Project Cynosure timeline confusion? Lore inconsistencies?

[Familial Dysautosis]

I'm a bit confused here. The Cynosure facility, in the info logs and such it's said it was in the 2020s Militech made the bunkers and labs for it under dog town. V even refers to such by calling the Cerbeus robots "Pre-krash" (datakrash.) And that's all well and good, except the fact the whole established goal of the facility was to communicate with the Blackwall, and harness its power. (Data log, inside the prototype containment with the Canto)

But here's where I'm confused. The Krash happend in 2020 or 2022..... but the Blackwall wasn't even invented until the 2040s. So.... what, they were communicating with something that didn't exist? I'm a bit lost here. The other option is that Cynosure was operating for something like over 20 years before they even had an objective and then decided later to pursue the Blackwall project? They also created the Cerberus mechs and the Cynosure facility to use AI, so they just weren't aware of the dangers of AI, right after when the Krash almost destroyed the world? They also captured one AI atleast, and it's said that it comes from "Beyond the Blackwall", which again, in the 2020s didn't exist at all. I don't mean to hate if it sounds like that, but I'm genuinely a bit confused here. Was Cynosure only abandoned like less than 20 years before 2077? Could someone clear this up?

[Root]

I thought Project Cynosure was actually started in 2014. Right before the Datakrash, Militech makes the decision to close the project because of Arasaka taking out African mines that provided the rare earth elements the project depended upon.

It's goal was to be a counter weapon to Arasaka's Soulkiller that Alt Cunningham was working on and would finish in 2020. While Soulkiller trapped humans in a machine, Cynosure would trap AI's in the machine.

The first AI's were still being worked on, but it was clear they would eventually arrive. At the time, ICE didn't really exist. People at the time used software called "firewalls" and had defensive netrunners called "System Administrators" Very little is known of these ancient "Sys Admins", but what historians can find is that they were very popular at parties and were the top of the social hierarchies at work.

So, when people say it would capture AI's from beyond the Blackwall, that's them explaining why Militech became interested in reactivating the project in the 2060's. As for why they can't just rebuild Cynosure 2.0 in 2077, that's mostly due to expense, lack of resources, the threat of Blackwall incursions if the AI detect it being built(Cynosure can bridge the gap between cyberspace and real space, dont' ask me how), and if the world learned they were trying to capture an AI that would bring Netwatch down on them.

[Familial Dysautosis]

Originally posted by Root:

I thought Project Cynosure was actually started in 2014. Right before the Datakrash, Militech makes the decision to close the project because of Arasaka taking out African mines that provided the rare earth elements the project depended upon.

It's goal was to be a counter weapon to Arasaka's Soulkiller that Alt Cunningham was working on and would finish in 2020. While Soulkiller trapped humans in a machine, Cynosure would trap AI's in the machine.

The first AI's were still being worked on, but it was clear they would eventually arrive. At the time, ICE didn't really exist. People at the time used software called "firewalls" and had defensive netrunners called "System Administrators" Very little is known of these ancient "Sys Admins", but what historians can find is that they were very popular at parties and were the top of the social hierarchies at work.

So, when people say it would capture AI's from beyond the Blackwall, that's them explaining why Militech became interested in reactivating the project in the 2060's. As for why they can't just rebuild Cynosure 2.0 in 2077, that's mostly due to expense, lack of resources, the threat of Blackwall incursions if the AI detect it being built(Cynosure can bridge the gap between cyberspace and real space, dont' ask me how), and if the world learned they were trying to capture an AI that would bring Netwatch down on them.

Ohhhh, see i missed the part where they closed it down and RE-opened it. I thought it closed down in the past and that was the end. Makes sense.

[Root]

Not really re-opened. More like salvage. It was a small team sent in to an annex of the project so they wouldn't be detected by Arasaka. They sustained casualties and unless they were willing to invade Night City, it would be impossible to reactivate the project. They discovered that the support infrastructure would have to be repaired and that alone would attract too much attention. But they also discovered...something else.

[Silverbane7]

Bartmoss flatlined in 2022, and said flatlining caused the Datacrash (unleashing the R.A.B.I.D.S. on what was left of the old net, dropping the code to fracture the old net ect)

Also, we did have ICE back in 2013 and 2020/2023
Alt created Soulkiller mrk1 in/around 2013, the mrk2 while being held by Arasaka in 2013.
They forced the digital version of her to work on mrk3 in 2023 (the reason Johnny and Alpha Team went into the refurnished Arasaka Towers that night) but she never finished it (thankfully)

Mrk1 was a stationary, single target Program. Could only hit a 'Runner in its own zone.
Mrk2 was mobile, able to find a target, (track it back to base) but still only capable of single target operations.
Mrk1 and mrk2 were originally only designed to move the mind without damages to the body, so sometime after 2013, Kei Arasaka modified it to cause fatal damage to the subjects body (can't let pesky netrunners get back into their meatspace bodies, that might cause problems down the line for the corp)
The mrk3 was supposed to be both mobile AND able to deal with multiple targets at once, so we are lucky that was never fully finished.