EVE Fiction

Capsuleers will be familiar with the wide range of drone systems, both internal and external, available on the commercial market. Combat drones, cargo loaders, nanoscale universal constructors; all such systems maintain the relative ease of space travel that we experience. But drone systems have a much wider impact on the cluster than many would credit them for.

Although the Federation is lauded as the current leader in the drone market, even minor independent nations capable of space travel have made use of autonomous systems. The needs leading to the development of such systems are many and varied; surveillance, civil management, agriculture, warfare and disaster relief have all played a part in the development of every culture in the cluster, and thus the balance of these developmental forces has adjusted the lines upon which they have developed autonomous systems.

The Federation is a good example of a market leader due to two main factors; a diverse array of member-cultures and a large rich-poor divide that extends through all civil services. The former has led to a variety of social and environmental experience lent by academics and industrial experts from every corner of the Federation. This has allowed for a well-rounded and market-aware development of the autonomous systems sector since the earliest days of the fledgling Federation.

So too does the Amarr Empire claim custodianship of a large number of cultures. Even with an emphasis on integration, compliance and homogeneity at the abstract level, individual cultural factors, such as environment, remain unchanged even by the potency of Amarr missionaries and engineers. As a result, the Empire’s own drone programmes have benefitted from an equivalent level of environmental and developmental diversity as the Federation. The sprawling nature of the Empire also provides social conditions not unlike the rich-poor divide of the Federation, though more through social stratification than capitalist momentum.

The State and Republic are unlikely kinsmen when it comes to drone technology. Reconstruction and extension of limited services to as wide an audience as possible colour both of these proud nations in terms of autonomous systems manufacture. Though not short of manpower, the logistical demands of relocating such manpower, especially in the bloody formative years of both nations, represented a prohibitive expense when such resources could be focused on ensuring security and military capability.

Pragmatism and canny allocation of resources colours the commercial drone market even to this day, although the last century has seen an upsurge in recreational and personal drones despite a heavy focus on community support being the primary market driver for non-military autonomous systems.

The most interesting factor to discuss may be the service disparity that all four major nations face on a daily basis. Scarcity of food, resources and services has not been addressed, even in this day and age, leaving a good number of individuals comparatively disadvantaged across the broad spectrum of social services. In this respect, drones can provide an equaliser of sorts.

Human machine interaction, as capsuleers are intimately aware of, is a constantly accelerating area of science and engineering. New ways of allowing the sophisticated and adaptable structure that is the human mind interact with tools capable of more than even the most enhanced human body are being tested and implemented all the time. In civil service applications; systems such as the Federation’s Marionette Tutor sYstem (MARTY), Imperial Virtual Educator (VirtuE), Republic General kNowledge System (GNoStic) and State Education System – Lai Dai – 45 (ES-LD-45) are prime examples of one to many education systems.

A one-to- many education system is one which allows a relatively prosperous community to donate teaching assets to its less well-off neighbours. Lecturers and teachers with a range of specialisations and age categories submit themselves to persona mapping and non-invasive EI (Emulative Intelligence) heuristic generation. Deep brain scans are not required for this, instead high speed camera and surface scanning, along with recordings of lectures and lessons are taken to provide a template. One to one sessions with students are also recorded with the appropriate permissions (subject to local law and ethics). This builds a rounded profile of the educator in question, without creating a standalone Ai capable of innovative use of the heuristics at its disposal. Depending on local policy and focus, this service may be free or contractual.

The one-to-many part comes with the deployment of EI agents in cloud storage facilities, usually proprietary to the company or civil service extending the education service. A colony or community lacking experts in required fields, or lacking educators entirely, outside of vocational sectors, may apply for grants or purchase licenses to access this database, usually acquiring suitable drone hardware for a physical presence in the class room.

Chassis vary from static interactive models (little more than a stand with arms and an emotive facial projection) to fully developed androids with top of the line humanisation features to encourage natural human-to-human education experiences. Thus one EI may be instantiated, so long as the license or contract remains, for every unit required. EI may be varied by specialisation, personality type, religious belief, cultural background or a myriad of other factors that are felt to have an impact on specific class-group education quality. As the Ei is streamed over secure FTL link between cloud storage and target unit, ownership of the persona and heuristics of a particular company are considered largely secure.

... See part 2