:State of the Rats #9
Another month, another message.
On the table today. Our reactor Reactor 'accident'. Motorcon done. Why we can't have nice things. Now Arriving at Platform 1. Lun crew qual boards. Disturbing. Y U No Kofen. Zenith Questions. Baron Von Frigga and the Poor Hamsters.
Anyway, we've been busy, so without further waffle....
1: Not even A mere Three-Mile-Island
So, the second biggest thing in my inbox this month is the incident with Unit 4. To all the people who insisted we were morons for even trying to run the test, or 'monkeys fucking around like hicks making moonshine with the most intense man-made radiation source known' as someone online put it, I defer to the Lensherr Heavy Power Systems PLC. They know far more about d/t-fuelled stellarators than me. The ultimate cause appears to have been a small hydrogen explosion in the de-aerator assembly, leading to a coolant spill. That sounds alarming, but it's not. Since 'Just trust us' isn't good enough, the Engineer's preliminary report will be on the public bulletin-board in a week.
Before anyone manages to have a panic attack, try to remember that incidents like this are exactly why these tests are run. This wasn't even an accident. We knew it could happen when we started the test and had taken steps. Had we been in an actual emergency situation with the core, and had similar explosion, the results would've been STALKER, Shadow of Frigga. As it is, it happened in an environment we had control over, so it was managed fairly quickly.
The reactor will be out of commission for about 6 months. We may get emergency funding to either repair or replace, this hasn't been decided.
The other three units are in no danger.
2: Motorcon.
This year we had a grand total of 5 accidents with 7 serious injuries, 4 cases of wankel-induced deafness and the usual minor cuts and scrapes, con-creepers and thefts. Not bad. Will be running next year. Which just goes to show that it doesn't matter how many people your con nearly kills, so long as everyone has a good time.
The Clarkson crew cancelling on short notice was a bit of a pain, but you can blame the insurance company for that. After last year they threw a bit of a wobbly. Still, the actual original Mad Max War Rig more than made up for it. Driving that thing is a challenge. That one Mustang owner, however?... Mediocre.
I had a lot of fun at the Wankel roundup. Thanks to the good people of Mazda for bringing out the 787b all the way here. And the always elegant Sylia Stingray's talk on how to start your own automotive business was especially informative, especially with regards to American Unions and bringing Fentech to mundanes..
After the response we got, 'There will be a rule' run-what-you-brung drag racing will be back next year. Additions to the rulebook will be pushed six months in advance of the next event. Suffice to say Rocket-Turbine differentials, liquid oxygen injection and 8 wheel drive will be banned next time around. The Yunick Memorial Trophy has gone to Korolevgrad for the next 12 months.
The Former British Leyland factory team from Guestton won the 24 hour Le-Mons event with fine lack of style in an open-piped SD-1. They will be back to defend their honour next year.
We also had a number of interesting talks on subjects ranging from restoration of classic muscle cars, looking after your dinosaur in space, making your own fuel 'from shit lying around', The Wasteland Review with Immortan Joe, Rally Mars, The Armstrong Classic, and the future of Formula One.
The committee are looking at proposals for events for next year. Given the setup time involved, you have six months to propose.
3: Why we can't have nice things.
I shouldn't need to have to say this. But the last 4 weeks have told me that I do. Especially those two catgirls getting run over after the BBQ last week. We were lucky both of of them survived. One broke his neck, but homeostasis ensured he'll make a full recovery. The person responsible left in irons on the JMC transport yesterday.
I don't care what gobshite excuse you come up with, if you're drunk in a car, you're done. Gone.
If you kill someone while drunk in a car. I will kill you. That is not a threat. It is a promise.
4: Now arriving at Platform 1...
Our new train has been bought and paid for, and will be on its way inside a week. With a little luck, Fenspace' largest indoor trainset will be running before November. We will have two passenger cars, a container freight car, and a train of ore carriers which should up throughput through the mine by 20%. Our locomotive will arrive unwaved, and general consensus spears towards keeping it that way unless required otherwise.
Name's suggested for the Locomotive are as follows:
1: Planetes
2: Lady Mars.
3: Mirai
4: Starlight Express
5: Rattle and Hum
Or a write-in candidate. I'm for not naming it after something U2.
As for the defence spending referendum. Tachikoma won hands down. We come up short on some security requirements so we can't go ahead with that - but we're only about ten points short. Second preference was to assign a technocrat to make a decision. Daryls considered opinion is to invest in an battleteam with motoroids. It won't have near the same capabilities out of the box, but we can do a lot of the work in-house, I can handle training, and it'll push our security rating up to the point where:
A) We can defend this place when I'm away from home
B) We can order the good toys, rather than GJ-era third tier stuff.
It's a simple yes or no vote whether we want to accept her recommendation.
5: Lun's Qual Board. Titanic and Arcadia missions.
Final qual boards are coming up, Monday next week. If you don't pass, you don't go on the test flight to Titanic, which means no Arcadia trip. No chainiks allowed. Final crew selection for the Titanic mission and then Arcadia will be the day after, posted to the Local bulletin boards under Frigga.Local.Lun.
Since we plan to dock in Detroit/New Jersey, anybody going who's from a free country will need to be America-legal, with valid passports, travel authorisations, identity suppliments, proof of employment (Ship's articles will count) and medical certificate. Remember, you can arrange all this through Port Luna if needed. Americans can return on a valid US passport.
Permission to dive the Edmund Fitz' is slow in coming, but we expect it'll arrive before departure. The Ballard institute has specifically requested we raise samples of material from Titanic to measure the effects of the preservation process on the ship's hull. This will be some real, useful science. And also the first time anyone has physically boarded the Titanic in 112 years.
Beyond that, Arcadia's going to be a tough mission. This is not a holiday. We're doing legitimate, accredited science here. Whatever we find will go to Artemis. And anyone who goes will be part of the very first deep exo-ocean survey mission in history. We're doing more than a few genuine firsts here
Anyone wishing to book Lun, check the ships schedule under Frigga.Local.Lun.Schedule. Don't just assume it's available.
6:Anika at Cybercon.
Anika succesfully presented her paper 'Reduction of latency through Use of Interwave signalling between processing Nodes in a multiple-core distributed processing system' at this years Cybercon to plenty of acclaim. I'm sure everyone will forward their congratulations to our little cyberpunk. Even if they don't understand what exactly that means. Suffice to say, it's something good. It means Good Things for the MAGI project. It also means Really Good Things if the same technique and protocal can be shrunk to a smaller form factor.
6: Disturbing.
Alright. It's time to be disturbing for a minute.
The circumstances of my creation are well known. I got drunk, drank some wave, then stepped into a hardsuit built with the same wave. That's the short form.
Please, for the love of all that is good and decent, do not try this at home. It is a catastrophically dumb thing to do.
The long and the short of it is this.
If you want to be a cyber, go through the proper channels. Talk to a qualified cyberdoc. Talk to me even, to get an idea of what life is actually like and see if it's actually all you think it's going to be because I guarantee it isn't. Remember, I've had 12 years of dealing with this for it to become normal. And if you still want to go for it, go the surgical route. I can handle the interview and character references you need for a reputable doc.... don't go for one that'll just take your cash and jam it in because you'll either pay far too much for basic gear, or end up living with kludgeware of the worst kind, either cobbled-together second hand junk, or worse.
You're asking someone to build the rest of your life, remember that.
Kiko is doing well. But it'll still take a few months of therapy to clean up the mess she made of herself. You'll have to use your imaginations to provide your own deterrent.
7: Y u No KoFen?
I'm still getting asked this question. Usually from the same group of people.
There're two big reasons.
First, our interwave transmitter probably predates the Boskone War.
Second - so does the rest of our network infrastructure. But it's a bigger a more complex issue than that. The real reason, is TITANIC. And MAGI when it comes online.
Both are distributed computers - they have no single core processing node. Which means the entire network is required to handle all sort of inter-processor communications that would normally be dealt with by a PC motherboard. And, to make sure that TITANIC is able to run at real-time speeds, all of that data is being shuffled around at absolute priority to get the latency down. It's why our ping-times for gaming and messaging are so high- most normal network traffic is scheduled at an unusually low priority. Even with a full network upgrade, to the latest fibre with ulrafast optical switching, it wouldn't work. TITANIC will always take priority to the point where everything else gets pushedout of spec.
From a raw technical standpoint, the network might be able to handle the overhead of a single set. From a practical standpoint, this would involve shutting down the entirety of our automation. Maintenance. Defence. Environmental. Landing Control. Reactor Control, Power Systems.... All of it.
To install a functioning KoFen set, we would need to fit a dedicated transceiver with it's own dedicated fibre-channels. This was on last month's referendum, as a stretch on the network upgrade options. And nobody voted to pay for it.
So please, stop constantly adding it to the Agenda. Bloody demagogues.
Also. On an unrelated note, November 22nd. Watch.
8: Zenith of Things Tournament Questions.
I'm amazed at how few people know what Battle Angel Alita is. Have Alita and the Gruppe been around so long, we've become more famous than our source?
The full details will have to wait until december, but the general format will be as follows:
Round one will be Live Fire Team against Frigga drones with sim-rounds. Maximum of 5 people per-team. Minimum of 1. Hacking of the drone controls will be forbidden for safety reasons.
Round two and subsequent will be team on team using simmunition weapons.
Top Three teams get a trophy and a prize.
That's the jist of it. We're working with our sponsors to figure out what the exact details are and what they'll accept - both from an entrant safety standpoint, an inclusiveness standpoint and a practicality standpoint. And also to figure out how to fully fund this thing. Maybe some sort of premium streaming option, or the like.
The most important Rule of Zenith will be that it's all real. Not simulated. Injuries, fatigue, wear and tear - it all carries forward to the next round. Survival Shot was founded on that principal. The downside of doing it live... it's a lot harder.
Oh, and we have Kishiro's permission to use the name.
--
9: Barony of Frigga
The Parliament, in a bid to encourage someone to actually win the election, have decided that whoevers comes in #1 will earn the title of Baron of Frigga. You'll have to provide your own Fokker Triplane, I'm afraid. They're a bit tight on the expenses after the Denise O'Brien corruption scandal.
After that, if nobody's election is forthcoming, some poor gobshite's getting appointed to the role. My sympathies. Cortana has offered tips on herding cats to the unfortunate victim.
---
10: Poor Hamsters
Finally. I think We have the rat problem under control. Putting Zapp-Guns on the exocomps worked. Apologies for the hamsters, Denon, I know you were attached to them.
In b4 'Mission Accomplished'.
--
Until Next Month. When we'll be renaming New Birmingham to something a little nicer, Lun'll be back from America, We'll know if Daryl won for Asagiri, and maybe we'll get lucky and have someone else doing these bulletins.
-Jet.
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?