Intergalactic Summit

Well, if things are taken directly from sleeper technology, as opposed to being reverse-engineered, then they're open to being controlled and used by the "other"... I could see this becoming a problem once again with the SoE BS, the Nestor, being designed to operate in a wormhole environment.

You should read Templar One- I really loved that book

As I said, I don't know much about DUST technology. If I have been misinformed on the subject, I apologize.

My area of expertise is with the propulsion systems on small sized vessels (ie. frigates and destroyers). As I said, interdiction nullification systems have very recently been fitted to interceptors by the various ship construction corporations (I suspect the reason most refits end up happening around the same time between manufacturers and empires is due to corporate and national espionage). It's only very recently that that technology has been possible for frigate hulls, and the technology itself only appeared once we began to reverse engineer Sleeper technology.

Again, as I stated, for the most part, this isn't directly sleeper technology (none of the vessels I have worked on contain any fullerines or salvaged sleeper equipment nor do the blueprints call for them), but lessons learned from the utilization of sleeper technology have almost certainly been applied to other areas.


I also certainly don't remember any similarly massive cross class revitalization and upgrade projects as seem to have been taken by the various factions and corporations in the past year.

Most of Sleeper technology is on the same technological trajectory we were already tracing. By and large it's just miniaturized, more efficient versions of what we were already making - graphene nanoribbons being a prime example of a technology we were already using, but more advanced. Even DUST implants are identifiably founded on principles not dissimilar to some of the then-cutting-edge products of Zainou, Poteque, Eifyr & Co. and Inherent, albeit several generations more advanced. But if their operating principles and construction weren't already within our grasp, we would never have been able to reverse-engineer them and begin their mass manufacture, so they're not so awe-inducingly far ahead as some people like to exclaim.

The exception is fullerene technologies. Fullerite just isn't a widely available resource in New Eden, which means that while we did have fullerene-based technology, it was always limited to small-scale materials sciences for use in things like nanoelectronics, medical equipment and advanced scientific facilities. The relative sparsity of the stuff meant that its applications on such grand scales as industrial starship design and manufacture was never really considered save in theoretical terms - any ship dependent on them simply would have been far too expensive to be worth the cost.

Phase Two space (I dislike the name "Anoikis") is rich in fullerite gas clouds, however. Hell, there are so many of the damn things that you actually have to wait for some of it to condense away from a larger concentration before you can get a decent astrometric lock on it, otherwise the sheer abundance of it overwhelms spectrographic analysers and prevents the calculation of a warp target. Some, such as C-320 are rarer and thus more valuable but none of them are in danger of becoming depleted any time soon.

The tricky part is going to be divorcing ourselves from fullerenes, I think - no resource is unlimited, and if we're not careful we'll find ourselves becoming dependent on Fullerite, which is only available in Phase Two space and thus only available via capsuleers who are, technically, violating a CONCORD directive. So it's going to be important for RnD back in Phase One space (New Eden) to focus on producing similar performance without having to rely on industrial quantities of fullerene molecules.

There's been some success there - Interdiction Nullifier technology has been successfully transplanted from strategic cruisers to interceptors without much altering the material makeup of an interceptor - but other areas might prove more difficult. The fullerene-based electrostatic bonding which makes modular subsystem ships possible at all simply isn't going to yield to non-fullerene materials any time soon.

As for where it's all going? Well, the same question has been asked of the wheel, the printing press, antibiotics and the warp drive. And the answer has always been the same. We're going to the future.

The consequences are always the same - ten years later, somebody is asking the exact same question of some new technological paradigm. My answer will likely remain the same, too: "Wait and see."

There's very little to be gained from bemoaning the course we didn't chart, especially when our course was in part dictated by forces beyond our control. I'm reminded of the ancient sea traders of Caldari Prime, who were at once at the mercy of the winds (in both the literal and spiritual sense) but also quite capable of navigating between two spots on different coastlines that, from orbit, seem barely visible, let alone distinguishable. In our case, the wind that blew and redirected our course was Seyllin.

That was a classic Outside Context Scenario. Stars, so far as we know, just don't behave like that, and I'm not aware of any serious scientific theory for what happened, beyond assorted grumblings about rare and unstable Isogen compounds.

After that, I don't really see how events could have unfolded any differently. Wormholes opened, new systems rich in resources and a technologically advanced army of drones were discovered, CONCORD issued a directive against travel to said systems, which was duly ignored, and within a remarkably short span of time, the first strategic cruisers were born. We were swept up by a storm and it carried us to a new and hitherto undiscovered port.

Unfamiliar as I may be with maritime sailing, I imagine that if your ship is caught by a storm front, then your best odds of staying afloat and living to see calm waters again come from taking the situation as it is and exploiting the opportunities that present themselves, rather than speculating about where it's all leading to.

The future is something we condense out of clouds of probability. Foresight helps us pick which outcome we prefer to see come to pass. The important part to remember is that it's US who do that - people. Humans. Technology itself does not shape the course of history: a slimmer, sturdier hull and better sails may make the voyage smoother, but it's still a human hand at the helm, and a human mind on the bridge... or capsule, as the case may be.

Where will Sleeper-derived technology take us? To wherever we steer it.

I am not as happy with the non answers Hakatain has given. While the wait and see approach is a laudable goal, the first and last paragraphs of the last reply effectively dodge the question asked.

Also, I am not bemoaning anything; I was merely fishing for opinions. it can be interesting to see what people think on subjects like this, and what if scenarios can also, occasionally be enlightening.

You're right that humans chart the course of the future but technology has as much an influence as sociological issues. Though it was for scocietal reasons the Amarr built an empire, it was jump gate technology that enabled it. Imagine the ramifications if it were the Minmatar who had discovered stargates first while the Amarr were stuck trying to make an interstellar acceleration gate.

Personally, I'm looking forward to the new tech those 'eggheads' design from reverse engineering. Not only will it make my hunting easier from the increased benifit in modules, but it will make my profit from looted ships go up too. And who knows, maybe these idiots on the end of my guns will make more interesting.