medium.com/universe-factory/…

^The guys over at worldbuilding were tired of FTL travel so they wrote this.

very nicely done

i have an impatience with most time travel stories. they have to be really good stories, and the time travel part seems to be associated with stories that, in my opinion, aren't.

they tend to be mostly about the angst created by time travel, in which case i think to myself 'but it couldn't happen, so stop whining'

I was thinking about some git inspired time travel mechanics, but time travel is still going to be lame.

git inspired time travel mechanics. i like it. but then the universe has to sort of be a computer, doesn't it?

something that is okay with keeping and fetching records?

yeah. But as for now I just have some mechanics and no story, and that would be the wrong way to begin.

it's interesting, because you seem to have no interest in the names of things, and haven't had much to say about the timeline, i thought you were generally not very interested in the story aspects in general

though it did occur to me 'but he has a broad library of web-comics he reads, which he keeps track of an organizes'

I don't think I can write a story. I have seen a lot of people I know start saying "Hey, I want to write something!", but so far, only my sister has succeeded in completing a book. So I am more into reading stories others have created.

you didn't conceive of the git time mechanics as the basis of a story?

then it sounds like you are more a theoretical physicist...

Nope. I just wrote a small handful of scenarios to illustrate how it could work.

So, I see a lot of people trying to write, but the failure rate is too high to be something to spend time on.

well, what you are doing has application as thought experiments though

And the problem with writing a short story to illustrate some aspect of Moonwards is that it would involve using English.

your English strikes me as entirely sufficient for that.

but is it really what you want to do? if you find it doesn't come to you naturally, maybe you haven't found the best way to apply what comes to you easily.

it's like what you were saying about learning to make 3d models - if you want to, great, but there is no need. your skills in the sciences and math, and in coding, are also needed as long as it is a good fit for you.

For writing anything I find it way easier to express myself in Norwegian, my English is limited to short technical texts or chat usage.

yeah - to really get the feel you want, i guess that is true. i sometimes really wish i could switch to english with my husband, because i know how to make the precise point i want to in english, but not in spanish.

but, writing something for moonwards in norwegian ought to be totally possible. it would just take a while, and it would have to grow a lot, in order to have a good spot to put it.

Localization ought not to be the focus at the moment :)

the thing is, you are at that age where you have to make decisions with actual implications for what you are going to do with the rest of your life.

System messages: 1message(s): What do you want to do with the rest of your life? "Hey, where is the 'remind me later' button?"

:P it isn't super important. on the other hand (ahem) i have to honestly say i can see how the choices i made immediately after high school set the stage for everything else.

in this case, what i want to say is that you are good at thought experiments, and if expanding that into writing stories doesn't come naturally, then consider that there are other places where that skill is valuable, and they could be the thing that is right for you.

As for what I want to work with, I am not sure. I know I can do programming, but I can not say it is very tempting.

that makes me think of Tildal. he has done a lot of work with satellite imagery data.

the actual work is boring, but the things you have to consider to do it are quite interesting.

as is the data itself.

i suppose programming is mostly worth it if it allows you to make something you find valuable.

^

Most people I know having that kind of job are smart people making stupid things.

that is because of this ongoing problem we have that almost everyone is obliged to work for someone else in a huge faceless system.

it has really seemed to me for the last few years, though, that the ability to stay out of that system has really grown.

if you can rent that central asian yurt and have an okay internet connection, you could make enough money to get along.

The need for an income decreases with consumption, sure.

i do think it is generally a mistake for people to make choices based on what they think will get them a job.

get better at doing what you do best, and actually inspires you, and don't worry about the job.

you do of course know that your programming skills are highly relevant to everything else you do well.

it is hard to imagine someone who wants to do something in physics or math these days not knowing how to program.

Somebody made an article about parallel processing and Amdahl's law using kittens game as a starting point: embeddedrelated.com/showarticle/1033.php

alright, i got to 'you can't win, you can't break even, and you can't quit the game' which was worth it, but i'm going to leave the rest, nominally for later but who knows.

it's interesting but not the stuff i need to work on right now

I link random stuff I find, filtering is your job :P

as a non-native English speaker, would you say you value things being expressed in a somewhat simpler vocabulary for clarity, or is it fine for less common words to be used because they are easily looked up and the writing is improved by them?

Oh, for reading, mix in all the buzzwords you can manage.

ok. i try to strike a balance. i try to use less common phrases and words when they really add something, and to keep things as clear as possible otherwise.