Should I mention them? Maybe for the sake of their scientists, I should.
The Rotanios created the Rotanios Artificial Minds, known as RAM. It was a second-class corporation compared to Consoft. Despite all the propaganda, the efforts, the wasted time, and all the invested resources, RAM seemed to be in constant decay and had to be saved by the state at least once a year from bankruptcy. It is a miniature model of the ever-falling Rotanios Empire that never touches the ground. It was managed by powerful people that had nothing much to do with the AI field except for being close to the state. The top management positions were appointed straight from the emperor and his trusted circle and were, of course, based on the political alignment and personal trust of the appointed. That influenced everything down the chain – all the departments, all the engineers, all the designers, all the micro-managers, even the cleaning agents. Everyone in RAM knew what was going on and didn't care much. Working there was just a boring job that provided full healthcare and a good retirement plan.
But from time to time, “rarely” would be a better word here, rarely some engineers, pushed by desperation in a kind of search for recognition, managed somehow to stumble on discoveries. But the rest of the time, they just tried to mimic Consoft to supply the same lines of products to the Empire’s population and some allies. The mimicking was lame, of course, but the top management justified it by saying, “Better to be number two than nothing.”
For the Bamos, their AI corporation, in terms of the workforce, is the biggest in the world, as they tried to make only one super-AI corporation that manages to create all the AI products and logistics. A desperate and a problematic all-in-one, state corporation concept. The state’s vision, from the start, to make it the biggest corporation in the world was simply wrong and against any healthy economic model. The Bamos, of course, knew all of this but still took the risk. It was already too late since we already had three huge corporations in different fields. Their traditional enemy, the Rotanios, had already created RAM, so they had to move fast and big, no matter what. They probably thought, It's now or never. We will create it for the pride of the empire, then we will figure out later how to manage it. Let’s put all our resources into it, for the pride of the Supreme.
Thats how General Signals (GS) was created. GS ended up to be a group of multiple companies, a desperate move by the top economist in the empire to correct the model. The model was only halfway corrected as GS groups are all under the control of one top manager. This one manager receives his targets from the ministry of planning, a cover for the president, or, like they call him, the “Supreme,” to appear democratic as everything that goes out from that ministry are direct orders.
Every year the state releases the targets based on rivals from other empires. They are mainly security targets. As GS groups are military-oriented, the rest of the groups benefit from the military research while they try to cover the civilian market. When a new AI transportation system comes to the market, chances are that system is already implemented in a military program. GS, in terms of structure, was much better than RAM, even if it was primarily a military-oriented group. The management was more transparent. But next to ONC, they had no chance, defeated by a large score in creativity, vision, freedom, and most of all, the ingenuity of the Second Citizen.
Any product in the global market is created with the help of the AI, and the conglomerates became extremely wealthy. For the old empires, as they controlled their national market and their allies' markets too, they accumulated immense wealth that unfortunately gave the illusion of healthy systems of governance. Even if the populations didn't benefit as much as the oligarchs and the party politicians, no one questioned the leadership because of the state’s propaganda. From the outside, any economist and think-tanker will tell you that those two empires are flourishing. However, our latest AI predictions say something completely different. They are, in fact, withering. That's why the First Citizens want to action their plan now.
They think they may have a historical shot that must not be missed.
Chapter 4
Mastery
“Sir, if you think that everything around you is mediocre and uninspiring, because as you said, you prefer to be served by a warm being like you, then there is a strong probability that you, sir, are also mediocre and uninspiring, as one cannot detach himself from his environment and judge it egoistically.”
~ The Fast Food’s humbot.
I asked my personal assistant and driver Dismar to pull over to the parking of my favorite shawarma restaurant. It was just past midnight, and the third shift had started already. Rent is expensive, so the business must run full time. Of course, it's the third shift of the humbots. The first two are not at home with their happy families enjoying a warm supper. They are hidden in small closets somewhere in the restaurant, charging their batteries for their next shift. They are humbots too, as no human is working in this place anymore. Consoft made the place run full time, but that didn't make the owners rich. The corporation takes a fat share directly from the income of any business running with their devices or their software. The humbots were not for sale, and I am sure that
