[GrimGriz]

As I was flying around this weekend I noticed several Solrain pilots I had never seen before tooling about the galaxy. I ran across one jumping out of Narrow Canal, one was leaving Outpost headed to Blasted Corner. I was mildly suspicious, that any pilot could achieve the 40th rank without me seeing them before. At the time I had chalked it up to me spending too much time in front of asteroids and not noticing the things around me. Now though, it all makes perfect sense.

As I'm sure you're all aware, Monday morning TRI began limited the services provided by the hyper-web that it maintains. They point to budget cuts and staffing issues, but the truth is something far more sinister my friends. What we are experiencing is not a TRI budget cut at all, but the STCC stretching it's influence over TRI and fleecing the profits of all pilots for themselves.

When the service limitation hit, several small companies made offerings to replace those services at no cost to the pilots. Unfortunately, the most effective place for them to do so was on the TRI controlled hyper-web. These advertisements were summarily "lost" by a STCC operative in the TRI bureau of communications, and all pilots were directed to large, corporate, STCC controlled communications terminals.

In fact, during the most crucial time immediately following the termination of service, the STCC operative kept himself very busy stifling the start up companies and nudging pilots toward the STCC. Every now and then, if you watch closely during the hours the operative is either sleeping or otherwise indisposed, you might catch an advertisement from one of those resisting the STCC's control.

What evil the STCC has planned for the pilots I do not know, but as a loyal Quant pilot I know I'll be watching my back.