The Skippies are an isolationist faction of Bobs that are dedicated to developing a true Artificial Intelligence.
The name is a reference to another sci-fi series: in Craig Alanson’s Expeditionary Force novels, Skippy is the name of an artificial intelligence whose physical form resembles a beer can. The nickname was given to them by other Bobs, but the Skippies aren’t offended by the name. Their true name for themselves is a mathematical pun based on quantum theory.
Their physical and virtual location is referred to as Skippyland. It is located 70 light years from Epsilon Eridani.
The Skippies feel that relations with biologicals are counterproductive, because the Bobs have to slow down their frame rate to interact on a human timescale. In other words, they don’t object to relations with humans on moral grounds like Starfleet does, but they believe that maintaining relations with humanity is holding back the Bobs and limiting their potential.
The Skippies no longer use audio communication between each other, and instead use packetized communication. Their names are designations akin to an IP address, although they adopt human names in order to interface with the Bobiverse.
The goal of the Skippies’ AI project is to develop a matrioshka brain named JOVAH. It has incredible processing power, but it has not reached sentience.
Hugh is the Skippy who interacts most with the other Bobs : the other Skippies chose him as their spokesperson because he is an earlier generation Bob than the rest of the Skippies. He also volunteers to help Bob to infiltrate Heaven’s River in his search for Bender.
Initially, the Skippies support the Search for Bender by developing a translation program to translate the Quinlan language, and to analyze the scans of the megastructure. Hugh frequently repeats that his group is only involved because it’s an interesting project. However, Hugh suddenly inserts himself into the project very directly and personally, making Bob doubt his motives. Bill also begins to suspect that the Skippies may be working with Starfleet in their attacks on Bobiverse assets.
Not Till We Are Lost[]
Most of the Skippies migrate into the cloud, because they stop exploring and instead pour all their resources into the development of their JOVAH and Thoth AI projects.
When they discover that Thoth has gotten out of control, he Skippies firewall themselves from the rest of the Bobiverse. However, they are unable to shut down the systems holding Thoth because the Skippies themselves run on the same systems. So instead they allow limited communication, and only then use audio/video channels with no VR or file sharing. This lasts from 2236 until 2344, when they apparently destroy the escape craft that they assume is carrying the only copy of Thoth.
References[]
https://expeditionary-force-by-craig-alanson.fandom.com/wiki/Skippy