| From: | "Paul J. Adam" <shadowrn@********.DEMON.CO.UK> |
|---|---|
| Subject: | Re: Runner's Attitudes |
| Date: | Tue, 1 Jul 1997 23:24:48 +0100 |
<topcat@***.NET> writes
>At 11:23 PM 6/30/97 +0100, Paul wrote:
>>In message <199706301959.OAA08030@*******.fgi.net>, TopCat
>><topcat@***.NET> writes
>>>Paul views them as something completely apathetic to harm done to them,
>
>>Beg pardon?
>
>You see, when corps say things like "Darn, the runners got outside the
>fence, guess we can just forget about them and a few million nuyen worth of
>research and resources, huh?" I consider that pretty apathetic. Don't you?
If I'd seen anyone suggesting that, I'd agree it was pretty apathetic.
Interestingly, I've never claimed it, so why you persist in attributing
it to me is a mystery.
I don't subscribe to the notion that, in the extreme, a corporation will
spend multiple millions of nuyen in hunting down and destroying a few
petty criminals. Most shadowruns don't involve that sort of cost to the
target, why throw good money after bad?
If you have cost the corporation ten or twenty million (and that's a
_big_ run), then you can expect a pretty savage hunt. If your run simply
planted some evidence that meant John Doe got knocked out of the running
for a certain promotion, and Richard Roe got the post instead; why is
the corporation even going to get involved? Why is it even going to know
there was a problem?
Runners _will_ be pursued if there is a case to do so. Sometimes that
will simply be "log it, file it, if we see them again we do something
about it: they didn't do enough damage to be worth wasting resource on."
Other times it will be an all-out manhunt and damn the cost, because the
corporation cannot afford to show weakness on this issue.
It puzzles me that Bob has so much trouble understanding this
distinction.
>>Okaaay.... I can see the way this is going to go already. You didn't
>>listen then, you're still deaf now.
>
Please remind me when I said that.
>They won't,
>it's silly to let them get away.
It's also silly to go bankrupt hunting petty criminals.
The response will be in proportion to the damage done, Bob. How many
different ways do I have to say this?
>>Either you cannot comprehend what I write, or you are so utterly set in
>>your thoughts that you will not listen to what I keep saying.
>>To hell with it, you aren't listening to this either are you?
>
>Read it all and you kept forgetting the prefix "mega" before corp and
>thinking that SR is only running against Megas and thinking that data gained
>from a run would be worth less than the effort to erase a single runner
>team.
I've snipped all your post, because I find your attitude bemusing and
your inability to comprehend what I write inexplicable: and while I
tried to come up with a response, I found your writing so bizarre on
occasion that it was virtually impossible to reply to.
The mere fact that a target is a megacorporation doesn't change the
financial cost of a given run against it, and your fixation that every
run against any megacorp involves a cost of billions is the crux of the
problem here. If the cost is small, the benefit of pursuit is similarly
small.
Many runs have no apparent cost: planting evidence to skew a promotion
board or influence a corporate disciplinary hearing, for instance. Done
properly they will never be detected, let alone pursued. You seem unable
to consider anything beyong The Big Datasteal as employment for
shadowrunners.
>If I could find something in the least bit realistic and inline with the SR
>world in your argument, then I'd have left this thread alone a long time
>ago.
One wonders whether that says more about you or me.
> I think you see corporations far too much from a Wal-Mart perspective
>and not from an extraterritorial entity perspective. Corps create and
>manipulate the shadows, not the other way around.
Corporations exist for one single solitary purpose: to make profit.
The shadows are there as a tool to that end. Not as an end in
themselves.
>So where's this thread going? I'll continue to disprove and attack any
>example you throw out
Thank you so much for demonstrating your open mind. No matter what I
say, you will try to attack and disprove it?
I said from the start that it appeared you were unable to listen to
anything said on this subject, and you appear determined to prove me
right.
>I won't agree that you're right and I doubt you'll accept my
>views either, regardless of what I do to disprove them...
I've given up trying to communicate with you. Why bother trying to
explain my views when, no matter what I say, you hear only
>Nope, you still claim that any corp will let the runners slide.
If you genuinely believe that's all I've said, then I'd suggest you
killfile me; because I don't want to waste words on someone determined
to misinterpret them.
>Feel free to reply to this, I'll allow you the last words on it.
Why bother? I could post that "Anyone spitting on the sidewalk outside a
Stuffer Shack will be vapourised by orbital lasers" and you would claim
I was implying corporations were casual about littering. You're
determined not to listen to any dissenting opinion.
>I'll read
>your reply,
How generous of you.
>should you choose to make one, and my view will remain
>unchanged.
If you were determined at the outset that you would not, could not, be
persuaded to even slightly alter your view, why bother posting your
views at all? This group is for _discussion_.
I don't particularly mind the fixity of your views: what I find
extremely offensive is the way you misrepresent my position and then
post lengthy and largely irrelevant diatribes on that misrepresentation.
Believe what you like: but try to allow others the same privilege.
>Regardless of what happens, I
>will stop posting on this thread. Seeya in the next one ;^D
No, thank you. I post to this list for the discussion. You are not
interested in discussion.
--
There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable and
praiseworthy...
Paul J. Adam paul@********.demon.co.uk
