[12:37] * DogSoldier ponders what is possibly an unintended subversion of a major trope [12:38] okay, one of the large themes in a significant number of tech types is this concept of "The Singularity" [12:38] That being a sort of cybernetic version of the Rapture :P [12:39] a major component in this belief system is that people can be "uploaded" into the noosphere [12:39] digital heaven [12:40] you are subverting that with the concept of bringing Pirogoeth, Ping and Pirogoeths son being materialized [12:40] * piroko[factory] has joined #mt-confidential [12:40] I find this to be somewhat amusing [12:41] * DogSoldier waves to Fred [12:41] People always want to make artificial digital life "real" and make real life immortal by making it digital [12:41] LOL hear I was off on a ramble and you were heading to the factory :D [12:41] [12:37] * @DogSoldier ponders what is possibly an unintended subversion of a major trope [12:41] [12:38] <@DogSoldier> okay, one of the large themes in a significant number of tech types is this concept of "The Singularity" [12:41] [12:38] <@DogSoldier> That being a sort of cybernetic version of the Rapture :P [12:41] [12:39] <@DogSoldier> a major component in this belief system is that people can be "uploaded" into the noosphere [12:41] [12:39] <@DogSoldier> digital heaven [12:41] [12:40] <@DogSoldier> you are subverting that with the concept of bringing Pirogoeth, Ping and Pirogoeths son being materialized [12:41] [12:40] * piroko[factory] (~pirokofac@50.42.150.151) has joined #mt-confidential [12:41] [12:40] <@DogSoldier> I find this to be somewhat amusing [12:41] [12:40] * @DogSoldier waves to Fred [12:42] actually Ray, they effectively want to make humans into some sort of fragmentary objects [12:43] create a hive mind if you will [12:43] Depends on what you're reading [12:43] hey guys [12:43] haha [12:43] all iterations have been explored by various writers [12:44] actually, i didnt think of it from the rapture pov, but when someone asked last night about the MT cast being downloaded into engames [12:44] i had to keep from commenting on that :) [12:44] I'm thinking about real life, for example how little real creativity is shown with mashups and rescripts and what not [12:45] Douglas Adams in his blog loves to talk about how someday we will all upload our minds into computers, unless it's already happened and we just don't know it [12:45] Scott Adams [12:45] Dilbert, not Hitchhiker's Guide [12:45] usually, yes. most people really can't think outside of the tropestrings that they are used to [12:45] the missuse of the term "meme" to cover a sort of locked in auto-response that keeps people from saying anything original [12:46] funny thing [12:46] "Challenge Accepted" [12:46] the story i was talking about last night [12:46] sort of oddly came to me [12:46] * DogSoldier pauses to listen [12:46] and actually deals with this a little [12:46] Oh your new Scattering angle [12:46] sorta takes what ive been setting up on MT and actually runs a bit further with it [12:46] consider a future where population is lower, no where near what it is now, but things are chugging along well enough [12:47] most people have moved more towards population centers, lots of digial abilities and stuff [12:48] (which as an undercurrent is because the digitization and ability to work with digital entities rather than real people results in fewer people having families and such, just an overall aggregation over time) [12:48] chemi has some thoughts on how that might not work the way i think it might - but thats details [12:48] anyways, one weakness of Scatterings was always what Hyupp did. what was his reason for being out and about [12:49] well it's already fact that people in well off western countries, the birth rate drops. See also: the open of Idiocracy [12:49] anyways, now think about the kinds of things people like to do [12:49] Ah, Hyupp [12:49] imagine you can wear goggles of a sort that give you the VR thing - some neural some visual, etc [12:50] you can create entire crazy worlds to live in and do stuff, to visit, and for a long time those things could just be as crazy as you might imagine [12:50] sorta like the way people live in WOW and everquest and stuff [12:50] now imagine a certain nostalgia developing [12:51] where people want to experience some of the places that have just sort of faded away, sorta like the small town life in the midwest [12:51] * RayKremer nods [12:51] not some fantasy of it, but to be able to look at what it really was [12:51] historical fiction is something people like - stuff that is to the best of the authors ability, based on reality [12:51] now, imagine there was an effort to sort of digitize a lot of places that aren't there now [12:51] people can visit physically or just digitally [12:52] * DogSoldier nods [12:52] towns are built up to be exactly what was there before [12:52] to be able to adjust the dates to view different structures that existed at a time, etc [12:52] It strikes me that structurally all this has been done, but I really like the angle of revisiting the old small town as somewhat of a root of society that has been lost [12:52] and the interesting part - to be peopled with the very people who lived and worked and visited there as much as possible [12:53] Even today kids are fundamentally different because they are not growing up in 1950s small towns [12:53] Normal Rockwell stuff [12:53] that'd actually be a pretty positive thing IMHO [12:53] Norman [12:53] they used to build people's lives from letters and stuff [12:53] now, imagine how thouroghly you could build, say, ray's life [12:53] from his msgs, logs, phone stuff, etc [12:53] so my thought [12:54] was that hyupp could be one of those guys out doing field work - gathering data, building up places based on what is still there and what records can be dug up on site and elsehwere [12:55] sort of like mega hyper digital research to build up things as real as possible on a detail level that is just crazy [12:55] but the data is there [12:55] Scott Adams and the TV series Caprica have both independently arrived at that concept also, building a digital replica not from brain scan but from writings etc [12:55] yep [12:55] now, imagine someone like Down [12:55] oh that's cool [12:55] yeah, somebody has to get that data [12:55] i was thinking ... her and her tribes and other people like them [12:55] they are like kuromaku [12:55] the stage people who wear black and make things work wearing all black [12:56] you are supposed to ignore them, etc [12:56] Down has been working as well as many others [12:56] to rebuild and fix up the cellular infrastructure in the places where they are working on digitally rebuilding these places [12:56] so in a sense, they are working on the same project [12:56] the fun part tho [12:56] (hang on a sec) [12:57] crap have to AFK, will catch up when I get back :) [12:58] ok - i'll finish typing it out [12:58] i am curing shirts, i have to get back to printing in a moment [12:58] anyways, on thought that i had toyed with was the idea of people hiding themselves to not get captured by the cameras and stuff [12:58] and these tribes might sort of be like that [12:58] and that if someone in the tribe gets 'seen' thats bad [12:59] anyways, moving forward here - the opening scenario that would start it would be Hyupp noodling around getting data on the structures and stuff in a town [12:59] he has his goggles on - which dont block anything, it just adds to what hes seeing, its part of his work [13:00] now imagine him just walking straight into something - he didnt see anything, but he hears someone cry out. [13:00] confused, he finally yanks the goggles down and finds that he had actually walked full into someone and knocked her down (and the gear she was carrying from her vehicle) [13:01] the system had edited her out - which was something he could not even fathom happening [13:02] where this leads to (there's more, but i'll be breif) [13:02] down the line, i see her falling and getting hurt. hurt badly [13:02] being on her own the way she is, she has no real support network from her tribe [13:03] so he tries (obviously) to try to get her help within his world [13:03] the problem is - the doctors at the hospital he evnetually gets her to... can't do anything. they are trying everything they can, but she is completely invisible to all the technology stuff they use to treat people [13:04] and what they can do is limited by what they can see in analogue only [13:04] whats funny is i actually can use the old Coma trope here, and use it in an curious way [13:04] Shades of some stuff they've done in Ghost in the Shell, but taken to a systematic level rather than a single hacker [13:05] Hyupp is going to help her by building her up in the digital world, from what he can learn about her and know about her [13:05] yeah, none of the base stuff her is new - it came to me while listening to virtual light, of all things [13:05] right, but I like this combination of it [13:05] so after a while, this digital version of her ends up following him around [13:06] as he works on it, he finds himself doing her work - and he is scared of height [13:06] s [13:06] and her digital self helps him - often more than a little frustrated with him [13:06] with the goggles on, shes there. when they are off, she's not [13:07] upshot, over time, he can't deal with the fact that she seems too deeply gone for them to really help her [13:07] inverse of the real girl, heh [13:07] and he literally just tries to cut her out, to block her from his view [13:07] which he does [13:07] till at the end of the story, he screws something up on a tower, and slips [13:07] he feels himself get caught and held - but theres no one there [13:08] goggles on or off? ;) [13:08] as the goggles slip upwards, she's there [13:08] goggles on [13:08] this time, just like the first [13:08] she's actually there, and not happy with him [13:08] since he had cut himself off from the digital version of her - she had actually got better [13:09] and it turns out, it wasn't just some disconnected version - that was her, she was aware of it all as she was under [13:09] Ooooo [13:09] and the disconenction actually pissed her off, and prodded her to get better [13:09] so she could get up there and smack him [13:09] that's a rough quick version of it [13:10] see, here, i can combine something i wasnt able to do [13:10] remember the more weird dream like stuff that sorta got absorbed into Scattering? [13:10] the rooms, connected, etc [13:10] The one with the two kids on opposite sides of the big wall? [13:10] i see her digital self there [13:10] yep [13:11] there's some interesting stuff there [13:11] this could be a short story even, really [13:11] anyways, i sorta like the ideas here. seems sorta ... interesting [13:11] not just rehashing stuff people are expecting to be the same as you usually see in the stories [13:13] Is the bit with the secret parachut he gives her still there? Maybe that's when she got hurt, it saves her life but just barely [13:14] it might be - it could be part of it (and works there) or if it is too much there are lots of ways she can get hurt [13:14] but yes, that is applicable too [13:25] of course there are a lot of ways to get hurt, but that was a cool idea, should keep it in there, and that's the logical place [13:26] and it makes sense. he didnt want her to get hurt - and it was able to save her from dying, but she still go pretty seriously hurt [13:27] yep. but without it she would have been a smear on the ground [13:31] anyways [13:32] the thing i like about this new overlay to it all is that it ties it all together nicely and in a way that makes for a potentially interesting story [13:32] with interesting angles to explore [13:32] without having to invent weird future stuff that is beyond a reasonable futureplace easy to get a grip on [13:32] yep yep [13:32] if that makes sense [13:33] RayKremer: can you save a log of what i wrote there for me later? i am at the warehouse [13:33] sure [13:33] and i wanted to get it typed out, and that wasn't bad [14:13] * DogSoldier catches up [14:14] oh sweet [14:14] you've got a play on the Augmented Reality concept [14:15] as well as Mediated Reality [14:16] being played against some manner of Razzle Dazzle type defense used by the tribe [14:57] * piroko[factory] pokes in [14:57] i'd like to do it in a way that feels sort of... ordinary, not trying to be overly clever [14:57] and how it would be applicable to a non-armageddon style future [14:58] honestly, i just have trouble writing anything that revolves around 'world is in dissaray' kind of stuff [14:59] The social commentary angle of this is more fun than a post-disaster world too [15:09] okay, on my iPhone for a while I had an app that would label things as viewed from the phones camera [15:09] so I look down main street and I see labels popping up for taco bell, kfc, K-Mart ...etc [15:10] now Hyyup has a pair of goggles that not only do that but "clean up' things [15:10] night vision as well [15:10] so they both augment and mediate the world [15:11] this is no more unusual for him than getting on the subway would be for a New Yorker