Machine Monotone: Mostly averted. Who builds a speech synthesizer that can’t handle the subtextual channels, seriously? Bad design. People need to be able to relate even to the non-sophont machines, and that means a good emotional simulation is a fundamental part of UI design.
(Played a little straight with the machines and also the non-machines; see Creepy Monotone.)
“Consider, gentle reader, that even as the flesh of an Emperor, or of any man, is constituted of what he eats, so then is an Empire, in bones and sinew, constituted of what it eats. “Therefore, to maintain the health, and to avoid the manifestations of ill-nutrition, unseemly bloat, or
I saw this picture today, via an Astral Codex Ten post on distinguishing human art from AI art, but that is not the context in which I reference it: Instead, I merely point out that it would be an accurate representation of what the Royal Alatian (later Imperial) Navy would
Pressed bean curds are a common item in many Eliéran cuisines, in recipes both savory and sweet. I refer to them using this long description since, despite being identical in many ways and produced from the same small group of plants, they are one of the very few foodstuffs to
As a brief cultural note, today, I happened to be looking something up on the Atomic Rockets Future Mythology page, and was reminded of Crazy Eddie. (The one from Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle's The Mote in God's Eye, obviously. Even if, sad to say, that