Our PAO office went silent, for the past 15 days, as a result.
As you may remember, this unique [Facebook] communications platform is only in use aboard the USS Enterprise-D. We are the testbed for this system, and have been ordered to maintain it, in active operation, for at least two years. After that time, Starfleet Public Affairs will determine whether to proceed with installation aboard other ships in the fleet. Unfortunately, our disappearance for a year (due to time travel via the Devron Anomaly) set that schedule back a bit, and subsequent maintenance issues may delay the project even further.
As I mentioned back in 2363, when I was first assigned to the Enterprise, I had spent the previous year as an administrative officer at Starfleet Headquarters on Earth. I was part of the team that developed this communications platform, and I was assigned to the Enterprise public affairs office because of my familiarity with it.
We’ve been tracking the recent system glitches and failures, and I think we’ve found the cause. The system was designed to compensate for warp travel (since normal point-to-point communication cannot, physically, operate through a warp field – at warp speeds). We thought we had discovered an exploit that would allow this system – and only this system – to send out non-targeted broadcasts, and then capture sensitivity-enhanced incoming messages. Unfortunately, components of this system have been wearing out -- at an alarming rate -- due to the operational stresses during warp travel. As a result, I have decided to preserve our new replacement parts by deactivating use of this system during warp. I’ll be sending our findings back to Starfleet Command, and they can decide how to proceed with the overall project.
In the meantime, our unique PAO comm system works just fine while the Enterprise is stationary, or at impulse speeds, and we’ll continue to use it, as we always have. There are no stresses on these components during sub-warp operations. We will, however, have to go silent DURING warp travel. These are expensive parts, and we can’t keep replacing them. The Enterprise does normally drop out of warp, periodically, during long warp jumps, so that we can send and receive commships, and standard broadcasts. We will have to get in the habit of using those same stops for our broadcasts as well.
If everything works out, as I think it will, this should result in minimal inconvenience to you, our fans, listeners, and supporters. We aren’t going anywhere – I just won’t be as active during warp jumps. We’ll see what Starfleet Command decides in the coming weeks and months.
So, all that being said, again, my apologies for the silence.
As far as the current Enterprise mission, we continue to study, chart, and assess the area in/near the Selebi System. Mineral resource data for the system’s asteroid belt has already been sent back to Earth. Unfortunately, I cannot comment on the our findings, for security reasons.
-Lieutenant Sam Archer
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February 16, 2366 -- (Original Devron Timeline, altered by temporal anomaly)