by CORIANDER NEUMANEIMANAYMANEEMAMANN, Alternate Reality News Service Urban Issues
Science fiction has predicted many wonderful things that science subsequently gave us. Communications networks based on satellites in geosynchronous orbit. Global climate change. Milk moustaches. Most often, though, science fiction has the predictive power of a lovelorn lemur. And, that's okay. We read science fiction to enjoy "what if?" scenarios involving beefy men with huge...ray guns saving scantily clad exobiologist fashion models from tentacly blobs of primary and secondary colours on a planet with seven moons.
Science fiction writers need to explain their futuristic scenarios, of course. What technological advancements occurred to make traveling to a planet with seven moons possible? What exotic new fabrics cover the most interesting bits of the exobiologist fashion model's flesh while still revealing so much? How do the tentacly blobs of primary and secondary colours survive in their alien environment?
Unfortunately, this information can often stop the action of a story dead for what reads like a science lesson from a disenchanted high school phys ed teacher. Worse, this first often is compounded by a second often: characters who explain these things to other characters who probably already know them. You wouldn't say, "Ralph, let me take the next five pages to explain to you how my fossil fuel burning combustion engine-driven four wheeled vehicle works," because you don't know anybody named Ralph. But, even if you did know somebody named Ralph, you wouldn't say it because you probably aren't consciously aware that you live in a work of prose fiction. But, even if you did know somebody named Ralph and were aware that you are a character in a work of prose fiction, you probably wouldn't say it because it's not polite in mixed company.
These passages often end up in an Info Dump.
"An Info Dump is a place where bad prose goes to...well, not die, exactly, but be removed from public discourse where it could scare small children and horses," stated Laurent Swishburne, curator of the East Lansing, Sri Lanka Info Dump. "And, raccoons. And, koala bears. And, fetid lemurs. We take all of the passages of background information that wise editors remove from stories before publication - or that not too bright editors didn't remove from published stories that are now out of print - and store them in a way that they will not numb any readers' senses in the future."
Over 60 per cent of the Info Dump is filled with explanations of how technologies function. Warp drives...stasis fields...left-handed nose trimmers - any future technology that may be necessary to explain the action in a story - or maintain good grooming - can be found there. Another 30 per cent of the Info Dump contains descriptions of personal and social relations in imagined worlds. Happy marriages...altruistic hedge fund managers...functional governments - these and other fictional scenarios can be found in the Info Dump. The remainder of the contents of the Info Dump are classified under the Protecting the Sensibilities of Small Children and Frigid Lemurs Act.
Individual sentences (ie: "After the invasion of the Puce Lectroids from Dimension Fred, eating frozen pudding on a stick would never be the same!") are kept in lead-lined boxes. "At first, we kept six sentences to a box," Swishburne told me. "Unfortunately, we found that the lines began to congregate into paragraphs, soon after which they began to multiply. Eventually, one of the boxes exploded, sending technobabble all over the place! After a thorough decontamination, we still sometimes find awkwardly stilted phrases in dimly lit corners of the building!"
I knew that.
Longer passages featuring multiple sentences are kept in stasis fields. (For example: "The introduction of the nuclear powered Skidoo had a deleterious effect on the red-breasted pigeon population of northern Florida. A bad one, too. As the bird's numbers dwindled, the diet of the Tribe of the Roundtree Retirement Facility and Keno Hall was impaired, and the elderly tribesmen had to find other sources of sustenance for their people.")
"We suck a lot of power out of the grid," Swishburne admitted. "And, yes, the stasis field would only hold out for about six hours if the power was interrupted by a hurricane...or a lover's sigh...or an asthmatic squirrel. Still, other than dry mouths and a compulsion to read Hemingway, a containment breach wouldn't affect the local population all that much..."
I knew that, too.
The Info Dump was originally supposed to be built in New York, but protests forced it out of the state. And, the country. And, the hemisphere. "Literary NIMBYism!" Swishburne snorted. Local residents were afraid that the stench of literary failure would drive down property values. Swishburne suggested that local residents didn't like the idea of writers moving into the area and driving down property values.
I knew that. From experience.
While we talked, I noticed that there was a laser rifle in a corner of Swishburne's office. When I asked what it was for, she responded, "Scavengers."
"Scavengers?"
"Writers often scavenge for useful phrases and ideas," Swishburne explained. "There is nothing sadder than writers poring over stasis fields in the light of the setting sun, desperately looking for something, anything that they might use to create a saleable story. Pretty, too. But, in a sad way."