Earth
 | |
| Name | Earth |
|---|---|
| Class | Planet |
| Mass | 1 Earth |
| Radius | 6371 km (1 Earths) |
| Rotational Period | 1 Terran days. |
| Gravity | 9.81 m/s2 (1 Earths) |
| Distance from Star | 1 AU |
| Orbital Period | 1 Earth year |
| Orbitting Bodies | Luna |
| Discovery Date | N/A |
| Surface Pressure | 101.325 kPa |
| Surface Temperature | ~15 C |
| Atmosphere | 78.08% N2 20.95% O2 0.93% Ar 0.04% CO2 |
| Ruling Bodies | Various SolGov member states |
| Population | 8 Billion |
Earth is the birthplace of mankind and remains the true heart of economic, cultural, and political influence - the pearl of both the Sol system and humanity as a whole.
Contents
Geography
Earth is a terrestrial planet, of which the majority of the surface is seas and oceans. The remainder is composed of seven large continents and many islands.
Infrastructure
Human population has over the years gravitated towards larger settlements, creating vast metropolises as larger cities merge together. The prevalence of rural communities has diminished even more since the early 22th century, with population density still increasing since then. A conscious effort by governments, non-profit organizations, and the private sector means that deserted land and former industrial regions have in places been somewhat restored or reclaimed by nature, often as managed forestry industry, leisure areas, or wildlife preserves. Public transport within and between cities is used regularly and extensively, and while personal vehicles are less common, they still provide freedom from transport schedules. The use of personal spacecraft is extremely tightly controlled, and space traffic around Earth orbit is some of the most closely monitored in the galaxy, with specialist remote-safety overrides required for vessels to even approach the planet, due to the potential dangers posed by rogue craft in such a densely populated and trafficked area.
Population
Earth's population hosts a number of aliens, owing to its economic and cultural importance. There are comparably few positronics on Earth as compared to even the rest of the Sol system-- by the time of the creation of the positronic brain, Earth's labor pool was incredibly stable and had no need for synthetic labor and thus has only recieved a more 'natural' buildup in the years since the codification of positronic sapient rights. Around eight billion people live on Earth, with a large number of retirees and high-ranking politicians (as well as the middle and lower classes that work in Earth's service industry, though many are expected to commute from elsewhere in the Sol system due to excessive costs of living). Enough shuttles leave Earth daily to easily match Earth's fairly low reproductive rate, leaving the population count stagnant.
Industry and Economy
Earth's primary industries are service and entertainment. The vast majority of high-budget films, video, and VR simulations are produced in Earth's metropoli, as is an appreciable amount of advertising. The high-paid executives and actors buoy an astonishing number of masseuses, chefs, prostitutes, private drivers, and other personal service workers (encouraged by the high top-bracket stored wealth tax rates of many Earth nations).
Mining, agriculture, and manufacturing have been largely outsourced to Earth's siblings in the Inner System. There remains, however, a luxury market for Earth-grown "traditional" agricultural products, especially tobacco and coffee beans (famously employed by Gilthari Exports in the creations of several high-class consumables). These farms employ a surprising amount of menial labor, often seasonal, and bolster Earth's export economy.
Earth's logistical infrastructure depends on a few key mega-spaceports that shuttle vast quantities of containerized goods between the surface and orbital berths able to handle large interstellar cargo ships. These ports are almost fully automated, and managed by highly sophisticated drone intelligences, with minimal sapient intervention between un/loading the orbital vessels and points of delivery or origin.
Tourism is the third pillar of the Terran economy. Earth is an important cultural and historic site for nearly every human group, and important landmarks from centuries prior have been meticulously maintained for the absolutely massive daily influx of tourists, some from as far away as Eutopia, who come to see the sights. Curious aliens also make up an appreciable number of tourists, with shuttles full of Skrell disembarking every few minutes at spaceports across the planet to tour in protected, culturally isolated groups. The most popular tourist sites are New York, Paris, Baghdad, and Cairo, although just about every surviving city has some level of tourism.
Government
Earth is still divided into a variety of states that are, on the interstellar scale, quite small They're almost all democratic republics with varying levels of corruption and autocracy, but most are recognized as SolGov member states, giving Earth an enormous number of votes in the Colonial Assembly. Prior to 2569 only a few tiny states chose to remain independent of SolGov, but following the Skathari Incursion, a handful of major nations left the organization, though all remain members of planetary and system trade agreements.
While borders in Europe, Oceania, Africa, and the Americas are much as they were in the 21st century and for the most part all 21st century nations still exist, they are generally divided into six sphere of influence of the "Big Six" superpowers: The United States, The European Union, Russia, Brazil, South Africa, and China. The 21st century's infighting in the Middle East calmed and resulted in a semi-stable coalition of minor states sometimes called a seventh superpower, while China was reduced in size by a series of revolutions and is now an indirect hedgemon of several smaller states within its prior territory.
Of the major powers, Brazil has the distinction of having withdrawn from the SCG in 2569, and has positioned itself as the defacto leader of independent Earth nations, most of whom declared independence in protest of Confederation resources being "unfairly" distributed during the crisis of the Skathari Incursion. These nations, which include Brazil, Madagascar, Paraguay, Bolivia, Mozambique, Tanzania, California, Myanmar, and the Phillipines, as well as a number of small states, often did so under the influence of Trans-Stellars leveraging economic power and support within their governments.
Notable Locations
Notable locations are largely constant from the 21st century with a very few exceptions (mostly seabed and Antartic colonies).
Baghdad
Baghdad was destroyed in the summer of 2092 by a self-replicating nanotechnology strain called the Gray Tide. While mostly rebuilt as a hypermodern arcology, portions of the devastated area remain preserved, and "pilgrimages" to Baghdad by Icarus Front loyalists and officials are common. The blighted areas themselves are mostly heaps upon heaps of plastic, wood, and bone-- the only substances not consumed by the Gray Tide.
Paradise Bay
The first site of permanent human habitation in Antarctica, and a pioneer of various arcology designs and technologies, Paradise Bay has weathered the regrowth of the ice caps fairly badly. Never a particularly sterling example of engineering, Paradise Bay is now in a constant state of disrepair and is one of the poorest and most economically-exploited regions on Earth.
Atlantis
A series of undersea geodesic domes off the east coast of Japan, Atlantis has some of the highest property values in existance. It is a glittering undersea city of excess, and one of the most sought-after tourist destinations of all time.
Elevator City
A SolGov-owned settlement off the coast of what was Curacao, Elevator City's purpose is maintaining Earth's historic first space elevator and managing the huge flow of cargo and passengers that enter and leave the city on a daily basis. The interior of the city, the closest to the elevator itself, consists of high-rise office buildings and vacation homes for off-world businessmen, while the outskirts are low-cost housing for a mix of refugees and hitchhikers.
Antananarivo
Rendered unrecognisable in its transformation into one of Earth's largest cargo spaceports and spanning much of the once-hilly Central Highlands, Madagascar's capital has become an undeniable company town for port operator NanoTrasen. The company began a wave of secessionist movements on Earth after it leveraged the port's significance to withdraw the nation from SolGov in 2569. One of few major population centers on Earth where the drone population outnumbers sapients by a significant degree, due to the sheer scale of the automated cargo handling operations.
History
The history of Earth after the 21st century is marked with a steady worsening of environmental conditions, leading to a global effort to colonize Luna and Mars, as well as to "re-terraform" Earth itself. This colonization scramble is sometimes called the Second Space Race, although it bears more resemblance to the Age of Discovery of the 15th century than to the US-Soviet Space Race.
Environmental conditions contributed to civil unrest in many major nations, exacerbated by high-profile technological disasters leading to widespread public mistrust of the scientific authority. This unrest was co-opted by the Icarus Front, who would spearhead the formation of SolGov from the basis of the United Nations, and the further colonization of the Inner System worlds. Widespread flooding ruined several coastal regions, including California and the Netherlands, but Earth was eventually re-terraformed with the help of extraterrestrial and extrasolar colonies. The refugee crisis spurred by these natural disasters contributed to the growth of the Martian and other colonial populations, and lead to the present Terran class structure.
