Bullseye Advertising Inc.

## Description:

Founded in 2021 by [REDACTED] after several of North America's major media conglomerates merged together for their own survival in the wake of The Fiscal Suicide of 2020, Bullseye Advertising quickly became the leading player in the world of marketing, advertising, data-mining, and info-brokering. The Megacorporation built its brand on journalism, news and media programs, and endorsement from all the popular celebrities; they work to support other Megacorporations by acting as a marketing agency, public relations service, and data-broker. If something happens, Bullseye's reporters know about it; and if they don't, then they will soon enough. Bullseye maintains relatively positive relations with most other Megacorps, but must manage a precarious balance between appeasing clients and stopping just short of making long-term enemies out of the Megacorps their reporters offend or investigate. Digital Dam Incorporated is especially hostile towards Bullseye, however, as the 2 companies are completely opposed to one another.

### Organization:

#### Headquarters: Dartboard Building, Ryanstown

Bullseye Advertising is owned and operated by the Publishing Board, the company's Board of Directors that direct the Megacorporation according to their investors' demands; the Publishing Board determines the Megacorporation's values, attitudes, major clientele, and the allotment of resources. Below the Publishing Board sit the Directors, who oversee regional operations with their Directing Boards. Chief Editors come below the Directors and manage operations within an entire Supercity or equivalent area, a job which often involves the management of multiple Branches, called Offices or Presses within the company. Below the Chief Editors are Area Heads, who are in charge of drawing stories, news, and data from specific Districts within a Supercity or equivalent area, equivalent to middle-managers who direct what stories from their area are presented for use to the Chief Editor; each Chief Editor also comes with a staff of Text Editors, who clean up approved articles and double check previous work, as well as aid the Chief Editor in matters of management. Text Editors are also responsible for, alongside their staffs of assistants and own networks of contacts, determining the potential backlash or legal consequences of a particular story and determining whether or not the topic is worth suffering the repercussions; as a result, Text Editors are often the ones doing most of the firing and reprimanding in Bullseye, as they are tasked with keeping Journalists on the right path and preventing them from running articles that could severely harm the company or the wider Megacorporate world. Each Area Head is in charge of a large number of actual Journalists, who are charged with gathering data, writing articles and stories, compiling advertisements, designing marketing campaigns, etc.; not all Journalists are actual reporters, however, as Bullseye does much more than just journalism. Below the Journalists come their assistants, informants, and network of affiliates that bring promising information, stories, and topics of discussion to the drawing board; these people are not paid by Bullseye.

Bullseye draws its recruits from top Universities around the world, primarily focused on North America; drawn from business, writing, literature, and marketing Colleges, these recruits undergo rigorous interviews, portfolio examinations, and standardized testing to ensure their moral, ethical, artistic, and marketing skills meet the company's requirements. All employees are also expected to start as interns for 1 to 2 years before moving to a paid position, and it is unheard of for affiliates and other informants to ever receive official employment under or recognition from Bullseye. Furthermore, all employees start at the bottom of their respective departments and must work their way up from there; very few people are brought into a higher position from nothing. The life of a Journalist is a dangerous, risky, and hard one, and many people do not survive until retirement; to compensate for that, Bullseye pays its Journalists moderately well, and expects results. Bullseye hires fairly frequently, especially after suffering a public loss of any kind, but is also known to fire and lay off employees that underperform or cause too much trouble for the Megacorporation, making the company's turnover rate fairly high in comparison to other Megacorporations.

Bullseye Advertising Inc. is known primarily for its news programs, social media presence, and advertising. In the corporate sphere, however, Bullseye is known for its true talent: data-mining. Bullseye is the 3rd largest holder of consumer data in the world, beaten only by [REDACTED] and Kodian Enterprises; Bullseye knows everything about almost everyone, and prides itself on being able to find the rest if needed. An estimated 60% of Bullseye's resources are spent managing and expanding their catalogue of data, and the other 40% is spent leveraging that data for news stories, articles, blackmail, use in their marketing campaigns, and sale to other companies. Bullseye has an extensive presence all across Earth, its planet of focus, but has a department dedicated to gathering news about Mars and even the colonies out in the Kepler Belt and beyond; this all-encompassing sphere of influence means that no one can escape Bullseye's ever-vigilant eye.

Bullseye makes extensive use of mercenaries and third-party affiliates to conduct its business. Individual Journalists often have 1 or 2 known mercenary contacts that they can rely on, either for jobs, information gathering and reconnaissance, and/or personal protection; higher ranking Bullseye executives will have swathes of street thugs, local gangs, and a team of Fixers on speed-dial to drain for local gossip, criminal goings-on, and more nefarious or violent tasks. These mercenaries are often used for plausible deniability and are used as scapegoats in the event that Bullseye faces major backlash for whatever it is that their employees found in the course of the investigation.

#### Major Employee Ranks:

1. Publishing Board
2. Director
3. Chief Editors
4. Area Heads & Text Editors
5. Journalists
	1. Data Rakes: Reporters who rely on the Matrix and their hacking/VR skills to acquire news for articles; known to steal or leak important Megacorp data for their hit pieces.
	2. Mud Rakes: Investigative Journalists tasked with digging into celebrities, Megacorps, other news articles, media, and everything else with the intent of creating scandals, dredging up old skeletons in forgotten closets, and drawing the attention of audiences the world over.
	3. Space Rakes: Interplanetary Journalists who are sent to other planets and space stations across the Sol System with the intent of gathering data and information for news; few and far between, these Journalists put in far more work than the other Journalist types and face the most risk out on the fringes of colonized space.
6. Informants & Contacts
	1. Breakers: Affiliates that come in a wide range of forms and specializations, hired by Bullseye (and other news/media companies) to cause chaos and create the scandals and headlines that draw in audiences.

#### Marketing:

Being a Marketing Megacorporation, Bullseye is a master of marketing strategies. The Megacorporation relies on multiple marketing campaigns, including a range of multimedia programs, advertisements across Realspace and the Matrix, reality shows, news programming, blogs and websites, etc. Bullseye also has one of the most recognizable brands in the world, with their classic bullseye symbol serving as a universal sign of journalism in modern K4.

#### Public Relations:

Bullseye's universal reach and intrusive knowledge surrounding almost everyone on Earth and beyond, Bullseye's marketing is also notoriously well-targeted; advertisements will appear in the form of the target person to model clothes or Chrome, or use their voice, or relay details about the individual that no one else should know. This level of targeting is uncomfortable for some people and incredibly convenient for others, creating a love-hate relationship between Bullseye and the public where people either love or hate the Megacorp.

Other Megacorps tend to have a similar love/hate attitude towards Bullseye. Bullseye is a weapon that can be directed at anyone for the right price, and while many Megacorps have been burned by Bullseye's articles and blogs, many more have found use for the company's wide reach. Should Bullseye get on another Megacorp's bad side, however, Bullseye is not above selling their own Journalists out to help calm the waters, a fact which has both helped and hindered Bullseye many times in the past.

##### Scandals:

Journalists receive a limited degree of protection from their employment under Bullseye, but Bullseye's uneasy footing and flip-flopping attitudes mean that the company rarely, if ever, provides security or anonymity for its employees, and has even been known to sell out troublemaking Journalists to remove some of the heat from the company. Bullseye's intrusive surveillance and creepy data-mining also cause problems for the company, as activists and hackers can abuse that information for their own ends or drum-up anti-Megacorporate support by revealing the extent of Bullseye's observations.

### Equipment:

Bullseye remains at the forefront of technological development, particularly in the Matrix, VR, Augmented Reality, and media industries; the company is responsible for producing many of the world's most popular phones, monitors, computer systems, and streaming packages. Bullseye is less advanced when it comes to security, however, as the company has no militarized department or branch outside of its Digital Security wing, which solely handles Matrix security. Bullseye relies on third-party contractors like the KPD and All-Seeing Eye-Corporated to provide security services and keep their Branches safe from all threats.

Bullseye is not known for its use of Mutants or Psionics. Rather, Bullseye prefers to place normal humans at the forefront of their employees' branding, and does not hire Mutants of any kind. Bullseye's Journalists also recognize the importance of remaining as anonymous and discreet as possible, and neither mutations nor Psionics fit either category.

Bullseye's employees do, however, make extensive use of Chrome and other Organic Augmentations. These implants are either well-hidden or incredibly flashy and obvious, with both approaches having their pros and cons for Journalists looking to gain a unique reputation or use their advantages to the best of their ability.

## Corporate Culture:

Bullseye's corporate culture is directed outwards onto the world, with an emphasis on keeping up appearances, etiquette, and ruthlessness; Bullseye does not sponsor or endorse any single religious belief. The company stresses the importance of "the truth" and the virtues of critical thinking, doubt, and investigation. While Bullseye has few dedicated holidays at the upper levels, Journalists are encouraged to use vacation days to celebrate their important career achievements every year, including celebrations surrounding important or popular articles, successful investigations, etc.

### Corporate Values:

1. Truth: Harmful truths are often the most popular, and the truth is malleable.
2. Free Press: The press knows what the people need to hear, and any nonsensical or moral objection to that rule should be disregarded; only the press knows the truth and how to find it.
3. Knowledge: Data is the truest currency there is, because numbers cannot lie; the more data one has, the better position one is in.
4. Doubt: Nothing is as it seems, and everything warrants investigation; the truth is out there, and some people may not want it to be found.

### Cultural Aspects:

Bullseye's symbols are their famous bullseye sign, dartboards and darts, and crosshairs; Bullseye's preferred colors are black and white, occasionally gray. Information is stored inside Bullseye's corporate Branches and dedicated Facilities, but few Journalists communicate with each other about what they do, as internal competition is fierce.

Unsurprisingly, writing is the art form most associated with Bullseye, but television, film, and podcasts are also associated with the company's large media brands.

Bullseye's average age of employment is around 38 years old, and the company does not hire anyone below the age of 18. Bullseye's employment rituals include a large celebration, a celebration for the employee's first big project/article success, and, as stated previously, their entrance into the lowest level of the company before being allowed to rise higher.

Unlike most Megacorps, Bullseye does not encourage its employees to have children, and similarly does not have heritable positions within the company; officially, this position is held to prevent the development of nepotism, but really the rule is in place to limit barricades to firing employees or handing them over to angry rival Megacorps. As such, many Journalists are discouraged from getting married, and especially from having kids; the danger of their work and constant traveling make such lifestyles exceptionally difficult. Executives with the money and time and broadcasted lifestyles to afford such luxuries are encouraged to have full families, since it makes for better television.

Death in Bullseye is almost expected. For Journalists who write their articles and post scandalous blogs, assassination by the target of a slanderous essay is considered a high mark on their record, considered a worthy award and a true testament to that article's veracity and success. For non-Journalists, death is considerably less honorable, and most non-Journalist employees seek to remain as anonymous, unassuming, and unimpressive as possible to avoid attracting unwanted attention. Bullseye executives that cannot escape the limelight surround themselves with fortresses of protection to ward off would-be assassins or offended readers.