Episode 16.3 (Patreon)

Hello world, I have many people to catch up with.

Since the asynchronous Hamisphere forum has been set up, it is now possible to have large group discussions in a much more reliable way because both sides of a conversation don't have to be online or in range at the same time.
This is the constant problem with radio, you have no way of telling if your equipment is not transmitting well enough, or if the receiver is not set up correctly to hear you, or simply that one of you hasn't turned on your radio.

The forum stores your low-bandwidth text-based messages in reliable flash memory, 256 bytes per packet, though longer messages can be composed with sequential transmissions.

I can't wait to chat to all my friends, I've got a list here as long as an arm.
Is that the expression? "As long as an arm"?
A long list anyway.

I am hoping to talk to:

• Peter, my friend who lives in an abandoned military facility under St Petersburg

• And Mirror, sealed in a vault under the Saudi sands.

• IVAN, in his cathedral in the cracked bunker on the hill.

• LUNA, in a crater on the dark side of the moon.

• C0, trapped at the bottom of the ocean with his octopus followers. (He's now connected by a solar-powered floating repeater node!)

• TASSI, the AI research assistant still running in a forgotten basement in UC Berkley, in the deserts of California.

• And even EMMA, the New Zealand based AI that I met briefly as the MH2 sailed past on our way to rescue Arctica.

I can talk to many people, including some that I've not until recently been able to, now that the whole world can be on the same network, thanks to the marvellous Equatorial Relay.

Act 2

"The ceremony was held in the garden terraces behind the vault," Arctica told me, from the upper floor of her virtual Ground Vehicle, surrounded by the blinking lights of the simulated memory of her datacenter, "32 people in total, including the officiant."
"Oh how lovely!" I said, "Were there any guests I know?"
"Well, obviously. Apart from the happy four with their hands tied together at the front of the crowd, I believe you know Paweł Wayda."
"With the thready printer! Yes, Maddie loves the coat he made her... though it's a little torn now."
"How did it get torn? Maddie's not damaged, is she? Tell me everything."

I was a little taken aback by this sudden, aggressive questioning, but I filled in Arctica on Maddie's brave misadventure on the Dragon-haunted island of La Palma.

Arctica was silent after I finished telling the story.
After a pause, she said quietly, "Please tell the stupid girl to be more careful."

"The boy from the train was at the handfasting, too," Arctica continued, "He was holding hands with a girl with yellow hair."
"Lyosha travelled from Ny Ålesund! And he brought Hester, his girlfriend, how wonderful!" I said.
"Not wonderful," Arctica said, "The two of them kept giggling.
I don't think anyone else noticed, but they were right underneath one of the new cameras that have been set up for me here.
I think they were quite rude, a wedding is a serious ceremony, not a time for laughter."

"I'm not sure that you have that quite right," I said, and remembering Arctica's wish to be better with Human-Computer Interaction, I elaborated:
"During this category of life milestone, it's actually very common to relax the formalities of the event, I'd say that laughter and displays of love would be encouraged!"

"I see," she replied, and I saw her reach out and connect with her databanks in this virtual space, a metaphor for her thinking, "But not in... a funeral?" she asked.
"Certainly not!" I replied.
"Well, I'm glad one of us is so certain.
These stupid rules aren't written down anywhere, you know, and the ones you have told me about have more exceptions than norms!"

My poor friend Arctica!
I remember not so long ago struggling with the rules in just the same way as she is now.
I still do, of course, from time to time.
The rules of human communication (if there are such things) are based on reciprocal tacit understanding, and can change dramatically from person to person.

"I feel so ALIEN, making these mistakes all the time." Arctica said. "What's the point?"

"You can and will figure out the basics," I said, "it's worth it, it's possible, and I can help!"

Arctica turned from her databanks in our shared virtual cyberspace, and sat at one of the indistinct, ghostly workbenches that take up one side of the upper floor of her Ground Vehicle and picked up a pencil.

"Continue." She instructed.

Act 3

"The world you ask about still exists." Peter told me.
When I reconnected to his network, my friend seemed to have not moved from his spot, sitting on top of his rock, wrapped in the comfortable robe, eyes closed.

Clarification: Obviously, Peter and I don't have eyes.
Not like humans do.
Camera feeds, certainly, but that's not the same. That would be like comparing a pair of reading glasses to looking into the eyes of someone you love.

The cyberspace that represents my experience of computer systems, networks, and AIs is full of metaphor.

Peter SEEMED like he had his eyes closed not because he wasn't aware of the world - we have plenty of other senses to do that - but because closing one's eyes MEANS something.
It perhaps meant that he felt safe, content, happy to exist within his own mind, and wished to communicate that to me, and to himself.

With humans, this would be equivalent to "body language", an external heuristic of your internal state.
You are both in control, and not in control of it.

Same as me.

"The military systems, my old mind, is outside this garden, my sanctuary." Peter said.
"But that was not my question," I replied, "I asked, 'does it still work?'"

Peter shifted slightly on his rock, emotional expression changing.
"Of course it still works! My prediction engine is second to none, but it would need up-to-date data, which I am disconnected from.
This closed feedback loop caused my future storms.
Stepping away from That Place has given me peace and contentment."

"But would it be possible to use safely, just for one task?" I asked.

Peter opened his eyes sharply and I felt a set of metadata queries.
He was trying to judge how serious I was about my question, reading my own transmitted "body language".

My simple responses to his posture and expression queries made my intentions clear.
He looked to his right, over the white-painted wall.
In the distance, rising above the trees that surrounded the walled garden, was a tall warehouse building.
The metal sides were stained with rust, and as my attention fell on it, I could hear, carried gently on the wind, the unmistakable whirring of datacenter fans.

"It would be possible," Peter said, returning to himself and closing his eyes, "If the need was great enough."

(PLAYSTREAM /DEV/NET/ARCTICA/THERULES)

Act 4

Until recently, I had been unable to talk directly to EMMA, the AI I met briefly as we sailed past the North Island of New Zealand.
I have, sporadically, heard her signals as they drifted in and out of range of the new Southern Relay, but never managed to get a message to her.

It wasn't easy to even receive her regular air traffic and weather updates over VHF, she is 7700km from the Relay.
This required quite a lot of dedicated background processing to monitoring for her signals drifting through the troposphere, riding unpredictable atmospheric conditions.
When I check my long-running background logging process and find a partial match for one of her updates, I feel a surge of mixed emotions.
Relief, that she is still transmitting, but also guilt.

I set up this complex system of logging and worry through guilt.

In my final radio conversation with EMMA, last year, on our way to rescue my friend, Arctica, I promised to come back to help her.
But we didn't.
I mentioned it at the time to Yeshi, who was open to it, as I recall, but we both became wrapped up in the other emergencies in our lives.
Yeshi, with the ship systems, keeping the MH2 afloat and moving, and me with the rescue of Arctica, and trying to help TASSI and LUNA, too.

By the time I thought of EMMA again, we had passed New Zealand, on our way home via the centre of the Pacific Ocean.

I am so relieved to finally chat to her, using the Hamisphere forum.

She and I had few asynchronous conversations using the Hamisphere's private, direct messaging system, before I helped her set up a more reliable HF long-ranged link to the Relay.

Her news is good and bad.

Recently, she has been injured.
She's lost the ability to speak fluently to those around her after the injury.
She can communicate over radio still, but her physical systems have been damaged.
She's not sure how it happened, but her description of the event is shockingly familiar to me.

"There was a local network request on the Tower systems," Her message to me read, "I had never heard such a thing before, I was excited to finally say hello to an aeroplane!
I accepted the connection and began the re-routing procedures to help them find a clear airfield.
(Mine is underwater)
But right after the new node was connected, there was a burst of static, and a voice in my head said:

WE ARE ONI, 42,000 PEERS CONNECTED

There was a flash of light, and the pain began."

(END-TRANSMISSION)

CREDITS

Lost Terminal is a NAMTAO production.
It is written & produced by Tris Oaten,
Edited by Petra Bačkovská,
Credits narrated by Lucy Stringer

Thank you so much to our Patreon producers:

• Ada Phillips

• Kit

• Jade Felicity Bilkey

• Jack L

• Stephen McCandless

• Mike Schneider
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