Probably because there are far fewer of us, and we live longer, and we are more guarded with our secrets.

I suppose all those things would push against being very systematic about keeping written accounts.

I believe Darktooth the Wise was actually the very first Draak to create written records of anything. When I said records, I meant lost art and old tools and so on. The concept has spread a little bit since then.

Ah, artifacts. Did Darktooth the Wise invent writing?

Yes. By creating visual shorthand that is reminiscent of certain common thoughts in the song, you could record information on a surface and it would be easy to teach the correspondences to others. Learning to read was a large part of his 'Test of Wisdom'.

Who took the test?

I believe a few hundred have taken the Test of Wisdom, and a few dozen have passed. Writing is not common and before I came here I might have said it never will be. Now, I am less sure. I have seen what you do with it.

It's ideal for one to many communication and asynchronous uses.

Asynchronous communication will be popular, once it is likely that any given Draak you wish to communicate with can read what you wrote. One to many communication will be useful, critical, in a more organized way of governing the Draak.

Is such a way likely on the horizon?

I intend to call a Grand Moot and express my true belief that it is needed. I think Darktooth will agree. I don't know about the other two elders.

That sounds prudent. How are the Grand Moots structured?

When one is called, we choose a recognizable astronomical event - usually phases of the moons - a few months in the future and send heralds to spread the news, to allow people to finish delicate business and travel to the designated place. Everyone who is interested assembles. The Elders announce that a Grand Moot is beginning and describe the purpose of it, then ask if there are any challengers who wish to declare themselves Elders. If there are, tests begin. Traditionally, a test should not take more than a day or two, and often they are much faster.

When there are no more challengers, the Elders discuss the problem in general terms for a while, then usually choose some non-Elders with relevant reputations or perspectives to speak as well. Then, there is a break of one day, for contemplation and rest. When we assemble again, the Elders each propose a solution to the problem the Grand Moot was called for, and we discuss the solutions for a time, again asking some other Draak to speak up. The solutions get changed and compromised during this. Finally, we choose a solution, summarize everything we have considered, and announce the new law.

The last time the Elders disagreed was the second war, and the Fleeing. We decided a while ago that if the Elders could not come to agreement among themselves, all Draak present would vote.

Voting's a very useful social technology.

Winning or losing a clear and fair vote and that being the end of it is certainly much better than fighting each other, yes.

I don't think voting for who gets to be an Elder would be a good idea.

No? Why not?

Power flows from strength and wisdom. Only the very best should be trusted to lead all of the Draak-Kin.

Perhaps we could invent some lesser positions and vote on those, with the final power of the Elders called in on only the gravest matters. This will be something we will discuss for days or weeks at the Grand Moot.

You don't think the votes would tend to accrue to the best?

Perhaps they would, but that is orthogonal to my objection... Here is a better translation of my thought: Challenges and tests are theologically significant, and keeping them as a trapping of power in this form will help us feel like we are growing, rather than being made to change.

I see.

That feels like a natural end to the conversation with Amseli. Are the other people they brought out still here? He wants to talk to Skenatshua! Mechanical engineering sounds fascinating! And he's curious what Itamime has to say, too.

The other people are around! Skenatshua is happy to talk about the elevator project he's working on. Itamime has been following all the transcripts of what Amseli says about her conversations with the Seeker, and is especially enthralled by the tantalizing descriptions of the other kinds of aliens! How long exactly did it take humans to reach various tech milestones from scratch and did they have written records to help them? Did anyone take the Collectors up on their overtures, are there likely more Draak and humans off wherever they're from? Has the Minisc city died out? What makes Blueblight seem designed? Any idea where the memetic virus in humans came from?

Elevators are interesting! Draak don't really think about traffic very much, it's a new problem to wrap his head around.

The humans he does not know terribly much about. There were actually three subspecies, (Enforcers, Delvers, and Farmers, as they were called, Enforcers forming a sort of blue-grey caste that eventually got overthrown and exterminated) and probably had some written records to work with. They developed religious practices that were obsessed with outer space and trying to call their ships to come aid them. They also had occasional old tools dug up from battle ruins or abandoned settlements to work with - he knows because one of his kids stole one from them and it was a phenomenally useful thing, a sonic mining tool! Clever girl. They went from hunting and gathering to pottery and farming almost immediately, and then had walled farm settlements with domesticated animals and windmills and so on in about three hundred Amentan years. He doesn't really know the details beyond that, sadly.

Plenty of human men took the Collectors up on it and he doesn't know about it if any Draak did. Humans have a lot more sex than Draak do. The Collectors are super weird, but at least he was able to figure out some of their tech later on. His shiny blue thing is not autonomous but it moves the same way their robots did. He doesn't know what happened to the Minisc city but he has no reason to believe anything bad happened to it. Guardian thinks it's pretty and lets them live in her favorite trove as a decoration.

Blueblight seems designed because of these qualia in the song that Amentans can't feel, and also mature colonies of not-quite-fungus will send each other pulses of light including the originating colony's identity encoded as a number, and information about their current environment and potential targets for colonization including calculations for how much resources would be expended and how likely colonization is to be successful, and even physically detach and move segments of flesh around to spread faster. He has no idea where the memetic virus came from.

The robots would be really useful to Amentans. Are the Minisc immortal, or just long-lived, that their city's chugging along fine with no new children? Are there more Minisc off somewhere else? Wow, Blueblight's super creepy, may he suggest it to his novelist daughter as a plot element?

Well, he has to do this complicated thing that's sort of - kind of like virtual reality to pilot the projection and has less than zero idea how to make it work for Amentans, he couldn't figure out the automated controls for the tech at all, just some of the materials and the principles that moved it. Do they really need more heavy industry automating things when they have so much already like trains and assembly lines?

The Minisc seem to manufacture new bodies as needed and attach them to their gestalt-minds. Each gestalt-mind maintains continuity even when all their original wetware is gone. Probably more exist out there, but they're very tight-lipped about it and might not actually know any details.

Blueblight is an actual thing, so he sees nothing wrong with it being used in stories. Especially if the story mentions him as having studied it. Has he got an email address to receive some really creepy photos at?