Borg linkage slowing down thought

[Franc28]

I distinctly remember there being a page or a sub-page on this web site about how networks slow down when enough computers are linked together, and the consequences of this for Borg reaction speeds. But I can't seem to find it. Anyone have any idea where it is?

[DaveJB]

While Mike suggested it as a possible cause of why the Borg seemed to become more and more stupid the more we saw them, I don't think he ever wrote an actual article about it - IIRC, he wrote about it in some of the flame mail pages, and possibly in the "threat assessment" pages.

For what it's worth, the TNG relaunch novels toyed with this idea; apparently the Borg's network infrastructure took a lot of damage in the Species 8472 war due to S8472's fondness for blowing up planets, which was where the Borg housed most of their processing centres. As a result, the Borg limped on in an overloaded and functionally reduced state for most of Voyager's run... until after the finale, where the computer virus that Voyager infected the Borg Queen with destroyed about half of the collective, which had the side-effect of balancing out their system load and letting them function as an effective threat once more.

[Franc28]

Ah. Thanks to your help, I think I found it.

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Hat ... iehle.html

"From real-life computer technology, we know that symmetric multi-processing introduces extra overhead, is unsuitable for certain types of tasks, and tends to bump into scalability limits with increasing size. The Borg "hive mind" is precisely analogous to an SMP system, it shows evidence of extreme unsuitability for certain tasks (eg- the inability of trillions of minds to equal Voyager's holo-doc), and it shows every indication that it has reached and then surpassed a scalability limit."

Funny, I remembered there being more than that. Oh well. It certainly set me on the right track, anyway.

[JME2]

For what it's worth, the TNG relaunch novels toyed with this idea; apparently the Borg's network infrastructure took a lot of damage in the Species 8472 war due to S8472's fondness for blowing up planets, which was where the Borg housed most of their processing centres. As a result, the Borg limped on in an overloaded and functionally reduced state for most of Voyager's run... until after the finale, where the computer virus that Voyager infected the Borg Queen with destroyed about half of the collective, which had the side-effect of balancing out their system load and letting them function as an effective threat once more.

I've only been paying minimal attention to the TNG relaunch, so I didn't know this; an amusing way to explain the Borg's villain decay during the VGR years.

[Iroscato]

It annoyed me how the Borg went from being the most feared race in the galaxy, barely seen but always in the background, to being on Voyager every other episode and turning out to be easily defeatable in numerous ways...