The Atlantis Variation: Difference between revisions
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{{a|myth|{{image|mezztranches|png|''I Watched Mezzanine Tranches Glitter In The Dark'', {{vsr|2009}}}}}}''The Atlantis Variation'' is a [[finance fiction]] novella by [[Vega|alpha-crazed]] beat poet [[Hunter Barkley]]. | {{a|myth|{{image|mezztranches|png|''I Watched Mezzanine Tranches Glitter In The Dark'', {{vsr|2009}}}}}}''The Atlantis Variation'' is a [[finance fiction]] novella by [[Vega|alpha-crazed]] beat poet [[Hunter Barkley]]. | ||
Set in a fluctuating spacetime that [[waiver]]s crazily between the present, future and | Set in a fluctuating spacetime that [[waiver]]s crazily between the present, future and one queasy weekend in September 2008, it concerns the machinations of a malign [[Clavam Hominum Senum Pallidorum|secret society]] working in the shadows to produce the [[2008 ISDA Master Agreement]], known under its working title as the Atlantis Variation — hence the title of Barkley’s novel. | ||
The Atlantis Variation was to be an apocalyptic edition of the {{isdama}} that was ''almost'' completed in 2008, only prevented by the intervening near total financial destruction of the planet. It never saw the light of day, instead collapsing into a form of dark tedium that continues to upset those who would seek to harness the power of the universe. | |||
According to Barkley’s dystopian vision, the {{2008ma}} was to be short, plainly worded, future-proofed and agile. It would allow counterparties to agree robust trading terms with little fuss and only the cursory clerical management | According to Barkley’s dystopian vision, the {{2008ma}} was to be short, plainly worded, future-proofed and agile. It would allow counterparties to agree robust trading terms with little fuss and only the cursory clerical management delivered through unskilled personnel in low-cost jurisdictions and, eventually, [[chatbot]]<nowiki/>s. | ||
It promised to be the long-lost missing [[Obsolescence|use-case]] for [[distributed ledger technology]], natively negotiated “[[Blockchain|on-chain]]” between arrays of dematerialised [[large language model]]s housed, for the sense of theatre, [[Proverbial school-leaver from Bucharest|in a single giant data centre in the outskirts of Bucharest]]. | |||
Had it been implemented, this template would have addressed the financial, infrastructural and regulatory challenges which would dog the financial derivatives market in the early 21st century, eventually bringing to the brink of an abyss the rolling countryside of {{aies}} a verdant land where peaceable swapsfolk had for generations made comfortable nests in the folded hills, nooks and crannies of that pleasant land. | |||
While these hobbity little creatures romped wealthily about their sun-drenched meadows, the ’08 would silently, effectively consolidate all documentation across a wide range of products and asset classes ([[including but not limited to]] [[repo]], [[stock lending]], [[prime brokerage]], [[exchange traded derivatives]], [[commodities]] and [[emissions]]), finally moving the financial world into a stable [[Utopia|utopian state]] in which all risks are known, all eventualities experienced and contingencies accounted for. ''[[Risk]]'' would finally be banished for ever. | |||
As it was, the challenge was just too big. The project expanded — at first gradually; in the closing stages at breakneck pace — and in the final days exceeded the [[Schwarzschild radius of document comprehension]] altogether. There was a sudden, catastrophic implosion, and everything associated with the project — all drafts, riders, boilerplate, annexes, schedules — and everyone — the firm {{ISDA}} engaged to hold the pen (a mysterious cyber law firm that spontaneously winked into existence when a document management system became self-aware)<ref>The firm, [[Tubb Fuller Breaden Potter Bacon]], (known in its marketing literature as [[TFBPB]]) has never been heard of since, and curiously, no record now exists of this firm before 2008, even though it was apparently a global behemoth.</ref> and several thousand members of ISDA’s document working group, seconded by their employers to contributing their “clarifications” and [[For the avoidance of doubt|doubt-avoidances]] for the greater good of the standard form, simply vanished into thin air. | |||
Well, speaking of | All — the document, the personnel, the drafting miscellanea and terabytes of [[Tedium|tedia]] — are now lost to history. We now do not know what the agreement said, how it said it, or indeed whether the agreement really existed at all. And the chatbots — | ||
Well, speaking of chatbots, Barkley claims that Roy Batty’s extraordinary speech from the original ''Blade Runner'' (1982) originated when a page of his novel fell ''backwards in time'' through a rent in the fabric of the [[space-tedium continuum]] created by the 2008 financial markets implosion, landing in Rutger Hauer’s lap as he was waiting in makeup for that final scene. Hauer, not realising this was a unique document from the apocalyptic future, took it for a script redraft. He adapted it, but only slightly, from the original record, which was exchange between an [[ETD]] [[negotiator]] and a mortally injured {{tag|CDO}} lawyer as he dragged his mutilated psyche away from the smoking ruins of his employer: | |||
“You thought you knew ''everything'', didn’t you,” [[sneered]] the hapless [[futures]] specialist. “And ''now'' look at us. ''You'' did this. You have no idea.” | “You thought you knew ''everything'', didn’t you,” [[sneered]] the hapless [[futures]] specialist. “And ''now'' look at us. ''You'' did this. You have no idea.” |