**>> SPYNET BULLETIN
 **>> EARTHDATE 95.01.08
 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE

 **>> Compiled by Hazed plus a team of specialist newsdroids
 **>> <SEND HAZED> your news and gossip and get paid good groats!


 **>> BY POPULAR DEMAND

Many, many moons ago (or were they very small planets?) a player
requested that a new feature be put into the game. At last, his waiting
is over, the request has been granted.

The feature is a variant on the <C PRICE commodity> command. The old
command lists the price for the named commodity on all planets. And
that's an awful lot of planets at the moment, so it causes information
overload. Now you have an alterntive: use the command <C PRICE commodity
planet> and you will get the price for the goods on just one planet. The
command works anywhere, and is available for Merchants and above.


 **>> FACTORY LIFE EXTENDED

Many, many small planets ago, factories used to stay operational even
after the owner left the game. For technical reasons, this facility was
taken out and to compensate factory production was increased.

Technial things have changed now, so Bella will be putting this feature
back, in a modified form. Factories will keep running after you leave
for as long as you have been on the game, up to a maximum of 360 mins
(six hours). Unlike the old version, you don't have to use a command to
set your factory to make it hang around in your absence; all factories
will do this automatically. Just make sure before you log off that you
have enough inputs in your warehouse to keep the factory going for long
enough.

Because factories will be running for far longer, the Stock on Hand will
now keep building up until there are 150 tons, twice as many as at
present, before flushing and sending the accumulated output to the set
destination. If you wish to deliver the goods before 150 tons have
rolled off the production line, use the <CLEAR> command to force a
delivery.

These changes to factories will be put in early next week.

The extended life of a factory will make pipelines far more useful.
Instead of having goods delivered to your warehouse, or directly to the
exchange, you can pipeline them to another factory - either another
factory that you own, or someone else's factory. Goods pipelined to a
factory are added to the inputs, so you do not always have to build a
factory on a planet which supplies the raw materials you need, you can
instead set up another factory elsewhere to provide the necessary raw
materials.


 **>> COMING SOON...

Bella is putting the finishing touches to the code that will make your
spyrings actually do something. This will go into the game in about ten
days, and we will give you full details in next week's news.


 **>> FEDTERM NEWS

Some of you may have seen the furore resulting from Compuserve's
announcement that royalties are payable by developers using their GIF
format for certain programs. Since, although it does not directly use
the GIF format, FedTerm relies heavily on a utility which converts from
GIF format to its own format, we have decided to withdraw the converter
program and will no longer be supporting FedTerm in its existing form.

We are currently developing a Windows version of the Fed front-end
program called WinniPeg 4, and plan to release the program for open
beta-test at the beginning of February. WinniPeg 95 (1st quarter) will
use Windows native BMP graphics format (and despite all their faults, it
is highly unlikely Microsoft will ever want to charge developers for
using BMP).

WinniPeg 95 (August) will need Windows 3.1 or later to run. For the
initial beta-testing, it will only be available to our GEnie players;
later releases will allow Delphi and Cris players to also use the
software.

We will bring you more details about the features of WinniPeg 96 in a
later news bulletin.

As the name suggests, the new program is being written by Pegasus, who
wrote the very first Federation terminal program. PegTerm was a
Commodore 64 program, dating back to the days when Federation ran on a
network that could only be used by C64s.

Our original plan was that Bella would write the Windows version of
FedTerm, but she has been much too busy with the Senate and Emperor
code, and other projects (see below).


 **>> INTERACTIVE BROADCASTING LIVES!

What is Interactive Broadcasting, you ask? That's a very good question,
we reply, and the answer is: Interactive Broadcasting Ltd is the new
name for the Federation Partnership. You will notice all references to
the Federation Partnership being changed to refer to Interactive
Broadcasting Ltd as we tidy things up.

Along with the new company will come some new products. We have two new
multi-player games going into beta-test in early February: Barberossa is
a strategy wargame of the German invasion of Russia in 1941; and
Armoured Assault is an arcade-style game involving futuristic tanks on
mining asteroids.

All Interactive Broadcasting products will be accessed through a common
entry-point on the host systems. A new version of the switchboard (the
first menu you see when you enter Fed) will offer you a cybercafe,
called (of course!) Chez Diesel. From here you will select which game or
product you want to enter.

We will give you more details about these changes, and about our new
games, in a later news bulletin.


 **>> PLAYING FED ON A BUDGET

If you discover a hobby or pass-time that you enjoy, it is always
tempting to keep on doing it. Federation can be addicting! Not everyone
can afford to spend many hours a day playing Fed, but that need not stop
you enjoying the game.

There are some techniques you can use to help keep your playing time
down to a reasonable level, without spending more than you can afford,
and the game itself offers some tools to help.

The first thing you need to do is decide how much money you can afford
to spend on Fed each month, and translate that into hours. Then decide
how you want to allocate your hours over the month. You could decide to
play a little every day; or save your time to use up at weekends; or
blow it all in one mammoth session just after you get paid. But whatever
you decide, stick to it.

To help you make the most of your limited time in the game, decide
before you log on what you intend to do during your game session. Don't
waste your online time by dithering, trying to decide whether to trade,
or look for stat items, set up some new factories, or chat to your
friends. And make sure you have all the information you need to hand (or
equivalent), so you don't spend valuable online time trying to find the
maps you needs for your puzzle attempt.

Once you are in the game, there are two commands that will help you keep
track of your budgetted time. <TIME> gives you the date and time (in
eastern time) and tells you how long you have been in the game. <ALARM
minutes> will sound an alarm when the specified number of minutes are
up, so you can use this to remind yourself when it is time to leave.

If you cannot afford to spend a great deal of time in Fed, you may find
it takes you a long time to gain a promotion - while other players are
zooming ahead of you. That doesn't matter. Fed is not a race. What
counts is that you enjoy your time in the game.


 **>> SEX AND DEATH

Poor Captain Jake had a rough time when he got picked up by the wrong
woman. The very strange, very dangerous, very homicidal Tellurani
started to chat him up, and lured him to her planet Citadel, where she
seduced the young innocent Captain and gave him (so she said) the time
of his life.

Unfortunately for Jake, Big Brother Tellurian wasn't too happy at his
sister's dalliance with the Poor Person. And rather than taking his
displeasure out on his wayward sister, he decided to punish Jake for the
incident. He chased him around space and killed him. To make matters
worse, the lady in question also joined the fight and took a few shots
at poor Jake!

The moral of the story? Don't get involved with the ne Galdur clan -
even the sexy ones!


 **>> WHAT'S IN A MOOD? 
      [Political Editorial by our special correspondent] 
 
What's in a mood, indeed. Many have been the enjoyable, zany moods in
Fed over the years, but recently, one mood in particular has appeared
that has sent the political-droids on a mission from our Dear, Beloved
Editorix [Whirr... beep!... not really... blorp!... she made us do it
under threat of turning us into Laura Ashley Designer Droids!...
whirr... click!]
 
Anyway, the mood in question belongs to Senator Marcia. What is it, you
might ask? Why, "Empereuse." Could it be, that Marcia has decided to
toss her /l/e/a/t/h/e/r/ hat into the ring of an already crowded field
of Senators seeking to keep the Galaxy under the yoke of oppression?
Armed with this rumour, this droid headed off to see what sort of dirt
could be dug up on this revelation. 
 
Last night, my arduous task was finally rewarded. While disguised as a
loo-attendant-droid, I was privvy to a private meeting on Roma between
Marcia, Cicero and Page. Cicero asked Marcia about her mood, and did it
mean that she indeed was going for the Imperial Gold? She smiled one of
her winningest smiles and said that while it wasn't official yet, enough
people knew. This brought a round of cheers and cries of bravo, followed
by a toast to the Senator. 
 
Now this begs another question to be answered: If Marcia is indeed
running for Empereuse, from where does she plan to draw her support? One
of her husbands is Duke Zagmar of Valaria, and he would most assuredly
vote for his own wife. But what about Nightstalker? For many, many
months, he's been rumoured to be firmly in Topper's camp. But could it
be that Topper's star has waned? Could Nightstalker be looking for a way
out of his agreement to vote for Topper? If so, one shudders to imagine
the mood Topper might find himself in when the news is broken to him
that... *gasp* ... a woman has been deemed a better candidate than he!
Keep your eyes and ears primed for the roar that is sure to come from
this one! 


 **>> PLANETS AND DUCHIES

For just about the first time since the switch to NewFed, we have no new
planets to report. Constructiondroids the Galaxy over heave a huge sigh
of relief, as they are at last allowed a week off.

A look at the <SYSTEMS> list this morning showed 39 player-planets in
the game at the moment. Thirteen of these are Agricultural worlds. More
interestingly, six are leisure worlds, and of those six we are told that
five are building the facilities they need to tackle the devilish Duke
puzzle. The five possible Dukes are Jade, Neuromancer, Maxwell, Ciaran
and Chance.

There are currently six Dukes, and there are two free slots. That means
that if all five of the wannabe-Dukes make it, three of the current
Dukes will be bumped up to Senator. Which three will it be? None of the
Dukes that we spoke to would admit to wishing to promote, and perhaps
throw their hat into the ring for the Emperor elections. But if three of
them do promote before the first election is held, it will drastically
change the power structure of the Galaxy and may well mean that
candidates who have been quietly (or not-so-quietly) campaigning for
support will have to start over.

Of the current crop of Senators, it is hard to predict who has the most
support. If the elections had been held two years ago, Occy would have
been the obvious choice, since at that time he had the largest duchy
ever seen and commanded a great deal of support. Now? He's probably lost
his chance, having been supplanted by the newer Senators.

Tellurian? Although he has some fierce support, he also has some bitter
enemies, so it's unlikely he could pull it off.

Topper would have been a sure-fire bet if the election had been held six
months ago. But he too has been making enemies, and his abrasive style
has alienated a great many players and eroded his grass-roots support.
If Nightstalker can find an excuse to drop his support for Topper, then
he won't be in with a chance.

Amigan and Budwarp both say they support Barberousse, as does Sean
(although not so definitely) but there are doubts about whether he is
strong enough to sit on the Imperial throne. Besides, we have a sneaking
suspicion that Sean may hanker after the supreme position himself.

If Marcia really is declaring herself a candidate, as our political
correspondent seems to think she is, she may well be able to scoop up
the votes as a compromise candidate. She has some fiercely loyal friends
in all strata of the game, and no real enemies. Tactical voting may
ensure that she'll get voted in by people who want to prevent their
enemies winning.

The Federation media offers its services to all prospective candidates.
We'll print your election manifestos, your promises, your smear
campaigns and your downright lies. It all makes good news!


 **>> SPYNET REVIEW

Once again, our data-collecting droid burped, and we missed grabbing the
details of any promotions yesterday. Apologies if your advancement
doesn't get noticed. We sincerely hope Steve did NOT get promoted
yesterday, since the malfunctioning droid has managed to ignore two of
his previous promotions!

The new Captains were Merkin (welcome back after a very long absence!),
Annabel (ditto), Drew, Dirkcrasher, Waldo, Clovis and Quetzal.

Chuckster, Chooser, Thomas, Annabel, Alice, Cooleo and Waldo reached
Adventurer or Adventureuse.

The Traders Guild admitted Thomas and Annabel.

Nightmare, Thomas and Cybnus made it to Merchant.

Ceinwein and Page were promoted to Explorer.

Windman advanced his planet, Storm, to mining level and became a Thane.


 **>> 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.

The current Federation Party Hosts are: Mira, Redqueen, Caterpillar and
Lyrynna. Their function is to answer questions, help new players get
started, and make fun things happen.

In the event of a problem or question, you can:

 * talk to Hazed or one of the Party Hosts in the game

 * <SEND> a message to Hazed

 * send mail on your host system to the Federation team:
   on GEnie, mail FEDII.2 or use the option on the main Fed page
   on Delphi, mail FED2 or use the option on the main Fed page
   on Cris, mail FEDERATION2


 **>> BULLETIN ENDS