New stardates

[Psion]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

with a habitable zone very close to the star

And what is that distance from that red star? 93 million miles, like the Earth's?

what about multiple star systems (such as where Vulcan is located)? Would the habitable zone of a multiple star system be similar distance (or orbit) to Earth's? I doubt it.

Perhaps you missed where I postulated in my first post:

If the Vulcans condescendingly agreed to use Earth years and maybe even 24-hour-days as a standard in the early days before the founding of the UFP, and that standard isn't appreciably different from that shared by other founding members, then it's likely that Earth standards for telling time might become accepted as well.

As a low-end class K star, 40 Eridani A (the star most folks agree is the primary of Vulcan) has a habitable zone of .61 AUs and any planet there would orbit in about 203 days. Cooler stars have a habitable zone closer to the star than Earth and warmer stars push it farther out. The Sun is roughly in the middle of the range of stars likely to support life similar to that found here, so it isn't unlikely that the average year among inhabited planets is close to ours.

If Andoria has an orbit close to 517 days, then the governments of those three worlds could easily adopt Earth's year as standard. Alternatively, we've seen references to a gas giant near Vulcan; if Vulcan orbits that planet and it generates sufficient heat, Vulcan might easily lie outside of the standard habitable zone for a K1 star. That's unlikely given the amount of radiation T'Khut would generate itself, but it's not impossible for an inhabited planet to lie outside of a habitable zone, just less likely.

And the above was mostly pointless, anyway, because I started my whole scenario off with a suggestion that the Vulcans adopted the Earth-standard year for interplanetary relations simply because they felt it made it easier for humans to cope -- an outcome that isn't at all unreasonable given the behavior seen in Enterprise by a species that could easily do the conversions in their heads without pausing in a conversation.

 

[Classic Fan]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I have no problem what so ever with the new system. It finally makes sense to start off with.

In the end, in Trek, i just saw stardates of a funky way of updating a calendar sysyem, it sounded futurisitc and, as no one understood them, it added more mystery as to what they meant.

Hearing 2678.9, or later updated version in TNG eras, the six digit 24553.2 sounded pretty neat.

And not knowing what they meant reminded me it was a future we know nothing about.

I think this hits in on the head..

My wife liked the movie, but I remember showing her an episode of TNG...with the Stardates she was a bit confused and I had to explain it to her, but I remember her seeing an episode of Enterprise, and when the year was given I remember her saying something like "Oh wow, 2151, really?" (she said the same thing when TWOK opened "In the 23rd century") , so perhaps this new system will help newbies get a better sense of the setting

Yes, exactly.

Even on the dvd releases, it still starts with 'in the 23rd century.' If your not a Trek fan, and you wernt given a date to work with, it'd be a bastard to understand.

so yeah, it makes sense to use a more 'homely' date system that we can translate.

 

[cooleddie74]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I always assumed pre-"WNMHGB"/2265 stardates lower than 1000 or 0.0 more likely reflected a calendar date anyways. I really like the pre-TOS era stardates.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I also welcomed the new stardate system. Could have done with more of The Numbers™ in it, of course...

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I also welcomed the new stardate system. Could have done with more of The Numbers™ in it, of course...

 

[Izzy]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I am very happy about the new Stardates. This makes things a lot easier, especially for my batch of six friends who are starting to get into ST and I don't have to navigate this obtuse system of previous dates with them.

In terms of standards though, I imagine Starfleet uses a different dating system than most organizations. Seeing as its central command is on Earth, it makes sense that organizations based on it would use it.

I can imagine a lot of adoption for local standards. However, any native of the Federation and by proxy Starfleet would probably know what Stardate it was via having two clocks or something.

 

[cooleddie74]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

For years, my own pre-Kirk fanfic set during the Pike era and earlier always used the Earth year in the stardate anyways. This was like the producers were sort of reading the minds of fans like myself.

 

[Nerdius Maximus]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

Stardates were always random gibberish anyway until fans tried to force it to make sense, so I doubt I'd even notice.

 

[Mr. B]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I don't have any real problem with them making up come new calendar system... but basing it on the birth of Christ on Earth and calling it the "stardate" seems rather stupid.

 

[cooleddie74]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

To be fair, when Old Spock says "Stardate 2387" he obviously is avoiding explaining the more complex TNG-era stardates of his own future era. Young Kirk would likely have been confused as hell hearing "I come from stardate 63567 point blah-blah."

 

[Zeppster]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I don't have any real problem with them making up come new calendar system... but basing it on the birth of Christ on Earth and calling it the "stardate" seems rather stupid.

Christ was probably born a good 5-10 years before the calender starts.

 

[Peter the Younger]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

Oh for God's sake, yes. That kooky mess (I refuse to call it a "system, it wasn't) never made sense even within individual series. Let the date be the date.

 

[Zeppster]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

Oh for God's sake, yes. That kooky mess (I refuse to call it a "system, it wasn't) never made sense even within individual series. Let the date be the date.

The only reason for the old system was because the original makers of TOS hadn't decided on when their show was taking place.

 

[Overgeeked]

Re: Did you like the new Stardate system?

I like it. The most logical system for writing the date is yyyy-mm-dd. So today is 2009-05-09. Or 2009.05.09. It's logical because it goes from biggest denomination to smallest. years to months to days. when you're organizing a list or filing by date, you don't do it by whether it was the 1st or 15th of the month. You'd go by year, and then the month, and only at the end the day. Thus I've always found the British system of 1 January to be illogical. Not that Jan 1, 2009 reall makes any more sense.

The British system is for avoiding commas. When you place two numbers together (January 1, 2009) the standard is to separate with a comma to avoid confusion. By writing the date (1 January 2009) you get to avoid commas and everyone know what's going on. Also, it flows logically from day to month to year.

As for the OP. I don't mind the stardates at all. As long as it's consistent.

The four digits are the year (obviously), but the decimal is up for grabs. I would think since they're keeping Gregorian Earth years, they'd just keep the months and days too (2009.05.10 or the like). Breaking the year into 100ths as has been suggested would just be cumbersome.

And as to the UFP foundation idea, that works. But instead of insisting they start the calender over with 1 (upon founding the Fed), just keep the Sol system's calender (because they founded the Fed). And since Sol is a star it's a stardate.

Best review I've read of the new movie: "Star Trek for the rest of us."

 

[lawman]

One thing to note, Robau told Nero the stardate, and it seemed like he understood what it meant.

Remember though, that Nero came from an era with five-digit stardates. He didn't have to understand the exact date he was in to understand that he had traveled back through time; just hearing Robau quote a four-digit stardate, as opposed to a five-digit one, would more than suffice.

Yeah, that's how I interpreted the scene myself when I saw it. They used the word "stardate," so the idea that Robau was citing a calendar year never even occurred to me. It was only later scenes that made it clear the system had been changed.

Now, dating it after First Contact may make some sense, but then this film would take place in 195 A.F.C., and that might confuse some of the newbies...

So yes, I do think it was a good idea, and it does work well enough for the casual audience...

Ah, yes, the "newbies," the "casual audience." Do we really view the mass audience with such condescension as to imagine they just can't grasp that a science-fiction story involving alien races and set in a different century might use a different dating system? (Even when it's based on a property that's been doing exactly that for 43 years?)

To be fair, when Old Spock says "Stardate 2387" he obviously is avoiding explaining the more complex TNG-era stardates of his own future era. Young Kirk would likely have been confused as hell hearing "I come from stardate 63567 point blah-blah."

Except it wasn't Old!Spock who said that. It was the computer on his ship, the Jellyfish. That computer was built in an era using 5-digit stardates, and when queried about its construction had no reason at all to use "2387.xx."

Best review I've read of the new movie: "Star Trek for the rest of us."

That kind of implies that Trek, as originally conceived, wasn't for everybody. Do you really believe that?

---
Just for the record, let me state: I don't really mind the idea of changing the way stardates are calculated. But if they're still going to call them "stardates" they shouldn't just be Earth years, and either way they shouldn't have violated story logic with them (i.e., Spock's ship should have used its native 5-digit system).

 

[Count Zero]

True confession: I've written ten STAR TREK books and I've never understood stardates . . . .

I'm relieved to hear that. Reading all those stardates in the novels and in fan fiction, I thought I was the only one not getting it.

The new stardate system was the first change that stood out to me (having grown accustomed to the new design style before watching the movie). I figured out immediately that the first number represents the CE year. I'm not sure what the rest of the numbers mean, though. Has anyone figured it out, yet?
I like the new system because it's less confusing.

 

[Zeppster]

True confession: I've written ten STAR TREK books and I've never understood stardates . . . .

I'm relieved to hear that. Reading all those stardates in the novels and in fan fiction, I thought I was the only one not getting it.

The new stardate system was the first change that stood out to me (having grown accustomed to the new design style before watching the movie). I figured out immediately that the first number represents the CE year. I'm not sure what the rest of the numbers mean, though. Has anyone figured it out, yet?
I like the new system because it's less confusing.

We would need more data to compute. We only saw about 3 or 4 stardates.

 

[Joby]

I did find it amusing that Kirk had some trouble with the date when making a log entry. That might explain why the stardates in TOS made no sense - Kirk was making them up as he went, and they never meant anything.

I think the stardates in TOS were also made to prevent people from guessing what year they were taking place. It wasn't till long after the show was canceled that it was revealed it was the 23rd century and on screen it wasn't till Star Trek 2. In the TOS episodes themselves it was referred to a different century several times. So if you tried to use TOS to canonize what century it was you would get confused.

Indeed. TOS episodes themselves seemed to hint that the series was taking place in the 22nd century, Kirk and Co. tended to refer to themselves as being 200 years ahead of the 20th century, instead of 300 years ahead. Then Star Trek II: The Wrath f Khan pushed it back another hundred years (wise move) and finalized it as being the 23rd century.