A guide for Users as to what is and what is not Canon
Foreword
The use of canon material within LCARS 47 is strictly monitored. There are times when we use non-canon sources to fill in gaps, such as missing dates, names, functions, terms, and so on.
Database Modules
Although nearly half a century of Star Trek is filled with interesting things to include in the Federation Database, there is also a vast number of things that we think deserve recognition, and simply put, compliment canon. The "Point Defense Phaser" from Star Trek: Armada is a perfect example. The reference to the Point Defense Phaser inside LCARS 47 has been edited to avoid conflicts with canon. In the Federation Database, this specific example was named "Point Defense Targeting" and is written in a way which would seem plausible.
"Point defense targeting is a defensive form of phaser fire whereby incoming hostile projectiles are eliminated by outbound phaser fire. Unlike point offense targeting (targeting the hostile ship/station directly), point defense targeting requires far less power as most explosive projectiles will detonate as soon as the point defensive fire reaches its target. Point defense targeting is also utilized as a means of destroying rogue asteroids, space debris, and other planetary, station, or ship-bound threats..."
Artistic License
There are times when original canon source material is not available. For example, alien languages like Romulan and Cardassian. In this case, our project linguist will draft up an entirely new language based entirely on canon material such as using only using glyphs that have appeared on screen. With regards to Drydock, and the cutaway MSDs, some classes do not have a canon MSD shown on screen (like the Akira and Steamrunner). We therefore have to do the whole design from scratch. In other instances, we may have to edit existing canon MSDs to make certain features physically possible (the Intrepid class shuttlebay).
Controversy of Non-Canon
Many fans have differing opinions of what canon is and what it is not. We understand that we cannot satisfy everyone.
Canon
Our current reflection of what is canon is as follows:
- Star Trek: The Original Series
- Star Trek: The Next Generation
- Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
- Star Trek: Voyager
- Star Trek: Enterprise
- The Prime movies
- Star Trek: The Motion Picture
- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
- Star Trek III: The Search for Spock
- Star Trek IV: The Undiscovered Country
- Star Trek V: The Voyage Home
- Star Trek VI: The Final Frontier
- Star Trek: Generations
- Star Trek: First Contact
- Star Trek: Insurrection
- Star Trek: Nemesis
Our current stance on what is not canon is as follows:
- Star Trek: The Animated Series
- All Star Trek novels
- All Star Trek games including Star Trek: Online
- All Star Trek comics and animated shorts
- Any official board games, trading cards or other miscellaneous paraphernalia See note 1
- Any fan made material See note 2
- Any of the 'JJ-verse' movies
- Star Trek (2009) See note 3
- Star Trek: Into Darkness (2013) See note 3
Further Non-Canon
As a blanket statement, the following examples are established as non-canon and will therefore not qualify for inclusion:
- Starfleet “Marines” or 24th century “MACOs” See note 4
- Rihannsu as a native term for Romulans and the Romulan language See note 5
- V’Ger and the Borg
- Starship classification (Dreadnaughts, Destroyers, et cetera)
- The USS Titan being a Lunar class starship
Appendix and Notes
- Exceptions include using the SkyBox pIqaD (the Klingon Language) as it's the most canon-abiding usable language. We will not however use the Klingon Language Institute's pIqaD as this is fan made and neither it’s formatting or its glyphs are used in any of the canon series.
- Fan made material may not please everyone, and therefore we will not add any fan made material. There's also an issue with obtaining permissions from each author.
- The reboot will not be considered for inclusion for three reasons:
- The reboot movies take place in an alternate universe and therefore do not affect the Prime universe.
- There's also a major debate regarding the reboot movies' canonicity as much of their story lines directly contradicts established canon, the apparent explosion of Romulus, for example.
- Moreover, the reboot movies fall under new financial interests with CBS and may represent legal problems regarding intellectual property licensing. However this is more of a legal issue rather than a canon issue.
- Starfleet “Marines” are a direct conflict of canon in that they represent a militaristic arc of Starfleet that does not exist in the series and movies. We know from canon that Starfleet is not a military, it is merely an agency of the United Federation of Planets tasked with peacful exploration, first contact, and in some cases escort duties. There have been instances however that have required Starfleet to act in a more defensive manner but all of these events are handled entirely by Starfleet themselves. Many people cite the strange uniforms in the Deep Space Nine episode titled "The Siege of AR-558" as evidence to support the existance of Starfleet Marines, but these are meerly special purpose combat uniforms just like the desert uniforms seen in Deep Space Nine: "Shadows and Symbols"
- This is completely refuted in Romulan text appearing on screen. Further reading
