u/Camil_2077

After the events of the last episode, I'm wondering what the FAM world is essentially heading towards in the next decade? Will it end with the disintegration of the M6 ​​alliance and the strengthening of the ISN? So, for example, to partially replicate the geopolitical situation in the 2020s? Is there a chance the Soviet Union will collapse as part of a Korzhenko coup? Morozova seems to suggest there's a chance for a change of power to someone reminiscent of the Gorbachev/Yeltsin of our times, because Gorbachev in For All Mankind is a completely different character.

A few days ago, an interview with the creators of Star City appeared, confirming my earlier posts regarding the plot of Star City. Specifically, one of the series' focal points will be the September 1969 flight of the N1 with Anastasia Belikova to the Moon. It seems the creators are confirming that the series will begin around Leonov's first lunar landing in June 1969. We'll see the aftermath of this event and the preparations for Belikova, who will likely be the second person from the Soviet Union to set foot on the Moon in this timeline and the fourth after Leonov, Armstrong, and Aldrin. I'm curious because this suggests we won't get much information about what happened before Leonov's flight. Perhaps it will be revealed through some events at the beginning of the season, i.e., what happened between 1966, when Korolev survived the operation, and June 1969. The logical assumption would be that the Soviets must have flown the N1 rocket at least once manned before the Leonov flight, perhaps on a mission like Apollo 8 or Apollo 10. It would be logical that the January 1969 N1 flight was manned, but the Soviets didn't boast about it for some reason. The last big unknown is whether Star City will overlap in time with S1 episodes 6-10 of For All Mankind, i.e. from 1974. The creators say that there will be various references to FAM and Soviet history, so I'm counting on deep lore in this matter.

I'm wondering what the outlook for this year holds, and whether Celebration 2027 will be filled with various announcements. Honestly, if there's no announcement about exploring a new era, like the Old Republic, it'll be a major failure for me. The franchise will be 50 years old, and we need to essentially create a new chapter, breathe life into new ideas to progress further.

I'll probably get downvotes from TSMC fanboys but it's worth the risk, especially since I can consider myself an Intel and Samsung fanboy.

Capitalism, especially the free-market version we had a decade or two or three ago, has a huge tendency to monopolize production by selecting ideal production locations. Chang's founding of TSMC and the popularization of the fabless model was the worst possible outcome for the development of the semiconductor industry. It's understandable that the more this industry develops, the fewer players remain due to high R&D and fab construction costs.

Fabless semiconductor companies, on the other hand, benefited from the thinking of the globalization era, which favored such development because it reduced the costs associated with owning factories and their maintenance. In this sense, one could even quote the famous manager and disruptor of American industry, Jack Welch, who said that ideally, all the world's factories would be located on ocean-going barges, adapting to the global financial market.

This situation, however, has led to TSMC controlling 70% of the global chip foundry market. Interestingly, there are players like Samsung and Intel, which are already delivering performance levels similar to TSMC, but American fabless companies are still reluctant to produce chips there for a number of reasons. The US government rightly supports production at Intel, for example, as a matter of national security. If China were to invade Taiwan, the West would suddenly wake up without advanced chip production. American companies, however, know that such a situation can or even will occur, but they are not doing enough to relocate this production because they are obsessed with their profits.

For example, now the issue of the memory industry. If the Japanese and German governments weren't so stuck in their free-market understanding, they would have saved their DRAM memory industries. Qimonda was bought out by Micron, and the same with Elpida. Seeing how Samsung, Hynix, and Micron now have the potential to become the world's largest companies in terms of operating profit, I think the Germans and Japanese are regretting their choices. Similarly, if American giants were to maintain and expand semiconductor production, they could not only increase competition, which is beneficial for everyone, but also manage it to reward Western companies. Unfortunately, I know that the semiconductor industry is often pro-globalization, but ultimately, this leads to monopoly.

The cast of Star City includes Solly MacLeod, who plays cosmonaut Sasha Polivanov. Interestingly, the current governor of Mars, Leonid, also bears the surname Polivanov. Perhaps Leonid is Sasha's son? Or is this similarity in surnames merely coincidental?

If I understand the trailer correctly and remember the story from For All Mankind Season 1, the idea for a lunar base arose in the context of the United States losing the race to the Moon. Administrator Paine wanted the US to be first in something. President Nixon wasn't interested in second place. Star City, in turn, suggests that the Americans began working on a lunar base because an American spy in Star City stole the plans and shared them with the Americans, forcing them to accelerate work on the earlier Skylab station plan and convert it into Moonlab.