and the infimtesimally short tame available for computation made pre-Guild navigation entirely the work of computers Before the discovery of Holtzman Waves, many considerations limited navigational problems to small and less powerful shipboard computers Consequently, travel (and therefore trade) could not be centrally directed, organization of shipping and transportation was haphazard and desultory, earned on by companies that might be out of communication, in direct rivalry, or even m open combat with one another One company might operate more or less efficiently in one star-system while adjacent systems were beset by shipping strikes and conflicts of interest that benefited no one Improvement came with the Holtzman Wave, nationally a mathematical phenomenon causing microcatastrophic folds m real spacetime along a selectable vector, when the vector impacts with matter denser than interstellar hydrogen, it excites that matter to emit long radio waves, which can then be received on normal radio antennae With interstellar cornmunicaton now possible, navigation could be enormously improved For example, Transeom, a trading corporation of the seventh millennium B G , direct cd its ships from a central computer bank called Gentians Centrans was located on the artificial satellite Xenophon, situated m deep space far from the Transcom planet (for freedom from efectromagneflc interference) The central computer served both to extend interstellar limits and to define and control areas of commercial influence, as well as to control navigation at predesigned points m transit (the welt-known "mail drops'), ships en route would reenter normal space com- municate with Centrans via Holtzman Waves, and receive course corrections or updates from the computer But at no time did Centrans ever achieve its potential Transcom was never more than a loose cartel of members jealous of their traditional prerogatives Centrans was like an efficient nervous system inside a loosely articulated, weakly muscled body When the Butienan Jihad erupted Transcom was one of the early casualties Xenophon and similar facilities were obliterated, and the danger of depending on centralized data-retrieval was revealed each cartel was fragmented, unable to navigate even in its own preserve The cartels fell one by one as the Jihad burned across space The fate of interstellar flight was shared by endeavors throughout the known worlds, and whatever the spiritual gams of the Jihad, and there were many, there were vast offsetting losses True the interests of the cartels had been almost exclusively commercial but they had at least promoted an awareness of common human identity and interest Now the elimination of man machine interaction threw hyperspace navigation back 10,000 years, and shrank humanity's awareness of its breadth and diversity Not until the Spacing Guild became the wings of the Impenum was unity within plurality reestablished WD I Further references SPACING GUILD FOUNDATION SPAC ING GUILD OPERATIONS HOLTZMAN EFFECT LOFS KardeU The Flame and the Flower A Short History of the Butlerian Jihad (Yorba Rose) IX.