Step 1: Be Joker-type grade-A insane.
Step 2: Be an unpredictable, unstoppable engine of destruction and chaos.
Step 3: Rinse and repeat across every major city.

Eh, even old art couldn't manage one Triple A. Still he gave it a good run.

I think you may have misunderstood my point. I don't think it needs to be changed, or even explained. Destroying the corps would destroy the setting.

Extraterritorial corps are intrinsic to the setting, and were I running a shadowrunner campaign they would definitely be there. They don't need an explanation. It Just Is.

It's cyberpunk, it's a trope, it's there. That's all the explanation necessary. It Just Is.

Haven't been reading my writing, have you?

Not yet I'm afraid. It's on my to-do list.

If you want to bring a firm down, you have to figure out a way to leverage the hell out of their balance sheet. Then, you need to do a run that causes an event that causes the leverage to come due faster than expected. Firms can hedge against normal markets, but when markets react irrationally to events, those hedges fail. You need a fat tail event.

I suggest reading the book When Genius Failed to better understand what I'm talking about.

If you want to see some current, real world examples of crazy leverage, start checking out how mortgage REITs are paying out double digit dividends on mortgage back security assets. It will either make you think the world is crazy or you'll start diverting all your cash to REITs for the next couple of years.

Of course, would you think the current batch of megacorps are too big too fail? If so, who bails them out in Shadowrun when they do fail?

Continuum is pretty darn good!

IIRC, the whole thing about "Too big to fall" is that if a corporation will cause more hardship if it falls than bailing it out will impose on the taxpayers, then we have a duty to bail them out.



The problem with that is that, for a corp to be too big to fall, it still needs to be small enough to be subservient to, and in a position to be aided by, a government. The Extraterritorial Megas are sovereign nations unto themselves, that doesn't really apply.


The closest I can think of is how the United States floated indefinite, interest-free loans to rebuild Europe after we got done bombing the ever-loving shit out of it, with a payback structure of "Eh, whenever you have some extra money in the bank."



Who would float those loans, though? Z-OG? Another Mega? National governments?

Take that as the ambiguity of "you".

If I ask "What year would you time travel to?" and the response is "Time travel is impossible" then I really don't know what else I can do. If you don't believe corps can be destroyed within the shadowrun universe, then fine but don't you think that's beside the point?

If it's a question of the practically impossible, can't you still theorize?

I don't think so (or rather it depends on what you consider "destroying the corps").

Some countries in the present setting do have limits on extraterritoriality. In the CAS extraterritoriality of premises needs to be registered with the ERLA and can be revoked by that agency IIRC. The PCC subjects extraterritorial corps to a licensing process and regular audits. Switzerland restricts extraterritoriality to predefined Special Business Zones. So did pre-crash Quebec.

I guess it depends if you consider the Corporate Court system consisting of a limited number of AAA corps central to the game. I think you could still have a recognizably shadowrunny setting without the CC, where the biggest corps are "only" AA level and where corporate extraterritoriality isn't a given just because you put a sign on your factory fence but rather subject to negotiations and the individual corps' relations with the local government. I'd contend that would actually provide even more opportunities/plot hooks for runs.

While a solid plan, the fact is, others will see it coming and take moves to ensnare you into a trap so that you do a lot of the work and they can figure out a way to swoop in and just waltz off with the results.

Similar, but alternative thought: Focus on building that company into an insurance company. Setup contracts that allow for all sorts of obscure loopholes. Hire runners to exploit those loopholes. Deny reimbursements because the loopholes remove your company's indemnity. Perfect model for this is our existing health insurance industry. For all of Sarah Palin's "death panels" talk, the fact is that death panels are very real in private health insurers. Use the contracts to drop a patient who is about to become super-expensive. You've already made the money off of them and now that they're in dire straights financially due to medical issues, it becomes difficult for them to find a lawyer to fight for their coverage.

You do like to whine don't you? Once again flawed analogy, if you had asked what area would I time travel to, the implication would be that time travel is possible. Here let me quote your original post.



From jump you closed the scenario and the only implications to the question is that I'm one six world person.



The problem is if in a scenario the outcome desired is impossible I have to open end the scenario, once we've opened up the scenario enough it's not as much a thought exercise as dream scenario building, which is useful in some cases. But the point remains, your example was one person. If we're not doing with one person though, my answer: Found a new religion capable of challenging the corps on an ideological level. But then there's the problem of how do i feed, clothe, and perhaps most importantly, arm my followers. Because unlike the British on the Indian Subcontinent the corps are more then willing to kill us to end us.

Easy there buddy. I don't even see how that's whining.

In any case, the limit to one person was so that people didn't suggest magical shifts in CEOs and whatnot. It is this: you are a person of the sixth world, you don't like the corp's over-reaching influence in everyone's life. You may not believe governments were better, but you want to bring the corporations down from where they are now.

You are just one person, possible Emerged or Awakened, most likely not.

One person can establish a religion. The rest of the post does go on to say:




I'm not asking for a series of events that can lead to the regression of the corps' influence in the Sixth World. I guess it's my fault for not making this any plainer.

No more from me about this.

That's almost poetic.

The problem is how do you conceal it for long?

I doubt a corp would 'fail' or dissolve before another crop snapped it up. The name on the doors would change, one corp would get smaller/go away and another would get bigger. No change really.

How do you make every major worldwide business in the world fail at the same time? You don't. At least, if something happens that does, the last think you care about is corps.

Which brings us back to the old line so popular in Shadowrun: The more things change, the more they stay the same.

What if you introduce a feeding frenzy? There have been hints that Ares is weakening; Knight's and Vogel's ploys have eroded much of the loyalty within the company. There have been setbacks in Ares Arms and in Ares Heavy Industries.

Now, the Big 10 would gobble up as much of Ares' assets as they could. But they'll fight each other for it too.

It doesn't have to happen all at once either.

So I become faster and smarter than they are. I make moves ahead of their moves to ensnare them in traps so I swoop in and waltz off with their results. I do businessy things that are better than their businessy things. The details of that are for people who are more interested in business things. I'm content to treat business things like casting spells or coding IC, I just roll my dice and do the thing.
Again, if it were possible.


Every AAA has an insurance branch and I would be no different. You've got to diversify, my brother!

Congrats, in attempting to fight the enemy, you've become them! You can call your company, "Horizon 2" or the more subtle, "Horizons".

I think you might just want to go Adept, non-combat skill buffs are dirt-cheap and things like Analytical Mind could help you play your game of multi-dimensional chess

Crash 3.0.

With a healthy dose of deliberate planning to bring around anarchy on a global scale with meatspace assets instead of purely digital disruption.

Yes, and if suddenly you can't use any legit services (money, stores, your gridlinked car, your ISP, etc), are you more worried about Aztechnology coming down a few pegs in relation to other corps or whether or not it's safe to eat devil rat?

I mean, runners might care and might be better suited to ...well, survive the transition, but the average wage slave?

I also thought it pretty poor how the crashes are both kind of glossed over. Can you imagine the sheer chaos of all computers suddenly not working in our world? Alot of people would die, from starvation, dehydration, sickness, etc. Not to mention violent deaths from predatory folks.

I remember a world before computers and I don't think that happened.

The problem is, that was the world before computers.

Shit, farmers can't pick up crops anymore without computers. Modern tractors and combines use them, even laser guidance autopilot systems to efficiently pick up cotton, etc.

Logistics companies sure are going to have issues getting this food to that place and that food to this place, etc.

If you think people wouldn't starve until it was all figured out, you're fooling yourself.

Perhaps Crash 3.0 combined with another VITAS-like event. But when you're in those scenarios, you're basically invoking Deux ex Machina.

Nah, that's overhyped Y2K nonsense. People use computers because they work. If they stop working, we just do something else. People are versatile.
I know plenty of farmers and ranchers(and living in Texas, so should you) who can do their work without all that stuff. Most of them I know don't.
Most entry level shipping employees can't work a manual shipping system, but their managers can. I can. You just teach them to do it without computers. Heck, just get people in there over 50 to teach them how to do it.
It'd be a transition, but it's not like it's Katrina or anything. The demand would still be there and the product would still be there. People survive and they don't need computers to do it.

If the "one person I am" is the Emperor of Japan I can see some approaches that might work...

You lose the SCADA systems and you lose the power grid, the oil pipelines, the gas pipelines, the city water supplies and every other large scale system. Do you remember what happened in New Orleans during Katrina? That IS the world.

Exactly how do you expect trucks to be hauling food anywhere when there is no fuel for the trucks, you can't program the robot pilots with their delivery route, the fresh food is busy rotting in the heat and you can't talk to anyone who isn't in the same building to place or get orders?

Or perhaps if the definition of "person" includes great dragons, one of those could have a chance.

The word "extraterritoriality" can describe four different things:
- corporate extraterritoriality created by the Shiawase Decision in 2001
- corporate extraterritoriality established by the Business Recognition Accords of 2042
- diplomatic extraterritoriality as depicted in Shadowrun and Hollywood
- extraterritoriality as used IRL in actual law

First, I must stand corrected, since I was using the third one myself in my previous posting. The actual definition of extraterritoriality is positive : it allows a law to applies in a place it shouldn't, not the opposite. Condemning a British company for dealing with Iran in a US court, for example, is extraterritoriality.

There is no such thing as diplomatic extraterritoriality. What they have is immunity. Contrary to popular belief, the law of the host country does in fact apply within embassies and consulates. But they have immunity against arrest, search, and seizure for their personnels, buildings, pouches, bags and vehicles. It is a practical consequences of those that prevent law enforcement agencies from enforcing local laws.
More important, the law of the hosted country doesn't apply either.
For the US, this has been established by the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals in Persinger versus Islamic Republic of Iran (1983). To sum it up, the court ruled the US embassy in Tehran is not US territory and is Iranian territory.

So, first, embassies and consulates are not extraterritorial, and there are not sovereign. Shadowrun is wrong when it says otherwise. But as one might suspect, Shadowrun actually exists in an alternate, Hollywood-based reality, where "diplomatic extraterritoriality" exists.

The next problem is what the word "sovereignty" describes. In real life, sovereignty is a supreme and independent authority.

Under this definition, Shadowrun extraterritorial corporations are no longer sovereign.

From 2042, most countries in the world ratified the Business Recognition Accords, that stipulates the Corporate Court decides which corporations get AA or AAA rating and that all signatory nations must grant them certain rights. By a majority voting, the Corporate Court can strip any megacorporation of its rating, save the seven founders, or declare an Omega Order against any megacorporations (including the seven founders). Megacorporations also must submit their differents with states and other megacorporations to the Corporate Court. This makes the Corporate Court the supreme authority over all megacorporations. Therefore, megacorporations are not sovereign. Should a corporation ignore Corporate Court rulings, the AAA would pressure signatory states to revoke all its privileges.

Between the Shiawase Decision in 2001 and the BRA in 2042, it was different. The US/UCAS Administration, Congress and States couldn't revoke the privileges the Supreme Court gave to the corporations because they cannot go against a Supreme Court ruling.
The problem is, what the books tell us about what megacorporation can practically do (corporate scrip, passports...) is valid in the game 2049-2074 period, in a post-BRA world. The actual description of what the Shiawase Decision allowed is much more terse.

As you might notice, Corporate Shadowfiles does use the word "sovereign". So as long as the Supreme Court did not overturn itself, they would be effectively considered as sovereign by the US government. All the other statement are much more weaker. Privileges of foreign governments actually is the same thing as the diplomatic privileges (that would be very different if it was "privileges of foreign states"). And the "right to defend themselves and their functions" is a basic right.

Regarding Shiawase in particular, a "sovereignty" ruling would be particularly weak. As I said, the Supreme Court could consider Shiawase as sovereign. It wouldn't change the fact that Shiawase was incorporated under Japanese law, with its shareholders and management Japanese citizens. So Shiawase would still be subject to the Japanese state authority. Sovereignty is first and foremost a matter of fact, that you can recognize, but not vest upon.
Practically, the UCAS or the Corporate Court are not going to cancel Ares extraterritoriality because the corporation would fight back. That's how countries gain independence and become actually sovereign. Might makes right and all that.

So, I agree with you a Supreme Court "sovereignty ruling" makes no sense, and would discard Corporate Shadowfiles wording.
However, I think there may be (little) room for the Supreme Court to produce a nearly sensical "immunity ruling" (or "extraterritoriality ruling" if you prefer). It's too late here so I won't enter the detail now, but I would go for something like Lochner versus New York is back with a vengeance, reestablishing Freedom of Contract and overturning Nebbia versus New York and West Coast Hotel Co. versus Parrish by inverting the burden of proof, so that contracts can ignore any regulation as long as the government hasn't proved it effectively increases the protection of the community, health, safety or vulnerable groups (that's precisely what the Shiawase was about : NRC regulation on security made the plant more vulnerable). It could explain why not all corporations in the US instantly becomes extraterritorial, as only those involved in business like nuclear energy or national security could effectively fend off regulation attempts on such ground. Well, assuming an Hollywood level of realism and lots of "it's an alternative timeline anyway" statements.

None of these actually require extraterritoriality or sovereignty. And again, we do not know if megacorporations started doing such thing as soon as 2001, or waited after 2042.

Many casinos, malls and private companies enforce their own "laws" regarding dress codes or proper behavior for instance. What extraterritoriality does is allowing to ignore the law of the land. Which allows you to set up what would miss to have your own legal system: if the laws that forbid forceful restraint or killing do no apply, you're free to enforce imprisonment and death penalty.

Several online companies established their own electronic currencies. Actually, between 1836 and 1913, before the Federal Reserve was established, US dollars were issued by private banks.

Citizenship is a relationship between the individual and the state. Other state may acknowledge that citizenship, and grant travel documents, but they don't have to: quite a few states don't recognize dual citizenships for instance. The problem is rather to issue usable documentation of citizenship. Recognition of citizenship abroad requires a treaty between the two states. That's where sovereignty comes in hand: in most states, the law forbids anyone outside of the central government to engage in treaties.

In Real Life, September 11th Attacks, Patriot Act, a decade of massive security spendings and all that, and yet the DHS and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission considered nuclear power plants security has to be handled by private companies, and still do in spite of some issues.
Then consider before the Shiawase plant incident happens in SR timeline, the US would have had a level of terrorism awareness and preparedness similar to that of the real US in the late nineties (that is, when CIA was withholding intelligence from FBI and similar stuff...).

Saved me the trouble, thanks.

SCADA cities have back-up plans for when the computers go down, not to mention the fact that rural communities don't have them. Power, water and oil all flowed freely before computers and they can run without them.
When computers go down people don't throw their hands in the air and scream "We're all going to die!" Instead, they fix the problem. Katrina was bad because of the city was under water and communication problems even with computers. I remember when the power went out in the NE in '03 and folks handled that with aplomb.

Fuel gets to trucks the same way it has for a hundred years. You can't program robot pilots, but there are people on those boats on on those trucks that can take stuff where it needs to be. Standing orders still exist. Fresh food doesn't rot in the heat because you take it to the places it needs to go and also because refrigerators still work. Radio isn't down and that's how most truckers communicate anyway. Heck, even the phone lines aren't down for that long. Once they figure out computers aren't coming back, you just revert back to telephone operators.

Don't get me wrong, it will be unpleasant, but there won't be roving bands of marauders or anything. We aren't going back to the Dark ages here, we're at most going back to Mad Men. Likely what would happen is what did happen with the two Crashes. There was panic, but capitalism took over and a new system replaced the old system within months.

I know it's hard to believe, but there was life before computers and it's possible to have life without them.

For my alt-History Technothriller Shadowrun, I am thinking through just such a scenario.

The first stage of the campaign is set in 2032, and the second in 2035. Between the two is the first Crash, where all TCP/IP connected computers get burnt to the ground.

How destructive such an event is depends on the degree to which computers are integrated into basic functions of society. For one example, in the campaign setting, intercontinental telephone cables have been severed and the phone system has been effectively obsoleted by VOIP. So, without the Internet, the most basic communications functions are unavailable. No phones, so no talk.

I am unsure as to how devastating to make the aftermath, but it would cause at least some disruption. The less a given city, state, or country is dependent on computers, the less vulnerable they are to disruption.

It wouldn't be Mad Max, but it would be... interesting, at the very least. Tumultuous.

One thing you have to remember is that the megacorps aren't really so much corporations as they are nation states. Every AAA has an economy larger than the current RL US economy (by a very wide margin), every AAA has WMD's of various types, every AAA has a standing army comparable in power to that of any existing nation state, every AAA has a hundred million + citizens, every AAA is fully diversified into virtually every sector of the economy and every nation, and as a collective the AAA's are the worlds supreme sovereign.

Nations remain and have any power in Shadowrun solely at the sufferance of the megacorps. If those nations ever try to claw back power from the megacorps as a collective, the nation in question will quickly find that it is the weaker entity and end up punished to such an extent that no other nation even contemplates a similar course of action.

Wide spread popular revolt against the Mega's isn't really possible or practical. The Mega's own and control all of the communications infrastructure, and have the ability to monitor and filter it. The mega's own and control the power grid. The mega's own and control the food supply. The mega's own and control the factories. It's an effort doomed to failure.

The only possible way to bring down the megacorp system in SR is to win the game. You need to manage to gain sole control over all of the mega's, solidify your power over them so that you can essentially use them like Lofwyr uses S-K, and then choose to use your power to change the system to something else. The odds of successfully doing this are so low as to be incalculable but it is, theoretically, possible.

*claps hands together thoughtfully* Right... Looks like I've got some work ahead of me.

I can count on you guys for support right? After all, the new world order is going to need competent leaders...

Awww, we have to be competent? I guess that leaves me out.

I suppose that competent isn't really that necessary. Coming to think of it, there's a real possibility that the words 'competent' and 'leader' are mutually exclusive...

Sure, all you have to do is replace EVERY control. With equipment that doesn't exist. Which then needs to be run by a small army of people who need to be hired and trained on the equipment that doesn't exist. And until that happens you have no power, no fuel and no water.

I was so badly tempted to simply reply with "and your point is...?" but I decided against it.
Just thought you should know.

That part there, that's the silly bit. New laws absolutely can supersede a Supreme Court ruling. If the ruling is constitutional, it takes quite a bit more work, but the Shiawase Decision wasn't.

The tough part about the TEOTWAWKI scenario is the loss of electricity. Our electrical systems are run by computers (in fact, ARE computers). Don't kid yourself otherwise. It's also extremely sensitive to EMP, is very dispersed, and transformers are rare and only manufactured overseas.

You and I could certainly survive without electricity. And there would be enough generators that stores can keep some food stocked, as long as they have gas. Gas stations could pump some gas manually (although not full capacity, and not enough for everyone). People on insulin would be in trouble, as well as anyone with health problems who needs AC. I can't speak to how fuel would be refined in these conditions. THey don't keep a large supply of refined gasoline on hand, and I think it's fair to say they would not be operating at close to full capacity. We wouldn't have street lights at night. A lot of people (myself included) would be totally out of the job. My neighbors on welfare wouldn't be getting their check, nor my grandmother on social security. And unfortunately for my neighbors, my grandmother has a gun, and doesn't plan on going quietly without her daily martini.

Even accepting that we will get the critical processes moving again, and accepting that 80% of the population survives, we're going to be damn pissed. Very likely a lot of people in places of power are going to get lynched. When the lights finally come back on, the 'corporations' might still exist, but they won't be the same corps as when power went off.


And to address the original post, that's exactly what I'd focus on; the bowtie in complex systems. The point where multiple inputs narrow to a single point, before spreading out again. Oil platforms or refineries. Power generation. Food prices. Mass transit. Water. If you're not familiar with the blog of Global Guerrillas, I recommend you check it out.

With the above clarification on the meaning of sovereignty, extraterritoriality and immunity :

- NATO has extraterritoriality provisions for all signatory countries. Military from one country has a privilege of jurisdiction inside all facilities located within another signatory country. If a British soldier assassinates an US citizen inside NATO headquarters in Belgium, US and Belgium have accepted Great Britain military code applies. That's not as obvious as some people may believe, and defense treaties are signed precisely for that reason. The US is particularly touchy on that issue, but without defense treaties, it would have no legal basis to act as it usually does.

- The United Nations has diplomatic immunity. There is no extraterritoriality in the legal sense (to apply the law of a nation in a place it shouldn't). All countries must respect this immunity, including the countries the UN employees are citizens of.
One example of this happened some times ago at the International Criminal Tribunal for ex-Yugoslavia, after a French citizen working for the tribunal disclosed confidential information. Neither the French or Dutch authorities (the Court is in the Hague) could do anything about it. Ended with the court pausing on war crimes and crimes against humanity to deal with her, indicting and convicting her for "contempt of court," issuing an international arrest warrant for a seven-day prison term and €7,000 fine.

My idea involves a whole group of A.D.s, sans meglimaniacal obsessions. Working with a general plan, create a AA corp that creates a purchasable citizenship (so any runner can be a corporate citizen). Using the massive funds and talet pool, gun for a AAA slot. If you're cautious it shouldn't take too long. I'd guess around ten years to get to or aquire AA status somehow. Then you play the game. Aftr your a tripleA, between being a mega and having a citizenry full of runners, let loose the dogs of war.

My bad. For the Shiawase Decision to extend past the realm of Nuclear Regulatory Commission rules on nuclear power plants' security measures and effectively grants any number of corporations the so-called "extraterritorial privilege" or whatever, it is likely it had a constitutional reach of some sort. Hence my suggestion of something akin to Lochner versus New York, which was based on the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

In the end, the Supreme Court can always be superseded by amending the Constitution. It can be considered US sovereignty ultimately lies in the Constitution itself (and not, as one may expect, in the People). But anyway, as the Neo-anarchist Guide to North America explain, while the US government thought it could take the power back from the corporations, the 2005 earthquake that hit New York, the Awakening and the Amerindian insurrection never let them the time to do so.

That equipment exists. Not just in warehouses, but there are companies that still make all that stuff, mostly for rural utilities. In most grids it's still in place, it's just be run around. That army of people exists too. They are private utility companies and city employees.
The water works without power or computers. It did in NYC in '03. You just have to go into the sewer and manually adjust the valves(which they do all the time during floods) and you don't even have to do that for a few days as the reservoir tanks are pretty steady. The power works without computers too, it just takes longer. But almost every US city is still using the same grid it used fifty years ago.

I'm not saying it's easy. I'm not even saying people won't die. But starvation? Dehydration? Marauding gangs? Get realistic! Leave that stuff for the Y2K conspiracy books.

Actually, there is a straight forward way to get around a supreme court decision. Well, there are two. Andrew Jackson used the first one. "John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it!".

The second one is based on this clause: " In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make." Congress can simply state that for a given law the supreme court has no appellate jurisdiction. This has NEVER EVER been done to my knowledge, but it's an option.

NYC has a very peculiar water system that is actually gravity fed. Chicago's isn't. LA's isn't. I personally live >500 feet above the the river that supplies my water most of the time. If the pumps fail I have a few hours of water max. Every tank has computer controls, as do all the main valves that switch between things like the pumps from the aquifer and the river. Not to mention the water treatment system controls.

And no, 50 years ago the US made all the high voltage transformers we use. Now the vast majority are made in Germany, and NOBODY in the US makes any. Oh, and they are all individually custom made and have a year long lead time. You burn out one of those and the power stays out on that circuit until you replace it. Utilities have a very small number of temporary spares that they can install, but they are temporary and have lots of limitations.

I disagree with your assessment, but I'll skip the details and break it down to: It's doable and there are people to do it. More importantly there is a massive amount of motivation to do it. Like I said, it's not easy and you are looking at things like folks dying from heat exhaustion or freezing, but a total breakdown of civilization? That's just science fiction. It's people whose lives revolve around computers not being able to envision a world without them.
I think Shadowrun probably has it right in that capitalism does it's thing a new computer system crops up to replace the old one. But even if it doesn't, we get things working again. We survive, we endure and we make things better because that's what people do.
The world and it's people are not so fragile that everyone will die without the Internet.

*Clap, Clap, Clap*
Well said...

We, yes.

Everyone, no.

Again, nobody is saying the world ends in the meantime.

But many people are screwed.