Blueprint for Fiction - Confessions of a former employee of an intelligence firm (early 2000s)

Blueprint for Fiction - Confessions of a former employee of an intelligence firm (early 2000s)

In the early 2000s, the rapid spread of the Internet and mobile communications was changing society in Japan. People saw information as an asset and reached out for "side jobs," "investments," and "strategies" via telephone and the Internet. Behind the scenes, however, a "new scam industry" lurked, selling fictions. A former employee of a strategy information company testified that a sales procedure called a "fraudulent business manual" existed within the company. Newcomers were trained in the art of "selling dreams," and made to memorize phrases such as, "We received information through a special route from the store manager," and "This new machine is sure to win. They would probe their opponents' anxiety and induce them to "make up for their losses" or "try it just once. In this way, housewives and middle-aged and older adults paid registration fees, and then piled on additional fees. Customer lists were traded among multiple companies, and the same victims were targeted on
e after another. The salespeople, bound by commission-based salaries, felt guilty, but they continued to lie in order to achieve results. Eventually, the Osaka Regional Taxation Bureau uncovered the tax evasion and the company executives were exposed, but the entire industry continued to operate under a different name.
This incident was no mere fraud. It is a symbol of an era in which the torrent of information technology has amplified the desire to believe, and trust itself has become a commodity. The illusion of "strategy information" was a mirror of economic stagnation and lonely hope.