A Little Trip to the Year 3000...

[Eternal_Freedom]

By Act of Plot, that bastard Q pops up and says:

"I'm feeeling delightfully smug today, so to celebrate I'm going to steal you irrevocably from your current life and timeline and throw you into a different one, circa 3000 ACE.

But, just because I'm a nice guy once in a while, I'll let you choose which future-alternate-timeline you go to. So, which version of the Year 3000 do you wan't to live in?"

RULES:

-You may pick a timeline from any sci-fi or fantasy series/franchise ever created. Books, films, TV, comics, manga, anime, anything.
-The chosen timeline MUST be one that is set in (or about) the Year 3000. (So anything from about 2900-3100 will do).
-No matter what technology or magic we see in your chosen timeline, you cannot return to your original life.

Personally, I'd pick the year 3000 as seen in Futurama, for the lols mostly, but also for some interesting tidbits:

-They have FTL travel such that the equivalent of a FedEx van can travel from Earth to the edge of the Universe and back in a morning
-Planetary destruction (presumably uninhabited!) is considered "humdrum" and can be done for a modest fee as a recreational activity (the fee must have been small or Fry couln't have done it!)
-Fully immersive VR internet
-Fully intergrated and sentient robotic and AI life is commonplace (so commonplace robots even have their own fraternity at universities).
-Your job is assigned based on whichever job you are best at. No more endless queues at the job agency trying to get some pointless dead-end warehouse job
-Societal acceptance of the above job-allocation system
-Even the priests accept that religious intervention is actually useless


What about the rest of you? What future world will you choose?

[dragon]

I'm think ST as the 31th century federation had some niffy tech that even allows historians to travel in time, Space compression as in Future Tense allowing bigger spaces on the inside, plus all the normal trek goodies.

[Ahriman238]

Aside from earth being largely run by bigoted, isolationaist assholes who initiate terrorist attacks, Babylon 5 five hundred or so years after the events of the series seems like a nice place to live.

40K might be alright as well, the Eldar rule the galaxy, the Chaos Gods are huddled into their tiny corner of the Warp, the Orks are a minor nuisance, and humanity is pretty much the same as today only involved in the ongoing colonization of the solar system.
I would, of course, require assurances that there is no way I could accidently become immortal, or be further time-displaced to otherwise live to see any point during or after the Fall of the Eldar and the Age of Strife.

A major problem is that in almost any version of the world a thousand years from now, almost all of my skills and experiences are going to be useless. I imagine this would be an even greater problem for those on this board who make their living via their technical skills. Still, if it's a relatively enlightened world, I may be able to trade on my knowledge of history.

[StarSword]

In the universe my game mod takes place in (Escape Velocity: Nova), the year 3000 AD came and went over 1,700 years ago. The original game starts in 1177 NC, or 3957 AD.

I'm not sure I'd want to live in the EV Nova universe at that time, because I imagine life for the average Joe wouldn't be too much different than it is now. At 220 NC (3000 AD), human civilization is about at the scale of the UFP's core systems, and no sentient nonhumans have been encountered yet.

[Crossroads Inc.]

I don't know why you have missed the obvious, but Arthurs C Clarks "3000" The final in the 2001 saga is a great place to go.

They have fully immersive VR. They have nifty "mind reading" typing machines (IE what you think is what is put down, I could write stories in no time!) They have space elavators, Space rings, a good peacful civilization. Yes there is no FTL no aliens and none of the other bits of SciFi.

But since we are FORCED to pick a timeline based on a single moment in time, our options become very restrictive.

One other thing is I would like to be able to bring my computer with me. Largely as, from the book, a lot of information was lost from the 20th century. being able to take a few terabytes of music, art, songs, movies and books would be a nice gift to the period on my arrival

[Eternal_Freedom]

Actually Crossorads, Reading 3001 was what prompted this thread. That and watching Futurama too much.

The world Frank Poole finds himself in is indeed pretty awesome, but you are hanging under threat of annihilation at some point in the future from the Monoliths. They've already tried once after all. And just look what they did to Nova Scorpio...

Plus there's that closing bit at the end, about the Firstborn coming back. It's a realy pity the series never went further to be honest.

[Slacker]

Well, he did take an alternative spin on the concept with Stephen Baxter-the series that starts with Time's Eye.

[Panzersharkcat]

Didn't he die before the Time's Eye series finished? The only thing I remember was a pending war between them and the Lastborn. One thing I've wanted to do was pit the Firstborn from the Time Odyssey series against the Galactic Empire.

As for me, I'd probably go with the DC Universe in the 30th Century. Not the biggest fan of the Legion, and I'd miss the Green Lantern Corps, but the tech of the time seems rather nifty.

[Slacker]

There's a bit of back and forth on if 'The Firstborn' is intended to be the final book of the trilogy or just another book in the series. I guess we'll only really ever know if Baxter decides to pick up the series on his own. The defiant attitude of humanity standing against the oldest sentient race in the universe is something he certainly knows how to do, and unlike the human empire in the Xeeleeverse, the Lastborn are actually justified.

[Sarevok]

BattleTech.

Sure they don't have much fancy tech but I love the sense of adventure. To be a Mechwarrior would be living a dream come true.

[Swindle1984]

BattleTech.

Sure they don't have much fancy tech but I love the sense of adventure. To be a Mechwarrior would be living a dream come true.

Cheap nuclear fusion, FTL travel, giant fucking robots, laser pistols, and the music, culture, and fashion is essentially trapped in the 1980's. I'm loving it.

I'm familiar enough with events that I could probably find a way to get obscenely wealthy by predicting the outcome of battles and gambling on them, leading expeditions to find Castles Bryan and Starleague data cores before anyone else, etc.

And best of all, for some reason everyone speaks modern english a thousand years in the future, so it's a win-win!

[aussiemuscle308]

given that if you go back 300 years in history, you would have trouble understanding english language, i'd imagine you'd have just as much trouble traveling forward that long. (how hard is it to understand shakespeare if you get what i mean?)

[Havok]

Star Trek.

I travel back in time to the day Q loses his powers and punch him repeatedly in the face.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I think Havok wins this one. On the subject of language and understanding, you can assume that Q will give you a instant education in local language, culture and customs.

[Starglider]

A major problem is that in almost any version of the world a thousand years from now, almost all of my skills and experiences are going to be useless. I imagine this would be an even greater problem for those on this board who make their living via their technical skills.

This is a brainbug, perpetuated in particular by liberal arts grads thinking 'ok so my degree is only good for working at McDonalds, but in 100 years it will be exactly as useless as it is now whereas those annoying techies will be worthless!'. In actual fact the more involved you are with technological change, the more equipped you will be to learn to survive/thrive in a future technological civilisation. In programming for example most practical skills become dated after a year or two and obsolete in somewhere between two and ten years. Technical people are used to constant novelty and lifelong learning; they cannot stay in the field if they don't constantly acquire new skills. On the other hand the fundamentals of computer science don't change any more than the fundamentals of mathematics, and all the related soft skills (requirements analysis, people and project management, technical writing*) won't be obsoleted by anything less than human psychology changing. Of course the whole field can be automated with AI, but that's pretty much every human occupation.

I would probably go with the future from Diaspora, or possibly Schild's Ladder if I had more information about its history (the universe of 22,000 is idyllic and has been for a long time, but it isn't clear what the timeline was).

* Helped by the fact that all these fictional futures conveniently have everyone speaking contemporary American English...

[StarSword]

Star Trek.

I travel back in time to the day Q loses his powers and punch him repeatedly in the face.

What happens when he regains his powers?

Not that I wouldn't want to punch several other Star Trek characters given the chance. *cough* Neelix *cough cough*

[Swindle1984]

Star Trek.

I travel back in time to the day Q loses his powers and punch him repeatedly in the face.

You win. Thread conceded.

[Darth Wong]

BattleTech.

Sure they don't have much fancy tech but I love the sense of adventure. To be a Mechwarrior would be living a dream come true.

What makes you think you'd be a mechwarrior in that universe, instead of an unemployed guy hoping to get a job at a fast-food restaurant?

Really, if you're going to pick future timelines, the socialist utopia of Star Trek is probably your best bet. It might not be as cool as some other universes, but the likelihood of finding yourself in abject misery is far lower.

[StarSword]

BattleTech.

Sure they don't have much fancy tech but I love the sense of adventure. To be a Mechwarrior would be living a dream come true.

What makes you think you'd be a mechwarrior in that universe, instead of an unemployed guy hoping to get a job at a fast-food restaurant?

Really, if you're going to pick future timelines, the socialist utopia of Star Trek is probably your best bet. It might not be as cool as some other universes, but the likelihood of finding yourself in abject misery is far lower.

Do we actually have any data on the 31st century UFP apart from tiny anecdotes in ENT, all of which are derived from a single source (Temporal Agent Daniels)? Apart from time travel supposedly being commonplace, for all I know the Ferengi took over management of the Federation economy, which would make it a capitalist's paradise.

[StarSword]

On another note, my personal favorite is Egosoft's X-Universe. The most recent game, X3: Terran Conflict, is set in 2938 AD, which is close enough to judge.

FTL is dependent on jumpgates for the most part (a couple factions have gateless jumpdrive, though it's not available to the player), and with a little seed money and careful planning it's fairly easy to build your own trade empire. Last time I checked, I had around five hundred ships, including a dozen or so capital ships, and a great many space stations. But I started out with 10,000 credits and a single interceptor.

[Starglider]

FTL is dependent on jumpgates for the most part (a couple factions have gateless jumpdrive, though it's not available to the player), and with a little seed money and careful planning it's fairly easy to build your own trade empire. Last time I checked, I had around five hundred ships, including a dozen or so capital ships, and a great many space stations. But I started out with 10,000 credits and a single interceptor.

In reality this will be exactly as easy as building a global megacorporation and merchant marine on contemporary earth, starting with a $500,000 harbor tug. Quite possible but about 0.00000001% of the population actually make it.

[PhilosopherOfSorts]

Futurama, no contest. Sure, I'll probably have to work a shitty job, but fuck it, I do that anyway, and in Futurama, even a shitty job like "delivery boy" involves interstellar space travel. Also, the culture is not so alien as to leave me completely lost.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Interstellar? Try trans-universal. As I said in the OP, their future-FedEx ship flies to the edge of the universe and back in less than a morning. At maximum thats 50-odd billion light-years in six hours.

That's pretty incredible. A universe, only a thousand years distant, where private, home-made spaceships can travel billions of light-years an hour.

Heck, even two twelve year old kids are able to build an ftl-capable two-man transport for their paper round. From a kit they bought mail-order for a quarter. Wow.

[StarSword]

Heck, even two twelve year old kids are able to build an ftl-capable two-man transport for their paper round. From a kit they bought mail-order for a quarter. Wow.

I hope they at least do background checks. I read a book recently (Red Lightning by John Varley) where a tsunami devastated the East Coast after a terrorist group* stole a starship, accelerated it to relativistic speeds, then crashed it into the Atlantic.

* The amusing part of this is, we never learn which terrorist group was responsible, because they messed up the timing of their message. All that was received prior to the crash was, "Death to the --"

[Darksider]

BattleTech.

Sure they don't have much fancy tech but I love the sense of adventure. To be a Mechwarrior would be living a dream come true.

What makes you think you'd be a mechwarrior in that universe, instead of an unemployed guy hoping to get a job at a fast-food restaurant?

Not to mention, isn't the year 3000 smack dab in the middle of the nastier parts of the succession wars? Even if I could be a Mechwarrior in the BattleTech universe, I wouldn't want to do it in the middle of a brutal conflict which is causing a technological backslide. Come to think of it, is there any time period in the BT universe that isn't consumed by warfare? It might not be as bad as WH40K, but it seems like the BT universe only has brief periods of peace in between major shitstorms.

Not a place I'd want to live.