Slave meshes are illegal in nearly all civilizations, with the obvious exception of the Union. When they are used, normally it's done either by a well-meaning renegade sect as an attempt at criminal rehabilitation, or as part of a particularly dangerous spy network or operation; extraordinary circumstances calling for extraordinary measures. And then there are Slave Lords. Slave Lords are those who specialize in chaining fully-sentient minds to their will through the use of cognitech slave meshes in service to their own goals, normally wealth and power. Dozens of embodied beings and usually hundreds of dataforms are bound to serve their every whim, granting their master an unlimited amount of sentient processing power and time dedicated to serving their every whim. Rebellion is not only impossible, but unthinkable; obedience to the master's will provides the highest happiness for their pitiful subjects.
Needless to say, most Civilizations (and the Transcendentals of the Patent Office) react with horror and indignation towards the idea of this sort of slavery. The Independents, Stardwellers and Mechanicians in particular will send whatever force is necessary to eliminate a Slave Lord and liberate their property, but no extant Civilization will tolerate their actions. Even the Rationalist League's lords consider such meshes to be wasteful self-aggrandizement, though some external observers opine that the Rationalists only say that because they achieve almost the same results through genetic and social engineering. And while the Union's own meritocracy often display many Slave Lord-like traits in the management of their subordinates, they are implacable foes of outside Slave Lords, who use slave meshes solely for their own benefit rather than the good of society. Most Slave Lords have rejected the Core Values of their Civilization and either live on the fringes of society, establish their own colonies, or seek to take over Cargo Cult worlds; keeping a secret like this in a technological panopticon is nearly impossible. There is, however, a significant overlap with Organized Crime, and many Slave Lords got their start working for one cartel or another.
Benefit: A Slave Lord's chattels can be wielded as an extension of himself. When doing so, his collective act as Infrastructure I and provide a point of Reserve, but do not increase Tech or decrease Import.1
Core Value: Either Ambition or Control; a putative Slave Lord must pick one. Ambition is the desire to obtain more power and more resources, and to fulfill grand, megalomaniacal goals. Control, meanwhile, is an obsession with controlling one's surroundings and slaves. The latter is trivially easy for a Slave Lord, but that doesn't stop them from placing ever more rigid rules on their slaves, and the CV also helps when resisting attempts to make them give up their power.