(Although I will point out that 'Jay and Acacia started a series' is where it all began; the stories begat the community, not the other way round!)

The PPC has always been a shared universe where things changed. New agents come in and out, and put their own spin on things. New concepts show up - like the recent advent of four separate 'fall of the future PPC' timelines - and either work or get forgotten. New chunks of the community appear - I was here before the Wiki - and disappear - I remember the Livejournal agent journals. And occasionally something pops up like the city in New Caledonia that changes the whole shape of things.

But for all that, actually, a lot of things are static. Agents are still using the same technology that was established in the first few years of writing - the last major innovation was TARDISes back in 2008. The list of departments is largely static, having come to a stable state with (roughly) the Departments of Temporal Offenses, Angst, and WhatThe. The proceedure for carrying out a mission has been standardised (back in the day, Bad Slash didn't have charge lists!). While people keep coming up with new bleeproducts and Suvian colours, they don't actually get used all that much - the defaults are still bleeprin, bleepka, urple and wilver.

In fact, the PPC is basically the same now as it was five years ago. But five years before that, practically none of it existed (and Despatch was a major department!). So what'll happen in another five years?

No answers from me! But Tia Hyrax will be 14 years old and in training to join the Department of Bad Slash - back when I joined in 2003, she was still a year away from being born! Now that's what I call an achievement.

hS