Today's links
- Big Tech and "captive audience venues": The digital equivalent of baseball stadiums and airport concourses.
- Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
- Object permanence: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2020, 2024
- Upcoming appearances: Where to find me.
- Recent appearances: Where I've been.
- Latest books: You keep readin' em, I'll keep writin' 'em.
- Upcoming books: Like I said, I'll keep writin' 'em.
- Colophon: All the rest.
Big Tech and "captive audience venues" (permalink)
Enshittification is what you get when tech companies, run by the common-or-garden mediocre sociopaths who end up at the top of most businesses, are unshackled from any consequence for indulging their worst, greediest impulses:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/20/capitalist-unrealism/#praxis
The reason Facebook was once a nice place to hang out and talk with your friends and isn't anymore is that Mark Zuckerberg is no longer disciplined by competitors like Instagram (which he bought) nor by regulators (whom he captured), nor by interoperable tech like ad-blockers and alternative clients (which he uses IP law to destroy) nor by his own workforce (who have become disposable thanks to workforce supply catching up with demand). It used to be that Mark Zuckerberg couldn't really move the enshittification lever in the Facebook C-suite because these disciplining forces gummed it up. He had to worry about losing users, or about users installing alternative technology, or about regulators hitting him hard enough to hurt, or about workplace revolts. Now, he doesn't have to worry about these things, so he's indulging the impulses that he's had since the earliest days in his Harvard dorm, when he was a mere larval incel cooking up an online service to help him rate the fuckability of his female classmates.
When we had defenses, Mark Zuckerberg had to respect them. Now that we're defenseless, he's shameless. He's insatiable. He will devour us to the marrow.
When I'm explaining enshittification to normies, I often make comparisons to other places where you can't escape like airports and sports stadiums: "Facebook can afford to abuse you once they have you locked for the same reason that water costs $7/bottle on the other side of the airport TSA checkpoint." It's an extremely apt comparison, as you can verify for yourself by reading "Shakedown at the Snack Counter: The Case for Street Pricing," a new report from the Groundwork Collective:
https://groundworkcollaborative.org/work/street-pricing/
"Shakedown" makes the point that – as is the case with tech giants – sports stadiums and airports are creatures of vast public subsidy. If this seems counterintuitive, try Mariana Mazzucato's Entrepreneurial State, which lists all the ways in which the tech revolution represents a privatization of publicly funded research, as with the iPhone, whose semiconductors, internet connection, voice assistant technology, touchscreen and other components all count the public as a key investor:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/the-entrepreneurial-state-appl
And, as with airports and sports stadiums, the proprietors of the iPhone business are able to reap this gigantic public subsidy without taking on any public duties. Regulators that could impose some kind of public service obligations as quid pro quo for using public funds are AWOL, or worse, captured and complicit in the ongoing, publicly financed ripoff:
https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/15/private-law/#thirty-percent-vig
Airport, stadiums and tech platforms are all walled gardens – roach motels that are hard to escape once they've been entered. Thus the scorching prices of stadium and airport food, and the 30% transaction fees imposed by Apple and Google on app revenues (this is 1,000% higher than the average fees charged by the rest of the payment processing industry!), the 51% fees extracted by Google/Meta from advertisers and publishers (compare with the historical average of 15%), and the 45-51% that Amazon takes out of every dollar earned by its platform sellers. Once you're locked in, they can turn the screws, either by gouging buyers directly, or by gouging sellers, who pass those additional costs onto buyers.
Groundwork has a proposal to address this in physical settings: regulation. Specifically, a "street pricing" regulation that keeps the charges for food and drinks within these walled gardens to prices comparable to those on the outside. They note that these regulations enjoy wide, bipartisan support. 76% of Republicans support a regulation that can only be described as "price controls," two words that normally trigger head-explosions in the right.
How is it that such a commanding majority of Republicans can get behind government price controls? Simple: it's obvious that when a company no longer faces market discipline – when they're the only game in town (or on the other side of the TSA checkpoint) – that government discipline has to fill the vacuum, and if it doesn't, you will get mercilessly screwed.
This is where enshittification – a form of monopolistic decay unique to the tech sector – departs from everyday monopoly abuse in other sectors, like aviation and league sports. Tech has an in-built flexibility, the inescapable property of "interoperability" that comes standard with every digital system thanks to the universal nature of computers themselves.
Interoperable technologies let you hack Instagram to restore it to the state of privacy- and attention-respecting glory that made it a success in the first place:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained
They let you monitor Facebook's failures to uphold its own promises about not profiting from paid political disinformation:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/06/get-you-coming-and-going/#potemkin-research-program
They let you claw back control over how Facebook's feeds are constructed:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/08/unfollow-everything/#shut-the-zuck-up
They let Apple customers maintain their privacy, even if they have the temerity to be friends with Android users:
They let shoppers use Amazon to order from local mom-and-pop stores:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/07/10/view-a-sku/
They even let you destroy the net worth – and power – of Elon Musk:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/03/08/turnabout/#is-fair-play
Interoperability creates a unique, easily administered source of discipline over tech bosses that just isn't available as a means of countering the ripoffs we see elsewhere, including in sports stadiums and airports. That means that, far from being harder to fix than other disgusting scams in our society, tech is easier to fix. All that stands in the way is the IP laws that criminalize the kind of reverse-engineering work that allow the users of technology to have the final say over how the devices and services they rely on work:
https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/
Those IP laws were spread around the world by the US Trade Representative, who insisted that every country that wanted to export its products to the US without punitive tariffs must pass laws protecting the rent-extracting scams of US tech giants. With those tariff promises now in tatters, there's never been a better time for the rest of the world to jettison those Big Tech-protecting laws:
(Image: Daniel Brody, CC BY-SA 4.0, modified)
Hey look at this (permalink)
- FTC Commissioners File Suit to Contest Trump’s Alleged Firing https://prospect.org/justice/2025-03-27-ftc-commissioners-file-suit-trumps-alleged-firing/
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Screamboat Is a Both a Steamboat Willie Horror Movie and Hardcore Disney Fan Film https://gizmodo.com/screamboat-director-interview-steamboat-willie-disney-2000581124
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Ploopy upgraded its new Classic 2 open-source trackball with better scrolling https://www.theverge.com/news/637794/ploopyploopy-classic-2-trackball-open-source-upgrade
Object permanence (permalink)
#20yrsago How HDTV killed firefighters, birthed the Broadcast Flag, and screwed America https://web.archive.org/web/20051020180115/http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2005/0218njsp.htm
#15yrsago ACLU prevails: US Fed Judge invalidates gene patent https://www.aclu.org/cases/association-molecular-pathology-v-myriad-genetics
#15yrsago UK record lobby has vehement feelings on Digital Economy Bill debate, won’t say what they are https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/mar/29/digital-economy-bill-bpi-doctorow
#15yrsago Leaked doc: EU wants to destroy and rewrite Canada’s IP laws https://www.michaelgeist.ca/2010/03/ceta-demands/
#10yrsago Stephen King versus Maine’s lying governor https://www.rawstory.com/2015/03/stephen-king-hammers-maine-governor-for-doubling-down-hes-not-man-enough-to-admit-he-made-a-mistake/
#5yrsago Don't worry about groceries https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/29/grifters-gonna-grift/#germophobia
#5yrsago California's missing medical stockpile https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/29/grifters-gonna-grift/#austerity-kills
#5yrsago Cozy Catastrophes https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/29/grifters-gonna-grift/#wyndhamesque
#5yrsago Andrew Cuomo is not your woke bae https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/29/grifters-gonna-grift/#comparative-virtue
#5yrsago Alex Jones's one-two punch https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/29/grifters-gonna-grift/#filter-for-vulnerable
#1yrago Subprime gadgets https://pluralistic.net/2024/03/29/boobytrap/#device-lock-controller
Upcoming appearances (permalink)
- Chicago: Picks and Shovels with Peter Sagal, Apr 2
https://exileinbookville.com/events/44853 -
Chicago: ABA Techshow, Apr 3
https://www.techshow.com/ -
Bloomington: Picks and Shovels at Morgenstern, Apr 4
https://morgensternbooks.com/event/2025-04-04/author-event-cory-doctorow -
Pittsburgh: Picks and Shovels at White Whale Books, May 15
https://whitewhalebookstore.com/events/20250515 -
Pittsburgh: PyCon, May 16
https://us.pycon.org/2025/schedule/ -
PDX: Teardown 2025, Jun 20-22
https://www.crowdsupply.com/teardown/portland-2025 -
PDX: Picks and Shovels at Barnes and Noble, Jun 20
https://stores.barnesandnoble.com/event/9780062183697-0 -
New Orleans: DeepSouthCon63, Oct 10-12, 2025
http://www.contraflowscifi.org/
Recent appearances (permalink)
- Fire the unelected social media dictators (Al Jazeera Upfront)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXa4DzhkUZ8 -
Capitalists Hate Capitalism (MMT Podcast)
https://pileusmmt.libsyn.com/195-capitalists-hate-capitalism-with-cory-doctorow -
How to Destroy Our Tech Overlords (Homeless Romantic)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epma2B0wjzU
Latest books (permalink)
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- Picks and Shovels: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2025 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels).
- The Bezzle: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2024 (the-bezzle.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3062/Available_Feb_20th%3A_The_Bezzle_HB.html#/).
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"The Lost Cause:" a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3007/Pre-Order_Signed_Copies%3A_The_Lost_Cause_HB.html#/)
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"The Internet Con": A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245).
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"Red Team Blues": "A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before." Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/.
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"Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin", on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com
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"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it "a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance." Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html
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"How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism": an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html)
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"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html
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"Poesy the Monster Slayer" a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/.
Upcoming books (permalink)
- Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, October 7 2025
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/ -
Unauthorized Bread: a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2026
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Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2026
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The Memex Method, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2026
Colophon (permalink)
Today's top sources: Naked Capitalism (https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/).
Currently writing:
- Enshittification: a nonfiction book about platform decay for Farrar, Straus, Giroux. Status: second pass edit underway (readaloud)
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A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING
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Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2025
Latest podcast: With Great Power Came No Responsibility: How Enshittification Conquered the 21st Century and How We Can Overthrow It https://craphound.com/news/2025/02/26/with-great-power-came-no-responsibility-how-enshittification-conquered-the-21st-century-and-how-we-can-overthrow-it/
This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution.
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