Okay, I don't remember the corporations not being worth the cost at all... My memory of it (playing single player as i always do) was stretching to get the needed great people and hoping that the AI wouldn't beat me to the gold/silver/gems corp.
While on the subject, I find that the increased number of resources in Orbi leads to more trade, more important city sites and so on. I see no real negative effects...... At least not on the "huge" maps I'm used to.
.... Perhaps silver circle could be the first guild of FF?