Otaku have been either created by the Deep Resonance or by an AI. So it would be conceivable that nuanced biofeedback can change the brain to create the Otaku abilities. With technomancers and certainly technocritters this becomes more difficult, but it's still possible to think that it's some naturally occurring isolated genetic trait to receive and manipulate matrix signals and the rest is learning to use it. (The case for a genetic component is made in Augmentation p. 78-79, twin studies and all.) It would probably be a biological system that has some functionality in all individuals of a species but only in techno*-individuals is a variant present that enables interaction with the matrix. Other animal species just happen to have the same trait, probably most of those animals affected that are also exposed to matrix signals can't actually cope with it, but then you have the odd specimen with higher than normal intelligence and you get these animal hackers. It's certainly a stretch but also not inconceivable assuming some artistic licence, which is necessary to make the whole concept work in the first place.

Now, if technomancy was an adaptive trait, we would need some kind of component-level genetic change and a semi-directed one, because it's a complex trait (receiving and manipulating matrix signals) that has pretty much sprung up at the same time and even across species boundaries in response to a new phenomenon. Here a mana-induced genetic change would actually present itself as a likely solution. And since technomancy and magical ability are mutually exclusive, I could certainly think of the former as some kind of awakened trait that failed to properly express especially if it was the signals of the technosphere that somehow disturbed it's development. Now that is not to say, that technomancy is itself a magical ability. I would find it difficult to actually introduce such an explanation at this point. Because if technomancers were manipulating mana, we should have heard about that by now. Many of them will have been closely assensed while using their abilities.

But in the end we are probably dealing with the shifting vision of how technomancy (and otaku abilities before that) works. So the tidbits we are presented could actually refer to different explanations and I would not expect them to all work together. Just one more example, System Failure describes the case of Alexandra Paris who obviously exhibits technomancer abilities pretty early on, 2065 or something, and she was connected to the matrix during the Crash 2.0 as with other cases of AIPS. So, I think the early explanation for the occurrence of technomancers was that they were exposed to biofeedback from the crashed matrix, so we are back to Otaku-like brain rewiring. Emergence basically says so. But how then do children who never experienced the crash and never get a DNI develop these abilities? The germline of their parents was also "rewired"? No, I think at that point they just went with well it's a convergent phenomenon: evolution, adaption, something, so maybe it's not even a singular explanation behind every case of technomancy.

No, I am pointing out that nobody ever claimed that no Otaku were created by AIs, therefore your show of disproving this "theory" is _slightly_ disingenuous...

This is correct. The novel Technobabel was written almost entirely separately from any Deus plot, which wasn't even really a Deus plot at the time. Dave Hyatt and Brian Schoner developed Renraku Arcology: Shutdown separate from Technobabel, though there was material in Technobabel that made some convenient links. We used to take advantage of those happy coincidences a lot with the plot books. After RA:S, there was initially no plan for a continuation of the Deus plot. That doesn't mean it wasn't going to happen, just that there was no development/writing work to that effect. I pitched Brainscan out of the blue; I wasn't even a Shadowrun freelancer at the time, but I knew Dave Hyatt from our work together on Shadowland.org and we occasionally chatted there about Deus and the Arcology plot line. I wrote up some notes for a continuation of the Deus plot line and sent them to Dave. He liked them and put me in contact with Mike Mulvihill, who thought it was a great idea to continue the storyline, and so I got my first SR writing gig.



Fact: the major AI were capable of creating otaku, to some degree. Mirage and Deus could. Morgan/Megaera probably could have also, but she wasn't altogether there enough to manage it.

Still, Deus was not the Deep Resonance and his efforts to create otaku were not as perfect as the otaku that claimed to get their gifts from the Deep Resonance. Deus was painfully aware of this fact, since his most prized Whites were recruited from Deep Resonance-spawned otaku, not from the ones he created in SCIRE. It's not clear whether Deus or Mirage truly knew what the Deep Resonance was, but if they did, they did not feel the need to share that with anyone. Deus did desperately want to be something more, though, which led to the events in System Failure. It is possible that if Deus had succeeded, he would have become something similar to the Deep Resonance. It's even possible that Deus is currently an intrinsic part of the new Matrix and no one realizes it.

I don't really know what conversations were taking place behind the scenes in SR4's early development. A good chunk of the freelancer pool was kept in the dark then, including myself. I do know that System Failure didn't make any attempt to move away from any plot elements from RA:S or Brainscan; I was basically given the job of wrapping up the trilogy of the Deus plotline in System Failure, which I did (though I always had ideas in the back of my mind about how it could have continued... ). Thematically, SR4's technomancers were designed as a fresh start on the idea of otaku, so I wouldn't draw too many conclusions linking SR4's technomancers to events before the release of SR4. I remember I originally had a different epilogue written for the otaku/AI plot in System Failure and then one day I got the orders to rewrite it to introduce these new technomancers and smaller AI, which I had known very little about at that point. That became the "Hello World" section on pages 123-126 of System Failure.

As an unofficial aside, I always considered the Deep Resonance to be the digital equivalent of the Gaiasphere. Something between a being and a force. Just like there are plenty of shaman who claim to converse with Gaia, there were plenty of otaku who claimed to converse with the Deep Resonance. And then there were hermetics who understood the mechanics of the Gaiasphere but didn't attribute any intelligent personality to it, and there were otaku who did the same with the Deep Resonance.

The whole Gaiasphere conversation was something Peter Taylor and I chatted about later when we worked on Ghost Cartels, because the antagonists in Ghost Cartels fully believed they were getting their orders from Gaia, whether or not that was actually the case. Though we were always amused by the idea that the planet itself could be the ultimate antagonist in a plot line and had decided it was just fed up with metahumanity and all its BS.

Awesome Information, Demonseed Elite... Thanks for sharing it.

Technocritters can be explained by this just as easily. I'm not assuming that technomancers are created. I think that they are normal people who are more natually in tune with the mind of the Matrix. Animals also have minds, so I see it entirely possible that some species would be compatible with the matrix as well, or at least prone to it.

Now, as to what underlying similarities those animals have with each other and technomancers, I couldn't say. I doubt that it's ever been thought about too heavily.

The most dangerous animal of them all...Earth...

But thanks for the insight from behind the scenes. Very informative.

It makes sense that the Deep Resonance would be the consciousness of the entire Matrix. And if it was more powerful and better at making Otaku then the old God-like AIs then it would be a better deus ex machina and be able to break rules. So if the Deep Resonance wants to grow, I think it'd make sense it'd start to make bio-nodes to expand its influence, in an abstract sense.

Or maybe Gaia has found a way to tap in to the Matrix, so the Earth is the first awaken and emergent "being."

All kinds of fun flavors to go with. I'm going to have to make a Technoshaman that believes something like this. I can see a lot of role playing possibilities.

Wasn't there a Horror that was information based? As in merely talking about him was enough of a conduit for him to Mark you?


-k

Was the Dissonance around in SR3?

Did Deep Resonance and AI Otaku have to worry about Dissonance Otaku messing everything up?

Yes, they did. One theory at that time was that Deep Resonance was Mirage, and Dissonance was Deus.