But apparently the ‘17 years after line’ invalidates all this per-MA guidelines. I guess because it’s a newer fact.
Spoilers Lower Decks and The Novelverse
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But apparently the ‘17 years after line’ invalidates all this per-MA guidelines. I guess because it’s a newer fact.
Yeah, in the same way that "James T. Kirk" is a newer fact than "James R. Kirk." Fiction is often revised along the way, and the revised form is considered "true" from then on. I agree there are some inconsistencies, but if the producers' working theory now is that they're still in 2381, then they're still in 2381, because they're the ones telling the stories and what they say goes.
I would guess that maybe the producers of LD talked with the producers of Picard, or with Kurtzman, and realized that they were getting too close to the time frame of events from the PIC backstory, so they decided to backtrack their timeline and retroactively say it had spanned less time than they originally assumed. So the same thing that happened with the SCE e-book series vis-a-vis the DS9 post-finale novels. SCE's editor Keith DeCandido decided to compress the timeline prior to a DS9 crossover so that it wouldn't spoil anything from the slower-advancing DS9 series by being set in its future. Which made it damn hard to cram all those adventures into the much shorter timeframe they were now supposed to take place in. Although I guess it works fine in the context of modern Trek assumptions where any starship can get anywhere in known space in a matter of hours instead of days or weeks.
I admit I totally would want to see Lower Decks deal with Romulus and Mars but in a bizarre offhand way.
Boimler: Did you hear Romulus' sun will blow up in a year?
Mariner: Eh, Picard will figure something out.
Boimler: Did you hear Romulus' sun will blow up in a year?
Mariner: Eh, Picard will figure something out.
Yeah, I was mentioning on another site about how the people here were immediately wondering if something crimes-against-sentients-y was going to happen to the computer-jail in LDS after we got to the attack on Mars, at which point I realized that, if the show goes on long enough, they'll end up in a situation where an episode is going to be "The Gang Reacts to Space-9/11."
I think that's why they slowed the timeline. If they've spent three seasons in 2380-early 2381, then they're probably not going to get to 2385 before the end of the series.
On the other hand, Prodigy is currently in 2384. So it's more of a potential issue for that show than LD.
I mean, I'd hate for them not to do some Picard tie-ins but it's not really in the show's nature either.
Technically, Picard could already be doing some evacuation of Romulans, though according to THE LAST BEST HOPE. It makes me wonder if they're going to retcon the Romulan mapping mission and the rescue in order to be about getting some evacuation plans.
Isaac Asimov said that he only created the positronic brain in the 1930s because no known technology could serve as a robot brain. He later recognised that he had created a computer under another name.
As a concept (artificial superhuman created by eccentric lone inventor), Data is pre-war. Even The Ultimate Computer (TOS) shows a more believable path to AI self-awareness, as an extention of previous technology and work. The EMH was even better, combining the 'human engrams' idea from The Ultimate Computer with the recognition that the power of computers is in the software, not the hardware.
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Tie-in material went further into establishing a research provenance for Soong, with him studying the androids and technology from "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" and "Requiem for Methuselah" in Immortal Coil, and the Starfleet Academy computer game had the Federation encountering and befriending a spaceborne entity with a positronic mind between TFF and TUC (complete with a winking remark about the information learned from it jump-starting the Federation's cybernetics field by a hundred years or more).
I imagine the simplest solution to the lack of "holotronic" robots is that, even in the 24th century, the amount of computing hardware and sensors to make an interactive hologram function is just too physically large to fit into a human-sized body (or requires too much power). There's Moriarty's cube and the expansion device it was put into, sure, but that's an entirely self-contained simulation. Even today with early "augmented reality" technologies, we're seeing it's much easier to simulate something from scratch than to simulate something that can understand and appropriately interact with the physical world. Moriarty could've been running in a very simplified environment that wouldn't have held up if it had to adapt to the complexity and unpredicability of real-world interactions.
I imagine the simplest solution to the lack of "holotronic" robots is that, even in the 24th century, the amount of computing hardware and sensors to make an interactive hologram function is just too physically large to fit into a human-sized body (or requires too much power). There's Moriarty's cube and the expansion device it was put into, sure, but that's an entirely self-contained simulation. Even today with early "augmented reality" technologies, we're seeing it's much easier to simulate something from scratch than to simulate something that can understand and appropriately interact with the physical world. Moriarty could've been running in a very simplified environment that wouldn't have held up if it had to adapt to the complexity and unpredicability of real-world interactions.
No, it's a simulated world plus two sentient AI consciousnesses, all fitting in that small device. So clearly just one AI consciousness could easily fit in a smaller device.
Besides, for whatever reason, the 29th-century Temporal Integrity Commission didn't confiscate the Doctor's mobile emitter when they tried to correct Voyager's temporal intervention. The only way that makes sense to me is if the TIC knew that the mobile emitter technology was going to be invented in the Federation before Voyager made it home, which would've been 2394 in the pre-"Endgame" timeline. So that means that by the time of Picard, there should already be commbadge-sized devices able to house a sentient AI mind.
The mobile emitter is still 29th century. Suppose, you wouldn’t leave a 1980s car in the 1930s even though that era already had cars. Because the model itself is too advanced for an earlier time.
Further, even if the Federation developed mobile emitters during Voyager’s odyssey, the ship was cut off and not supposed to have access to that tech.
The novel DTI: Watching the Clock proposed that time agencies allowed certain temporal violations to happen because those would allow their realities to come to pass.
Further, even if the Federation developed mobile emitters during Voyager’s odyssey, the ship was cut off and not supposed to have access to that tech.
The novel DTI: Watching the Clock proposed that time agencies allowed certain temporal violations to happen because those would allow their realities to come to pass.
Yes, obviously, but I'm trying to handwave a plot hole that doesn't make sense, so you can't expect it to be perfect.
Uhh, you know I'm the guy who wrote that book, right?
The fascist Confederation timeline in season 2 of Picard does have mobile emitters, holo Elnor is seen wearing one towards the end of the season.
If I may float some other possibilities like Pennywise the Clown:
1. The 29th century Temporal Integrity Commission seems to be something that was highly unstable and in a period of transition as we see them affecting their own timeline (which should be a big no no) regarding Braxton and the things he might do. This may have resulted in them deducing that "crossing the streams" by further involvement in Voyager's timeline could only result in something catastrophic.
2. To make a reference to your own books, the 29th century time police seem incredibly incompetent compared to the 24th century given that they almost blew up Earth, had a rogue agency, and left behidn the Mobile Emitter in the first place. Arguably even corrupt given the immorality of punishing someone for something they might do. They might have covered it up.
3. It could be a predestination paradox. I know, they hate those. The Doctor being meant to receive 29th century tech. They actually implied this with the idea that Henry Starling in "Future's End" started the computer revolution according to Chakotay even in the main timeline with the information he gained from Captain Braxton's ship.
4. It's the same fix for Janeway's time travel trip needing to arm the Federtaion for the Borg. Which is to say some meddling for the greater good. Better to have a holographic mobile emitter in a time of holographic rights than not.
5. For a really funky timeline thought, the 29th century crew WERE going to retrieve the holoemitter but the Burn happened and they were prevented from doing so--which means that they can't retrieve it now due to the timeline "settling."
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The same Burn which happens two hundred years in their future?
Have you seen their paperwork backlog?
Today's Lower Decks episode has what is probably a coincidence but could be interpreted as a fun reference to how The Face of the Unknown interpreted "The Corbomite Maneuver".
And for better or for worse,
The information broker whom Captain Freeman throttles is a real person with a design based on Balok's puppet. This could be a canonical version of the Dassik, having integrated into the galactic community.
another element of The Fall (and STO) is now out as Thomas Riker is publicly known to Starfleet as alive in 2381.
It would have to be an exceptionally diminutive Dassik. It clearly wasn't a reference to my book.
5x04, "A Farewell to Farms," reminded me a lot of A Burning House and, to a lesser extent, The Klingon Art of War. I wonder if either of those were direct influences, or it was just a common solution to the "What about the Klingons who aren't warriors or nobles?" question. I mean, they did reference the VHS board game of all things, this is LDS, they go deep.
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