CiaraI’ve been binge-listening to Lost Terminal podcast. I'm a fangirl now. It’s fiction, but not. It’s a podcast, but feels like a film or book. Beautifully written, beautifully voice-acted. A gripping, immersive hopepunk journey. I feel like I’m in the story, living on post-collapse Earth. It’s moving, funny, dramatic. It’s the clear-eyed, informed, hope-ridden social commentary I didn’t know I needed about AI, climate collapse, degrowth, technology, solarpunk & community.
A nice incidental milestone on the journey: I started at Episode One, broadcast in 2020. At the end of each episode, it referred you to their Twitter account. Later on, that was replaced by: ‘Follow us on Mastodon at @lostterminal'
It was on Mastodon that I first learnt about the Lost Terminal audio-drama. Thank you to @CowboyWho for recommending it.
In Lost Terminal’s post-collapse world, people greet each other by saying ‘Batteries and bars’. Like you'd say hi, hello, goodbye, safe home, see you soon. 'Batteries and bars', because they're important things to keep you safe because they keep you in touch with your community. ‘Batteries and bars.’ Maybe you need to hear it said in the context of the story for this to make sense, but I find that touching.
"A Silent Key is an expression from the early days of radio communication when Morse code was the only way to transmit, using a switch called a 'key' to communicate. In the global forum of pre-Internet Amateur Radio, friendships were made across the planet by anyone with a big enough antenna who could tap a message. When someone stops tapping their key with no warning, ending all contact, they become a silent key"
A moving term. Fedi-friends who disappear: silent keys.
https://www.spreaker.com/episode/16-5-i-think-i-have-another-sister--60537102
16.5 - I think I have another sister
📓 Episode transcript: https://www.patreon.com/posts/106920863 ❤️ If you like Lost Terminal and would like bonus episodes, extra podcasts and other perks
Michael ᚋᚔᚉᚆᚓᚐᚂ@CiaraNi Related: I was fascinated to learn that the war time listening stations were able to detect the operator's ‘hand’, a skilled listener could tell one operator from another. Like handwriting.
wibble@baoigheallain @CiaraNi My dad was one source and, when I was little, told many forgettable tales about his days in the huts and the 'hands' he communicated with.
I think we've still got his morse key somewhere. According to its markings, it remains the property of the War Department, but operators got very attached to them and seem to have smuggled them about, which might have helped in the hand detection, depending on the state of the springs.
@wibble @baoigheallain I love how personal Morse key operation seems to have been. The operator's way of tapping the keys being so individual that an expert could 'hear' it was theirs, like a voice. The operators getting so attached to them that they smuggled them about. That's a lovely memory from your dad.
Ole Wolf@wibble @baoigheallain @CiaraNi Fun fact: Thomas Edison proposed to his second by tapping in Morse code in her hand.