Subspace Ansible: Difference between revisions

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* Richard Morgan's ''[[Altered Carbon]]'' features "needlecasts", but no FTL travel. Interestingly, since [[Brain Uploading]] is routine, people may travel from planet to planet by downloading into a local body.

** The information-only aspect is a power limitation, not an inherent limitation of the functionality. The information is transmitted by energy; the best matter-energy conversion reactors they have can hold open a needlecast portal for at most 15 to 30 seconds, and transmit only blinking light. They find a stable [[Stargate]]-style portal created by the precursors, extrapolate the energy costs, and realize that a hiccup in the portals matrix would crack the planet open like an egg. Hazards of children playing with adult toys.

* In ''[[Time ~~For~~ ~~The~~ Stars]]'' by [[Robert A. Heinlein]], telepathy is used for instantaneous communication. Eventually, scientists studying the process learn how how it works well enough to create [[Faster-Than-Light Travel]] as well.

* In ''[[Time for the Stars]]'' by [[Robert A. Heinlein]], telepathy is used for instantaneous communication. Eventually, scientists studying the process learn how how it works well enough to create [[Faster-Than-Light Travel]] as well.

* Similarly, in [[E. E. "Doc" Smith]]'s ''[[Lensman]]'' series, the title Lens enhances the Lensmen's telepathic abilities, thus allowing instantaneous communication between them.

** There are also a variety of "waves" and "rays" that can be used for FTL communication and sensors by people who aren't Lensmen.

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* Heightened stellar activity can interfere with FTL communications in the ''[[Wing Commander (novel)|Wing Commander]]'' universe, as shown in the novel ''Action Stations'' (aka "Pearl Harbor [[In Space]]"), but otherwise, the only time there's significant time lag for communicating across interstellar distances is the human steps relaying transmitted messages to/from the comm system and the people ultimately at either end of the line.

* Elizabeth Moon's ''[[Vatta's War]]'' series featured the operation of these {{spoiler|as well as the sudden non-operation of them}} as a major plot point. Notably, interstellar FTL comm is possible, but not local FTL comm, due to the ansibles being full-scale space stations. {{spoiler|At least at first.}}

* FTL communication is possible in ''[[Empire From the Ashes]]'' but very cumbersome, not available in sub-lightspeed craft and requiring exotic synthetic materials that starships aren't equipped to make. The mutineers sabotaged Dahak's and stole the only spares, so Dahak was forced to throw together a mundane lightspeed device instead in his attempts to phone home. {{spoiler|The lack of an ansible is one of the Achuultani's greatest disadvantages, forcing them to slowly advance through a system of preplanned rendezvous points and delaying reports back to their homeworld by centuries.}}

* The popular ''[[Star Trek]]'' [[Expanded Universe]] novel ''Spock's World'' by Diane Duane tells the history of the planet Vulcan, and points out that since Vulcans are [[Psychic Powers|psychic]] to varying extents and telepathy is assumed to be instantaneous, telepathy was their first subspace ansible. The limiting factor is that only a small minority of Vulcans are strong enough telepaths for this to be practical.

** In ''Infinity's Prism'', there's a [[Star Trek: Voyager]] story set in an alternate timeline where ''Voyager'' didn't manage to cross Borg space at the end of season 3, and instead ends up building a new Federation analogue in the delta quadrant. The holographic Doctor becomes a distributed AI with one node sent back to the Vidiians to cure the Phage. That node's updates via subspace take a day (each way, I think) to make the trip to the Doctor's central processing core located near Borg space.

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== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* In ''[[Macross Frontier]]'', the Vajra are capable of interstellar communication via their {{spoiler|[[Hive Mind]] link, which uses symbiotic, fold quartz-carrying bacteria in their entrails to link the whole species together}} instantaneously across the galaxy, without any sort of fold interference or delay. In fact, abusing this {{spoiler|galactic overmind to link up the entire galaxy whether it wants to or not (humanity included) is the major goal of the [[Big Bad]].}}

* The SolarNet in ''[[Cowboy Bebop]]''.

* The ability of the Emilys from [[Soukou no Strain]]. {{spoiler|Which led to them being [[Nightmare Fuel|cranially bisected alive]] by human scientist to obtain it. Being [[Hive Mind]], they share the pain as well...}}

* Galaxy Network in [[Starship Operators]].

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* In ''Hellspark'' by [[Janet Kagan]], there is FTL travel but no FTL communication. Messages have to be physically transported, and there are severe penalties for interfering with a ship carrying mail. Expeditions planning to spend time away from the regularly-travelled routes may take unmanned message drones, but these are expensive and hard to replace, and are kept in reserve for emergencies.

* In [[Timothy Zahn]]'s ''[[The Conquerors Trilogy]]'', there are two possible FTL speeds for ships allowed by physics, but faster-than-light communications are impossible.

* [[L. Ron Hubbard]]'s ''[[Battlefield Earth]]'' features the Psychlo Empire, a civilization linked by the miracle of teleportation. Here's the thing, though - the rules of teleportation make opening two "links" to the same planet [[Teleporter Accident|dangerous]], so the Psychlos set up a strict schedule of when their worlds can link up with the capital. This means that the disparate worlds of the empire have to function on their own for a year or more, until they reach the hours-long window to exchange communications and supplies and personnel. Aside from the inherent problems with this scenario, this means that once the protagonist bombs the Psychlo homeworld into a new sun, there's no way for the rest of the empire to know about this until they try to open a teleport link to it and instead get a facefull of atomic fire.

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* The time taken for messages to reach to the other recipient is practically the entire point of ''[[Voices of a Distant Star]]''. There ''is'' [[FTL Travel]] in ''Hoshi no Koe''.

** There's also, briefly noted, some form of subspace communication. But it's only there for irony -- a newspaper shown for a moment has a report on the next generation of starships, the ones built ''after'' Mikako's fleet leaves. The new ships will have this form of FTL communication; the fleet Mikako is in, however, does not.

*** And, to make the irony even more cruel, -- Noboru is a comms officer on one of these new ships.

* Communication across large distances is virtually impossible in the ''[[Super Dimension Fortress Macross]]'' universe; it is actually a plot point in ''[[Macross Frontier]]'', where even relay buoys must contend with "fold interference" that delay or disable communication entirely. However, the [[Neglectful Precursors|Protoculture]] and the Vajra have their ways around that (see above.)

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== [[Video Games]] ==

* ''[[Halo]]''. All messages are carried on ships that travel between planets. Described as the futurisitc Pony Express.

** This is more a UNSC problem though as the Forerunner definitely had FTL communications (it's unclear if the Covenant have this technology or not). Some scenes also suggest that the UNSC has at least "short" range FTL sensors as for instance they seem able to detect ships incoming at FTL speed somehow. It's also notable that their never seems to be any delay in communications even over large distances inside systems.

** In the books it's shown that they'll send probes into slipstream, which will then scan for anything traveling FTL before returning to regular space, and then transmit the data back.

** The book ''Contact: Harvest'' has a Kig-Yar (Jackal) [[Privateer]] ship find the human colony of Harvest. All Covenant ships are equipped with a [[Precursors|Forerunner]] device known as a "luminary", which scans for Forerunner energy signatures (and other factors) and relays the data back to High Charity. Tampering with luminaries is forbidden under the pain of death (not the least reason being that they're Forerunner relics and are, thus, holy). The Kig-Yar attempt to do just that in order to prevent their luminary from letting the Covenant know about the discovery. They fail. The rest is history.