How Much Do You Think Equestria has Advanced? · 5:05pm Aug 19th, 2015
'Cause I'm writing the next chapter right now, and that question is nagging at me. Currently, I'm trying to keep a balance between old and new. I mentioned in the old chapter that they have radios now, and I recently posted a thread asking if ponies would develop cars for mainstream use.
My problem is that I don't want to go too far. I don't want Applejack thrown into something similar to what we have today. Things like cell phones, modern TVs, widespread car use, and modern computers are all things I'm hesitant to add in, and I probably won't. Futuristic things like teleportation being the main mode of long-distance transportation are completely out of the question.
My question is... Does this seem fitting? I don't want Equestria to have advanced too far, but things obviously have to have changed. Are you alright with that? Have any suggestions?
Thanks.
Maybe go for a mix? Have maybe black&white telly, cars for only the rich, basically 1930s.
3331580 That's what I've been thinking. I imagine the show's Equestria to be like America in the late 1800s, so the 1930s make sense to me.
If long range teleportation is a possibility, what if it's done via a stargate sort of contraption?
As for the other stuff. I'm really not sure. I might go with a crystal version of DVDs so ponies can view some form of movies, although clarity might not be all that great. Phones could be stationary and cumbersome due to needing to be used by hooves, and look more like a switchboard sort of setup.
Hm...
Maybe try to add some elements that existed in the 1980s or early 1990s on Earth.
Electronics started to get attention in the 80s, and they improved even faster during the 90s; the Internet saw its earliest forms in the late 90s, even.
Well, go for what's funny/convenient. The show is so all over the place it barely matters. But as a rule of thumb, i don't think technology happen the way it does here. Cars or carlike thing exist (the floats) but it's not something that's really useful to ponies. I don't think day-to-day tech has evolved much beyond some extra convenience like maybe tv's.
Okay, advancing equestrian tech...
First off you have the philosophy of individual achievement vs deponyization stuff. Hence you do not get assembly lines in equestria, nor do you tend to get infrastructure. This influences what advances are made. You don't see cars (even with them able to make such) because they aren't going to litter the countryside with roads nor are they going to make the assembly lines to stamp those cars out.
Ponies also tend to be social and face to face. This also outs certain other things.
So that gives direction. As for speed, I tend to figure HALF what we advance for everything that is not counterindicated by what I said above, and full advancement for anything ponies would embrace, or something that can be passionately developed by a pony with the right cutie mark. So figure medical tech advances as normal and something like a television at half speed(doesn't require tremendous non-cutie mark infrastructure to do, is an entertainment medium, etc).
3331623
Well, if we want to get technical, the earliest framework for what we now know as the Internet started in the 60s.
Though tech wise, I would think something on a slightly smaller scale then what TLoK did for its 70 year time skip.
3331805 Well yeah, but that's the technical sense. I'm talking about the Internet as we know it, publicly. Up until the 1990s, the precursors to the Internet were a luxury largely limited to government usage, and to well-funded institutions.
For the general public to properly use that technology, it is likely that there would have been a lengthy process of implementing the new telecom upgrades all over the various areas that would start hosting the early Internet (upgrading the rest of the US afterwards probably wasn't the easiest of tasks to do). And then there needed to be an entirely new business sector that specialized exclusively in managing these new telecom connections, and handling the first customers to "get connected"; the first Internet Service Provider (ISP) would have been born.
New developments that are scaled to a public level tend to take longer to get released; the larger the project, the more points of failure that must be considered (and the more headaches involved in trying to reduce the points of failure).
Anyhow, my suggestion was that his fanfiction would depict post-timeskip Equestria as in the process of developing and implementing the earliest forms of an internet. Not the uber-broadband stuff we have in reality, but a level close to what we first had at the public level. And possibly a widespread use of basic telephones; the ones that only need a phone jack to function, basically.
I think that equestria is more advanced than it looks. But technology isn't really popular in equestria [on example of Flim and Flam], so evrypony keep it old-modish:
Unicorns stick to their magic, because it gives them theoretical superiority. And tech would give better chances to others.
Earth ponies hang to their traditions, fearing that new things can take away their stable position in society and economics .
Pegasi think technology is good. They utilize it big time in the
rainbowweather factory. Maybe even manipulate the other races from the shadows to not use it and keep the good stuff to themselfes.My guess is that pony technolgy development is at least 1940s. >Insert Spitfire joke here< Eventually 1950-60 tops. Anything before the transitor was invented and considering 3/4th of the society is amish*. >Now insert Pinkie's Dad joke here<
Imagine Pinkie with such a beard singing this song. Or C. Sandwich. I can.
*No disrespect fot the amishes but they would propably agree it's a valid comparison. And heresy. So much heresy.
AND by how it looks not much is gonna change in the future. Considering Button Mash and Luna have basic enjoyment devices on Atari level... you know what I'm aiming at. Those things are unlikely to break the no-tech trend in pony society but maybe some cities would gather their relatively unnumberous enthusiasts, so we could see some future places with even 80s technology.
Equestria's technology already doesn't mesh with our own in a straight up "it's in this decade" sense. Mostly that's just anachronisms working their way into it, but it makes sense with magic and all that technology could develop along an entirely different path. I'd say go for a mix of 1920ish in some areas to straight up futuristic in others (like maybe medicine, which seems modern in 'old' Equestria already).
You could have early cars, which were slow and only used by the rich.
Depending on how far you go, you can add eletrical networks and phone lines, as well as different sources for eletricity like dams.
I would say aim for a 1930s-1940s feel at the best. Ponies, despite capabilities, never had an Industrial Revolution as such. They have a lot of the technology that came out of it, but never had the mass social shakeup that was also part.
Anything with the internet would be right out. We don't even see they have telephones in the series, so you'd be looking at technological development from Graham Bell, to Turning, to the stuff DARPA pioneered. You need an entire telecommunications infrastructure in place as well. Anything involving digital technology, just no.
Analogue is fine, as that's a much simpler way to go. Radio and early TV are more practical due to their wireless nature; just a transmitter and a bunch of receivers, and communications is just one way. Only minor infrastructure changes required (ie, transmitters on top of existing skyscrapers). Vacuum tubes as the height of electronics.
Power is an interesting question; is it actual electricity like we know it (Ponyville does have a hydroelectric dam stashed... somewhere, as we saw in Mare Do Well) or some kind of magictech/zero-point-energy-ish equivalent. Power source(s) will dictate a lot of what you can do for portable technology. We use gasoline in vehicles nowadays because it's a very energy-dense fuel source (relatively speaking). Look at early generation batteries vs today's to get a better feel for what I'm saying in terms of size and capacity for what they can do.
For the transportation question, you could probably make a very interesting debate around cars and really trucks. We have trains already for hauling goods and I think light rail for public transit, so something like transport trucks being developed to take large loads of cargo to un-tracked areas is something I could see come about. The personal car is more interesting and an idea would be that it's just in its infancy, but we're already getting protests from the taxi drivers and other similar unions about how it'll destroy their jobs. Just imagine if horses really could have protested something like the Model-T. By extension, changes in agriculture that the introduction of tractors and its ability to haul way heavier equipment than mere horses would also lead to a great deal of upheaval in the earth pony farming communities.
If you have tractors and cars, have them be made by the same company; make it run by minotaurs and call it Lamborghini. Works on all levels if you know the history of that company.
Air transportation is also a terribly interesting idea to explore. I saw a story that postulated blimps and dirigibles and the like in the MLP-verse functioned similar to the ones in Bioshock: Infinite except that instead of a quantum particle acting as the suspension point, it was pegasus-magic reinforced clouds in the ballasts. Then again, the fact that a species that has direct and instinctive understanding of the functioning of wings not having developed fixed wing air craft is also surprising.
I think a lot will come down to the question of what do you want to world to run on. Fuel sources of the time dictate the technology. The greater the energy density of it and the more portable it is, the more you can do with it. Look into that first and see where it leads you. Level of infrastructure as a reflection of social change is the second part. We've seen a pretty low infrastructure so far, so if the technology requires a lot in place to function (ie, the internet) then it's probably best to leave out.
Hope that helps, and best of luck!
The highest tech I've seen on the show is a motion picture projector in the episode where Ponyville is to provide water to Cloudsdale (even if the film sounded like a '50's school science film
). Ponies (here and in Equestria) are gregarious, so I feel the most advanced tech would probably be in communications. For transportation, railroads would still be using steam trains, although more advanced (possible using 'magic fire' 
) and streamlined. In terms of ponykind transportation, Earth Ponies would still dominate, perhaps assisted by magic to move loads easier (Earth Pony running in a sort of hamster wheel device to power cart 
).
). Power plants could be built in remote areas and transmitted by repeater towers like early microwave com systems.
A hydropower plant is shown in one episode, but there are no power lines ever shown, so it is probably broadcast 'magic' (eat your heart out Tesla
For transportation I would recommend using blimps. They would be a step up in technology and not feel too out of place for AJ. Airplanes could work but a blimp has a better feeling with how the world works. I would use cars as if they where seen as a fad that would never catch on by the modern ponies.
1930s? The Great Depression.
Victorian era to the 1920s.
I will note that tech levels don't really exist as such.
Techs have prerequisits, but are almost luck based on what is discovered.
Mlp wise, I would actually consider teleporters for transportation to be plausable, as long as you have the prerequisite of having tech able to reproduce unicorn spells
Equestria has already been around for a thousand years, I doubt a few decades would make that big a difference, given their seeming lack of interest in technological pursuits.
Personally I would just keep the romantic rural setting with just one or two innovations thrown in, like, now they have telegraphs and radios and maybe gas stoves instead of wood fired.
Considering the selective nature of Equestrian technology, hospital equipment probably already surpasses our own while trains likely still run on coal and radio might be a new thing.
Since Equestria is a magic land (sorry) teleportation and other advanced stuff, at least what we would call advanced could very well be available, especaly since Twilight is all in all a magical genius. I think in generell it's more a need/use thing. Since the populations is Equine,
cars don't make much sense, cariages would be more in use etc.
Also, ponies in generall are very friendly to their environment, so the stakes are high that thery wouldn't try to destroy that trough anything. TVs are highly possible, but a gobale network not with keyboards not, since hooves are too big to hit the keys.
Maybe advanced trains?
Then again, Equestria is slowly advancing if at all.
Edit: Technologie would propably mostly powered trough magic, since that has no side effects, instead of coal or gas.