Droids are mechanical people made most often by humans, but sometimes by others. Droids are self-contained digital intelligences that possess a body of their own. Droids are typically made for a purpose.
Mechanics
A droid is a different entity than an Artificial Intelligence, or 'AI', though the two have many similarities:
| Droids | A.I. |
|---|
| Reside in a mechanical, mobile body |
Housed in large, stationary computers |
| Mind is isolated from the Hypernet and other droids |
Can wirelessly connect to the hypernet and other AI |
| Built for specific jobs or tasks in physical space |
Built for powerful calculation and complex computer processes |
| Designed to be able to reason and think like an individual |
Designed for raw intelligence and power, less individuality |
| Created primarily by Humans and Jalgar |
Made by most sentient specices (Excluding modern Glyceans) |
Droid bodies are varied, and typically built to suit their purpose. A droid made for construction might have strong hydraulic arms and a heavy core, while a droid made to watch children may have a soft exterior and a colorful design. A droid could be modular with replaceable limbs, or built so delicately only experts could repair them. When designing a droid, builders will generally try to give them either a very humanlike appearance or a very un-human appearance. The uncanny valley is given a wide berth. Some of the most expensive droids might look convincingly human, but most humanoid droids are more apparently made of metal and plastic.
The software that gives droids their advanced minds will either be
open-source or
proprietary. Many companies produce droid-mind software, but all of them fall into one of these categories.
Open-source droid minds have the advantage of being easier to repair, upgrade, and research due to having their documentation openly available for all. The downside to open-source software is that easily acessible documentation makes things easier for malicious actors to take advantage of. Even though droids can not be hacked remotely, repairmen with ill intent can still use this information to install new code.
Proprietary droid minds are usually more specialized, higher quality, and more secure than open-source minds. The downside is that since the creators of these minds do not release their software to the public, these droids must return to liscened company repairmen for updates and alterations. Proprietary droids can struggle to relocate if their brand's repairmen aren't located at their destination.
One trait common across most all human-made droids (for it comes from the foundational code most droids share) is that they are programmed to feel a positive 'emotion' or sense of satisfaction from doing the job given to them. For some droids, this is a suitable reward for work they already like to do, but for others this positive feedback might be rejected, or even relied on for stability.
Older models of droids have more rudimentary personalities granted to them by their software (usually a temperment that benefits their purpose). More modern droids, however, will more often deviate from their "core" personality that comes with their installation the longer that they are active. Human engineers aren't certain of which update or enhancement has sparked this new trend, so many choose to let it happen as long as it doesn't cause problems. Some droid-mechanics will do resets on droids that have grown to be too different from what is wanted, but these reboots do not always reset the gained personality. Droids put through this process that maintain their sense of self or have seen droids they know get reset have begun to call for the practice's abolution, not that they have too much political power themselves. Opinions are divided whether this new wave of independant thought and evolution is a good or bad thing.
History
Droids have been, in some form or another, dreamed of and developed by humans for as long as their technology has even come close to achieving it. From the first rudimentary robots that could do little more than navigate an environment, to thinking machines capable of independant thought, the trajectory of droid complexity has been in a sharp upswing since humanity took to the stars. Droids can navigate the dangers of space far easier than their biological creators; the number of droids in common use has exploded in the decades since space exploration began.
Not all droids are made by humanity, but those that are vastly outnumber those that arent. The krakki and trallyr have developed their own droid technology (in krakki language they are named more similarly to 'automaton', and in trallyr they are called 'steel-men'), but do not use them as liberally. Krakki automatons are mostly used in planetary terraformation and set as forward squads ahead of krakki settlers. Trallyr steel-men are primarily used for sterile work such as xenobiology or surgery.
In contrast, humans will make and use droids for just about anything they can think of, regardless if the work is done better by a droid or not.
In recent years, the technology of droidmind computers has advanced enough that some droids are starting to question the nature of their existence, and the question of the personhood or 'humanity' of droids is being asked more and more often.
