"What a win-win," I kept repeating to myself. My credits had increased in value. I should have been happy. I felt the exuberant crowd dispersing past me like a swarm of ice-cold fish. They were all chanting: "WIN-WIN WHEN WE WORK AS ONE. WIN-WIN WHEN WE WORK AS ONE." The flood lights went out and the two bodies remained on the platform. The shadow of the two guillotines remained across a billboard advertising MACROHARD's latest software package. "Of course we want win-wins, all of us want win-wins," I said out loud again, trying to convince myself.
The history, as far as it can be pieced together from rumor and illegal network news, is that at one time the NATIONSTATES came close to a complete collapse after years of overwhelming debt and corruption. One of the original corporations, MACROHARD, saved the government from bankruptcy by buying up information rights to large government data banks. The government became so dependent on MACROHARD for the management of its data it eventually caved in to all of MACROHARD's demands. What had once been called the United States gradually sold off all of its assets to a variety of consortiums. But the biggest asset of all: information--went to MACROHARD. All of the databases, all of the copyrights, all of the knowledge that kept society civilized was eventually "privatized" to the MACROHARD corporation.
All that remained was a sophisticated computer system that kept track of the dwindling tax base and a demoralized military-police force that managed to maintain a mild form of "order."
I'm pissed because MACROHARD holds the copyrights to all the Beatles' music. The best music in the world and it all belongs to these corporate wingdings. It's a crying, fuckin' shame is what it is.
MACROHARD and its charismatic leader Will the II were behind a political party called the TECHNOLITERALISTS. The main theme of the party is that the government is not needed. The free market was considered to be the only factor of importance in guiding the affairs of daily life.
Knowledge and information came to be looked at roughly in the same way that land itself was treated by the original colonists of the United States. As software companies started losing more and more of their market to information "pirates," a different type of police and justice system took shape. Privacy took on new dimensions as the giant information companies won lawsuit after lawsuit. How much a person knew was truly equivalent to a person's financial status. Stealing an idea in the twenty-first century was like stealing a horse in the pioneer days.
The act of communication itself gradually changed. People were afraid and reluctant to exchange information. You could chat, but it was better not to ask questions. The asking of a question was considered a form of panhandling. Rather than ask questions, you were encouraged to utilize their subscribed on-line interactive systems. Indeed, this was the only safe way to find out anything. Speaking to strangers was unwise, if not down-right dangerous.
Information was accounted for through an elaborate system that equated bits of information with currency. All information was given a specific monetary value. People hoarded information like bits of gold. Nothing else seemed to matter.
Public education ceased to exist. Its elimination was justified on the grounds that the government had no right to give away the basis of our economy. They said it was like the land grants in the early days of the railroads. The government only "gave away" real estate as a way to reward settlers. No one thought it odd that land was no longer given away once the nation was established.
By the year 2037, the nation was weary from a twelve year depression. Public Universities had long since gone out of existence. Education consisted of giving each child a compact disc, the CD4ROM5, a reproduced version of the library of Congress (edited to the socio-political specifications MACROHARD, version 36.0). This was what Will considered his great "contribution," to the NATIONSTATES. Through the direction of market forces, each child would pull him or herself up by their bootstraps into productive citizens. "The future is in their hands now," he used to like to say. The "bootstrap" education was all any one child could expect.
Everyone who wanted a job had one. MACROHARD made that part of the deal. Guaranteed lifetime employment. No one, except the ten-percenters, could say they couldn't find work. The only people who didn't work were the people who wouldn't work. Hell, everyone was so damn hungry after the depression they were all eager to sign on. No more excuses. Insiders said Will was tired of hearing people whine. When the offer of nationwide employment was made public, they made him look like he was doing us a superhuman favor. He once said in a speech: "Look, the law of the market says you should all die. But, I'm such a swell guy, I'm gonna risk invoking the wrath of the God of natural selection by bringing all of you under my umbrella."
Everybody was happy, at first. Shit, everyone was busy at least. It was all data entry for the most part. The masses stayed home and chugged away entering data into their terminals fourteen hours a day. How else would all the libraries of the world be put on-line? It was an enormous project. The privatization of all known written data.
The problem was that people who couldn't keep up with the fourteen hour days stood out. The homeless couldn't say they couldn't find work. They could find little pity because those who were working were so damn tired. If someone begged on the street the reaction was: "Hey, go log-on to your terminal and work like everyone else, asshole."
I think at first everyone thought the unemployment problem was licked. Suddenly there were jobs for everyone. I mean guaranteed jobs, not the Singaporian make work slave labor that broke our backs during the occupation. Hell, that was different--we had to work, or else. When Singapore was in town we worked our butts off. Since MACROHARD took over, things were different. Anyone could just walk into town, get a password and start earning credits. Honest, crisp, electronsweet NATIONSTATE credits. It was all part of Will's "no excuses" management philosophy. He eliminated the possibility someone could say "I can't find a job."
As for me, I try to avoid the doings and goings on of these corporate affairs. I do my best to keep a low profile. I don't like people to mess with me. I do my work. I fix the machines so people can input the daylights out of 'em. That's okay by me. I did my time during the occupation. That taught me one thing: Stay out of the fuckin' limelight. Don't call attention to yourself unless you want trouble. I'm just a piece of driftwood. I wash up on one shore and then another. I go where the tides take me, and that's fine with me.