**>> SPYNET BULLETIN **>> EARTHDATE 91.10.27 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE **>> IMPORTANT - NEW FCC RULES COULD INCREASE NETWORKING COSTS The FCC has proposed changes to the law which could drastically increase the costs for services like GEnie. We urge you to write letters of protest to the FCC, asking them to rethink their decisions. GEnie has posted a banner giving full details, and telling you who to write to and what you should say. It is one of the banners you see at log-on. You can look at these banners any time by going to page 100. The information has also been posted in the MPGames BBS, Category 1, Topic 22. Please, please, go and read about this, and write some letters. It is very important. **>> MEGA-CHANGES TO GALACTIC ECONOMY The markets have been rather flat over the last few months, and traders have found it hard to make huge profits. One of the reason has been the vast stocks of goods built up by planet owners - far more than they could ever use themselves or sell to other planets. When the Galactic Administration discovered the extent of their hoarding, they planned to leak the information to the enraged populaces, causing widespread rioting which would wipe out the excess stocks. But planet owners were furious at this plan, wishing to have time to reduce their stockpiles to sensible levels themselves - despite the fact that the huge piles of goods in their warehouses had been in storage so long they were rotting, rusting and breaking down! As a compromise, Our Illustrious Leader has decreed that when the game fires up, it will check the levels of all stocks. Any stockpiles over 10,000 tons will be reduced to 10K. However, while the game is running, planet owners can go over the 10K limit, so long as they dispose of it before the reset. In addition, Bella (as de facto ruler of the Solar System planets, as well as the power behind the throne of the Galactic Administration) has put a halt to all native production in Sol, and banned the building of new factories on Sol planets. Rotation of planets will start as from tomorrow (Monday). Avalon will go back into the game for a day, to give you a chance to dispose of any factories on the planet. It is with great regret and sorrow, and with a howl of anguish, that we have to announce that Scratchwood will be removed from the heavens. Hazed herself, her eyes brimming with tears, will press the button that nukes her beloved planet and reduces it to radioactive slag. This will happen tomorrow, so if you have any factories on Scratchwood, best flog them off now before they go up in flames! Farewell, Scratchwood. Goodbye, Albert Ross. We'll miss you! [Sob] **>> GALACTIC REVENUE NEW RULES There's been a major shake-up at the Galactic Revenue offices, and the tax rules have been made a lot simpler. They were previously so convoluted that even the man who thought them up didn't understand them! The new rules apply to money given by one player to another, and are as follows: Sums under 5,000 groats are tax-free. Sums between 5K and 1 meg are taxed at the rate for the planet the transaction takes place on. The whole amount is taxed. For sums over 1 meg, the portion below 1 meg is taxed at the current rate, and the portion over 1 meg at twice the rate. Planet owners can give money to other players tax-free on their own planets. They can also set the tax rate for their planet using , where % is between zero and 30. The Solar System tax rate will remain at 10%. If you want to give a large sum of money, it would be worth making arrangements for a planet-owner to reduce the tax rate for you! The limit of 2 meg per transaction remains for lower ranks, however Squires and above can now give away up to 5 meg at a time. **>> TRANSPORTATION CHANGES The number of trader points awarded for successfully completing a job given by another player has been increased to 8. To compensate, the rating required for promotion to Trader will be increased from 1400 to 1800. The change will take effect from next Monday, so anyone currently jobbing has a week to get their promotion before the requirements increase. The number needed for Adventurer will remain unchanged at 600. **>> VAGUENESS ON THE HORIZON Following discussions with planet ownerss, Bella is looking at ways to make Transportation (the outfit that offers jobs) more interactive. Her ideas are all a bit vague and woolly at the moment, but would include players being able to direct the output of their factories or planets into jobs which would be offered by Transportation. They would also be able to specify whether the goods would be delivered to a warehouse or sold direct to the exchange. We'll report on this as soon as Bella become firm and decisive. Oh look, the moon has just turned blue! And there's a pig orbitting it! **>> PHEW! Records show that at times recently there were as many as 100 factories running at once! No wonder Our Illustrious Leader was getting paranoid and wanted to cut down on numbers. Bella is considering increasing the number of factories owned by a company to 15, but only allowing 10 of them to run at one time. Which ones that would be would depend on which planets were rotated in at the time. **>> CLARIFICATIONS We've received a few queries about player planets recently. To clear up any confusion, there is absolutely no safety from attack at Interstellar Links, unless the owner of the system has decreed that the location be a peaceful zone (by setting the P flag). Accumulated time on a planet's clock counts when any player enters the system, including the link area. **>> FROM THE TYPO FILE As you know, players can leave messages to Bella by using the TYPO command. As well as bug reports, people often use it to ask questions or make general comments and suggestions. From time to time, Bella passes the best comments on to the News team, and we print them. This batch contains a record number of grumbles and wails about Zippy, Occy's planet. You may remember when it first appeared, it was riddled with errors, which left many players completely lost, stranded, and reduced to tears. Some of the comments about Zippy were: the trade command on zippy gives the clothing message typing south gives the offer command syntax message I was in space and wound up in what I thought was a space maze, but proved to be location on occy's planet... now I'm back on a blue star...????what I don't think there is a way out of the system. You can go from space to a road on the planet in one move. And all the error messages are bizarre. Not to mention the many many grammatical errors. Can we build an interplanetary bypass there instead? Given the abysmal state of Occy's planet, maybe you should put in a way to let people walk round their planets before they go live... I am very sorry for the grief that I caused you! (This one from Occy herself) We don't want to put anyone off visiting Zippy, we understand that things are much saner on the planet now! There's now a facility for planet builders to run their files through a checker, which highlights some of the problems for them before the planets go live. More general comments in the typo file: Spynet Report: Someone needs to keep Galauriel and Spiff out of CD's - - getting way 2 hot in here!!! If you touch the diamond without enough intel and aren't on venus, your ship is left on the origanal planet! (This has now been fixed, by the way) bella I wish to own two ships and its not possible so in your magnifiscrent abilities can you fix that (What's he going to do, clone himself so he can fly two spaceships simultaneously? **>> SPOTLIGHT ON INVERSITY Sadly, once again this item is going to have to be held over to next week. Last week's excuse was lack of time; this week, the excuse is that this edition is already bulging at the seams with an excess of news! Sorry, Oddball. Remember, patience is a virtue! **>> SNIPPETS (BITS THAT DON'T DESERVE A HEADLINE ALL TO THEMSELVES) Mood of the Week award goes to Aackverdi, for his "Searching for a decent mood, Aackverdi is here". Talking of Aackverdi, we were wondering what was the derivation of his somewhat unusual name. He said he wasn't sure, but after a few drinks he admitted that "Aack" was a sound he made when something wasn't very nice. Since "verdi" means green, we conclude that his name means "Green unpleasantness". So now you know! Freya is continuing to make us all chuckle with her Fed cartoons. At the time of writing, their are 3 available in the Fed Library, with the fourth one imminent. They are available in MacPaint or GIF formats, and well worth a download. The Tuesday night RTCs in the MPGRT area are continuing, with this week's subject being "Running a Planet". Merkin will be your host. The RTC starts at 10.00 Eastern time. Oddball has started a sort of "Guinness Book of Records" for Fed (perhaps we should call it the "DOP Book of Records"), in Topic 3 Cat 14 of the BBS. It lists the longest, greatest, largest, noisiest, etc etc. He's missed a few: Most obnoxious player ever - Cryptosporidium, and Sexiest being in the history of the universe - Hazed. **>> GOSSIP Our report from Deep Throat, our undercover gossip-agent, caused quite a stir in Fed Data Space. Almost as soon as last week's edition of the news hit the streets, denials were being flung about! In particular, we received a long, long letter from a woman who wishes to remain anonymous, representing several organisations that wish to remain anonymous. Here's some of what she had to say: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The raunchy red-head, Tal, was indeed murdered in a henious and horrifying manner. We understand she was accosted by one Guido the violin player and subsequently taken to the martian ruins where she suffered a horrifying death after being thrown to the bottom of a radioactive pool of slime. We are under the impression that this pool was chosen because of its acidic qualities, and the evidence would be dissolved in a matter of weeks. Guido, of course, was paid -handsomly- for his services in this instance, by a name we are not at liberty to mention. We have learned that this fellow has hired Guido to do his "dirty work" on more than one instance, preferring to rid himself of his enemies without sullying his hands. The brief return of Tal was a plot by her friends and supporters to shock the murderer into an admission of guilt. They felt that seeing her return would so horrify him that he would be overcome with guilt and admit his henious crime. This, however, was not to be, as he is too sly and crafty to ever admit it. The hologram of Tal needs to undergo some adjustments before it may be used again, as the only words the hologram could utter was "Hi" and "I'm not dead". Rather obvious, if you ask us. We have learned from Dr. S.P. Ock that if Tal's bones are recovered in time she may once again be cloned into her original state, although we have no doubt that her murderer (one of them anyway) is indeed using a clone of Tal for his own convenience. We think it is disgusting, to say the least, and would advise this fellow to buy a blow up doll instead. With regards to Freya's vow of silence. She lied to your Deep Throat investigator (very cunning is that Freya) who isn't anywhere near as fastidious and nosy as we are, because only we know the truth about her vow of silence. Freya took a vow of silence, because she learned the true nature of the murders of Tal and Trippin and she didn't want to be next. She has also sold herself into indentured servitude to keep from being the next one found at the bottom of the toxic pit. Yes, we said indentured servitude, as she must spend the better part of each day (the times when she doesn't answer to comm messages) in a disgusting and very compromising position. We think it is revolting that she doesn't complain in the least regarding her position but has been heard to scream "more, more." We also have discovered information on Explorers Krell, Occy, Otoole and Merkin, but we must insist on payment of 1 million imperial groats before we reveal this interesting news. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We have the 1 meg here, in used bills, in an unmarked envelope. If this anonymous woman would care to contact us again, we will make arrangements to hand over the cash in return for the information. Despite this set-back, we have persuaded Deep Throat to send us another report: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ OK folks. Fine! I was wrong about Freya's vow of silence. I need your help! I need suggestions... rumors.... stories... lies... whatever it takes to get to the bottom of this. If you have suggestions please post them on the boards. (Oh, and notice I didn't say I was wrong about Oddball) * * * The truth about the rotating planets... Looks like everyone fell for the STORIES about why the planets have to rotate in and out of Fed space. Hay... even I has tricked for a while but your fearless (not to be confused with FEAR) reporter (gossiper) has discovered the truth (via SpyBeams). Bella has been working on a programming change to allow her to extract large sums of groats from everyones' bank accounts and give the groats to other players in return for... yes, you guessed it... "personal" favors towards her. But before she could complete this change she needed more memory so this is what she did... she nuked warehouses AND she made planets vanish. All for her personal greed and gain! Hmph! What a tart! Be aware and watch as your bank balances mysteriously vanish whenever Bella is online. * * * Looks like someone has a new toy in Fed space... That's right, Kazilumb has found... hold onto your pilot seats... TBRB (the big red button). And the worse part of it all is TBRB is connected to twin lasers, missiles and his garbage disposal. Be aware Fellow Feders... for this evil, vile dude be strutting about the stars... watching, waiting, (and locking his weapons onto) perhaps YOU. It just isn't safe out there anymore! * * * That's all for now... so please... leave your clues and rumors posted on the boards for Deep Throat to investigate. **>> PROMOTIONS NEWS We've got quite a batch of promotions to report on this week. Keep on telling us when you advance, please! Galt made Adventurer, and once again sent in a list of 37 names she wishes to thank for help. They include such nice people as Spiff, Aackverdi, Merkin, Elex and Treato. Saralyn also made Adventurer. Well done! Cq and Kyle became Traders. At last they can turn for ever! Congratulations to Fatal, who was promoted to Merchant. Helio make JP, and Spiff and Gandolf are the two newest Explorers. **>>CONTACTS The following information will appear at the end of every News Bulletin, so you don't have to read it if you already know it. In the event of a problem or question, you can: * talk to Hazed, Bella or Clem in the game * leave a message in the game log * send mail with the Federation Feedback option from the main menu You can order a copy of the unexpurgated printed Idiot's Guide to Federation by typing ORDER at any GEnie menu. Cost - a mere $12.95. Federation has several category in the new MPGames RT. To get there, type M1045,1 from any menu prompt and SET category 13 (for information, instructions, questions and answers) or 14 (for general chat and discussions). The Federation Leader in the bulletin board is Occy (Mail ID: OCPAC). The MPGames RT also has a Federation library in the files area, Library 5. Library 18 holds the Federation News Archives. **>> BULLETIN ENDS