PRESENT SHOCK: AREAS IN TRANSITION

Sociologists in 2100 refer to nations successfully managing a shift from an older technological-economic base to a modern one as “transition” states. The degree of success varies; often this means simply not falling into civil war or economic ruin. For even the most stable of the transition countries, the sudden availability of advanced technology and resulting social and economic dislocations is jarring. Yet this does not mean failure – most transition nations appear to be on a path to development. Democratic leadership, a good relationship with the developed world, and cultural flexibility and adaptability are all key indicators that the transition will succeed.

The process of moving from the Third Wave into the Fourth or even Fifth Wave can be traumatic. Culture evolves slower than technology, and the fruits of rapid technological transformation do not spread evenly. Nations going through a period of transition have old institutions and new systems side-by-side, each needing to adapt to the demands of the other. The results are difficult to control, yet many developing countries are keeping this complex interaction from devolving into chaos.

In the world of 2155, nations attempting to modernize face two major barriers. The first is the effective integration of new technologies and ideas into existing social, political, and economic structures. Doing so too quickly can lead to chaos, too slowly can leave the society lagging ever further behind. The second is the adoption of controls over intellectual property common in the hyperdeveloped world. The rules are complex, and the implementation difficult, but they are the cornerstone of the global economy.

Transition regions combine the accelerated pace of mid-to-late Third Wave culture with the weird and rapidly changing technologies of the Fourth and Fifth Wave world. It’s not unusual to see a 60-year-old fuel cell automobile parked outside of a newly opened memesculpting salon, or a salary man juggling two incompatible wearables, the older one with data archives and easy connection to local networks and the newer one with an LAI and a global reach. Local companies offer services that combine technologies, adding off-the-shelf bio- or nano- components to older designs, sometimes with unforeseen consequences.

Life in the transition nations exposes the underbelly of Fifth Wave existence, peeling away the sleek gloss of comfort and power. The transition world has all of the churn and change of the Fifth Wave, but combines it with the speed and aggressiveness of the Third Wave. Transition society is less interested in identity than in power. The riches of modernity are becoming visible, and can be had with just a little more work.

There is an insatiable appetite for experimentation in the modernizing parts of the developing world, one often missing in the conservative patience of the hyperdeveloped states. Most of the citizens in the Third Wave world can’t expect to live another 80, 100, or 300 years – anything they can get, they need to get now. The nations often compete for the attentions and gifts from the great-power patrons, and a technology, design, or meme that the Fifth Wave considers an obsolescent embarrassment can be of earthshaking value in the poorer regions of the world.

Yet this drive to compete, succeed, and transcend comes at a price. The stress of constant change can drive people insane. Social institutions rocked by the onslaught of Fifth Wave memes can decide to fight rather than adapt. And the very technologies seen as the engines of progress can fail, wrenching the society to a painful halt.

Mexico City, Mexico: The Ballad of Enrique Martín, by Dia de los Muertos. A nanocorrido about the life of a recently executed data smuggler.

Kampala, Uganda: Composition 13, by Pika Pika Overdrive. A dance club favorite combining neotraditional drums with classic tranceabilly hits.

Bangkok, Thailand: Sympathy for Mick Jagger, by KT Event. New French lyrics over old Bulgarian folk tunes by an entirely artificial Dutch band.

Baghdad, Iraq: Whiplash, composer unknown. An underground compilation taking samples from the Caliph’s speeches and layering them with hard-edge-style rhythm tracks.

Managua, Nicaragua: Biometal Lullaby, by Lords of the Belt. As yet unreleased Lords song that recently appeared on the TSA Web Library. The band has filed a complaint with the WTO.

The varieties of new technologies and ideas rushing into a transition society can be overwhelming. A single 3D universal printer brought into a town can threaten local businesses. Uplifted animals, sentient machines, and genetically modified parahumans – all commonplace sights in the Fifth Wave cities – drastically change a baseline individual’s sense of his place in the world, particularly when jobs are lost due to competition with technologically augmented workers. The vast array of new reproductive choices can make prospective parents doubt the timing, method, and wisdom of having children; within one year of the introduction of inexpensive genetic reproductive modifications, national birth rates drop by nearly 30%. Most overwhelming of all, the change doesn’t stop. Techniques and machines that seemed nearly magical become archaic relics in a matter of months, or even weeks.

Approximately 40% of all adults in transition societies have some kind of stress-related medical problem. Alcoholism is the most common, but the influx of new designer drugs can often lead to abuse; current generation psychotropics may not cause physical dependency, but psychological addiction is widespread. Social Transition Stress Disorder is a frequent diagnosis, and simple insomnia, depression, and anxiety are nearly ubiquitous. Targeted psychopharmacology and memetic counseling provide effective treatment, but cases can go unnoticed for weeks or months. Rumors in developing nations claim that STSD is deliberately induced by the Fifth Wave world through memetic warfare.

Antistress medication is available around the world. In most developed nations, taking a dose of antianxiety or antidepressant is a typical response to unsettling events. In many transition nations, the use of antistress drugs is promoted by governments and leading businesses.

Social Transition Stress Disorder, or STSD, first identified in 2067, is a chronic memetic illness affecting millions of people around the globe. Originally described as a traumatic reaction to interaction with robots – hence its other name, “cybershell-shock” – STSD is now recognized as encompassing a broad range of psychological effects arising from rapid, discontinuous social change. Known triggers for STSD include significant economic disruption or transitions, encounters (particularly unpleasant or threatening ones) with new technologies, and paradigm shifts resulting from assimilation of new memeplexes. Symptoms vary, but usually manifest as depression or apathy; less frequently, paranoid anxiety or irrational hatreds (sometimes even violence) can result.

Incidence of STSD rises with the speed, degree, and surprise of a given change, and is typically cumulative – a succession of moderate cultural shocks can be much more damaging than a single large event. STSD is most common in societies undertaking a rapid transition from Third Wave (or pre-Third Wave) to Fourth Wave culture and technology, although cases also occur in advanced regions falling into rapid decline due to environmental or economic disasters. Treatment, typically a combination of memetic therapy and drugs, is well-understood and very effective. Unfortunately, many of those most in need of STSD treatment are those least able to afford it.

Found all over the world, these medications are cheap and usually effective.

MyOpia. The best-selling antistress drug of 2154, MyOpia promotes a feeling of well-being and imperturbability that lasts for 48 hours. $5 for 10 doses.

Pacifica. Used primarily as a calming agent in periods of stress or fear, it is extremely popular among soldiers in combat zones. $20 for 10 doses.

Thalus. No longer officially on the market, Thalus – which gained the nickname “Soma” – has long-term side-effects: while it grants a state of imperturbability for 12 hours, it has the cumulative effect of eroding the user's will based on the quantity of pills taken, persisting for one to six weeks after use stops. It is still found in the developing world, often sold under different names. $5 for 100 doses.

In the Fifth Wave world, nearly every human institution – marriage, reproduction, religion, education – has been indelibly altered by the advent of new technologies. These changes affect transition states, too, but because they come in faster, they hit harder. The hyperdeveloped nations had years or decades in which to adapt to genetic engineering and machine intelligence – transition regions deal with it all at once, as well as the memes and philosophies that developed in the Fifth Wave world in response to these changes.

Yet not every transition society is willing to roll over and become a mirror of the hyperdeveloped world. Traditional religions remain quite strong throughout the developing world, and memetic movements that seek to control the spread of Fifth Wave technology, such as Preservationism and Bioliberation, are gaining converts. Transhumanism is far less common in the developing world, especially the transition states, than in the advanced nations. The common meme is simple Humanism – making humans and human society work before trying to move beyond.

Sometimes the transition stalls. Promising technologies fail, and public support for more change dries up. Algeria was once seen as the model for nations moving from poverty and unrest into modernized stability. With help from the E.U., the newly democratic Algerian government brought the bulk of the country into a high-Third-Wave existence by the 2060s, and gave a public timeline for introducing advanced bioengineering that promised universal health treatments and reproductive upgrades by 2090. In the late 2070s, the first generation of genetic upgrades hit adulthood, and promptly started experiencing side effects from their treatments. The genome design the government labs had used, the Germline Improvement Modification (the “pre-Alpha” mod), was faulty.

The public mood quickly turned against the bioengineering program, and thousands of parents who had gone through with the upgrades sued the Algerian government and the European Union. All human genetic-engineering efforts ceased. In 2155, Algeria remains a stable Third Wave democracy, but one that is extraordinarily resistant to the introduction of new biotechnologies.

Most developing societies are eager to become part of the global technological and economic system, and become happy consumers of the new devices and ideas flooding across the border. The streets of a typical transition city are filled with a mix of old and new technologies existing side-by-side – vendors sell old-style digital videos alongside the latest slinkies, and dilapidated methanolelectric hybrid automobiles compete for parking with the latest hydrogen-burning aircars. Discontinued models and previous-generation devices are found at substantial discounts. There are also thriving markets in adapter and translation systems to let cutting-edge equipment coexist with less advanced gear.

Developing nations are fertile markets for technologies that have been superseded by newer advances in the Fifth Wave world. Biomedical treatments, AR systems, cybershells, even near-sentient infomorphs can outlive their usefulness in the hyperdeveloped states and still be of great value in the developing world. Entrepreneurs known as tech brokers make good money finding buyers and sellers for barely obsolete devices. As far as the cutting-edge world is concerned, these systems are woefully out of date; to the developing-nation customer, these system are great advances. Customers know that they’re not getting the latest, but they also aren’t paying anywhere near full price.

One problem for many transition regions is the mismatch between supply of and demand for these updated systems. Companies importing Fourth/Fifth Wave devices into transition markets must be aware of the speed of “product churn” – demand for a given technology can peak and collapse with alarming speed. A distributor can go from not being able to keep up with demand to not being able to dump stock fast enough in a matter of weeks. This does provide further opportunities for enterprising tech brokers, however, both in the rapid import of high-demand products and in the arbitrage of buying overstock from one part of the world to be sold quickly elsewhere. Rather than selling product itself, the Fifth Wave developer of a given technological system may instead sell licenses to local manufacturers. Very often the licensed designs are the older models no longer on the hyperdeveloped world’s markets. The result, produced locally, is then a “homegrown” product – important in many areas concerned about the local economy – and the rights-holder continues to profit from an otherwise-obsolete design.

Supply and demand problems affect communication networks too. As increasing numbers of citizens move to more-advanced networked technologies (such as networked infomorphs or teleoperations gear), communication and support systems can overload, resulting in dropped signals, network “lag,” and temporary outages. While these effects are often transient, they occasionally persist for minutes or even hours. Many transition areas have local entrepreneurs (usually known as netwallahs) who can set up quick-and-dirty alternative communication networks to get around the congestion. Network supply problems don’t just affect Third Wave gear; any outside equipment brought into a transition area suffers the same outage and congestion problems unless it operates on a separate network.

The transition nations, particularly those with a substantial local industrial base, are often the home to technological pathways abandoned in the hyperdeveloped world. In some cases, this is due to particular local issues, such as with the continued use of refined petroleum for fuel in Iran and the Islamic Caliphate states. In other cases, the use of dead-end systems comes from the ability to purchase the technology at greatly reduced prices, such as Mongolia’s widespread use of videophones, which never managed to catch on globally and were eventually superseded by AR and VII systems. Genetic modifications unpopular in the developed world are also found in some developing states, for similar reasons.

There is also the “wrong protocol” problem, where a networked system (such as augmented-reality or voice-communications) installed in the past can’t communicate with current systems due to incompatibility. There are few elegant solutions. The fastest fix is to rip out the old network and install a new one, and make new gear available at low cost. A variation on this situation comes when multiple transnational corporations are seeking to dominate a local market. Aggressive firms often tune their systems to shut out competitors, forcing consumers to choose one system over another. Whichever system has more users tends to win out, regardless of quality. In the meantime, users are stuck trying to translate between mutually incompatible systems.

While much of the technology from the hyperdeveloped world is brought in intentionally, some systems are not. These so-called “kudzu” technologies invade the local infrastructure, choking networks, overloading systems, and overwhelming defenses. Adviruses are the classic example; code designed to display an advertisement in an AR system or virtual interface, they’re globally unpopular but extraordinarily common. Nearly every wearer of AR and VII systems employs some kind of antiviral software to prevent advirus infection; as a result, evolving in the Darwinian environment of the Fifth Wave communication and information networks, adviruses have to be flexible and robust to survive. The older technologies of the transition nations are often no match for the advirus’ ability to hide, reproduce, and subvert systems.

Less common, but still troubling, are Gypsy Spirits. These nomadic sentient infomorphs can damage systems by deleting existing software, and are usually considered illegal rogues. They are frequently found in transition-region computer networks, as these systems are advanced enough to support their existence without being sophisticated enough to recognize and defend against them.

As Third Wave technologies disseminate to the masses, one of the first systems usually to gain wide use is the virtual tag, or v-tag. Allowing the ready identification and tracking of any tagged item, v-tags become ubiquitous parts of a transition state’s surroundings. Many places also adopt the v-tag as a means to track individuals. Virtual tags designed specifically to track people are known as p-tags.

The decision to tag citizens is a controversial one, and a number of countries ban the use of p-tags entirely (most notably in Europe and the South African Coalition), although many recognize that virtual interface implants can serve the same function. Other nations, however, came to believe that p-tags are socially useful for reasons of public safety, transparency, or political control. A slight majority of nations on Earth use p-tags on adults to some degree, usually for monitoring prisoners; more than two-thirds regularly use them in children.

P-tags are implanted, most often in the shoulder but sometimes in the back of the neck. They are designed to emit a weak beacon containing, at minimum, a unique code identifying the wearer. Some p-tags provide more data, including the person’s current health status. P-tags are designed to be detectable with the appropriate equipment at ranges from 100 feet to one mile, depending upon the model. P-tag signals are not difficult to jam, although a p-tag suddenly dropping out of view usually raises suspicions. Unauthorized removal of a tag causes it to send out a higher-strength alarm; removal of a p-tag is a simple first-aid task, once the p-tag itself is located.

The most common use of p-tags is for the monitoring of children. Implanted as toddlers, kids wearing p-tags can be tracked easily by parents or crèche-keepers. In relatively free societies, only the parents or legal guardians have access to the location information, although law-enforcement agencies can request or demand access as required. In societies where p-tagging of children is universal, there are abundant warnings when leaving a monitored area, and many parents refuse to allow their children to travel outside of “safe” areas. Removal of the p-tag is a rite of passage in these societies, indicating a step into adulthood, and rebellious teens may have their p-tags cut out by friends.

Another wide use of p-tags is for the monitoring of high-profile people, from prisoners to national politicians – anyone the state needs to keep track of for their own or the public’s safety. In these cases, the implant are deeper in the wearer’s body, impossible to remove without surgery. These signals are also usually heavily encrypted in order to prevent unauthorized monitoring of the wearer.

A minority of nations require p-tags for all citizens – notably Panama, Kazakstan, and Thailand. The usual argument for this is the need to fight crime, although in many cases a broader justification of “public order” is used to watch dissidents. Since visual identification alone can be mistaken, a unique encrypted ID tracked to the location of the crime is far less likely to be wrong. P-tagged societies often combine cameras and AIs to watch public behavior, watching for suspicious activity. Any person seen by the camera without a correlated p-tag is considered suspicious, at best, and subject to immediate arrest in some countries. Tracking nodes are distributed as widely as possible to prevent anyone from going unmonitored.

Countries that rely on general p-tagging require all visitors to be temporarily tagged, usually on the back of the hand. This prevents the guest from being stopped by police for not showing up on p-tag monitors, and can trace the wearer if he is kidnapped. These temporary implants are not as valuable in that regard as a VII or implanted communication system, however, as kidnappers can easily cut out the temporary p-tag.

There are four broad approaches to the use of p-tags in a generally monitored society.

Transparency: Everyone has access to the p-tag information of everyone else; citizens can watch the government and each other. No state currently uses total transparency, although there are a small number of Isolate experiments with this form of society.

Safety First: Everyone has limited access to p-tag information. A given individual typically has access only to family members’ data. Most monitoring is done by NAIs to watch for crimes.

Smart Business: P-tag information is accessible only by commercial entities. In some cases, these are private corporations providing monitoring services under contract; in other cases, monitoring is done by employers.

Big Brother: Only the government has access to p-tag information; monitoring is done by law enforcement to maintain public order, safety, and compliance.

In some cases, the kind of monitoring varies based on social or economic class. In Madagascar, for example, p-tag data for the political elite is transparent for other elites, allowing them to watch each other for signs of treachery, whereas p-tags in regular citizens are handled with a nod to safety, with policies against the abuse of p-tag information. Anyone with limited rights – criminals, bioroids, SAIs – is subject to full “Big Brother” monitoring, with p-tag information a matter of public record.

YAOUNDÉ/TEN: The government of Cameroon filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization today, alleging that the Shanghai Interactive corporation, makers of the popular MRsiv augmented-reality systems, failed to adequately protect users from infection by the “Lucky Horse” advirus. The advirus, which has been a sporadic problem since it first appeared in China in September of 2154, specifically targets the MRsiv system. In December of 2154, Shanghai Interactive released an update to the MRsiv firmware that prevents further infections. The spokesavatar for Shanghai Interactive noted that the contract the government of Cameroon signed with the corporation in October of 2153, in which the developing nation purchased over 5,000,000 units of the MRsiv hardware at substantially reduced rates, explicitly states that the MRsiv model, which has been replaced by the MRsiv2 augmented-reality system, would not be eligible for free upgrades. “The terms of the license are very clear. In order to receive the firmware upgrade, they will need to purchase replacement MRsiv2 units,” stated the spokesavatar. When asked for comment, the WTO told TEN that they will be looking into the matter, but warned the Cameroon government not to use pirated copies of the firmware update. “We would consider the use of illegal copies of rights-managed software a very grave offense, and will be paying close attention to Yaoundé’s behavior in this matter.”

One of the ongoing issues of the 21st century was the tension between owners of intellectual properties and those who use those properties without compensation. Unlike physical goods, digital properties are not lost when given to others. The original and the copy are identical, as are subsequent copies. This perfect replicability threatened the economic well-being of corporations that relied on intellectual property – and as more physical goods and commercial services took on an “information” character, an increasing portion of the global economy faced disaster if intellectual-property rights were not enforced.

By 2030, the advanced industrial nations had all moved to firmly support content-owners’ rights, and had outlawed technologies that facilitated unrestricted duplication of intellectual property. The uproar among the technological elite was deafening, as these regulations made many general-purpose computers illegal, but died down over time as it became clear that consumers cared less about having tools to alter or create new content than about continued cheap access to entertainment, software, and the like. Over the course of the 21st and 22nd century, the degree of control exerted by the intellectual-property-rights holders has varied, peaking in the 2040s (acting as a catalyst for Kyle Porters’ exploration of information socialism) and again in the 2090s.

Digital-Rights Management: Primarily used to control duplication, distribution, and use of entertainment media. When purchased, the content (song, InVid, slinkie, etc.) is coded to only play on a particular piece of hardware. If that content is copied to another system, it will not play or will require the new user to also purchase the material. Most content only allows single-play rights.

Experience-Rights Management: Primarily used to control the level of detail a person receives through his augmented-reality, virtual-interface, or slinkie hardware. Most AR and VII users keep their ERM at a minimal setting, then pay for additional material when they desire it.

Genetic-Rights Management: One of the more controversial types of CRM, genetic-rights-management systems control the duplication of registered-genome designs. Genetic upgrades and parahumans are sterile unless they, or their parents, purchased a reproduction license from the owners of their genome design; this is routine in wealthy societies, but less common in poorer regions.

In the hyperdeveloped world in 2100, this is all ancient history. Rights-management code preventing unauthorized duplication, distribution, or content use is built into every piece of technology available on the open market. Commercially available AIs are inherently unable to duplicate themselves or assist in the illegal duplication of other content. Reading an essay, watching an InVid, or experiencing a slinkie costs a small fee; these micro-payments are handled invisibly, behind the scenes, and most advanced-nation consumers pay them little mind. In fact, given the overall wealth of the hyperdeveloped world, the minor fees associated with licensed material are so inconsequential that most consumers treat the material as if it were free, passing along (paid for) copies to friends, making (licensed) edits for their own amusement, and the like.

It is common that some content has little or no real protection built in at all, relying upon the centuries-old culture of respect for intellectual property and fear of prosecution to prevent unauthorized duplication, distribution, or use. The World Trade Organization, which over the course of the 21st century began to focus exclusively on issues of intellectual property, is quite aggressive in its pursuit of those who violate content owners’ rights. Penalties can be stiff and, depending upon the jurisdiction, often include memetic rehabilitation and reconditioning.

While consumers in the Fifth Wave world are completely accustomed to paying for all content, citizen in the transition nations are less sanguine. In most cases, the pretransition society had a fairly limited copyright and content-control regime, and the people are unused to the notion of paying for every passing consumption of intellectual property. Of greater concern is the cost – fees that seem insignificant to a New Yorker or Parisian are far more noticeable to a citizen of Cairo or Havana. Some corporations adapt their fee structures to local conditions, but many do not, relying on an overall increase in local wealth to eventually make the content affordable.

As augmented-reality and virtual-interface equipment becomes more widespread, a type of content control called experience-rights management often comes into play. With AR and VIIs, the world as seen by an individual using the equipment can vary radically from what an unaugmented person would see and feel. Looking at a shop can reveal data about current products or comments by other customers, advertisements can become animated and interactive, and the world itself feels richer as it takes on a layer of information and communication that blends seamlessly with the surroundings. With experience-rights management, what a person can see and interact with using the systems varies by how much he spends. Two different people can have radically different experiences of the same event by virtue of how much they’ve paid. In addition, sharing the richer, more-detailed experience with someone else who may have paid for fewer rights is a violation of the law. While this notion is hardly controversial for most citizens of the Fifth Wave world, many people in transition nations find the concept troubling.

While the World Trade Organization’s influence over intellectual-property policy appears draconian, few people in the developed world worry much about it. Use fees for most content remain fairly low, and AI assistants handle the vast majority of transactions. For a Fourth or Fifth Wave consumer of music, InVids, or even 3D-printer designs, incremental use and duplication costs are close to inconsequential, and are only noticed when they are unusually high. The fees – typically ranging from $1 to $50 per viewing/use – are more onerous for citizens in poorer areas.

Very few pieces of digital content are purchased physically. The vast majority of songs, programs, and the like are downloaded. Transactions are quick, but almost always involve identifying the specific device and creating a unique key based on a hash of the device’s and software’s identity codes. The user purchases the right to play or use the content on that device only. Any attempt to play or use the content on another machine results in another transaction charge, this one applied to the owner of the other device. From the content owner’s perspective, a copy passed along is just another sale. Generally speaking, if the digital file is available for general purchase, copies can be made in this way. Many pieces of content, especially entertainment content, are tagged Single Use Only, meaning that payment is required any time the material is played or used.

Some digital files are marked with a No Copy flag, which all commercially available devices will honor. These digital files are only usable on the originally authorized system. Devices that have been hacked to ignore CRM can copy and use flagged content, and it is possible to alter the digital file itself to remove the protection code. Individuals often mark private data files with a No Copy flag. The initial use of a piece of commercial content requires a CRM check, which confirms the identity of the player and modifies the content data such that it is authorized for that device. The CRM check requires access to the web, but does not require a connection to the main WTO database. The WTO has contracted a large variety of content-rights brokers to provide CRM-check services. These brokers take a small cut of the initial payment for the content. This initial CRM check takes a second or less in most locations on Earth and established space colonies. Single-Use-Only-tagged items carry out this CRM check every time. Deep-space users are able to get a group license for the ship or station, allowing copies to be made without added CRM checks.

Programmers, musicians, and others who wish to make their own material available can register easily with the WTO. In fact, most commercially available content-creation tools have registration routines built right in, so that the author doesn’t even have to worry about it. Fees for registration are minimal for individuals, usually only around $30, and scale up depending upon how many pieces of content the author has registered. Content creators can also mark their works as public domain – if they do, no CRM checks are required. Public-domain works may be registered for free, and doing so prevents others from claiming ownership of the content.

While a sustained crackdown on intellectual-property pirates is usually a condition for entry into trade arrangements with the hyperdeveloped world, copies of many new hardware and software designs, recent genemod codes, and CRM-cracked duplicates of popular InVids and slinkies, are still found with a bit of effort. The official policy of the United States is that local pirates are usually a front for a TSA operation, and that foreign governments should provide all possible cooperation with U.S. law-enforcement authorities. Anti-piracy raids advised by FBI agents have become common in transition states seeking to curry favor with the United States. China has a similar policy, but the Chinese Ministry of Public Security uses covert infiltration more often than its American counterpart. The European Union is less inclined to link all piracy to the TSA, but still requires its trading partners to adhere strictly to intellectual property controls. In general, Europe tends to pay closer attention to biotechnological piracy than to entertainment and software piracy.

Trade in high technology is fairly open with transition states. In general, if a product or device is legally available to the general public, it can be legally exported. While local authorities may have restriction on some types of technology, such as pharm animals or implants, transition regions generally adopt the technology legality classes of their patrons. Weapons, nanofacturing systems, and fully sapient AIs are generally export restricted.

Just because a product is legal to export does not mean it will be made available, however. Technologies are not necessarily for sale in all markets around the world at the same time. Manufacturers may find that the current infrastructure would not support new systems, and does not wish to make an added investment in the transition region. Local governments may restrict the sale of particular products because of agreements with other providers or concerns about the economic or political impact. Yet demand can be global, even if supplies aren’t, and clever entrepreneurs find ways to satisfy the market.

It’s not unusual for the price of a given imported item to vary widely in different markets around the world, for reasons of import duties, trade regulations, or simple competitive pressures. These price differentials lead to gray markets, the borderline-legal sale of products from foreign suppliers. Gray markets show up where it is easy to move tech from a low-cost nation to a high-cost nation and sell below local prices. For example, the popular MRsiv augmented-reality gear, from Shanghai Interactive, is twice as expensive in Algeria as it in New Guinea, as the Australian ARcompany Walkabout is aggressively pursuing the New Guinea market. But cases of MRsiv units purchased in Port Moresby show up in Algiers; even with the cost of shipping and customs fees, the New Guinea models run 75% of the local price and still make a profit for the importer.

Gray markets also emerge in situations where a given product is legal to own but simply unavailable locally through normal suppliers. This often happens when a manufacturer decides that the support costs exceed the marginal profits, and pulls the product. Demand still exists, even if supplies have to come from somewhere else in the world and at higher prices. Tech brokers are often the middlemen for such transactions. It’s also not unknown for a producer to pull out of a given area but continue to sell through the gray market, thereby reducing costs and keeping prices up.

When demand is high but supplies are low – or overpriced – there is an opportunity for savvy local producers to grab the market. Knock-offs, the unauthorized duplicates of popular products, are designed to be just different enough from the original to avoid WTO disputes. The name, color scheme, or physical appearance are reminiscent of the original product, but key elements (computing speed, interface, type of fabric, etc.) are changed – and the price is significantly lower.

The quality of a knock-off can vary dramatically; some are functional duplicates, others little more than junk. Most knock-off producers are careful to obscure the source of the item, largely to avoid harassment from the original manufacturer. A handful of companies are known for making high-quality legal knock-offs, using advanced software that analyzes a product design and produces an item with similar functionality but falling within the letter of the law. If given an original, these firms are usually able to produce a legal knock-off sample in less than 24 hours. The cost of making a single sample is usually roughly identical to the original’s price, although subsequent copies will run about 50% less.

Several corporations based in the developing world are globally known for their ability to provide inexpensive supplies of high-demand products, either through technology arbitrage or producing functionally similar items. These items are usually found only in less-developed countries, although they occasionally make their way into the hyperdeveloped world.

Benford Analysis Group (BAG): This serious-sounding name masks one of the biggest legal knock-off companies around. Based in Belize, it uses top-of-the-line software and robofacs to produce borderline-legal duplicates of popular products. The WTO has had BAG on its watch list for the last seven years, but has never found sufficient evidence to file lawsuits. BAG sales agents work in nearly every transition country.

Tipping Point: A virtual organization of independent tech brokers, Tipping Point has one of the largest corporate contact networks in the world. Tipping Point partners pay an annual membership fee of $5,000, but gain access to the organization’s accumulated information, more than making up for the cost

Xiao-fang Industries: Originally based in Kowloon, this knock-off firm was investigated in 2105 by the Chinese government firm for alleged TSA sympathies. Rather than stay and fight, the company’s owner, Xiao-fang Li, moved operations to the Philippines. Xiao-fang Industries is the main global competitor to Benford Analysis Group, and specializes in getting product to market faster and at lower cost than any other company. Even if quality sometimes suffers as a result, Xiao-fang is usually able to get legal knock-offs to resellers anywhere in the world within 72 hours of the first scan of the original item.

Copyright Violation Is the Sincerest Form of Flattery. – Posted in an anonymous chat board on the TSA Web While knock-offs and gray-market suppliers are careful to observe content rights, pirates have no concern about such niceties. Content pirates are in the business of directly copying licensed material for profit. This is widely considered morally wrong, almost universally illegal, and very, very popular.

The WTO’s definition of piracy includes any unauthorized duplication, distribution, or use of licensed material. Engaging in this practice isn’t as simple as it was in decades past; many content-managed products simply do not function for anyone other than the licensee, and standard consumer entertainment or information technology no longer allows for casual copying. Piracy usually requires some means of getting around CRM protections. Many CRM-hacking tools are available on the TSA Web, although possession of those tools is a felony in most nations. Software and hardware modifications intended to defeat CRM controls are not always reliable, and can actually damage systems and data.

Despite the challenges, piracy is epidemic, as pirated material is very popular. In some cases, it’s more popular than legal copies, even at the same price – many consumers in the developing world like to think they’re taking money out of the hands of Fifth Wave transnational corporations. For this reason, over 20% of the pirated material for sale in developing states is actually legally copied and produced, but repackaged to appear pirated.

The WTO does not directly control how intellectual-property laws are enforced, but they provide detailed guidelines for governments. The following suggested penalties are typical for most non-TSA nations:

First Offense: A fine equivalent to 10% of the monthly income of the criminal and his registered partners/spouse(s).

Second Offense: Memetic rehabilitation/counseling and a fine equivalent to 10% of the annual income of the criminal and his registered partners/spouse(s).

Third Offense: Memetic rehabilitation/counseling, imprisonment of one to ten years, and a fine equivalent to 10% of the annual income of the criminal and his registered partners/spouse(s).

In most jurisdictions, “casual” pirates – those who make or use illegal copies for personal use – are given a warning but no fine on a first offense. Piracy of intellectual property for purposes of resale is usually treated as a third offense and given the maximum jail sentence.

The heyday of smuggling has largely drawn to a close in the Fifth Wave world. The legalization of most forms of drugs over the course of the early 21st century eliminated the vast majority of smuggling into developed states. The advent of 3D printers and robofacs has made it far more practical to send data instead of physical objects. As a result, data smuggling has now become much more common than the illegal movement of material goods.

Tighter controls on drugs and other locally prohibited materials, coupled with limited availability of minifacs, keep smuggling alive in the developing world, however. Neuro-agents, weapons, minifacs, and advanced computer systems are regularly moved illegally from the hyperdeveloped world into poorer areas. Satellite monitoring, v-tags, and AI customs agents help considerably, but Interpol estimates that nearly $65 billion worth of goods are smuggled across borders every year, worldwide.

The largest single customer for illegal imports is the Acquisitions Directorate of the Transpacific Socialist Alliance. The TSA Acquisitions agents routinely pay top dollar for rare or difficult-to-acquire items. The Alliance isn’t the only consumer, however. In general, the biggest customers for smugglers are governments in the developing world, which routinely seek items that can tip a regional balance of power. States without close relationships with great-power patrons often do not have access to cutting-edge technologies, and pay considerable sums for modern systems. Such hard-to-get smuggled goods can be sold for five to 10 times the standard price, the substantial profit reflecting the danger to the smuggler.

Very occasionally, transition regions can have access to technologies before they’re introduced in the hyperdeveloped world. Corporations need to test new products, and even the best simulation systems can’t always account for the complexity of how people will make use of a new device. Furthermore, mature technology markets are very competitive, and customers in the hyperdeveloped world are extremely sensitive to poorly tested products. One buggy release can destroy a firm’s reputation.

Many Fourth and Fifth Wave companies realize that citizens of mid-late Third Wave societies are far more tolerant of imperfections. The accelerated markets in many of these cultures means that having access to products or services that are new can provide a distinct competitive advantage over users of less cutting-edge systems. Customers in the hyperdeveloped world are less likely to pay attention to occasional reports of technological problems in the transition regions, letting firms try out experimental designs with real users without running the risk of damaging the corporate image.

Fourth and Fifth Wave firms doing beta tests in transition areas often look for people who will use the new systems in surprising and challenging ways. The goal of the tests is to discover hidden flaws or features that combine well with existing equipment. Some corporations focus exclusively on wealthy businessmen as testers; others prefer more rugged environments, and look the other way if the gear is used for not-entirely-legal ends. In every case, the testers are required to sign NDAs (Non-Disclosure Agreements), with stiff penalties for violation. Once a test has run its course, and the producer has settled on a new design (or scrapped it), the devices tested are much harder to get. Some corporations require the return of test systems; others simply cut off support.

There is a thriving black market for beta-test gear. Competitors, the TSA, even government intelligence services offer substantial rewards for test systems. Depending upon the type of equipment and the range of features, the black-market value of beta devices can range from three to 10 times the cost of a similar current-generation version. Beta-test hardware is typically given unique identifiers, often woven into the components at a molecular level, so that they can be traced back to the registered tester. Theft of test systems is an ever-present concern; many corporations outfit beta-test gear with biometric devices that fry the components of the system if someone other than the registered tester attempts to use it.

The return of the global middle class in the middle of the century could be seen most conspicuously in the rapid economic and technological advancement of many nations previously thought of as “Third World.” Yet while the countries of the developing world evolved into information societies, the “First World” had long since moved on, integrating biotechnology (and now, increasingly, nanotechnology) into its social and cultural models. Developing countries that had struggled valiantly to catch up with the developed world once again found themselves at the base of an even higher cliff. Some saw the barrier as insurmountable, while others started climbing anew. – Caleb Metelits, The People’s History of the Future, 2067

Relations between the hyperdeveloped and developing nations in 2155 are neither as dismal as many had feared, nor as cooperative as many had hoped. Changes in the use of energy and raw materials allowed advanced states to wean themselves from dependence upon the resources of the developing world. While this led to less aggressive foreign policies, it also meant that the developing world lost its one form of power over the advanced industrial nations.

By the fifth decade of the 21st century, the developed world was tempted to simply stop paying attention to the poorer nations. The problems seemed intractable, compounded by societies that apparently did not want to stop killing their neighbors or themselves. The advanced industrial countries were looking to the future, to developing the solar system and taking full advantage of emerging sciences. There was little interest in rehashing the same territorial, ethnic, and religious struggles that had been fought and re-fought for the last century.

Yet for the most part, advanced states resisted the urge to withdraw. Aid became a priority, and many of the poorer nations were helped by technological and economic assistance from the U.S., Europe, and China. Moreover, new generations of leaders had arisen, no longer tied to post-colonial philosophies. Many developing states started to think that for the first time they might have a chance.

As a handful of nations took on the roles of “great powers,” weaker societies sought patrons for protection and continued economic growth. This pattern continues to the present, with the great powers maneuvering for political advantage while their client states jockey for the best economic position. Great-power patronage does not come without a price, however; each year, the dominant states and alliances interfere more deeply in the policies and agendas of their weaker clients. Many in the developing world see this as uncomfortably reminiscent of the colonial days of two centuries past.

In 2155, the developing and hyperdeveloped parts of the world remain closely bound. The increasingly wealthy developing world is an expanding market for advanced transnational firms, as stable Third Wave states consume an ever-growing portion of the technologies and ideas from the Fifth Wave producers. Despite the presence of pirated goods and cross-border smuggling, the vast majority of economic transactions between the Third Wave and the Fifth Wave worlds are legal and mutually beneficial.

“Always remember: You are not a people. You are not a nation. You are a market.” – Rodney Phelps, CEO of American Pharmatek, in a telepresence speech to the parliament of Uganda after signing an agreement to invest $25 billion in the struggling country. Phelps denied that he said this, claiming that meme-hackers had manipulated the datastream, but the uproar was sufficient to have Uganda reject the investment

By 2155, many transnational corporations – firms that set up shop and open subsidiaries in multiple countries – have moved into space. This doesn’t mean that they’ve lost interest in Earth; with the majority of the solar system’s population, and the richest consumers, Earth is likely to remain the best market for transnational companies for years to come. Contrary to popular fiction, most transnationals are fairly good global citizens. They are rich and powerful but they are focused on the bottom line. Controlling governments, ruining environments, and hiring private armies are usually not profitable. Most firms would much rather have a market of eager consumers than servile laborers. Despite the rhetoric from infosocialist parties, corporations are not evil, in the same way that sharks are not evil.

There are exceptions. In 2109 MetaCom A.G. became synonymous with callous rapaciousness when it bought the most advanced biotech company in Mali, shut down its soil-rejuvenation and crop-improvement programs, and used its research department to pursue development of a species of lawn grass better able to withstand temperature spikes. When marketing studies came back indicating that homeowners in Europe and the U.S. were tending not to plant lawns, MetaCom abandoned the project, sold the research equipment to tech brokers, and shut down the biotech operation. MetaCom refuses to give the results of the soil and crop work, claiming that these are valuable assets, but it has yet to decide on an appropriate price. Meanwhile, the Sahara continues to spread south into Mali’s agricultural heartland.

Such single-corporation domination is rare. More often, multiple firms explore promising new markets, each looking for an opportunity for new profits. The Fifth Wave economies are saturated, and it’s difficult for established firms to generate growth. Emerging markets are the only new source of economic growth available on Earth. As a result, competition between transnational businesses is intense, and while rare, it’s not unknown for intercorporate struggles to turn deadly, especially in promising new areas.

In late 2153, the government of Paraguay opened its information and communication networks up to global corporations in an attempt to jump-start the stagnant economy. The Brazilian web and virtual-reality giant, MenteMundo, moved quickly into the market. A Turkish startup called Ankaranet was even faster, however, and managed to lock in several key Paraguayan corporations and government agencies as clients. MenteMundo’s board of directors was furious that a company from outside of South America moved in on the area. Throughout the early part of 2154, MenteMundo and Ankaranet attempted to disrupt each other’s ability to do business. In July, local thugs hired by the Brazilian firm destroyed the Ankaranet office in Asunción, accidentally killing the advance-marketing agent. The Ankaranet investors, with unspecified ties to the Turkish mafia, responded in kind, having the MenteMundo building burned down and killing several key Paraguayan employees. As of the end of 2154, 17 people have died, and there is no end to the violence in sight.

Competing corporations don’t often hire hit men. They’re more likely to hire “noise” – people who disrupt the competitors’ ability to communicate, advertise, market, deliver, or generally operate successfully. This disruption doesn’t have to be violent, it just has to be effective. Jamming communication networks, hiring key personnel away from competitors, and creating advertising campaigns for the competitors that are misleading or insulting are all common methods of “market hacking.”

Most transnational corporations are highly attuned to their target culture. Ethnographers, sociologists, and network analysts are part of the initial exploratory team, used to determine a market’s potential value and to find local talent. They need people who know the land, both geographically and culturally; those with strong pop culture skills are particularly valuable. Understanding of the local political scene is also helpful, and the leaders of underground movements are preferentially co-opted.

Manufacturing industries were transformed in the latter part of the 20th century by the advent of robotic systems, and by the 2030s, totally automated factories were commonplace in the developed world. A similar revolution has taken place with the advent of minifacs and robofacs, which allow a single facility to produce a nearly infinite variety of products. Although the technology in 2155 is slow and expensive, few expect it to stay that way.

While robofacs replacing automated factories in the hyperdeveloped world caused little concern, most manufacturing facilities in the developing world still use human labor to manage and control the workplace machines. Many governments in transition nations are extremely sensitive about new fabrication technologies eliminating so many jobs. In 2083, the Darjeeling Motors Corporation sought to open a fully automated plant outside of Tripoli, Libya, giving it easy access to the Mediterranean. In an inspired moment, the Libyan government asked the firm to pay an annual fee equivalent to the welfare benefits for the number of people that would have been employed at a non-automated facility. The Indian carmaker was surprised, but agreed. The Libyan Tax, as it is now known, is now a common point of negotiation between transnational corporations and the governments of developing markets.

While factory jobs are visible, the manufacturing industries are minor concerns compared to the largest industry in the world: entertainment. A London School of Economics report in 21538 estimated that almost 15% of the global workforce (outside of TSA countries) was employed in entertainment-related fields, from creation and production to distribution and sales. The entertainment industry makes more money and has greater memetic influence than any other organized activity. Products of the entertainment industry have a global reach and an appreciative audience. People around the world love InVids from Bollywood, game shows from South Africa, moviefab blockbusters from China, slinkies starring Holly Hartley, virtual worlds from San Diego, slogs, News Hounds on Mars… there has rarely been a better time to be part of the entertainment-industrial complex.

One of the key myths driving the industry’s success no matter its medium is that anybody can be a star. In this case, the myth has an element of truth. While most recognize that massive transnational entertainment corporations dominate the industry, it is also well-known that each of these studios is starving for an edge over rivals. There have been enough cases of a new talent making a studio a substantial sum of money that most are occasionally willing to take a chance. This process has been commoditized with the near-ubiquitous use of prank game shows, 24-hour profiles, and shows like The Hunt, in which a normal person is kidnapped and brought to a secure island facility where they are tracked down by a variety of increasingly bizarre hunters – those that elude capture the longest win the biggest prizes. All of these shows are designed explicitly to turn a normal person into a celebrity to see if anyone pays attention. Few people become stars this way; most are returned to their everyday lives after their whirlwind 72 hours in the spotlight.

In 2155, one of the newest forms of entertainment in the developing world is based on a two-century-old medium. Movies – with their 2D visuals and non-interactive, linear stories – never really went away, but had greatly declined. By the late 21st century, most movies were linear edits of interactive stories repackaged for lower-technology audiences. The so-called “moviefab” movement has changed this, using cheap, high-quality 3D environment software as virtual soundstages to record 2D stories. Although technically possible for decades, the movement really started in 2108 with the Yin brothers in China. The practice has spread globally, with dozens of moviefab features being released on the web every month.

The process of making movies, InVid, virtual worlds, and dramatic slinkies isn’t nearly as glamorous as many imagine. Much of the work is done in what the industry calls, in a mix of honesty and morbid humor, “memetic sweatshops.” These are small studios that provide people to write behavior scripts for digital extras, perform slink “experience looping” (recording visceral sensations such as fear, pain, or pleasure over the one shown on the slink), and create the pieces that make the stories come to life. They exist everywhere, and produce material for virtually every media.

Few consumers know about these shops, but for those looking for a break, a job in one is a chance of a lifetime. It has been widely reported (and never corroborated) that erotic-comedy slinky-star Holly Hartley started in a memetic sweatshop as an experience looper. Copies of movies and InVid claiming to feature her reactions are widely sought-after.

“We learned an important lesson over the last hundred years: crime that is not stopped overseas soon becomes a problem at home.” – Special Agent Sartaz Ahmed, Interpol Of the various social and governmental institutions of a society, law enforcement is among the first to be changed by links to the hyperdeveloped world. Fifth Wave forensic equipment is made available, local databases are tied into global-information feeds, and police forces from the hyperdeveloped world are more than happy to lend officers and technologies to agencies in developing countries. This is not due to simple altruism – such gifts cost far less, in the long run, than criminal activity.

In most respects, police duties in 2155 have changed little in the last century. Community law enforcement focuses on the prevention, investigation, and punishment of crimes. The tools may have improved, but the process – finding evidence, identifying a suspect, and establishing a case – is familiar.

The main procedural difference between policing in 2155 versus 2000 is the heavy reliance on physical evidence over eyewitnesses. It has long been recognized that such testimony is faulty and that memories are easily manipulated. Witness testimony uncorroborated by physical evidence or monitoring systems is largely inadmissible in Fifth Wave courts, and most developing nations, particularly transition states, are moving to this policy. Even the testimony of AIs is suspect; while they cannot lie, it is possible to hack their memories. Fortunately for investigators, Fifth Wave forensic technology is quite powerful.

Aside from the multitude of law-enforcement agencies, there are a handful of services with international jurisdiction. These organizations focus on narrow issues, and work closely with local authorities. Most have some degree of indigenous operational personnel, however, for those situations where regional law-enforcement officers are less cooperative, or are themselves the subject of investigation.

The Genetic Regulatory Agency, based in the free city of Königsberg, advises nations on proper regulation of human genetic engineering and enforces existing laws restricting bioroid development and illegal genetic modifications. Although it is largely European in outlook and policy, most nations are signatories to treaties authorizing its expanded global role. The GRA concentrates its investigatory activities to those countries where weak government, controls on the press, or a history of genetic engineering abuses make it likely that violations will be found, although the GRA claims the right to investigate human-species-threatening genetic engineering anywhere. The GRA’s emphasis on the developing world is seen as unfair by some, and is a regular point of dispute at international gatherings.

The potential dangers of unrestricted biotechnology are well-known. Although the most egregious of the “black labs” have long since moved offworld, a substantial amount of genetic engineering of dubious legality still takes place on Earth. The creation of bioroids, the development of bioweapons, and the synthesis of new lifeforms do not require a Fifth Wave industrial infrastructure, and less advanced countries sometimes have fewer of those pesky regulations. As the international clearinghouse for information, resources, and investigatory support for police enforcing biotech regulations, the GRA is there to make sure that international rules are enforced.

GRA agents have an almost missionary zeal – they really do believe that they are saving the world from destruction. Field operatives, who see the worst of the offenders, tend to speak in apocalyptic tones about unfettered experimentation in bio- and nanotechnologies. The GRA can be called in on situations ranging from unknown environmental toxins to bioengineering waste clean-ups to suspected use of bioweapons.

The World Trade Organization has changed considerably since its origins in the late 20th century. As modern industry came to rely on digital information, the WTO shifted focus exclusively to issues of intellectual property. The WTO is the leader in maintaining controls over copyright, patent rights enforcement, and prevention of information piracy, which includes anything from data smuggling to the illegal exhibition of a rights-managed work. It aggressively lobbies to ensure the continued dominance of intellectual-property owners over users. Infosocialist parties view the WTO to be the enemy, and the feeling is mutual – in 2152, the WTO was discovered to have funded anti-infosocialist party rallies across Europe, some of which resulted in vandalism against party offices.

The WTO employs lawyers, lobbyists, activists, marketing experts, strategists – anyone who may be able to help the WTO maintain and propagate the meme that contentrights violation is wrong. The WTO also employs operatives to investigate potential cases of rights violations, and support the local enforcement of antipiracy laws. WTO agents are known to operate on every continent.

WTO personnel rarely work alone. They more often operate in close cooperation with the intelligence and international law-enforcement bureaus of the United States and China. They consider the Transpacific Socialist Alliance to be their primary opponent, and with good reason – almost all of the intellectual property pirated around the world eventually ends up on the TSA Web.

Interpol, while declining in overall influence, remains an important element of international law enforcement. Historically more of a clearinghouse of information than an actual law-enforcement agency, the organization took on a more active role in the 2040s and 2050s, as advances in biotechnology made a wider array of inexpensive and powerful drugs available around the world. Even as global sentiment moved away from legal controls on drugs, Interpol retained its enforcement authority, making some high-profile arrests for illegal genetic modifications and data piracy. Critics claimed that Interpol wasn’t sufficiently aggressive, often abiding by local laws over international treaties; the GRA and WTO moves to develop their own enforcement branches is traced to these disputes.

Interpol still functions primarily as a center for information and coordination among local authorities, but also employs a small number of investigation and enforcement units. National and local police have ready access to Interpol’s databases and information tools, and Interpol advisors can be dispatched within 24 hours of a request for assistance. Interpol strives for continued good relations with local law enforcement, and it is widely respected for its history of effectiveness and honesty.

Interpol uses its own operations division only for the investigation of non-piracy web offenses, such as computer intrusion cases and the pursuit of rogue AIs (Gypsy Spirits), and for supporting local police in international smuggling cases. Over the last decade, however, the World Trade Organization has occasionally contested Interpol’s authority in this arena. It is not unusual to have both Interpol and WTO operatives show up to investigate a big smuggling case. The WTO argues that Interpol is not aggressive enough, and is seeking authorization from member nations to expand its jurisdiction officially.

Politics is about power, and the balancing, wielding, and distribution of power is of great interest to transition nations. Transition states are looking for patrons to provide the best protection, intelligence, and economic support; great powers are looking for clients who are capable proxies, strong allies, and lucrative markets. The developing world also provides a useful setting for competition between the hyperdeveloped countries.

With the decline of the United Nations, most diplomatic activity happens at a peer-to-peer level; dignitaries meet with each other, treaties are signed (both public and secret), and alliances are forged. Ties are rarely permanent, however, and some developing nations have become quite adept at playing great powers against each other. Most developing states with any reasonable level of stability have signed treaties of friendship with all (or most) of the great powers, as well as trade agreements, law-enforcement cooperation pacts, and the like. Becoming a “good international citizen” involves agreeing to a variety of international laws about intellectual property, genetics, and weapons of mass destruction.

Even with abundant espionage technology (satellites, microbots, webtapping), the bulk of effective intelligence gathering involves personal efforts by operatives on the ground. Developing nations, especially those experiencing rapid technological growth and social dislocation, are fruitful locations for conducting espionage against opponents. States that border, or are strongly associated with, a particular great power are often hotbeds of activity. Bangkok is widely known as a location for significant espionage against the TSA, but other regions that seem to attract spies include Mexico City, Zanzibar, and Cairo.

Despite a flirtation with privatized intelligence in the early part of the 21st century, the United States and a handful of other advanced industrial nations, along with most governments, treat intelligence gathering as an official duty. Transnational corporations have their own information-gathering operatives, but they focus on other corporations. Still, it’s not uncommon to have multiple government agencies, a few corporations, and an international law-enforcement service all investigating a single target. Such circumstances lend themselves to disinformation, disruption, and “noise” campaigns.

It is rare for great-power nations to send their own troops to directly intervene in a crisis in a transition nation. More often, the great power send military advisors to nations in conflict, personnel who can provide substantial intelligence and strategic value, but who may not necessarily engage in combat. For the great-power patrons, this has several benefits. It increases ties between the local government and the patron, making defection (seeking out the protection of a competing great power) more difficult. It also creates a closer relationship between the patron and the client’s military forces, useful in situations where the client government decides to be troublesome, and an opportunity to test new weapons or tactics. Patron military advisors are usually under strict orders not to engage in combat; the degree to which they abide by those orders depends on whether there are advisors from another great power on the opposing side. With memories of the Pacific War still fresh, most Fifth Wave nations are desperate to avoid a situation that might spiral into another global war.

Not every transition area is an independent state. There are a number of locations around the world where parts of an otherwise developed (or even hyperdeveloped) nation lag, where the fruits of the Fifth Wave have yet to truly reach. This can occur for a number of reasons, ranging from tensions between populations to local environmental disasters, or simply extended periods of economic stagnation and poverty. These areas are often difficult to integrate, and are left to fend for themselves.

As with developing countries, advanced technology is still found in the backwards parts of a Fifth Wave state. Police, especially those in larger urban areas, usually have access to modern forensic equipment. Inexpensive consumer goods are widespread, and industrial minifacs relatively commonplace. Information and communication networks are less dense, however, and environmental technologies such as v-tags and augmented reality are much less widespread. Advanced biotechnological and bionanotechnological medical treatments are difficult to find, although modern treatments for commonplace diseases usually have filtered down even to local clinics.

In even the most-advanced societies, there are regional communities that have not quite caught up with the rest of the nation. In some cases, this is due to a massive influx of immigrants from the developing world; Los Angeles, in the United States, is the best-known example, but there are many others. In other situations, the process of development simply takes time to spread across a large geography or population, such as in China, where the majority lives in Third Wave and even Second Wave conditions, even as the urban centers along the coast push the cutting edge of nanotechnology.

Social Transition Stress Disorder and other extreme reactions to change are fairly uncommon in these areas, in part because the change is happening much more slowly and in part because these areas often have very strong community-support networks. However, hyperdeveloped nations often face strong economic pressure to attempt a “crash modernization” of backwards areas, in order to bring consumption and production up to national standards. China tried this in 2100, with its “Thundering Hooves” campaign, which attempted to install advanced information and communication technology, optimized minifacs, and bioengineering clinics in all villages and towns in a straight line west from Beijing. Successful at first, it soon faced problems with local leaders wary of tools which allowed greater central control, rural populations with irrational fears of the new technologies (there is still a rumor in western China that biotech reproductive treatments will make infants gwai lo, or “ghostperson,” a derogatory term for white people), and non-Han ethnic minorities who fought any attempt to assimilate them into the broader Chinese culture.

Ethnic and cultural minorities who live on the edges of a national geography often get left behind during technological and economic development. This does not necessarily happen due to overt racism; quite often, the minority culture is strongly separatist, and rebuffs attempts to bring in advanced systems, viewing them as assimilationist. Ethnic groups, which are minorities in every nation they inhabit, tend to face the most problems in development. The Kurds, who live in territory overlapping the E.U. (Turkey), the Islamic Caliphate (Iraq and Syria), and the rogue nation of Iran, have refused every solution to their poverty and powerlessness that involved settling in one area. Similarly, the Rom, traditionally called Gypsies, remain a nomadic ethnic minority across much of Central Europe, both in and out of the European Union. While a few clans have adopted high-tech systems that don’t interfere with their nomadic travels, most cling to traditional ways, becoming an anachronism in Fifth Wave Europe.

In some cases, the Third Wave areas are the aftermath of failed development. Cases of STSD are rampant, either from the initial rapid advancement or from the rapid decline. The violence and apathy that often accompany the disorder greatly hampers recovery attempts, leaving the regions mired in a cycle of poverty. Marseilles, in the south of France, has still not yet fully recovered from the period of intense ethnic violence in the 2040s and 2050s, and remains an economic and social disaster. Outside of Johannesburg, South Africa, the slums of Soweto saw a seeming renaissance mid-century, only to fall back into disrepair and poverty as local corporations started using cheaper remote labor.

As rated by Trendorama, the Atlanta-based meme sampling and analysis firm.

1. Nambaryn Jargalsaihan. Known as “Namby,” Jargalsaihan is the 16th Dalai Lama’s nephew and a globally popular musician. In 2098, he ran for the Mongolian presidency and, much to the world’s surprise, won. The Chinese government regularly criticizes him, which increases his popularity elsewhere.

2. Hannah Nablus. Often called the “Muslim Gandhi,” Nablus leads Dar-us-Salaam (“Abode of Peace”), a pacifist group seeking the independence of the Palestinian Enclaves. She has regular run-ins with the Islamic Caliphate’s Administrative Police Services.

3. Misha Leyden. An infosocialist senator from Flanders, Leyden is known best for her passionate support of the concept that “you own your own genes.”

4. Paul Baruta. The former vice president of Rwanda, Baruta now is a widely recognized leader in the abolitionist movement, speaking globally for bioroid freedom and slavery.

5. Miguel Hernandos. The president of Belize, colorful and charismatic Hernandos is known for his empathy for his nation’s poor as well as for his deft diplomacy. He often handles back-channel negotiations between the U.S. and the TSA.

The transformations of the 21st and 22nd century do not come without a price. New communication networks can easily disrupt long-established hierarchies, access to external sources of art and culture can overwhelm local traditions, and advanced methods of production can sweep away uncompetitive businesses, quickly monopolizing markets. The very nature of the modern world is the destruction of the traditional society. A substantial number of people around the world are reluctant to pay this price, and this often translates into firm resistance to change.

Ironically, access to and use of new technologies can actually accelerate the resistance to them. People may get a first-hand look at the immediate effects of the new tools or practices and find them repulsive. Information technologies may facilitate the organization of resistance or dissemination of knowledge about the changes. Biotech tools can be used to disrupt the introduction of new bioengineered plants and animals. Increasing availability of sophisticated memetic engineering methods often results in the use of those very tools against the dominant power structures.

“In an era of memetic science, the use of puppets, costumes, and chants of ‘hey hey, ho ho, anthromorphic biotechnologies have got to go!’ just isn’t going to cut it. We need to be sophisticated, compelling, and able to beat the transnats at their own game. In short, we need to achieve meme-space dominance.” – Ang Wen, A Guide to Meme-Hacking Politics

Resistance to change can take on various forms, some more effective than others.

The boycott – the simple refusal to be a part of a new system – is the most common and least successful method of resistance to new technologies, corporate practices, and government policies. The more effective boycotts are those with ample media coverage and substantial popular support. For this reason, the key to a successful boycott is good memetic engineering, from staging rallies to planting stories in the press to spreading rumors. Boycotts tend to fall apart, however, if the new technology or service provides a clear short-term benefit, has no local alternative, or is backed through officially sanctioned force (e.g., rallies are broken up with police violence, people who refuse to have their genome scanned are subject to arrest, etc.).

In countries with a stable civil society, the use of lawsuits and legal harassment can interrupt and sometimes even prevent the implementation of feared changes. This is a dangerous course, however, as tools available to activists are also open to the entities being challenged, who usually have much deeper pockets. Lawsuits are usually most effective when the subject has actually done something wrong, such as lie about genetically modified contents of food products or use illegal bioroid labor to provide the goods or services in question.

As listed on Collective Action Collection, a web clearinghouse for activist information and communication:

Happy Burgerland. The New Zealand-based activist group Southern Health is boycotting the German fast-food company for its use of soy and wheat gluten patties instead of ground fauxflesh.

Athenawear. The European sapient rights group Sandpiper is boycotting the American sports clothing manufacturer for its “murder” of AIs, after Athenawear shut down several of its older design AIs as part of corporate restructuring.

Indus River Studios. The Christian Hyperevolutionist Church is calling for the boycott of Indus River Productions in response to the release of the InVid Judgment Day, which the church claims promotes stereotypes of Christian Hyperevolutionists.

Clash of Civilizations. A grassroots group of music fans is calling for the boycott of all songs by the Greek fire band Clash of Civilizations, after the band released a song that carried a program that erased any unauthorized Clash of Civilizations songs from a listener’s system.

Islamic Caliphate. The bioroid-rights website Bioroid Amnesty has renewed its boycott of all products and services from the Islamic Caliphate in response to what BioAm calls “the ongoing mistreatment of bioroid individuals.”

The purely memetic approach is less organized than boycotts or legal harassment, but more successful. Often called “social engineering” or “meme hacking,” this approach is intended to undercut the target’s legitimacy, making the broad populace question whether the technology or practice has a place in their lives. Planting rumors, changing advertisements or AR information streams, even creating parodies – all are useful memetic tools. The goal isn’t so much to get people angry about the change as it is to make it a subject of ridicule. Popular comedians making jokes about the technology or practice can be devastating. As with boycotts, success is contingent on the value or mandate of the technology, practice, or policy.

One manifestation of this is sometimes called “hacktivism,” referring to its purely web-based form. While this can include direct action, it more often involves the attempt to spread resistance via popular web media, such as slogs. Since it involves the memetic manipulation of people who work with memes daily, it’s difficult to carry off. When it does work, however, it can be very effective.

Vandalism is another popular form of resistance, although it is almost always illegal. This can range from pure destruction of property, such as blowing up non-sapient cybershells or incomplete office buildings, to more subtle approaches, such as adulterating food products with a harmless but foul-tasting substance, or buying infomorphs, reprogramming them to provide faulty information and surreptitiously returning them to the market. Vandalism combines memetic engineering intended to persuade (or dissuade) the general public with direct action to disrupt the ability of the target to successfully operate.

Terrorism is the ultimate form of vandalism, in that the dissuasion and the disruption are carried out in ways that intentionally risk the lives of others. Terrorism usually happens when the element of the populace undergoing a technological or social transition feels powerless to stop it, and has few, if any, alternative avenues for expressing political discontent. Terrorism is often a manifestation of Social Transition Stress Disorder.

Civil war as a form of resistance is actually fairly rare in the transition states. The situation has to degrade severely before war comes about, as the government is usually able to buy off a sullen populace, especially with the help of great-power backing. More-common scenarios for civil war in a transition nation come when the government itself is resistant to the requests of a great-power partner, and the more capable nation decides that elimination of the recalcitrant regime is the only way to bring “much needed democracy, modernization, and free markets” to the state.

One of the better-known examples is the fate of Angola. In the 2060s, the Luanda government was ruled by a charismatic pan-Africanist named George Ngolo, who had a compelling Majority-Cultures-style philosophy and some socialist policies. While Angola had nowhere near the power of South Africa, Ngolo proved able to win several of the Central African states as allies. The Pretoria government, which had begun the process eventually leading to the creation of the South African Coalition, considered Angola a significant challenge. Throughout the 2070s, while working diplomatically to bring Angola into the fold, the South African government was quietly funding a growing insurgency. By early in the 2080s, the uprising had become a civil war. When Ngolo’s forces reportedly massacred a village, the South African armed forces moved in an attempt to “restore order.” Ngolo was then toppled in a coup, and Angola has since been managed as an ally of South Africa, although it is not yet a member of the coalition.

Conflicts in transition regions, while less common than in the more chaotic regions, often be some the bloodiest on the planet. Sophisticated weapons are widely available, but soldiers are primarily human, with fewer cybershell and bioroid troops involved in the fighting. Many transition states have sufficient biotechnological capacity to use a variety of environmental weapons against their opponents, and the use of nanotech agents, while rare, is not unknown.

Armies maintained by stable, moderately wealthy governments are typically outfitted like low-Fourth-Wave soldiers, with high-quality smart gear such as battle rifles and intelligence-gathering microbots. Cybershells, whether teleoperated or AI-resident, are used largely for backup of regular troops; MCS-52 and MCS-64-type cybershells are the most common. Bioroids are increasingly popular in combat units, as they are “maintenance free” and don’t require spare parts, although public opposition to bioroid use restricts them to special forces and elite-guard assignments. The more the government has the support of a great-power patron, the more likely it is able to outfit troops with more recent equipment. In most cases, special operations units have select access to Fourth and Fifth Wave equipment, either supplied by patrons or from the black market.

Irregular troops, particularly those without significant international patronage, are generally equipped more like Third Wave soldiers. The capability imbalance between Third Wave and Fourth Wave gear is significant, however, and some lower-technology resistance movements resort to illegal biological, ecological, or nanotechnological weapons. Great powers supporting local guerrillas are careful not to reveal their identity – resistance forces’ higher-technology weapons are often TSA copies of other nation’s designs, even when the TSA is uninvolved.