the lag of the spread of the technology from the wealthy to the baselines
I don't think you understand what true power implies. The heart of the Singularity concept is not an ensemble of technological developments like rejuvenation and nanofabrication, access to which then diffuses through society as a result of political and other developments; the heart of the Singularity is self-enhancing greater-than-human intelligence. It implies that something or someone becomes omnipotent by human standards. It can kill all humanity, it can change them as much as it wishes, it can remake this whole solar system into whatever it wants.
In principle, you could have a post-singularity world where there is a slow diffusion of transhuman powers, but that would have to be by design, because the ruling power wants it that way. One might imagine a small clique, who happen to be the owner-operators of the first transcendent AI, who start out reserving advanced technology for themselves, but who intend to gradually share it with the rest of humanity, but only after conditions are met. What sort of conditions? Maybe someone outside the clique gets access once they possess a stipulated level of ethical maturity and practical competence. Maybe someone outside the clique gets access once they have been safely brainwashed into servile adoration of the original clique-members. Maybe someone outside the clique gets access once they have been brainwashed into adopting a peculiar set of beliefs and dispositions which originally marked the clique as an oddball subcultural cult, but which will become the new norm of post-singularity civilization.
But such changes can surely be made rapidly and by force, given a post-singularity level of technology. Mind control, personality alteration, the synthesis of designer people according to any blueprint at all - the work of less than a day for the robot agents of the ruling power. And I haven't even touched on how unlikely it is that the ruling clique would remain separate from the powers they control through their obedient AI. Eventually someone will want to be the omnipotent being themselves, rather than just commanding it, and it is rather unclear what happens to a human will and intellect when it is no longer constrained by the intellectual and physical limitations of its natural form.
The post-singularitarian society that I envision is something similar to the one Yudkowsky described somewhere (I can't find the post), in a story that had humanity find out that the stars were going on and out in the sky at regular intervals in a way that made it clear that it was a message, intended to them. They end up focusing on decoding that message. Eventually, they become a super-advanced genius race, with most of its members kept in stasis while the rest were occupied in decoding the signal and responding to it (there were shifts), with the hope o...
It was Yudkowsky's Fun Theory sequence that inspired me to undertake the work of writing a novel on a singularitarian society... however, there are gaps I need to fill, and I need all the help I can get. It's mostly book recommendations that I'm asking for.
One of the things I'd like to tackle in it would be the interactions between the modern, geeky Singularitarianisms, and Marxism, which I hold to be somewhat prototypical in that sense, as well as other utopisms. And contrasting them with more down-to-earth ideologies and attitudes, by examining the seriously dangerous bumps of the technological point of transition between "baseline" and "singularity". But I need to do a lot of research before I'm able to write anything good: if I'm not going to have any original ideas, at least I'd like to serve my readers with a collection of well-researched. solid ones.
So I'd like to have everything that is worth reading about the Singularity, specifically the Revolution it entails (in one way or another) and the social aftermath. I'm particularly interested in the consequences of the lag of the spread of the technology from the wealthy to the baselines, and the potential for baselines oppression and other forms of continuation of current forms of social imbalances, as well as suboptimal distribution of wealth. After all, according to many authors, we've had the means to end war, poverty and famine, and most infectious diseases, since the sixties, and it's just our irrational methods of wealth distribution That is, supposing the commonly alleged ideal of total lifespan and material welfare maximization for all humanity is what actually drives the way things are done. But even with other, different premises and axioms, there's much that can be improved and isn't, thanks to basic human irrationality, which is what we combat here.
Also, yes, this post makes my political leanings fairly clear, but I'm open to alternative viewpoints and actively seek them. I also don't intend to write any propaganda, as such. Just to examine ideas, and scenarios, for the sake of writing a compelling story, with wide audience appeal. The idea is to raise awareness of the Singularity as something rather imminent ("Summer's Coming"), and cause (or at least help prepare) normal people to question the wonders and dangers thereof, rationally.
It's a frighteningly ambitious, long-term challenge, I am terribly aware of that. And the first thing I'll need to read is a style-book, to correct my horrendous grasp of standard acceptable writing (and not seem arrogant by doing anything else), so please feel free to recommend as many books and blog articles and other material as you like. I'll take my time going though it all.