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That is, unless you're one of the ones that wants the entire human race (at least) to die out entirely. And, since everyone here is human, we will ALL be killed.

Sure, that means the planet is better off, but still! We're all DEAD.

Are you familiar with Pandora? It's a great music discovery website. I've got a few channels there with techno: Daft Punk Radio is, well, Daft Punk (real techno), while Keep Hope Alive Radio is more dance-esque (based around The Crystal Method's work). Dragonstea Din Tei Radio is real electronic dance ('90s, mostly), and E Nomine Radio is some of the fun-ness that happens at the intersection of Gothic Metal, classical choral music, and electronic.

Other music that's less techno but might appear in DoSAT would be E.S. Posthumous and Hyper (see Cascade Radio).

Okay, that's just music I like. But still, it's good music.

Just a note, I am still kinda working on DoSAT stuff. It's very, very backburner thanks to school, work, and life in general, but please don't make additions totally impossible.

... which is what I do best, I'd like to point out that this is hardly a major perturbation.

Planet's been here for 4.6 billion years. It'll probably manage at least another 4.6 billion years. We've been here less than ten thousand years. Our influence extends maybe three or four miles into the crustal rocks, and up into the atmosphere, maybe the troposphere. And a few bits of space junk. This planet has some FABULOUS feedback systems that mean that, if we were removed, in the blink of a geological eye our influence would dissipate (of course, this doesn't take away from the fact that if we continue doing what we're doing, OTHER fabulous feedback loops will make things considerably worse, but I digress).

Given evolution works how it does, I suspect that another sentient species would arise. Or maybe not. It's not like a planet has to have a sentient species, it took about five hundred million years for us to toddle along, after all :)

Basically, guys, gals and undecided, life goes on. Whatever happens, the sun will keep shining, photosynthesis will keep happening, water will freeze and water will evaporate, sand will move, gravity will hold rocks down ... so why worry? Keep writing, or hey, go outside, look at the sky, see the grass (the most successful organism on the planet, grass), enjoy yourself. You're alive. That's all that matters.

/end serene eccentric scientist warbling.

Russian rearmament is fairly inevitable - their economy tanked in the 80s and continued going down when the Iron Curtain fell, so military spending dropped fairly significantly. A resurgence is only to be expected, especially with ex-Soviet states starting to have border squabbles. Also, considering the last seven years of American foreign policy, I wouldn't be surprised to see Russia taking a more aggressive hand in international politics.

If it does come to nukes, though, you're probably fine. Soviet-era nuclear doctrine consisted of atomic strikes on nuclear military installations (B-52 bases, sub pens, ICBM silos) and runways long enough to serve nuclear bombers (>11,000 feet, IIRC) in tactically important places. If you live more than ten miles from any of the above, you're not going to be killed by blast effects. While initial fallout will be major (and should be avoided if possible), it's mostly very hot, short-lived particles. In 10 days, radiation levels will drop to 1/10th of the initial, and after another 10 days, it'll be down to 1%. After a month, you're down to background radiation levels except for a couple square miles at each epicenter.

Seen pictures of downtown Hiroshima? It's a thriving city, and grass grows around the ruins of the nuclear war memorial. Admittedly that was a small nuke, but the physics is the same, it's just on a larger scale.

Okay, so what, they're increasing militarization. How does that spell the end of the world, again?

And God Damn, listening to the Decemberists makes me just really want to give their vocalist a HUG or something. He sounds so sad, and he sings about all this really depressing stuff.

Also, any fans of electronica and/or techno: I would much appreciate some suggestions, since I don't know that much about the genre myself.

Fine, entertain your doomsday. Even if I did agree with the idea, I can't very well do jack about it, being as I am a poor college student. So I will ignore it and focus on what I can do.

Namely, readin' and writin'.

Pretty much everyone who's got nukes is waiting for an excuse to use 'em, and most of them are about to get that excuse, especially with the next Great Depression and Russia going all USSR again. Even if we don't get nuked into oblivion, we'll see a more conventional WW3.

Unless you're from the Dr. Strangelove 'verse.

I would like to think that the world's sanity quotient is higher than that. Pretty much all of the current crop of leaders were born during the Cold War, they know what the specter of nuclear terror looks like. They have no reason to want to resurrect such a nasty ghost.

Pakistan, India, Iran, Korea, Russia, and the US all launching their nukes would leave nothing left. And the US and Russia alone have enough nukes to reduce the Earth to glowing green rock. Imagine what happens if all the other nuke-happy fellows join in when the big boys start throwing nuclear punches?

That's not funny.

Do not fear, my friends! For in that sentence lies our great strength! Nothing is more powerful than friendship! It's the most powerful force in all the universes and beyon--

-gets shot-

Yeah, we're experiencing the warning signs again, aren't we? And history always comes with that irritating tendency to repeat itself. *headwalls* But you know, I don't mean to sound corny or anything, but we, the next generation, are the only ones who can really help at this point. I'm a teenager, adulthood is just beyond my reach, but it's still coming and I can't do a thing to stop it. The previous generation kinda effed things up for us, and it falls on the next set of adults of the world to set things right. In the end, it's all up to us. We humans ended up on this earth, a fact which we can all agree on, no matter what religion we follow or whether we follow one at all, and this earth is the only one we have. We have to take care of it, and we haven't been doing a very good job of it lately. When it all comes down to it, the fate of the world really does rest in our hands. WE decide whether or not we're dead.

Hence why I only tend to write male characters. I prefer sticking to what I know.

They have the atomic bomb, and there are many fanatics with nothing to lose standing mere inches from power. And the situation with India, another country with weapons of mass destruction, is quite tense.

What worries me about Russia is not the new weapons they plan to get, but how they will dispose of the old ones. A few million dollars in the right pockets could put something very dangerous in the hands of a terrorist.

Just... just please stop, okay? Please. I don't need to hear this. You sound like a doomsayer sitting on a rock in Israel.

Things will be fine. All right? Things will be fine. Remember that. They have been MUCH worse, and we have been MUCH closer to nuclear armageddon before than now. And the world isn't glowing yet.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7947824.stm

We're all going to die. First Vietnam II, then Great Depression II, and now World War III. Wish I could say it's been nice knowing you all, but I barely knew most of you. Let's all just hope we die in the initial blast, instead of surviving to be killed by the radiation and such. Makes you wonder if there's even a point in writing PPC things, huh? Heh, I guess technically the PPC would survive, they'd just see a sudden stop of recruits coming from World One.

This is the end, beautiful friend, this is the end, my only friend, the end...

I'd say it probably depends on your knowledge of the PPCverse and your writing skills. Agents are accepted on a case-by-case basis.

To the point where I would like to have a transdimensional airship rather than a TARDIS or a response center. Airships are made of pure, undiluted awesome. Unfortunately they don't fit in a lot of settings, and I don't want to disrupt the canon of non-cyberpunk stories.

The novel you refer to seems to be rather obscure: it has only 7 reviews on Amazon.com. And I'm not one of the few who have read it. But I give you back your three cents (interests included).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematic_Titanic

Technically, you can kill the Sue however you want. Usually I just shoot them, for example, similar to how TOS did. However, you're supposed to kill them in the fic/continuum they're from. Body disposal is a sort of "anything goes" (like feeding them to Cthulhu), but they're not supposed to leave the canon.

Around fourteen cups of coffee and a half, Cal was extremely tired, but he felt he had done a decent job. All wires had been reconnected and several missing parts had been replaced. He only hoped his tampering had not turned the android into a blood-thirsty megalomaniac bent on world domination.

Of course, there was only one way to find out, and it was to flick the switch — which he did. The android immediately came back to life, and Cal half expected her to start explaining in Morse code why France lost the Algeria war. When she did not, he took this as an encouraging sign that his repairs may have worked.

"Where am I?" was the first thing the robotic girl asked, frowning with puzzlement.

"Response Center 72," answered Recruit Cal. "Headquarters of the PPC."

"Ah... and who am I?"

"I have no idea," Cal apologized. "I found you in the storage room of the Department of Sufficiently Advanced Technology. Apparently they wanted to get rid of you in a yard sale."

"Don't you have any concern for my self-esteem?" the girl complained.

"Oh, sorry. You were broken, and I guess the Department couldn't be bothered to repair you. But I did. And I won't sell you in a yard sale." He paused. "Unless the price they offer is really good. But I'm not planning a yard sale any time soon, so don't worry. I'm glad you're here: I should start going on missions in just a few weeks, but they haven't given me a partner. You interested?"

She thought about it. "What do we do on those missions?"

"We kill Mary Sues and restore the plot continuum."

"Does it involve spiked flails?" she asked hopefully.

"Yes, if you want."

"I'm in," she grinned.

"Great. What's your name?"

"Dunno. I don't remember anything about myself."

"Then find yourself a name."

"Sure. I'll browse the Web, I have Internet access." Her gaze grew distant. After a moment her grin widened. "Hey, did you know that the Meganeura, a kind of dragonfly from the Carboniferous period, had a wingspan of 75 centimeters? Most. Awesomest. Insect. Ever!"

"Don't get sidetracked," sighed Cal impatiently. "The 'Net is interesting, but you only need to find a name."

"Could I be called Meganeura?"

"NO."

"Okay, fine," pouted the android. She went on searching the Web. It took her half a second. "I'll go with Ellen. After Ellen Ripley, from Alien."

"Hey, she's..." Cal began, his ears reddening. "...She's my Lust object! I can't have a partner who's named after my Lust Object. That would be disturbing."

"It's either that or Meganeura," replied the girl stubbornly.

"Arrrrgh, okay. Anything but Meganeura."

"HA! No one argues with a badass like Ellen!" exclaimed the android triumphantly.

Cal rolled his eyes. Being partnered with someone more or less sane was probably too much to ask.