Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Dec 8, 2021 22 tweets 16 min read Read on X
Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).

Inside: All the books I reviewed in 2021; Broken Promises; How elite hobbies let billionaires pay no tax; and more!

Archived at: pluralistic.net/2021/12/08/req…

#Pluralistic

1/
I'm heading on a work trip that dovetails into a Xmas holiday and then, in turn, to a hip replacement. I may not put out another Pluralistic edition until Feb (though I might squeak another edition in before then, who can say?). Get vaxed, stay safe and I'll see you in '22!

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All the books I reviewed in 2021: Plus one I published!



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Broken Promises: The Writers Guild of America West makes the case for media un-consolidation.



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How elite hobbies let billionaires pay no tax: More from Propublica's IRS Leaks.



5/
#10yrsago Yellow Kid Weil: Autobiography of the greatest con man in American history memex.craphound.com/2011/12/08/yel…

#10yrsago Money is the dark matter of American elections: visualizing political donations since Citizens United motherjones.com/politics/2011/…

6/
#10yrsago ESP proponents claim that ESP skeptics are psychic, and use their powers to suppress ESP chronicle.com/blogs/percolat…

#10yrsago First-hand account of Occupy LA arrest myoccupylaarrest.blogspot.com/2011/12/my-occ…

7/
#5yrsago Everything is a Remix, including Star Wars, and that’s how I became a writer recreatecoalition.org/new-recreate-p…

#5yrsago In Africa, British spies target allied leaders, executives, and telcoms engineers lemonde.fr/afrique/articl…

8/
#5yrsago William Gibson on individual privacy, governmental secrecy and the future of history nytimes.com/2016/12/06/opi…

#1yrago Uber pays to get rid of its self-driving cars pluralistic.net/2020/12/08/req…

9/
#1yrago All the books I reviewed in 2020 pluralistic.net/2020/12/08/req…

#1yrago Ford patents plutocratic lane-changes pluralistic.net/2020/12/08/req…

10/
Yesterday's threads: Podcasting "Give Me Slack"; A lexicon of euphemisms for "corporate crime"; IP lawyers weaponize trade secrecy to stall vaccine waivers; and more!



11/
My latest book is Attack Surface, a sequel to my bestselling Little Brother books, now in paperback, wherever books are sold.

Signed copies at @darkdel:

darkdel.com/store/p1840/Co…

12/
My book "How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism" is a critique of Big Tech connecting conspiratorial thinking to the rise of tech monopolies (proposing a way to deal with both) is now out in paperback:

onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy…

Signed copies here:
darkdel.com/store/p2024/Av…

13/
My ebooks and audiobooks (from @torbooks, @HoZ_Books, @mcsweeneys, and others) are for sale all over the net, but I sell 'em too, and when you buy 'em from me, I earn twice as much and you get books with no DRM and no license "agreements."

craphound.com/shop/
14/
Upcoming appearances:

* @intgovforum (Warsaw), Dec 10
intgovforum.org/en/schedule/20…

15/
Recent appearances:

* Seize the Means of Computation (@SeaGL)
seagl.org/archive/2021/s…

* Redistribute the Internet (@NGIForward Summit)
vimeo.com/651018259

* NFTs (@UpstreamPodcast)
soundcloud.com/upstreampodcas…

16/
My first picture book is out! It's called Poesy the Monster Slayer and it's an epic tale of bedtime-refusal, toy-hacking and monster-hunting, illustrated by Matt @MCRockefeller. It's the monster book I dreamt of reading to my own daughter.

pluralistic.net/2020/07/14/poe…

17/
You can also follow these posts as a daily blog at pluralistic.net: no ads, trackers, or data-collection!

Here's today's edition: pluralistic.net/2021/12/08/req…

18/
If you're a @Medium subscriber, you can read these - as well as previews of upcoming magazine columns and early exclusives on doctorow.medium.com.

My latest Medium column is "Pandemic of the Unvaccinated":

medium.com/@doctorow/pand…

19/
If you prefer a newsletter, subscribe to the plura-list, which is also ad- and tracker-free, and is utterly unadorned save a single daily emoji. Today's is "🗾". Suggestions solicited for future emojis!

Subscribe here: pluralistic.net/plura-list

20/
Are you trying to wean yourself off Big Tech? Follow these threads on the #fediverse at @pluralistic@mamot.fr.

Here's today's edition: mamot.fr/@pluralistic/1…

eof/

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More from @doctorow

Dec 20
There was never any question as to whether Trump would implement Project 2025, the 900-page brick of terrifying, unhinged policy prescriptions edited by the Heritage Foundation. He would *not* implement it, because he *could* not implement it. No one could. It's impossible.

1/ A WWII-era infirmary with two ranks of beds. Behind a bed on each side stands an outraged Tweedledee/Tweedledum figure from Tenniel's Alice Through the Looking Glass engravings, pulling their hair; they face one another. One is tinted green; the other, blue. Between them in the aisle stands an elephant in GOP livery, wearing a Trump wig. A spatter of blood climbs the wall on the right.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/20/cli…

2/
This isn't a statement about constitutional limits on executive authority or the realpolitik of getting bizarre and stupid policies past judges or through a hair-thin Congressional majority. This is a statement about the incoherence of Project 2025 itself.

3/
Read 30 tweets
Dec 18
Running a business is risky: you can't be sure how many customers you'll have, or what they'll ask for. Guess wrong and you'll either have too few workers for the crowd, or you'll pay workers to stand around. This is true even when your "business" is a "hospital."

1/ A nurse, pouring medicine out of a bottle; she is terrified because she is being held a gunpoint by a male figure whose head has been replaced with the staring eye of HAL 9000 from Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' The background is a sepia-toned early 20th C wartime infirmary, crowded with wounded men. In the top left corner there is a subtle 'code waterfall' effect as seen in the credit sequences of the Wachowskis' 'Matrix' movies.   Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg  CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/18/loo…

2/
Capitalists hate capitalism. Capitalism is defined by risk - the risk of competitors poaching your customers and workers. Capitalists secretly dream of a "command economy" where others must arrange their affairs to suit the capitalists' preferences, taking on their risk.

3/
Read 49 tweets
Dec 12
Postmortems and blame for the 2024 elections are thick on the ground, but amidst all those theories and pointed fingers, one explanation looms large and credible: the American housing emergency. If the system can't put a roof over your head, that system needs to go.

1/ A modest pink bungalow in the southwestern style. Its roof is askew, and a mushroom cloud emerges from behind it. The sky around it is filled with menacing storm clouds.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/11/nim…

2/
American housing has been in crisis for decades, of course, but it keeps getting worse...and worse...and *worse*. Americans pay more for worse housing than at any time in their history.

3/
Read 61 tweets
Dec 6
After 9/11, we were told that "no cost was too high" when it came to fighting terrorism, and indeed, the US did blow *trillions* on forever wars and regime change projects and black sites and kidnappings and dronings and gulags that were supposed to end terrorism.

1/ A vintage Ray-O-Vac battery; the 'o' in Ray-O-Vac has been replaced with a demonic hellmouth cropped from an medieval manuscript. From the top of the battery, a giant mushroom cloud emerges, against a starry backdrop.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/06/sho…

2/
Back in the imperial core, we all got to play the home edition of the "no price is too high" War on Terror game. New, extremely invasive airport security measures were instituted.

3/
Read 67 tweets
Dec 5
The Canadian national identity involves a lot of sneering at the US, but when it comes to oligarchy, Canada makes America look positively amateurish.

1/ The cover for Denise Hearn and Vass Bednar's 'The Big Fix.'
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/05/ted…

2/
Canada's monopolists may be big fish in a small pond, but holy *moly* are they big, compared to the size of that pond.

3/
Read 23 tweets
Dec 4
The Biden administration disappointed, frustrated and enraged in so many ways, including abetting a genocide - but one consistent bright spot over the past four years was the unseen-for-generations frontal assault on corporate power and corporate corruption.

1/  Uncle Sam in a leg-hold trap. The trap is staked to a log, against which rests a sign bearing the MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN wordmark. In the background is a halftoned image of a waving US flag amidst the clouds.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

pluralistic.net/2024/12/04/its…

2/
The three words that define this battle above all others are "unfair and deceptive" - words that appear in Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act and other legislation modeled on it, like USC40 Section 41712(a).

3/
Read 69 tweets

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