A look at the mind-mapping process behind the development of future of the internet, or The Five Internets as it ended up being called in the novel.
The Cobweb
This is the old internet, the dysfunctional mess we use today. In the near future, this will still be around but no one in their right mind would want to use it.
Satnet
Designed and deployed by Meganat’s Jim Dochersky, this private internet utilises low-earth-orbit satellites to connect paying customers.
Ambercast
A closed Wide-Area-Network, this optical web is the first private and secure internet used by governments and corporations.
Episoft
A peer-to-peer, NearMe-Area-Network, this open internet applies handsets that act as relay mesh-stations for communication traffic. The more devices in the vicinity, the faster and deeper the coverage.
Angry Tree
This is the hacker’s internet that funnels into existing communication networks, employing ‘dryware’ to create branches between them.
The Bluezone: Somewhere deep within this last bastion of democratic society, segregated from the chaotic slums and destitute refugee camps, lurks a technology that could either push civilization further into the abyss, or bring forth its salvation. Struggling to save his innovative hybrid techno-finance company from malign threats leftover from twenty-two years of severe economic depression, a young uberman ends up fighting for his life against ruthless enemies. Not that James Tucker, a war veteran and corporate Uberman by the age of nineteen, and a staunch proponent of alternative economic theorem, minds putting his life on the line. At stake is the destruction of his country, the disillusionment of his fans, and the prospect of betraying a promise he made to his daughter. THE BLUEZONE WILL NEVER BE THE SAME AGAIN.
When I scored this freebie there was never a thought in my mind I would end up compelled to go through the motions and give it a review. Yet here I am. The pleasure of knowing your reading some little gold nugget that no one else has discovered is why I scavenge all the free ebooks I can download, looking for that little gem. This I’m ashamed to say is one of those. As with most free crap out there you read the first three chapters, you give up and move on to the next. This one I gave up after the third chapter, only to return to it a weeks later.
Why? I just had to find out why the AI’s in this book were so retarded. The fact that they “may or may not believe the human world actually exist” intrigued me. Next thing you know I’m sucked in. The story is set in a familiar high tech corporate world, but with added brutality. We have a protagonist facing off with ”uber gangsters, some friendly, some not so friendly, some just plain deadly. Nearly everyone here is a bad guy. It’s a world where there is no respite from violence, threatened, present or otherwise. Even in the non-action chapters there is a sense of danger about to befall any given character. There is enough future tech stuff here to appease fans of future tech stuff. There is plenty of nasty politics and dubious notions of economics. There are jetpacks, self driven automobiles, ‘turbocopters’, five or so different internets and some really retarded AI’s and no I never found out why they were so stupid but I did find them very unlike what we’d expect AI’s to be. There is also some really crazy dialogue, some of it hilarious but some outbursts were so weirdly demented at one point even the main AI was left scratching its virtual head. And after trudging through the first act, fighting through the second and free falling in the third towards a preposterous finale you come to the end and feel a tad guilty for enjoying this book. Very much like a B grade scifi flick, you’re sucked in and because you have nothing to compare it to you can’t tell if that’s a good thing or a bad.
Treat loyalty as though it were a currency. Power based on lesser currencies is easy to come by and even easier to lose. Power based on a hard currency backed by loyalty is difficult to achieve, but once it is, makes you invincible.
Remember, loyalty and honour work as a two-way street.
I was provided with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I never imagined when I started this blog that it would take me a year to get around to reading something, but it has. Nevertheless, this was a really good story. It was action packed and moved at a good pace. Unfortunately, the copy I received had numerous misspelled words, incorrect word usage, missing words and the like. Though this made me pause at many points, I did enjoy the story and found myself invested in the main character, James Tucker.
This story is written in a time when the government has all but collapsed and the world is run by corporate thugs and gangs that run the corporations. There are a lot of things about this book that I can’t even begin to give a succinct explanation about, such as zoids and hypergoblins, which are technological entities that assist or inhibit humans during their daily lives. Imagine that your cell phone earpiece was sentient with a personality of its own, but wasn’t quite sure the human world existed. I’m sure you can see how this could become a problem given the gang situation in this story and yet that explanation probably isn’t detailed enough to really give you an idea of what these little gizmos can do.
Overall, I enjoyed the story. It kept me on my toes and was definitely an original piece. I have yet to read another story like this one. Not to say that they don’t exist, but so many books and so little time. If it weren’t for the fact that it could use some serious proofing, I would heartily recommend it. Given the fairly serious lack of editing on the Kindle version I received, I’ll leave this one up to your judgment. If you can stand the mistakes, I think the story itself was really interesting. Despite my comments about the proofing, I found myself coming back to the story to see where the next chapter led as the main character spent the majority of the book in a convoluted mess of corporate thugs and running for his life.
There is never a neutral role or action you can take. Every decision you make will either hinder or help you. Even doing nothing can have a positive or negative effect.
Fortresses can be advantageous and disadvantageous. They are good because you’re in a castle. It’s a safe place to be.
They are bad because you’re in a castle. You’re stuck there. If you’re a defender on the inside make sure you are not hatred in there. If however, you’re attacking from the outside don’t try bashing down the door. They’ll pour hot oil on you and shoot you with arrows.
Avoid contempt and hatred! Hatred can be a very powerful intellectual resource. Give your enemies or allies the opportunity to despise you and you do so at your own peril.
Having a corporate headquarters is not a requirement of the company’s existence, and the rule of law governing corporate activities ceases to be applicable once they declare their independence. The headquarters could be moved to an island, or to a ship, or even into a satellite in space for that matter. Even the location of corporate executives is a separate matter from the rule of law governing the company.
When it comes to money, Meganat already has its own form of currency – Meganat stock. They could choose to monetize their stock in a way that could be used for paying salaries to employees and for making vendor payments. Employees, as an example, may get 13.8 shares of stock on payday rather than the equivalent amount in Corona dollars. The Intermarket is already programmed to convert money from one country’s currency into another, such as Atlantic Union’s ‘atlo’ into SG federas.
With a little effort, Meganat could design its own market that would instantly convert their stock into spendable currency. So employees, living in any part of the world, could make purchases at their local grocery stores.”
“This is what THEY want. To continue shackling us with death and taxes. The destruction of Rintexx is evidence of this. They wiped out a commercial breakthrough in stem cell technology that would have made death less certain and now THEY are mobilising to clamp down on any school of economic thought that has the potential to make taxation unnecessary.”
