"Weeding" the Timeline & Early Timeline Contribution Guidelines?

[QwertyYerty]

The one issue I have with removing these (And why I didn't remove them initially) is that most of them refer to articles in the EG (Static, various smoking/tobacco related articles). The European Federation is a part of the timeline, although I don't think we have a full on EG about it.

One of the criteria I used when weeding this section of the timeline was that the entries removed seemed to have no real connection to anything in the EG.

These entries don't have a terribly strong connection, but they do have one.

This doesn't mean I'm saying we can't remove them, but are we sure we should do so?

Todd

The early timeline up to 130 AT should be the most sparse timeline since it can easily dated by events in the next couple decades. I feel that a lot of the events in the early timeline just distract our attention from Current day and Terragen Sphere, which is the main focus of the project. The Early timeline serves as exposition than the main story we're telling, so it should be relatively short so it doesn't distract writers from writing about the current day. I've read a few posts in the story creating threads describing stories that focus on the Interplanetary Era. That's not bad in itself, but it does tend to take the focus away from the current day where a lot of stories don't get as much attention.

Frankly I think the European Federation is probably dated given the fact the UK has already voted to leave the EU, with states like Greece likely to follow. We could reduce the European Federation to a few states like France, Germany, or Belgium in Central Europe.

The European Federation is irrelevant to most of the pre- expulsion history and completely irrelevant afterwards. So if we keep the European Federation we'll need to relate it to events after the expulsion to keep it relevant, like with the Huanghua colony which descended from Chinese settlers. However its more prudent to delete the European Federation since its unnecessary to justify anything in the pre- expulsion setting.

As a rule, if its not necessary to justify a part of the pre- expulsion era, we should delete it so the entries aren't dated. If we want to add more events to the timeline, we should focus on the Sundering or First Federation period or later since the Great Expulsion makes since most events that would make the timeline dated won't be relevant in the period after the Technocalypse.

Huanghua page
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4978914e5eb57

[stevebowers]

61 - Despite intense protests from proponents of independent academia, the EU Parliament decides on a "unified and quality controlled" university standard. The brain drain to the US and emerging academic free states like Peru and New Zealand intensifies.

I think this one is derived from Ben Higginbottom's article on the Academion Island free state
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4b04a72e80982
I'm not quite sure what Ben was intending, but this article probably needs amending in the light of Brexit. I think he intended the Free Island State movement to be a reaction against EU bureaucracy, but there may be other routes open now.

[Drashner1]

Although they don't currently have links a number of the timeline entries mentioned here are actually associated with EG articles. Some number of these could potentially benefit from rewrites or possibly should be removed entirely.

Since a number of these are tied to the EU, and some folks have expressed some ideas for changes in this area based on Brexit and the like, perhaps those of you with an interest in this area would like to take on the project of doing the necessary article updates?

Todd

[Matterplay1]

The one issue I have with removing these (And why I didn't remove them initially) is that most of them refer to articles in the EG (Static, various smoking/tobacco related articles). The European Federation is a part of the timeline, although I don't think we have a full on EG about it.

One of the criteria I used when weeding this section of the timeline was that the entries removed seemed to have no real connection to anything in the EG.

These entries don't have a terribly strong connection, but they do have one.

This doesn't mean I'm saying we can't remove them, but are we sure we should do so?

The NAFTA war against Andean druglords can go, IMO. History since that snippet was written has already made that line less plausible.

As for the whole improbable tobacco ban thing, I have a plan to make that bit a chunk of pseuodohistory inserted by later meme-warriors who meant to create a lesson about the unintended consequences that laws and taxes can have (apparently they were unsatisfied with the real examples like the War On Drugs, Prohibition, or 16th century British tea taxes and tea smuggling). The tobacco references can go out of the timeline now, or they can go later...

As for the EU, EF or whatever, I think references should be kept vague where we don't eliminate them entirely. What exactly will happen to the region in the real world of the next half century or so is hard to predict, which is why we are pruning the early timeline in the first place. Also, in the OA setting the details of which nation-states or former nation-states were inside or outside the EU or EF at which particular parts of the Information, Interplanetary and Nanotech Ages, or how that umbrella organization functioned at different times (it could have been quite radically different from one century to the next) is of small consequence after the Technocalypse and the Great Expulsion, however important it might have been to the people living in those ancient times.

[stevebowers]

Here's the Europe article
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4c1db9d238473
I note it doesn't give any dates, which is a good thing and should stay that way. There is plenty of time for a European Federation (or several) to form over the next 600 years or so before the Great Expulsion, but we needn't tie ourselves down to an exact schedule.

[Drashner1]

The NAFTA war against Andean druglords can go, IMO. History since that snippet was written has already made that line less plausible.

As for the whole improbable tobacco ban thing, I have a plan to make that bit a chunk of pseuodohistory inserted by later meme-warriors who meant to create a lesson about the unintended consequences that laws and taxes can have (apparently they were unsatisfied with the real examples like the War On Drugs, Prohibition, or 16th century British tea taxes and tea smuggling). The tobacco references can go out of the timeline now, or they can go later...

As for the EU, EF or whatever, I think references should be kept vague where we don't eliminate them entirely. What exactly will happen to the region in the real world of the next half century or so is hard to predict, which is why we are pruning the early timeline in the first place. Also, in the OA setting the details of which nation-states or former nation-states were inside or outside the EU or EF at which particular parts of the Information, Interplanetary and Nanotech Ages, or how that umbrella organization functioned at different times (it could have been quite radically different from one century to the next) is of small consequence after the Technocalypse and the Great Expulsion, however important it might have been to the people living in those ancient times.

Fair enough - I've removed the NAFTA war entry, as well as the mentions of tobacco and the EU from the Information Age part of the timeline.

If I've missed anything, please let me know.

Thanks!

Todd

[QwertyYerty]

Hey QwetyYerty here. I propose deleting the following entries from the timeline up to 130 AT. They are too specific and/ or don't contribute to the post- Technocalypse OA setting. If we're keeping them they need detailed Encyclopedia entries and/ or a direct connection to the post- Expulsion setting. Otherwise they just clutter up the timeline.

52 - Continued environmental degradation in some third-world countries.

55 - Laser Weapons first used in warfare.

56 - Employers begin discriminating on the base of the applicants geneprint.

57 - In the spirit of optimism NASA, Russian, Chinese, Japanese and European Space Agencies and a consortium of private corporations begin work on the astonishingly expensive international Mars Mission Profile.

60's - Genetic modification of humans becomes increasingly accepted

61 - Despite intense protests from proponents of independent academia, the EU Parliament decides on a "unified and quality controlled" university standard. The brain drain to the US and emerging academic free states like Peru and New Zealand intensifies.

62 - First minor optional human genome tweak improvements available. The techniques are widely controversial and heavily regulated (even banned) in most nations. Whilst certain improvements in health are possible, many tweaks, selected by correlation to desired traits, have little to no effect. In addition, the risk of miscarriages or cancer through genetic damage remains low but significant. Despite the downsides, 'black clinics' (often employing questionable quality control procedures) flourish in some parts of the world, offering illegal embryonic enhancements.

63 - Autonomous cars represent a significant percentage of car ownership. Some nations introduce policies favouring them over manual cars.

63 - Academion Island founded by Aristos, a front company of various European universities.

65 - Nanoscale technology in widespread use for the manufacture of electronic equipment and other commodities; biotech continues to play an important role in the development of many poorer counties, despite political difficulties

67 - Widespread robot development

70 - Precooled air-breathing rocket engines allow for the first trans-oceanic hypersonic airliners as well as reusable SSTO vehicles. Initial costs are high but dramatically decrease the launch costs to space.

70 - New superbaby generation of child entrepreneurs force big changes to business and employment law and practices, as well as rules relating to legal maturity and asset ownership

70's-80's - The Space Hilton (private investment orbital hotel) still held up by mounting technical and financial difficulties, meanwhile there is a boom in Freedom Ships (giant floating cities for the wealthy). With the rise of these "Freedom Ships" and "Freedom Islands" increasing numbers of people taking to the sea to live and work, connected by the global internet economy and community.

78 - Personal transport market dominated by autonomous cars. Many nations have regulations limiting the use of manually-controlled cars.

78 - Brief fad for Polypedal pots, robotic houseplant containers

81 - First inter-city Vac-train system developed in China with plans to extend through Asia to Europe and Africa as part of the Silk Road Development program.

86-87 - Static Music and White Noise becomes the most popular form of music in the 11-24 demographic.

86 - First broadcasting of The Planet X epic-comedy-drama saga featuring the popular fictional character Morag the Moravec more.

87 - First commercial fusion reactor (a D-T inertial confinement design) comes online in France, supplying 300MW of power to the European grid.

90's - Especially among the educated classes, traditional religions continue to be usurped by younger, more exotic beliefs, such as Sanandism, Babaism, Cosmism, Transhumanism, etc.

90's - Megacorps begin loaning money to hard-pressed governments.

90's - Cyborg augmentations developed that allow domestic animals to understand human speech.

92 - Jarvis Microtechnics introduces the 25 gram robot "Pocket Tractor", revolutionizes agriculture

103 - The Static craze dies out thanks to a counter-meme created by an independent memetic engineer and Elvis Presley fan Ryu O'Connor, despite numerous lawsuits on behalf of the entertainment megacorps

110 - A full-scale collapse or reformation of many geopolitical states is underway; a boom in gambling; emerging virtual states take on increasing importance; major developments in Antarctica

110s - Worldwide weakening of nation states.

110 - Chinese Gobi colonisation project begins with the dual aim of transforming the desert into habitable land and developing a model for self-sustaining high-tech extraterrestrial colonies. The project continued for many decades and in combination with international sister projects in the Antarctic, Atacama and Pacific spearheaded CELSS technology and colonial economic management.

113 - The increasing population of Earth (which has now reached 10 billion) and the decrease in easily exploitable resources and human-induced climate change lead to widespread starvation, epidemics and many small-scale conflicts. Numerous environmental mitigation projects are underway, many of which have conflicting objectives.

114 - "Tweak" superbaby Marcus Alfonse Lee becomes Chairman of the Board of "High Frontier" venture startup Orbital Explorations Pty Ltd (later to be renamed Lee Interorbital) at age 12.

115 - New developments in animal cross-species gene-splicing

Thanks,

QwertyYerty

[stevebowers]

Academion island has its own article, as mentioned upthread
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4b04a72e80982

The first fusion reactor is mentioned here, with a date
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4654e3ea9c809

Polypedal Pots have their own article
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4887cffb463e2

Static has its own article
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4b5136d212684

Morag the Moravec is mentioned here, with a date
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/4a0c88d76ca81

Marcus Alfonse Lee is mentioned here,
http://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/467b21f755b27

I'll add links to all these entries, and I should be able to find links for a small number of the others, but most of them can go.

[Rynn]

Hang on there's definitely important stuff here. I'm posting from my phone so don't have time to go into it but several of those dates provide valuable context for the early timeline. The Gobi project for instance shows the first significant attempts at building a closed ecological system. Sensibly the project is on Earth but paves the way for later sea, space and hostile environment colonisation.

We revampt the early timeline a year or so ago to add entries like this because without them advanced technology and infrastructure projects just pop up later, seemingly fully formed.

Also as a point of procedure can we not go hacking away at the EG without some discussion first? Small entries are one thing but dozens of them removed with nothing more than one persons say is quite damaging.

[stevebowers]

Entries like

52 - Continued environmental degradation in some third-world countries.
55 - Laser Weapons first used in warfare.
56 - Employers begin discriminating on the base of the applicants geneprint.
are a bit too near-future and too specific, or they don't add much information to the timeline. So some of these can definitely go.