INTERCON
Synthesia
Red Star
Digital Union
Interbank
Eagle Corp
Eurospace
Holy Trinity
CLANS
Undernet
Heartlanders
Latinate Council
Huaren
Triad Association
Neo-Victorians
Atlantis
SECURITY
Protocol
Apparatus
Medical Collegium
Sec Franchise
The Registry
Governance
EuroSecur

Sovereign entities abound in this fragmented world, each fighting for survival and each trying to propagate itself to spread its message. Megacorporations (now known as Intercontinentals) compete with ethnic Clan networks, digital tribes, consumer unions, and national governments, not for mere physical resources but for people. Entities represent the ideal society for their members, pulling in new citizens while at the same time manipulating them to further the entity's agenda. People who prefer contractual business relations and meritocracy usually join Intercontinentals. Those who believe in traditional ethnic groupings and family ties join the recognized Clans.

Every entity is competing not only within the hyper-competitive global markets and the Purchasing Market, but also in the realm of political influence. Each entity tries its utmost to bend and subvert the harsh Research Control Regime, which slows down scientific thought and makes genegineering and nanotech innovation impossibly arduous. Entities have gained certain extra-territorial powers - akin to diplomatic immunity - which dwarf their influence during the previous century. Yet these powers can be overriden or twisted by powerful national governments and do not confer total immunity even to such gigantic Intercons as Eagle Corporation.

Clans are distinguished by their ethnic character and often racist behaviour. Those who feel threatened by multiculturalism or other tribes join Clans to regain their sense of identity, traditional moral values, and sense of purpose. Clans are about Blood and Belonging. Clans are powerful actors on the international stage because the Protocol-registered Clans are legal entities in their own right and are treated just like national governments. Members of a Clan are citizens of that Clan, hold passports, and have all the rights and duties of a normal citizen. Clan territory is considered extra-territorial, just like an embassy. However, Clans are much more demanding than national governments in what they expect of members. Members must strictly adhere to the tenets of the Clan or face punishment or expulsion. Clans make their own laws and members must follow them. Clans usually expect members to follow their moral, as well as legal, codes. For example, members of the Heartlanders Clan are expected to go to Church on Sundays, abstain from many vices such as excessive alcohol and sex, and have a liberal-democratic political orientation. Since Clans are independent 'countries' in their own right, they are not obliged to follow any anti-discrimination laws and can refuse or expel members as they wish. You won't find many non-Chinese in the South China Commonwealth, or many blacks in the Mormon Union. There are also many unregistered or illegal Clans whose members are nominally citizens of another Clan/State, but who follow the codes of their secret organization.

• Neo-Victorians — a Clan based on traditional Victorian values of hard work, progressive technology subservient to man, class divisions based on Equity, and a deference to Classical thought. Most members are British, Anglo-American, and Eastern European, but a large number of minorities from the former British Commonwealth are also part of the Establishment. Neo-Victorians were strong supporters of the Research Control Regime - wishing to turn back the clock - but chafe under its un-Enlightened restrictions.
  
  
• Atlantis — a technocratic Clan based on scientific rationalism and trans-Atlantic ties. Atlanteans believe in a society based on reason, intellectual achievement, controlled technology, and the repression of primitive instincts and irrational emotions. Atlantis Clan citizens devote their lives to perfecting technology, developing sociological models, and melding man with machine. Atlanteans tend to be Euroamerican-oriented and hope for eventual union between the two continents.
  
  
• Heartlanders — rural-based Mid-West American clan centered around traditional family values, Christian Protestant beliefs, simple clean living, equality, basic freedoms, limited government interference, and minimal technology. Often derided as dull peasants, in reality this Clan maintains a sophisticated international network of grassroot parties and supporters which allow it to wield massive influence during critical moments in American politics.
  
  
• Uhuru — African-American Clan devoted to economic development for underprivileged people, promotion of pan-African culture, stable families. Uhuru is united against the common enemy of white oppression, but is split along traditional Evangelical Christian and Muslim lines. After a prolonged guerrilla war in America during the Pacific War (and comcomitant casualties), Uhuru negotiated with the administration and renounced the use of violence, instead channelling its energies to economic development and a peaceful separation of the races.
  
  
• Huarengo — Also known as the South China Commonwealth, this is a formal grouping of the various overseas Chinese communities in Asia and America. Based on traditional Confucian values, the promotion of personal business alliances, extended kith & kin ties, and shared traditions. Huaren citizens promote Chinese cultural awareness (gonshi), support pro-market policies, and cultivate extensive bamboo networks across the world. The leaders of this Clan tend to be quiet Christians and Muslims but promote the traditional Chinese triad of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism in public.
  
  
• Slavonika — a Russian-dominated clan devoted to unifying and defending Slavic peoples. Emphasis is on fellow Orthodox Slavs. This clan is constantly fragmenting because its members still revive ancient animosities. Slavonika Clan is nearly indistinguishable from The Kombinat, and is generally ignored as the propaganda arm of Holy Russia. Nevertheless, Slavonika has managed to wrest diplomatic control of Serbia from the European Legion Integration Command.
  
  
• Latinate — Latino Clan based on a liberal lifestyle, traditional syncretic Roman Catholicism, mixed Indian-European blood, and a mission to 'enjoy life's pleasures'. Citizens are conservatice in some respects (re: gays), but liberal in others (alcohol and sex). Recent demographic and religious shifts towards Latino Protestant sects have been the cause of vicious street battles and numerous riots in Sapario city and Buenos Aires.
  
  
• Kombinat — union of several Russian crime syndicates. Ultraviolent, racist, business-friendly and extremely xenophobic, the Kombinat is perhaps the most overtly ruthless crime syndicate on the planet. Other crime syndicates look upon them as barbarians and psychotics, but occasionally form alliances in order to harness the Kombinat's military-industrial ties.
  
  
• Triad — an association of many Triad rings united in a common cause to unify Greater China (which, according to Triad propaganda, includes almost all of East Asia) and expel foreign 'barbarians'. The Triad(s) are not formally united and tend to be opportunistic, though they coordinate attacks against the hated American Governance forces on a regular basis. The Fists of Righteous Harmony are the most militant wing and engage in terrorism, employing illegal nanotech and bioweapons with a cold-bloodedness rarely witnessed elsewhere. The Triad is racist, highly conservative, and not averse to using any means necessary to achieve its goals. The more pacifist sections of the Triad are involved in smuggling, gun-running, and laundering. The Triad has connections to the government of Imperial China. Triad members especially hate Muslims and Christians, and with most other people with barely-disguised contempt.
  
  
• God's Lightning — puritanical Evangelical Christians who try to punish deviants and fringers, and who believe in an imminent Armageddon - which they try to hasten by provoking conflict between other groups. Though illegal everywhere, GL is often tolerated in Mid-Western America. God's Lightning is a minor player in American politics, but a major in webworks proselytizing and digital conversion.
  
  
• Flame of Allah — puritanical Muslim brotherhood devoted to cleansing all signs of mutation and deviancy from the population, usually through death. Tolerated in Central Asia, illegal elsewhere.
  
  

Intercontinentals are gigantic multinational corporations whose motivating factors are profit, market share, and return-on-investment. Most are meritocracies where rank and promotion are based on skills and productivity, not family ties or connections. In reality Intercons are as prone to corruption, bribery, infighting, personal connections and backstabbing as any other organization. Intercons in 2038 are usually divided into Western and Eastern variants.

Western Intercons are usually informatics-based, highly streamlined and efficient, specialized (core competency), and rely on research, design, innovation, and engineering aspects to make money. Western Intercons rely on sophisticated Infospheres and are usually not in the business of making any physical products, but rather of providing complex services. Western-type Intercons can be found in many free-market areas such as America, Cathay, Australia, Britain, Italy, and Argentina. Their distributed organization and lack of physical plant make them highly-mobile and independent of national governments.

Eastern Intercons are classical vertically-integrated conglomerates which make everything from toasters to airplanes and who tend to have operations in every sector from banking to manufacturing to informatics. These are the infamous 'industrial dinosaurs' from the Twentieth Century, and their massive bulks often conceal bloated bureaucracies and inefficient production. Eastern Intercons invest heavily in factories and laboratories, and tend to rely on national governments for protection and subsidies. Most have branch-plants around the world but may be concentrated in their home country. These Intercons are usually less efficient and profitable than Westies, but often dominate in market share and can sometimes bludgeon opponents to death using a variety of tricks.

There is also a growing number of Southern types, which are usually co-operatives operating under employee-ownership and profit-sharing plans. Most are minors and are heavily dependent on foreign venture funds. They can be found in places such as Tutsigiland, Congo, Java, San Francisco, and the Bolivar States.

• Eumed — a venerable health-care consortium from the early century. Includes the powerful electronics maker Medicon Industrial. Eumed (supposed to mean Eu-medicine, or Good Medicine from the Greek) competes with Holy Trinity in providing health care services from telesurgery-on-demand to patented herbal cures and visits to witch doctors. Whatever you prefer. Eumed also designs medical machinery such as Clotis generators and gene sequencers. It's most successful service to date has been the 'Good Baby' line of franchised eugenics counselling clinics.
  
  
• Genesys — formerly General Systems, a combine from the union of the semi-balkanized IBM and DEC corporations. Genesys designs cutting-edge connector and compad hardware as well as more classical mainframe and minicore systems for network applications. Many small electronic gadgets carry the Genesys logo, though the actual manufacture is in places like Myanmar, Sakha and Ogonia.
  
  
• Reflex — the world's premiere software corporation. Reflex specializes in custom-made software and is not in the mundane business of mass-market applications. Reflex software is held to incredible standards of precision, robustness and durability. Through a series of subsidiaries Reflex also controls the major business and infosphere markets around the world, except in China where they compete ferociously with Cathay Infosys and Iso Systems.
  
  
• Shang — East Asia's most powerful industrial corporation, with manufacturing concerns throughout the world. Builds cars, planes, small space modules, connectors, computers, and other physical objects.
  
  
• Powercorp — a confederation-style of allied corporations, each with the Power name added, such as Powertrans (electricity transmission), Powertrade (purchasing networks), Powerhydro (water utilities), Powercom (communications), etc. Powercorp specializes in handling any physical networks, from power lines to sewerage lines.
  
  
• Systemhaus AG — a German minor with interests in informatics, geomatics, networking, telecoms, and dataprocessing.
  
  
• Shiva — the largest Indian intercon with holdings in pretty much every industry, but most widely seen in the West as a maker of white goods (stoves, fridges, etc.) and and light electronics. Shiva controls a large chunk of Hindustani trade by government edict and also bullies its way into East Asian business circles.
  
  
• Quizatl Designhouse — Mexican information and design guild/society employing tens of thousands of architects, simulationists, decorators, graphic designers, modellers and other artsy sorts. Employees are also owners, but profits are redirected to overseas branches. Quizatl claims to have the best researchers who are able to re-create any given moment in human history in perfect detail.
  
  
• Gestalt Mechanics — the world's largest maker of biomechanical constructs such as chimerics, anti-parasites, and even (surreptitiously) xenorganics. Gestalt does secret offworld modelling and has a crack team of lawyers who have managed to defeat all attempts at prosecution in the last 9 years. Gestalt is believed to be secretly owned by the US Apparatus. Competes with Synthesia.
  
  
• Telepresence — formerly a large European media combine which later merged with Brazil's Orba to form a massive multimedia, information, telecoms and entertainment intercon. Telepresence makes television programs, news, veeworlds; operates theme parks, offworld resort habitats, and spectacles such as the Olympic Games. Their motto is "If we're there, you're there".
  
  

Digital tribes are subcultures that have evolved on the Net over many generations, and which now have a legitimate claim to their own traditions and morals. These online tribes share cyberspace realms but may be widely dispersed in realspace. Digital tribes permeate the webworks and include :

• Undernet — the infamous uncrackable subnetwork of libertarian cipherpunks.
  
  
• Digital Union — mankind's biggest collective dream. A veeworld collective and a potential new religion.
  
  
• NegatiFland — a loose group of neo-anarchists who oppose all forms of government and coercion. Currently resident in Nuke York's vast sub-sewerage network.
  
  
• Tea Party — banned political party which promotes direct democracy and civil rights in America. From Boston Tea Party.
  
  
• Helix — progressive scientists (originally genegineers) who oppose the Research Control Regime. Banned. Plans unknown.
  
  
• Apple Clan — an obscure digital cult centered around an ancient (but supposedly divine) computer type.
  
  
• Seventh International — fractious grouping of Communists, Marxists, Maoists, and other revolutionary left-wing groups. Most popular in nations south of the Equator.
  
  

Consumer Unions are specialized collectively-owned corporations whose sole purpose is to provide their members with cheap high-quality goods and services. They are not considered extra-territorial legal entities, but their purchasing power and political influence make them fairly independent in most areas, and their pronouncements are closely watched by the Intercons. The largest consumer union is United Consumers. Franchises are unique business enterprises which actually have a guiding philosophy. Franchises provides goods and services in a standardized fashion and follow their 'mission statements' to the letter. For example, the Security Franchise is basically a global mercenary operation which maintains strict codes of behaviour, makes mass weapon purchases, enforces contracts, and brings professional management practise to a rather disreputable activity. Security Franchise is successful because their member-franchisees follow strict regulations on behaviour (no looting, etc), efficiency, training, objectives, fees, and even cleanliness. A Security Franchise contract is ironclad. Security Franchise signs on only the best professionals and runs a tight ship. Other Franchises include:

• Holy Trinity — a Vatican-sponsored health services corporation which promotes healing through science and Christian principles
  
  
• DataGenesis — a franchise which creates beautiful 'organic' data structures and promotes the idea of information as a new life form.
  
  

Since players will either be working for or against an entity, there must be a set of rules to deal with meta-events — such as a corporate boardroom power play — that might be boring for players. Some events will be over their heads, but should be decided by some dice rolls. In all such cases the Controller should perform tests using the following Entity Traits:

• Bureaucracy — a measure of efficiency and smooth organization. Used when players are attempting to fool a sales office, pit two branches of an entity against each other, or suborn head-office communiques.

• Military Might — a measure of the [para-]military forces an entity can bring to bear when faced with a big problem. This includes soldiers, tanks, warplanes, war satellites, sea ships, submarines, etc.

• Infosphere — a measure of an entity's wisdom, accumulated knowledge stored in a vast database, and its network of contacts in the field. Infosphere is used when an entity is trying to locate information about anything, be it a fringer, a new combustion process, or your home address. Infosphere is most often used against an entity's Secrecy trait.

• Influence — a measure of the power to do want you want. This can take the form of political influence through bribery or other dirty tricks; close relations with family businesses; favours stored with powerful people; alliances with other entities; or simply vast amounts of money to buy power.

• Internal Security — a measure of the care with which the entity guards its network, facilities, and employees. Internal Security can be used to ferret out infiltrators, traitors, saboteurs and disloyal personnel. The Severity of the security describes the punishment against those captured by IS.

• Secrecy — a measure of how much other people know about this entity. A high secrecy means the entity is unknown, unrecognizable and the actions of its operatives are very difficult to trace back. Secrecy is most often pitted against Infosphere.

• Equipment — a measure of the equipment resources the entity makes available to its operatives/employees. Entities with high Equipment scores will be able to provide macroparasites, dissemblers, lasguns, and other restricted hardware.

• Presence — a measure of the entity's global presence, as indicated by branch offices, field sites, legations, etc. A high Presence rating indicates the entity has a presence in nearly every country and major city in the world, while a low Presence entity would only have a few bases.