It's not "communication lag times", it's "all the distance failures"
Subspace communication is a Star Trek thing, it's real-time FTL infinite distance, fine. That's how Kirk was able to call Scotty, on his civilian cellphone, from Khronos (which is ~25 light-minutes from Earth)... and then, nobody was able to call Earth from the moon, and nobody on Earth could SEE the moon, but New Vulcan was totally reachable.
It has nothing to do with "lag time" and everything to do with "inconsistency of range".
Like, for example: I thought it was much stranger that starships can park right next to the homeworlds of major civilizations and go unnoticed/unchallenged for any length of time. ... that.
Less than 20 light-minutes from Khronos is *the far edge of the neutral zone*. That same spot is less than 5 minutes at Warp 1 from Earth, making it less than 5 light-minutes from Earth.
(no subject)
Date: 2013-05-26 08:27 pm (UTC)Subspace communication is a Star Trek thing, it's real-time FTL infinite distance, fine. That's how Kirk was able to call Scotty, on his civilian cellphone, from Khronos (which is ~25 light-minutes from Earth)... and then, nobody was able to call Earth from the moon, and nobody on Earth could SEE the moon, but New Vulcan was totally reachable.
It has nothing to do with "lag time" and everything to do with "inconsistency of range".
Like, for example:
I thought it was much stranger that starships can park right next to the homeworlds of major civilizations and go unnoticed/unchallenged for any length of time.
... that.
Less than 20 light-minutes from Khronos is *the far edge of the neutral zone*. That same spot is less than 5 minutes at Warp 1 from Earth, making it less than 5 light-minutes from Earth.