Oh, don’t worry! I will have plenty of questions for you. If I’m going to upload in the future, I’d also like to know more about how things are sys-side. I mostly only contact you (and I guess Ioan through you? Hi Ioan!) so it all sounds very surreal.
--I do remember the name Michelle Hadje. She was on the Council of Eight as you mention, but more, she was the source of (or at least involved with) many of the ideas that drive the System to this day. She came up with the idea of forking, for instance, as well as the reputation market that we use in lieu of currency in order to regulate forking in the early days. Unfortunately, Michelle herself does not remain in the System as of a bit under twenty years ago, so I will not be able to put you in touch with her, and should you choose to upload in the future, you will not be able to meet her face to face. I am sorry for your loss.
+I do remember the name Michelle Hadje. She was one the founders as you mention, but more, she was the source of (or at least involved with) many of the ideas that drive the System to this day. She helped with consensual sensoria, for instance, as well as the reputation market that we use in lieu of currency in order to regulate forking in the early days. Unfortunately, Michelle herself does not remain in the System as of a bit under twenty years ago, so I will not be able to put you in touch with her, and should you choose to upload in the future, you will not be able to meet her face to face. I am sorry for your loss.
Thank you so much for letting me know. I’m saddened by this, but weirdly calm as well. That I will never get to meet her comes with grief, but that I now at least know something of her (even if it’s of her end), a portion of my curiosity has been sated.
+Thank you so much for letting me know. I’m saddened by this, but strangely calm as well. That I will never get to meet her comes with grief, but that I now at least know something of her (even if it’s of her end), a portion of my curiosity has been sated.
I say a portion, though; did you ever meet her? You say she was formative for a lot of the System’s tech; does everyone know that about her? Is she famous? If you did know her, what was she like? You say that you’re working with a historian, perhaps ey knows?
I know her end, but I remain hungry for any information that you can give on her life.
@@ -86,8 +86,11 @@If you could go back anywhere in history and change any one thing, what would it be?
Shit. Um…I guess in light of your last letter, I’d stop whatever made Michelle leave or quit or die or whatever happened to her? I don’t think I’d want to have uploaded sooner. I’m proud of what I did for the launch. Doesn’t change the fact that I’d love to have met her.
-If you could go back in time and tell yourself any one thing, what would it be? -Of all the things that I have groused about already, I don’t actually have any one thing that needs changing. I don’t wish I’d uploaded sooner. I don’t wish I’d left sooner. I don’t have any regrets about the way I got here. Maybe go back and kick my ass and tell myself to talk to Michelle sooner? It’s starting to sound like an unhealthy fixation at this point, and I’m kind of wondering if it was, to some extent.
+Is that weird? I’m starting to feel like it’s weird.
+++If you could go back in time and tell yourself any one thing, what would it be?
+
Of all the things that I have groused about already, I don’t actually have any one thing that needs changing. I don’t wish I’d uploaded sooner. I don’t wish I’d left sooner. I don’t have any regrets about the way I got here. Maybe go back and kick my ass and tell myself to talk to Michelle sooner? It’s starting to sound like an unhealthy fixation at this point, and I’m kind of wondering if it was, to some extent.
@@ -95,7 +98,7 @@ Of all the things that I have groused about already, I don’t actually haveYou are given three wishes, with three restrictions: they must have plausible deniability (that is, be explained by luck, natural causes, etc.; no changing people’s memories!); they must not involve singular personal benefit for you or any one individual; they must provide a benefit, rather than a detriment. What are they?
I’m going to assume by plausible deniability, that rules out changing anything about the past.
First, I’d wish there to be some technological breakthrough that would make it easier to communicate with the System. Text is fine and good for those who live up in their heads, but I think that one thing that keeps a lot of people away from uploading is the mystery of what’s up there. They hear that life is better, but hearing is not seeing. They hear that they’d be functionally immortal, but hearing is not proof. If we had a way of seeing what day-to-day life was like in the society, we’d feel less of a taboo of making our way there.
Second, I’d wish that whenever a nuke or bioweapon was launched, there’d be some plausible failure in it. A firing mechanism doesn’t work. A wowrker comes to work hungover and snips the wrong wire during a fix. That sort of thing. I said saber rattling, and that mostly comes down to a slow, quiet arms race, and even if the chances of anything actually happening are very low, I have an intense paranoia of that kind of widespread death and destruction.
-Third, I’d wish for some sort of astronomical event that would kick interest in space down there back into gear. It’s weird, because I realize that this is contrary to the first wish, since folks zooming out into space is kind of the opposite of folks uploading. Still, everyone’s got their heads down. There’s some threshold level of hardship that makes folks turn to survival rather than out to the stars, and I think it’s higher than one would expect. Aliens? A rogue asteroid? Some crazy discovery on the moon? Anything grander than keeping a job or a house or just plain staying cool.
+Third, I’d wish for some sort of astronomical event that would kick interest in space down there back into gear. It’s weird, because I realize that this is contrary to the first wish, since folks zooming out into space is kind of the opposite of folks uploading. Still, everyone’s got their heads down. There’s some threshold level of hardship that makes folks turn to survival rather than out to the stars, and I think it’s higher than one would expect. A rogue asteroid? Some crazy discovery on the moon? Hell, aliens? Anything grander than keeping a job or a house or just plain staying cool.
@@ -119,11 +122,11 @@ Of all the things that I have groused about already, I don’t actually haveDo you have any romantic attachments? I am assuming no by your previous message. Have you in the past? Will you in the future?
-What are your opinions on sex?
It seems fine? I don’t know. I don’t have much experience with it. Again, it’s low enough on the priority list that I just forget that it’s even a thing most of the time. I imagine it feels good, of course, and I can see how it’d deepen an emotional connection. Those are good things, so it’s probably a good thing, but I can also see it being used as an emotional weapon because of that intimacy. It seems fine.
+It seems fine? I don’t know. I don’t have much (or any) experience with it. Again, it’s low enough on the priority list that I just forget that it’s even a thing most of the time. I imagine it feels good, of course, and I can see how it’d deepen an emotional connection. Those are good things, so it’s probably a good thing, but I can also see it being used as an emotional weapon because of that intimacy. It seems fine.
-Have you had sex before?
No. It’s been offered, but in such a subtle manner that the girl I was with at the time used my missing those cues as reason for leaving me. My social awareness is minimal, though, so I don’t really know what she expected. I was left mostly baffled after the whole relationship. It was my last before leaving for the station, and I haven’t tried dating since for previously mentioned reasons.
+No. It’s been offered, but in such a subtle manner that the woman I was with at the time used my missing those cues as reason for leaving me. My social awareness is minimal, though, so I don’t really know what she expected. I was left mostly baffled after the whole relationship. It was my last before leaving for the station, and I haven’t tried dating since for previously mentioned reasons.
@@ -161,7 +164,7 @@ Were toward Eternity — Like a treeWill you have sex (again) before you upload?
This one felt impenetrable until I realized that it might be about forking. Is it a contemporary thing? I can see that being the three minds portion, and I can see the tree as a metaphor of the same root personality, but blackbirds haven’t existed in more than a century, so if there’s specific symbolism behind that, I’m missing it.
+This one felt impenetrable until I realized that it might be about forking. Is it a contemporary thing? I can see that being the three minds portion, and I can see the tree as a metaphor of the same root personality, but blackbirds haven’t existed in any of the place I lived for decades, so if there’s specific symbolism behind that, I’m missing it.
Birds = flight and freedom, maybe? Black = death? Or maybe eternity? Three minds, each of which is bound up with those things? The freedom of eternity? I can see why this would appeal to one sys-side.
-She has but does not possess,
@@ -169,7 +172,7 @@ acts but doesn’t expect.
When her work is done, she forgets it.
That is why it lasts forever.
I’ve never heard it this way, but this is from the Tao Te Ching. Of those who are not focused on doom-saying, Taoism is popular planet-side, as a lot of people use it as a way to focus on letting go of the terrible things.
+I’ve never heard it this way, but this is from the Tao Te Ching. Of those who are not focused on doom-saying, Taoism is popular planet-side, particularly among the ‘net crowd, as a lot of people use it as a way to focus on letting go of the terrible things.
This is particularly interesting in the way that the System and the LVs are designed to last forever. “When her work is done, she forgets it” makes me think that those who helped build or worked on the System wind up forgetting about it when it becomes their life. “Has but does not possess/acts but does not expect” took more thought, but I can see it applying to the act of uploading, maybe. All those things you had, you never really possessed, as you leave them behind. Uploading itself is terrifying, in a way, as you can never go back and no version of you keeps living on phys-side. Maybe the only way you can get over that fear is to let go of expecting the procedure to succeed/fail. You need to leave behind your expectations, too.
Flown to space by what callous earth destroyed,
@@ -188,7 +191,7 @@ And we are the motes in the stage-lights,
Beholden to the heat of the lamps.
You never answered me about your name. This is another one of those snippets from the work you sent earlier, isn’t it? It has the same feel as your name, so I can’t help but wonder if that is related to you in some way.
-There is something feverish about these words that I don’t quite understand. I don’t know what they mean, can’t even begin to give you an interpretation, other than it makes it sound like that feeling of insignificance that comes with looking at the stars and buffetted about by forces we can’t understand.
+There is something feverish about these words that I don’t quite understand. I don’t know what they mean, can’t even begin to give you an interpretation, other than it makes it sound like that feeling of insignificance that comes with looking at the stars and buffeted about by forces we can’t understand.
I’m trying to hold back on replying to you in the same emotionally inundated state that I ended my last letter, so I’ll just say that this left me feeling things that I can’t even name. Loneliness? Insignificance? I don’t know, even those don’t feel right. Can you send me the whole work? I’ll block out some time to cry over it or something.
Thank you as always, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.
@@ -208,7 +211,7 @@ Launch director