All this kerfuffle is good effort put towards a fruitless gain. If ships can receive the signals, then couldn't the ship just relay it to the person planetside? Then receive and transfer the person's reply to the galaxy channel? People need to be able to communicate with their ships for beaming (onto and off unsettled worlds). Without a rock solid setting, these details are paper thin and easily worked around. What's the point? This is complicating things for trivials. Galaxy Chat is a minor annoyance when over used, but a necessity to RP convenience. I'm against this, but, last I'll say of it.
Agreed with Leschinsky. This was never an issue, and this is the perfect example of creating a mountin from a single grain of sand. I still remember some IC arguments have been done through radio. Don't spoil a entire basket because it has a few rotten fruits.
Well, neither idea has to be complex at all. In regards to GC communication via planetside array: Drop an outpost satellite dish on the roof of the main faction or colonial government building, and add a room with a server and console. Done. You have to use the console (be standing or seated directly in front of it) to use or monitor GC. IF you wanted to add planetside access to everyone, build additional radio relays and antennas planetside to allow remote access to the primary planetside dish array and the greater GC network. In regards to Starnet: Start with a SWAX equipped freighter parked in orbit of a moon or in an asteroid field. Again, the basic Outpost satellite dish works fine. Throw a generator, a half dozen server racks, and a console or two in the cargo hold and... Vawala! The STARNET I! Create your own FREE account today! There are thousands of SINGLE males/females looking for you RIGHT NOW! Lol. Jk. But seriously, from there the starnet can be accessed via the standard GC network. Problem solved. I'll even volunteer my character Albert to build and maintain the STARNET I. I really try to avoid colonies most of the time anyways. My potato of a laptop has issues with them. I'd also volunteer to build other STARNET relay nodes should the need arrise. If I build it in an asteroid field, we can also utilize the "secret server locations" bit because they are soo important to keep classified. Everyone's information is stored there, and I'm sure that would be very valuable to some certain individuals either now, or later. It also easily explains in character why the servers go down, slight bump from an asteroid knocked the relay out of alignment.
Because when there's 40+ people on the server (I'm thinking of the future), and everyone is trying to RP, you don't want to see Galaxy Chat clutter. Minimizing Galaxy Chat use is a good approach in my mind.
Maybe factions/colonies could pay with In-game resources to setup a satellite system to provide interstellar communication on select planets.
Here's my system of intergalactic communication: FTLCR (Faster than Light Communications Relays) boost radio transmissions at post light speeds for lag-less communications across the stars. It works off the same principal as the FTL drive in modern ships, except instead of propelling solid objects, it projects waves similar to radio waves at post light speeds. Obviously this design is too intricate to be hand-held, but provided someone is within direct proximity of an FTLCR, they should technically be able to broadcast off of it wirelessly. There'd also likely need to be FTLCR transmitter satellites around the galaxy, cuz shit aint gonna go through a damn planet. That's just my interpretation anyway... Up to you if it's a valid system or not.
I agree with this. Handheld radios should only work on-planet, and there should be a need for ship-based machinery to send out messages on the Antares-wide channels.
If actual "pseudo" science were to be applied, I believe you mean a meta-spacial transmitter that broadcasts the data through miniature-wormholes to send signals at super-luninal (hyper-luminal also works) speeds to negate signal latency regularly created by sending the signal via standard newtonian (or sub-luminal) methods. I believe your proposed method is the already accepted canonical understanding of how signals are sent and recieved. The signals themselves can pass through practically anything because they technically don't travel any distance at all. The signal is sent through the worm hole directly to the reciever. But your affermation that planetary relays are a strongly suggested addition to colonies to allow for instantanous Galaxy wide communication is appreciated.
The method I was proposing involved particles moving faster than light (tachyons), but honestly I prefer your explanation a LOT more. Good show my boy.
Believe it or not there is a world outside america and most people live in different time zones. But on topic, I support the idea that galaxy chat requires you to be on your ship.
Thanks! Your tachyons idea works better for a broadcasting system, but I think the tachyons are a bit too unreliable. Between the distortion of the signals caused by the gravity fields of all the planetary and solar bodies, and the magnetic interference of said bodies and the universal background interference, I can't see them transmitting with any reliability. As for the shipboard FTL drives, I think Starbound uses compression drives... which make sending and receiving messages exponentially more difficult due to the time distortion that method causes. From a technical standpoint, the galaxy should be aging decades or centuries each time your character makes a jump. I'll grant those numbers are rather high and there is definately a valid argument to be made for nitpickers, but the point is solid. BSG FTL seems to be the most accurate version of FTL, minus the star streaks of course. Check the time stamp of that message. Most of the people that were posting were still EST or AST for the rando or two in Nova Scotia or Labrador-Newfoundland. 4 AM is too early/late to be posting.
Almost sounds like Quantum Entanglement Communicators (QEC) from Mass Effect. Spoiler: QEC When a pair of quantum-entangled particles is separated, a change to one particle will affect the other instantaneously, wherever it lies in the universe. QECs exploit this effect to transmit binary data any distance. Two pairs of entangled particles are necessary for transmission and reception. While QEC technology is extremely expensive and difficult to produce, it offers two enormous advantages. First, it allows instantaneous communication over any distance without reliance on the network of comm buoys, which is limited due to the sheer volume of space. Further, destruction of buoys hampers a foe’s military intelligence; comm buoys are the first targets of raiders in wartime. Second, quantum communications cannot be intercepted between source and destination, allowing no "wiretaps." Unfortunately, QECs cannot replace the galactic civil communications infrastructure. First, they have extremely limited bandwidth. A single entangled particle can only transmit a single qubit (quantum bit) of data at once. Second, the system’s exclusively point-to-point nature precludes peer-to-peer networking and data dissemination through the galactic extranet. The most strategically appropriate military application of QECs is at the headquarters level. Each Alliance colony would maintain a QEC at its military headquarters and each fleet flagship in its CIC. All the pairs for these would be located at a central facility within Arcturus Station. During an attack, a facility would signal Arcturus to transmit its information to every other fleet and colony. However, destruction of the comm center at Arcturus would collapse the entire network.
Honestly the science is pretty much magical techno-babble that really has no basis in reality. I like the ideas you've all been talking about but the main points are really these: 1.) Galaxy chat is not truly galaxy wide in the event of the Space Anomaly, otherwise we'd be able to communicate with the core sector(s). 2.) People seem to agree that we shouldn't allow planetside GC communications. It's just not practical, unless you can relay it from a ship or relay station of some kind. 3.) Starnet is something the mods would be behind as long as everyone at a given settlement had a satellite relay? (this point is still not firm to me) The hows and whys are just details, but fun ones I think.
He had the answer the first time. A system of deep space satellites that relay massive quantities of information to other satellites or to geostationary satellites orbiting planets. Logs could be the server banks of the council storing the data, and starnet being down could be a critical relay was knocked out for some reason, and the council rushes to fix it. ~probably going to edit further~
Bro, you necro'd the thread. Pretty sure this discussion happened when everyone thought that the server wipe was going to be caused by a magnetic storm vortex nanobot portal or some nonsense called "The Anomaly". It has since been changed to "Tentacles attacked, oh no!" and we all bailed to Council Space, which is somewhat populated.