This is one of my favorite background articles for the 2300AD RPG.  Andy's advice really helped to add a more futurist flavor to my campaigns.  Considering how quickly computer technology has advanced since 1991, it is remarkable how "cutting edge" the article still remains.  My thanks to Andy for granting permission for me to host it on my web site. - Kevin Clark - Jan. 13th, 1998.

Wired Society

Information Technology in 2300AD

Table of Contents:

1. Introduction
2. Vehicle Computers
3. Military HUDs
4. Industry
5. Medicine
6. Home Technology
7. Finance
8. Personal Communications
9. Using Information Technology In Gaming Situations
10. Appendix: Data Storage

INTRODUCTION

Which sounds more exciting: You walk out into the parking lot, hop into your four-wheel-drive range truck, put it in gear and steer out onto the highway?  Or Your sleek hovercraft hears you whistle and buzzes to a stop at your side, asks your destination as you climb aboard, then handles all the routine driving and navigation chores?

Technology updated to AD 2300 standards can lend your game a more futuristic flavor -- and is not as unbalancing as you might think.  After all, an "intelligent" hovercraft really gives PCs no more of an edge than an NPC driver would.

The full impact of developments in information technology is only felt on Core worlds and is naturally most evident in larger cities.  Frontier worlds, except for the most developed urban areas, don't have the communications and power networks to support this kind of technology, nor the skilled human resources needed to install and maintain it.  However, any military or research teams will be likely to have a higher level of technology, and items issued to them are designed to work in wilderness areas.

VEHICLE COMPUTERS

Although an onboard vehicle system is referred to as "the computer", it is in fact a group of a half-dozen or so microcomputers each tied in to separate sensor/effector clusters and running different programs.  The various computers are tied together by a small onboard communications network, usually using wires or optical fibers, and one of the nodes is tasked with running the network and overseeing the work of the other nodes.  In military vehicles, a backup node, able to take over this directorial function if the master node is damaged, is also included.  The typical vehicle computer is programmed with the performance parameters for its vehicle and will override the operator if he tries to do anything dangerous.

Autopilots: Autopilots have a socket similar to a neural jack where reference chips can be inserted.  Any autopilot can take a map chip; civilian models normally take a reference chip containing data on local traffic regulations, and military ones are fitted with a chipped copy of the current tactical manual (for the crew's reference).  Autopilot programs can take the vehicle to a specified point, either by road or cross-country, then halt the vehicle, orbit the point or start a search pattern.  The autopilot can also intercept, pass off or take station on a specified point or object.  Military versions can drive evasively; this function is often set to activate if the driver releases the controls (referred to as a "dead-man switch").

Military autopilot programs share navigation and movement data via short-range radio or laser communications links.  This enables vehicle platoons to coordinate their activities.  Groups of vehicles can be programmed to move together in travel mode or "bounding" overwatch mode.  In travel mode, they simply move in column, following the lead vehicle at a safe distance.  In bounding overwatch mode, the vehicles move individually from cover to cover in short bounds, covered by fire from their stationary fellows.

Communicators: All vehicles have long-range communicators.  The police on Core worlds can remotely activate these to pass on traffic information or safety warnings, and can locate any vehicle at any time by its transponder emissions.  In Core world cities, police can take control of any vehicle at any time by a remote radio link, and routinely do so in traffic jams or emergencies.  As criminals routinely damage or disconnect the communicators on stolen vehicles, police imagers are set up at key intersections and linked to computers which scan the highway for specified vehicles, identifying them by their license plates.  Random spot checks are carried out from time to time to make sure that vehicle license plates, communicator responses and positions all sync up.

Weapons Control: The main difference between civil and military vehicle computers is that military ones have weapons control software.  These programs provide automatic adjustments for range, target type and weather conditions.  The system automatically identifies moving objects, trains the weapons, and alerts the gunner, who specifies the targets as friend or foe.  Friends are ignored, and the gunner can specify the response to foes: observe, observe and record, engage now, engage after current target engaged, or engage when in range.  The computer will provide a default response based on the tactical doctrines in its database, but can be overridden.  The gunner can also select autotarget mode, in which the system will engage any target in range not previously specified as friendly, with larger and closer targets having priority.  One of the crew's necessary daily tasks is to specify which vehicles, buildings, etc. are friendly for the day or the mission.

Vehicles in a platoon share target and tactical data over communications links to minimize the chance of engaging friends by mistake or having several friendly vehicles engage the same target.  However, this capability is not so commonly used or as useful as might be imagined, as enemy antiradiation missiles will home on any radio transmissions during combat.

MILITARY HUDS

Occasionally troops will mount mini-imagers on their gun barrels with fiberoptic links to their HUDs, where video picture-in-picture software allows them to see and shoot around corners without exposing their heads.  A small area of the HUD display shows the view from the weapon's muzzle, with corrected aiming graticules overlaid on the scene.

Recent experimental work with subdermacomps has introduced what some have called the "eyes-up display".  By inducing impulses in the optic nerves of the user, military subdermacomps can overlay their information directly on the user's vision.  This technology is not yet available for general use.  Although most subdermacomps can display text or simple graphics in the user's eyes, complex color graphics and map overlays cannot yet be reliably induced, so HUDs are used where these are needed.  Due to its expense, the eyes-up display seems likely to remain limited to undercover operatives in covert surgical strike teams.

INDUSTRY

The few employees in a typical corporation work three- or four-day weeks, and a second set of staff uses the machines for other purposes on the first set's "weekends".  To cope with the long weekends, most workers have second jobs or complex hobbies.  The machines work around the clock, seven days a week.

Dedicated creative staff are still in short supply and frequently work 60-hour weeks.  Some people work from home via the communications net, using a remote work station in their study.  This is not as common as might be expected, for two reasons: Going to work fulfills an important psychological need for social contact with other people.  Also, in a conversation between people, much information is conveyed by body language, facial expressions and gestures, which are harder to make out over a videophone or via a computer bulletin board.

To minimize the capital tied up in stock and warehousing, all factories use "just-in-time" production, keeping less than 12 hours' stock of component parts.  Products are built just in time to meet orders; parts are ordered just in time to make products.

Often, a corporation will be spread out over the globe, with its manufacturing plants wherever they are cheapest to operate, its offices wherever staff and accommodation are cheapest, and so on.  Most supervision is done electronically over the videophone.  Troubleshooters -- roving jacks-of-all-trades -- solve unforeseen problems quickly.

MEDICINE

This arrangement is surprisingly common on Frontier planets due to the limited numbers of medical staff available and the large areas each has to cover.  Indeed, like the old-time Australian outback, many Frontier planets have flying doctors.

HOME TECHNOLOGY

Many shopping malls and public buildings have public terminals from which information databases can be interrogated by passersby.

The home computer is programmed with the owner's tastes in video, and will automatically record or suggest he watch anything of interest broadcast on any of the hundreds of TV channels.  A wall screen can zoom in on particular areas or points in a program, freeze the action, fast forward and rewind, or show windowed inserts of programs on another channel.  An interactive channel is used for teaching.  Some houses have domed circular rooms whose entire inside surface can be made into a screen.  Some viewers have their home computers programmed to enhance the emotional impact of video by adjusting the home heating, making suitable sound effects, and so on.  Others rely on recreational drugs to enhance their viewing.

The communications net includes a library of films and old programs which can be viewed on request, as well as back issues of journals, legal documents and scientific papers.  It can search these files on request for any specific subject, providing a list with cross-references and a printout of the results if required.

Computer animation and edited video are indistinguishable from film of actual events, and many officials seen on the videophone are just PR graphics.  Thus, in most countries, film of a crime is not acceptable as evidence in court, unless taken with specialized, tamperproof equipment.

The home computer has limited intelligence, about equal to a dog's, and will respond to verbal commands or keyboard input.  It controls the lights, heating, outside doors, and TV of a home.  The computer will let in the owner, or specified friends and relatives if the owner is out, so keys, as such, are rarely seen.  The police can always gain entry to a home upon presenting a warrant to the external cameras.  Should any criminal break into the house, the computer will use the wall videophone screens to record the intruder and his activities for the reference of the law enforcement officers, and will attempt to inform the authorities of the break-in.

FINANCE

PERSONAL COMMUNICATORS

Portable communicators continuously transmit their owner's national identity number, even when switched off; the police can learn the rough location of any phone at any time.  Intelligent listening systems monitor all conversations, and if specified people, places or subjects are mentioned, the systems will record the conversation and alert the police.  Police can also activate any phone remotely (to eavesdrop on rooms or conversations) or break into any conversation at any time.  As a precaution against criminals who don't carry communicators, police imagers are set up in key public places and linked to computers which can scan those places for specific persons and alert police to their presence.

USING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN GAMING SITUATIONS

Computers are very good at doing the right thing in a predictable routine situation.  They are not good at dealing with the unknown and unpredictable.  For instance, like a PC using an Aircraft Pilot skill chip in his neural jack, an aircraft computer would be able to take off, land and fly from A to B, but it would not last long in a dogfight without help from a skilled human pilot.

Most computers will not have very high skill levels -- they are generally only skill level 0 or 1.  At the referee's option, they may be able to learn from experience.  If so, they will only be able to improve skills directly relevant to the purpose they were built for.  An onboard computer for a hover APC, for example, might be able to improve Hover Vehicle and Heavy Weapons skills, but should not be able to learn Tactics or Medical.

Information Gathering skill will be vital to PCs working in the Core.  The communications and computer webs there provide Core PCs with instant access to a great deal of information -- so much so that they are likely to be swamped by it.  Successful use of Information Gathering skill -- which in this context is used to phrase requests for information precisely so that they get the data they need and no more -- will keep PCs from being swamped.  Computer skill can also be used in this fashion.  As an oversimplified example, if the PCs need to find out about a Mr. Smith in the course of their work, asking the computer at the public library for data on Mr. Smith could result in a pile of printout nine yards thick.  A character with Information Gathering skill would ask for Mr. A. G. Smith of a specific address or birthdate, reducing the amount of data to be sifted.

Tracking: This technology was first introduced for laudable purposes.  Continuous transmission of identity numbers by personal and vehicle computers, for instance, was intended to assist transport planners to provide better service by finding out people's habitual movements -- this naturally told the planners where roads were needed, which trains needed how many cars, and so on.  But it wasn't long before the police realized how valuable the information could be.

The major impact of this technology on PCs is in the ability of Core police to track them and prove their involvement in various capers.  This is where the darker side of information technology appears, and it fits very well with the downbeat, "cyberpunk" view of Earth in AD 2300.  Anywhere the PCs go, the police are monitoring them by transmissions from their personal or vehicle communicators.  Thus, the police know where the PCs are, when they are there, probably who they are with, and what is being said (if they have a mind to know).  Whenever the PCs break into a building, its computer will record their crimes on imager chips and alert the police.  Whenever they make phone calls to each other during a scenario, intelligent monitoring systems can listen to the call, check for key words or names, and alert the police about what they're up to.  In short, Big Brother is watching.

This won't make crime in the Core impossible for the PCs, but it will make them sweat for their ill-gotten gains.  Streetwise skill as learned and practiced in Core cities includes knowledge of how to make your movements and activities look like part of the normal pattern to the watching computers, which are programmed to alert the police if a citizen's movement patterns become eccentric or even too regular.  Electronics, Disguise, Computer and Security Systems become skills equally as valuable as Sidearm or Melee, as PCs must perform difficult tasks using these skills and their ingenuity to evade detection.  For example, PCs might avoid the police monitoring their movements by carefully removing their vehicle's communicator and connecting it to an electronic rig which feeds it false information, making it seem that their car is at home in the garage.  Then all the PCs have to worry about is the police imagers spotting their license plate 50 miles from that garage and raising the alarm.
- Andy Slack

Appendix: DATA STORAGE

                       Storage
Item to be Stored      Required
Letter, one page          5 KB
Photograph              100 KB
Book, 200 pages           1 MB
Hi-fi music, one hour   100 MB
Video, one hour          10 GB

                       Storage
Storage Medium         Available
Portacomp chip          200 MB
Imager cartridge          3 GB
Home/vehicle computer   100 GB
Office computer        1000 TB

KB: Kilobytes (thousands of bytes).
MB: Megabytes (millions of bytes).
GB: Gigabytes (billions of bytes).
TB: Terabytes (thousands of billions of bytes).

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