I'm confused, you seem to romanticize the notion of megacorps greatly yet most dystopian settings (Dredd, Robocop, Bladerunner) tend to feature megacorps as this horribly bloated powerhouse that manipulates government organizations into establishing policies that benefit them.
Huxley's Brave New World warned of a society that would be the total opposite of Orwell's 1984. Megacorps would be closer to Huxley's hypothetical world - the people being drowned by sensory overload. Buy this, eat this not that, look like this or you won't get laid, buy this new car because it's better for the planet, etc.
Huxley won over Orwell as that's just 21st Century America, China, and other first world nations.
I write cyberpunk fiction (the books have just been delayed until this year) so I have both a fascination with the concept and have a somewhat ambivalent relationship with the tropes thereof. I think part of the issue is the fact the majority of cyberpunk writers are either from deeply urbanized areas like New York, Los Angeles, or London.
The thing is, I'm from Appalachia so I *KNOW* what it's like to be directly ruled by corporations who employ 90% of your city and own all much of the housing as well as public buildings. The big city-boys whine about advertising but don't really know what it's like to have everything under the control of business with the local politicians as nothing more than mouthpieces for one single company. They're usually mouthpieces for several and can get new ones if they want to change their mind or the party resists.
Go to the Kentucky Highlands Museum museum in our city and you'll be stunned that it has a children's playpen which is a re-creation of our city's factories and lots of videos made to explain how Ashland Oil, and Kentucky Power brought civilization to the rural hillbillies. They actually removed the exhibit dedicated to Ashland veterans during WW2 to talk about how the companies were founded. Honestly, they'd be incredibly racist if not for the fact the people they're talking about as savages are white.
I deeply deeply loathe these organizations but I also understand how they come to power and how the people pretty much are the ones who prop them up as alternatives to big government. The MobTM is prone to greed every bit as much as the individual and easily swayed by promises of prosperity.
American influence is dependent on these corporations nowaways and their bloated obsessive power which is near impossible to reign in and the atrocities they commit within the US, especially environmental damage (cancer, nerve-damage, and similar things are constants iin my area--not that anyone will ever bring the companies to task for it). Again, Enron's collapse affected not just people in Texas but people in my home town and that was a company run by lies and greed.
On the other hand, having seen behind the curtain, I also understand how much of the United States' security and cheap goods comes from using these companies to leverage the economies of other nations and keep them from hostility with America or allying with its enemies. One of the most amazing things I'd ever seen was attending a speech with my father how they talked about essentially remaking Northern India with a series of power plants all owned by local companies owned by American companies owned by KEP's parent companies.
The amazing part being it wasn't a proposal but following up on
how it worked and how half the region was now employed by them. They'd also bought up all of the local real estate and were going to move large numbers of people into company housing dependent on them.
We are living in an age where the British East India Company has given birth to many many children.
