Ok, so I am a bit new, but I just don't understand how the Power Play thing works. For me to be Alliance, do I need to align to an Alliance person in Power Play? I read somewhere that I can become allied to Alliance just by doing missions? I don't quite follow it.

Timeline (some non-canon here) from a particularly Alliance Perspective: http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Chronicles_of_the_Milky_Way
http://alioth.net/GuideBooks/Atlas/

Alioth.net has heaps of old lore, but be warned that a lot of the links don't work - you have to mod them by hand to remove the "www." at the front.

Frontier First Encounters Manual:
http://www.wischik.com/lu/senses/ffemanual.pdf

Lots of Tourist Beacons around Alioth and Gateway.

A lot of us, (because ASS is not great) use ADV: Alliance Diplomatic Vessel

Alliance Dimplotic Vessel.... Dimplotic!

Great idea!

Can you see each other's ship name in the game?

A.S.S. Teroid