Evan Mayerle posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 9:33pm for Contact

I doubt the Culture would get the reference, but MSV It's Five O'Clock Somewhere sounds like a fun one.

SirBino posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 7:09pm for Contact

How about the GCU That's Going To Leave A Mark and the GCU It's Tuesday Somewhere.

This is an interesting story, and I can't wait for Harry's interaction with the Sorting Hat. That's going to blow the It's Not My Fault's mind.

jdcox61 posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 6:31pm for Contact

GCU That's What She Said

jdcox61 posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 6:30pm for Contact

Oh yeah, there's also the ever popular
GCU My Bad

jdcox61 posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 6:28pm for Contact

Very Interesting, I haven't read the crossover material, but you're making it easy to follow along, which is great.

What sort of names are you looking for? I think these might be funny if you want them:
Watch Out O'er There
Oops
and That Wasn't Supposed to Happen

These are just some of the first that came to mind

Evan Mayerle posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 5:50pm for Contact

It was those knickknacks that kept track of Harry’s location, relative to Hogwarts, that left Dumbledore truly befuddled. First and foremost was an enchanted compass, whose needle would always point towards the boy. A problem arose, however, in the fact that the needle would never settled down in a single direction. Not once in ten years. In the first few weeks the needle had swung round and round, completing four revolutions each day. After that, it had settled to only one revolution a day, though there had been a period of roughly a month (four years ago) wherein it had shifted in some complicated manner before settling down again. Regardless of the change, the needle continued to spin lazy round its axis, completing one revolution a day.

It's really a pity that Dumbles never really familiarized himself with, or if he did, failed to keep up with, the muggle world. Those indicators would clearly mean something to anyone living the last third, at least, of the 20th century and in any first or second world country (likely at least some in third-world countries, too, at least among the better educated) with the ready growth of operations in space. It does make you wonder, then, just how much magical energy was expended by that ritual to contact Harry. I daresay that Dumbles was/will be quite surprised by the amount of effort that required; if he does a power/distance calculation, that will -really- unnerve him, though it might prepare him, somewhat, for Harry's return.

As 'tis, you've got two vastly different cultures and more than the usual probabilities for mis-communication. I'm definitely looking forward to future chapters.

Joe4 posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 12:53pm for Contact

GCU It's not my fault
GCU I wasn't even there
and
GCU Don't blame me

Wonderbee31 posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 12:26pm for Contact

Wow! Really getting into this here, and got to say, will be wondering what will happen with Harry once he arrives, and given the way he's grown up, how he'll be reacting to such things as Snape's and Malfoy's taunts, as well as Dumbledore's manipulations, and what the interactions with the ladies will be like since Harry is being trained by the others on the journey.

Kathleen posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 11:38am for Contact

Very interesting. Harry seems quite mature -- more like 18 or so. Dumbledore is in for a shock. I wonder what a knife-missile is? Can Harry control it? Can it do a small amount of damage, or does it destroy everything, or both?

Crys posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 10:29am for Contact

You're just having fun with these ship names, aren't you?

Interesting that the avatar keeps going back and forth between precise answers (22.6 seconds) to approximations (give or take). Not a problem so much as "why go back and forth?"

There are some implications in that AI chat (the cloning and "soul transfer" specifically) that raises some serious ethical questions that are being bypassed completely. As they're AI's, that makes some sense (plus their later conversation on breeding Harry), but in all other ways the 'puters seem so solicitous of the organics, I have a hard time believing this issue hasn't come up. Either that or the idea of cloning isn't at all objectionable to the Culture inhabitants.

Ah, okay, this is a crossover (should have realized it earlier, and you DO mention it in your A/N on first chapter). You're doing a pretty good job of explaining what we need to know, though. Only lost so much as expected in a new "environment". Otherwise it's a fascinating read thus far.

What Harry makes of Hermione (and she of him) will be fun.

Adrian R Brown posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 9:38am for Contact

I love the original mix. I'm not familiar with the Culture books, but they sound very intriging. I also love the names of the ships. Are the ships in the books typically named in such tongue-in-cheek ways? Or was this all you?

Can't wait to read more. Keep it up!

KenF posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 8:54am for Contact

This looks like fun, but I may be missing things since I've never read any of the Culture books.

I like the names of the ships (or whatever they are).

Matt T posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 6:55am for Contact

While I am unfamiliar with the cross, this is an excellent read so far. To go with the theme of GCU names... perhaps the "I Didn't Do It" or the ever-popular "It Wasn't Me"? Can't wait to read more. Keep up the good work!

kutekess posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 5:59am for Contact

is it a crossover, or do i just not understand it?

Ben Russell-Gough posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 5:29am for Contact

I think that the Minds determination to spread magic to the Culture will make Harry's life... interesting for the next few months. I do hope that they are polite enough to explain why he suddenly is having all these genetically-optimised lovelies thrust at him.

I also am more and more of the opinion that, human body aside, he is a Little Green Man from Mars in his thought patterns and behaviour. I stronly suspect that he will hit Hogwarts like a pretty large nuclear bomb. It will be interesting, as I have already said, to see how Harry interacts with the canon characters closest to him in the Canon Timeline (he will probably treat them the way you or I would treat an armed and potentially dangerous caveman, but that is just an opinion). I am really looking forward to your explanation of how (in Culture terms) magic works; I had always assumed it was a genetic affinity like sensitivity to the Force in the Star Wars universe.

That aside, I will be looking forward to seeing the response of the Mind of the It's Not My Fault to actual practical magic in action. I also wonder exactly how much will be recognisably left of Quirrel once the Culture realises that he is host to an extremely dangerous non-corporeal psychic parasite.

BenRG's Rating: 8/10

busted posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 4:59am for Contact

"Also, the level of detail chronicling Harry’s time at Hogwarts might vary depending on circumstances — perhaps with some rather lengthy gaps and breaks."

When people redo hogwarts years theres nothing worse then when they make you go through every single thing again. Your idea is the one that works better from what ive seen in other stories. Everyone that reads fanfiction has read the books so they will know pretty much what happens when you gloss over some events.

Also its good that you want to diverge from the later yeas substantially because things really would happen alot different and its no fun when everything works out the same anyway.

I look forward to your future updates ;)

Katsuhito posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 4:21am for Contact

An interesting story, considering I haven't read any of the Culture books. I look forward to the next chapter.

liquidfyre posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 4:06am for Contact

before i start reading this one am i going to have to worry about it going the way of the rest of your stories? in otherwords are we going to stop getting chapters for 2 years soon until a new story is started?

UdderPD posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 3:54am for Contact

Different.

I assume that we are going to find out what happened when Dumbledore transmitted Harry's letter.

TTFN UdderPD

T.Zukumori posted a comment on Monday 7th January 2008 1:23am for Contact

Thanks again for another installment - I'm am intrigued as to what kind of changes Harry will undergo in three months of space-travel before he returns to Earth.

I've never read any Banks myself, but I find myself very interested in what happens next.

Please keep up the good work,
-T.Z.