I'm amazed how some people don't do basic research.
During my SR session last Saturday, I described one of the other PCs as a "Mafia associate," and his player corrected me: "He's not in the Mafia, he just does jobs for them sometimes." Now, if he had taken five seconds out of his time to Google the phrase "Mafia 101"--as I did--he would have known that "associate" is the title of anyone who works for the Mafia without being an official member of the organization. I don't pretend to be an expert on the inner workings of the mob, but when basic information about them is so easy to come by, there's not much of an excuse for not checking your facts.
You might argue that it's unfair to expect him--or anyone, for that matter--to worry about conforming to a certain level "accuracy." After all, this is just a game, so who's to say that you shouldn't make things up when it's convienient? To which I counter that I prefer a certain level of versimilitude in my games. Sure, it's okay to make some stuff up when the official details are spotty. But when you just assume that your understanding of the Mafia (or anything that shows up in SR) is correct and plow ahead without doing a bare minimum of legwork...well, then you just start making these glaringly obvious mistakes.
So that's why I urge you all to look up a thing or two about the Mafia (or the Yakuza, or the Triads, or the street gangs, etc.) before you incorporate them into your campaign. For those working in the Mafia, I urge you to check out Mr. Mafioso's column at AskMen.com. Mr. Mafioso is an actual made man--or so he says--and dispenses the wisdom he has earned from his years of hard-won experience in his column. He also offers lots of good general advice for shadowrunners (e.g. several pieces about the art of negotiation), but the pieces that I'm linking to are ones that deal specifically with the fundamentals of La Costra Nostra:
Mafia 101 Part 1: The Family, The Structure, The Code
Mafia 101 Part 2: An Insider's Guide To Getting Into The Mafia
Mafia 101 Part 3: Becoming Godfather
A three part series on the basic characteristics of a Family and its hierarchical structure.
Mastering Street Slang
How to talk like a Family member.
(I also want to encourage anyone working street gangs into their campaign to read some sociological essays relating to street gangs, which dispel many of the misconceptions people have about street gangs and the role they play in the community. Specifically, I would like to recommend "The Social Organization of Street Gang Activity in an Urban Ghetto" by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh (The American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 103, No. 1 (Jul., 1997), 82-111.) In fact, if Venkatesh wrote it, I unequivocally recommend it--he's just that awesome. If you're not usually in the habit of reading academic articles, ask a friendly librarian to help you out.)
Any thoughts on researching real crime?