The section on all of the planned resources in the game and how they'll be found in their own specific areas (asteroid fields, nebula, etc.) and I thought it was really neat; but I noticed that all of them were focused on improving your ships (shields/hull, weapons, sensors, etc).

Any plans for resources that provide boosts to population growth, research, productivity or cultural influence or maybe luxury resources that improve happiness?

Maybe some manner of spice that only occurred on desert planets.

The more traditional GC2 like resources will be back by beta, they will now be in the form of Precursor Artifacts, that will give you global bonus, to Research manufacturing, influence, etc... much like in gc2, when you "study them" 

My birthday is whenever it gets here.