@Syd: It's the beloved sound of a fax/telephony modem dialing in :D

Why Sombra wasn't allowed to stick around

edited 14th Jan '13 9:01:48 AM by AceOfScarabs

@ Ace: My old dial-up modem regularly sounded like it was horking kilobytes, but it never sounded that bad. O_O

A while back, I thought up an internet equivalent that fits Equestria's tech level. Basically, take a bureau of index cards, like the card catalogues that libraries used to keep track of all their books (back before those systems were computerized). There are multiple, identical card catalogues like this, all across Equestria. They're magically synchronized, so that if you change the text on one card, the text on the corresponding cards in every catalogue changes simultaneously.

Individual catalogues would probably be expensive enough that very few individuals would own them—instead, you'd find them in schools and public libraries.

Use a database management spell to collect information from cards and books in a library and broadcast/sync it cloud style to a bunch of projection tablets (stone slabs, lol), blackboards, and magic mirrors/scrying crystals. Use enchanted mailboxes to accept literal postings into this system. The backend can be managed by a group or by the Royal Library, while everypony can own an affordable tablet :V

Said magic mirror can also become a videophone with a 2-way scrying spell and voice projection magic.

edited 14th Jan '13 9:12:03 AM by AceOfScarabs

Why wouldn't ponies invent the computer?

They already have magic-fueled automatic machinery and vacuum-tube arcade games, microelectronic processors are just a few tech tree branches up.

edited 14th Jan '13 9:23:08 AM by AceOfScarabs

Goodnight, Ace.

Goodnight Ace.

I still remember the noise that my computer made whenever I was trying to connect to the internet. I think you all remember the dial-up noise?

I see Rainbow Dash Presents is great as always. I take it the Jokermort stuff wasn't in the original story.

Librarian: Of course. My old workplace used to have a 56k for the debit and credit card machine too (and they didn't replace it until after I left to work elsewhere, which was over 7 years later). There's no way I'll ever forget that noise.

So for the people who read My Little Dashie, what is it actually like? How does it compare to the video?

I noticed a few grammar problems and whatnot, but it was a pretty good WAFF fic.

Story: Haven't been able to watch the video, but as for the fic itself... to summarize what I said a ways back, the protagonist is very lightly characterized to the point where I felt I never really got to know him. A lot of the content focuses more on Dashie, who regrows up to more of a cross of Applejack and Fluttershy in terms of personality than the Dashie we all know (which honestly feels kind of creepy). In the end, it feels more like "some random guy standing in for the reader meets the author's filly OC and they have an overly idealized father-daughter relationship."

So who wants my cold? Anyone? C'moooon.

Something with snow.

I like it as much as everyone else does

@Meta: I actually had a similar idea to that, although it was less index cards and more a set of enchanted books where anything entered in one of them appears in all the books that are synced. So characters could use them as information repositories, or as a way to communicate, chat-room style.

Also, nobody cared to guess why this picture is a unique specimen on Derpibooru?

You know what's something I find kind of weird? How few artists seem to be able to draw Chrysalis's teeth in a way I like. They always come off as either Buck Teeth or scary monster fangs. That's fine when you're going for those looks for the sake of the picture, but as often as not, it seems purely accidental.

I meant in terms of the events in the story.

Enough studying for today. I'm fried.

Story: As in a summary list of all the things that happen? Or something else? In the first case, you'd be better off either reading the fic or visiting the trope page than having someone try to lay it all out here.

By the way, it'd be a good idea to disable Java in your browser if for some reason you haven't done so already.

For everyone, or just for a certain person on the forum?