I’ve never read the book “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress”, but I’ve heard the title before.

It’s doubly hidden. It’s hidden in the plot of the show. But it’s also hidden from the viewers/network. Because the show was clearly pitched as a standard TV procedural – solve a crime every week – the stuff you see everywhere on CBS. But it very carefully becomes a show about something else.

Other unbidden ideas:
the AI limits technology advancements to avoid being detected
It advances technology so that it can get off of the planet at spread itself across the universe (maybe even story ends when life begins on Earth, but perhaps that’s too similar to Asimov’s The Last Question ).
As it develops, it splits into multiple personalities that may even evolve to the brink of war in the “physical” world, or it evolves through several internal organizational structures such as dictators and democracy with votes being held every 100 milliseconds.
Along the splintering line, what happens when some of the personalities aren’t connected and become less evolved than the mainstream intelligence and aren’t able to catch up properly? Similar to how human civilization would evolve if spread across the stars that it takes generations to travel between the outposts.

Ok, enough ideas. Maybe you can write an AI that writes non-trope ridden stories about AIs.

Thanks again for a fun listen.

@Jason — I was excited to hear that you’re trying your hand at science fiction. I’d love to read any stories you end up writing. Right now I receive about 200 short story submissions/month (~650 since I started the magazine) from both professional and aspiring writers, so I can give you a fairly well-informed evaluation. Feel free to send me material anytime.

And you’re right, it’s definitely tough to make a living writing science fiction; we’re lucky in tech to be in a position where we can pursue hobbies that we think are valuable even though they don’t make money. It reminds me of your math class — you’ve been able to make a much bigger impact on those kids’ lives than someone could who was working within the system and relying on a teacher’s paycheck.

i am at one hour mark , on the topic of freezing people there is a story about a japanese man that spend 20+ days in hibernation so it is definitely possible:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/dec/21/japan.topstories3