Recent content by Melbourne Guy

This dynamic is the basis for many sci-fi stories as the ship social structure devolves over time. And @Strato Incendus, over many posts, has delved into this aspect because keeping the dream alive over such time scales in such a limited space is a narrative challenge.

I used an O'Neill cylinder as an interstellar spaceship because it simplifies a lot of engineering. My ship was the asteroid Hektor hollowed out with the cylinder spun and held in place via superconducting magnets. The rocket engine needed a lot of hand waving (metallic hydrogen in this case)...

Yes, that's one thing I found when my novels were proofread, that I tended to name the OP in discussions too much. Took me a bit of effort to trim the named participants in conversations, but seven books in, I think I've got the hang of it! However, posting is different to talking. It is...

Just seems polite to refer to people by name if you're conversing...unnamed commentator! But if I ignore the wink, and take that you're a Mentor at face value, I'll stop with the '@' mention as it's actually easier. Hmmm... There's a lot I don't like about LinkedIn, but that's one useful...

Yes, but compare PF to LinkedIn, and this is the only feature which is more convenient on LinkedIn where the mere act of typing the '@' triggers an autofill of the most recent commentator's name. It's not a 'die in a ditch' feature, obviously, @anorlunda, but merely put into the pot for...

Sorry, I should have included an example, such as this, where you can see that I've explicitly recognised fluidistic in my reply.

When I quote a PF member comment, and I want to refer to them using the '@' method in my comment, I have to type in their name. It would be helpful if the editor could auto-fill the name from the immediately previous quote.

Oh yes, I've written myself into corners before, @Algr, and it's annoying to discard chapters and wind the story back to fix the problem. But it's speculative sci-fi, so it happens, and my aliens are generally cyphers, used to trigger reflection of the human condition. In this case, they're...

Hi @Algr, I try and keep my aliens inexplicable, but it's not a total surprise that they're flinging little BHs around, they use a big one to cloak their entire civilisation in an FTL bubble. However, I'm unlikely to elaborate the mechanism for their magic weapons, I just need the aliens to have...

Here Down Under, @Algr, we'd be the exact opposite. "Fifty degrees outside? Strewth, it's enough to turn you troppo. But stone the crows, is that some galah wearing a jacket? Fair dinkum, must be a few stubbies short of a six-pack, what a larrikan."

You're a champion, @Vanadium 50, that's exactly the type of horrific energy output that makes for a gripping sequence, thank you 🙏

Thanks, @Vanadium 50, but that's actually better. You've got that right :biggrin: And while I'd like the physics to be as realistic as possible, the story has general purpose AI, FTL, and aliens, so it's already well beyond the universe as we know it. But I've no idea how evaporating black...

I've decided my latest novel uses black hole bombs, which aliens create by a mechanism unknown, and which are small enough to quickly evaporate to blast ships in the vicinity. Knowing it is sci-fi and doesn't have to be perfect, about how fast do BHs evaporate? Alternatively, if I need them to...

Like you, I'm not on Twitter, @quasar987, but are intermittent interruptions of 'something interesting' based on other people's assessment a service you would value? My alternative is to routinely plug-in "science news" to my browser, and also regularly review sites like phys.org and Science...

Aha, then we're in heated agreement, @DaveC426913, my point was that professional authors will mostly be bots because they can overwhelm human authors in output. Anyone can write as a hobby (or fly as a hobby, good point), but why would I pay a person when I can have a bot write just as good a...