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Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
@doctorow
May 9, 2022 • 26 tweets • 24 min read • Read on X
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Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).

Inside: At the FTC, a quiet, profound shift on antitrust; and more!

Archived at: pluralistic.net/2022/05/09/res…

#Pluralistic 1/ Norman Rockwell's WPA painting 'Freedom of Speech,' depictin
This Thursday (May 12), I'm participating in an @imaginationASU workshop called "The Sci-Fi Feedback Loop: Mapping Fiction’s Influence on Real-World Tech"

asu.zoom.us/webinar/regist… 2/
At the FTC, a quiet, profound shift on antitrust: Listening to "those who have experienced firsthand the effects of mergers and acquisitions beyond antitrust experts."

3/
Hey look at this

* Ben Franklin’s Abortion Recipe slate.com/news-and-polit… ("deeply rooted" h/t @yvessmith)

* Fuck Nfts Shirt tiotee.com/product/fuck-n…

* Why I, As a Libertarian, Think You’re Silly To Worry About Your So-Called Abortion Rights edroso.substack.com/p/why-i-as-a-l… 4/
#20yrsago Virus infects worm web.archive.org/web/2002080320…

#20yrsago Why Freenet? Why now? web.archive.org/web/2002080416…

#20yrsago Why secrecy sucks (digital TV DRM edition) web.archive.org/web/2002060516… 5/
#20yrsago Roll-your-own consensus and defeat the Hollyweird conspiracy memex.craphound.com/2002/05/09/rol…

#15yrsago Spider Robinson’s Hugo-winning “Melancholy Elephants” online spiderrobinson.com/melancholyelep…

#15yrsago AT&T whistle-blower interview wired.com/2007/05/spying… 6/
#15yrsago Giant coalition opposes Broadcast Treaty keionline.org/misc-docs/Stmt…

#15yrsago India trying to save the world from yoga patentshttps://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/07/opinion/07mehta.html

#15yrago BBC recruits Microsoft DRM exec web.archive.org/web/2007052309… 7/
#10yrsago RIP, Maurice Sendak theguardian.com/books/2012/may…

#10yrsago Welcome to your 2012 election season, let the suppression of political debate begin. eff.org/deeplinks/2012…

#10yrsago German Pirate Party wins seats in a third regional election techdirt.com/2012/05/07/pir… 8/
#10yrsago Why Tech Review is ditching its iPad edition web.archive.org/web/2012051003…

#10yrsago Geekdad on Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow wired.com/2012/05/cory-d… 9/
#10yrsago Buying DVDs just got worse thanks to obnoxious new anti-piracy warnings (pirating movies remains unchanged) wired.com/2012/05/anti-p…

#10yrsago Leaked DHS memo: Pornoscanners don’t work wired.com/2012/05/body-s… 10/
#10yrsago @NeilHimself on Maurice Sendak wired.com/2012/05/mauric…

#5yrsago Intel declared war on general purpose computing and lost, so now all our computers are broken memex.craphound.com/2017/05/09/int… 11/
#5yrsago John Oliver’s amazing new Net Neutrality video crashed the FCC’s website vice.com/en/article/3dx…

#1yrago How copyright filters lead to wage-theft pluralistic.net/2021/05/08/cop… 12/
Friday's threads: Safegraph follows people into abortion clinics and then sells the data; and more!

13/ Image: Paul Sableman (modified) https://www.flickr.com/photo
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… 14/
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… 15/
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/ 16/
Upcoming appearances:

* Sci-Fi Feedback Loop: Mapping Fiction’s Influence on Real-World Tech (@imaginationASU), May 12
asu.zoom.us/webinar/regist…

* @openjsf Keynote (Austin), Jun 8
events.linuxfoundation.org/openjs-world/p… 17/
Upcoming appearances:

* @CMAgovUK Data Technology/Analytics (London), Jun 15-16
eventbrite.co.uk/e/cma-data-tec…

* A New @HOPEconf (NYC), Jul 24
hope.net 18/
Recent appearances:

* Revolutionizing Activism — The Power of Utopia (@theC4AA)


* A Little Patience and a Lot of Tape (@TWIT)
twit.tv/shows/this-wee…

* Blockchain, Crypto & Web3 (@forlifeitself podcast)
19/
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… 20/
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/2022/05/09/res… 21/
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. 22/
My latest @Medium column is "About those kill-switched Ukrainian tractors: What John Deere did to Russian looters, anyone can do to farmers, anywhere"

doctorow.medium.com/about-those-ki… 23/
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 24/
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… 25/
Today's top sources: Lee Tien. 26/

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More from @doctorow

Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Feb 9
It's hard to talk about the Epstein class without thinking about "The Economy" (in the sense of a mystical, free-floating entity whose health or sickness determines the outcomes for all of us, whom we must make sacrifices to if we are to prosper).

1/ A detail of a US $100 bill. Jeffrey Epstein's mugshot has been overlaid over Benjamin Franklin's portrait. Peter Theil's portrait has been swapped for the US Dept of Treasury seal. Trump's signature has been swapped for the US Treasurer's signature. The line of zeroes after the 100, top and bottom, has been extended to the edge of the image. The image has been roughed up and recolored in a hellish mix of reds and yellows. Image: Gage Skidmore (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Peter_Thiel_(51876609719).jpg CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/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/2026/02/09/slo…

2/
As nebulous as "The Economy" is as an entity, there's an economic priesthood that claims it can measure and even alter the course of the economy using complex mathematics. We probably won't ever understand their methods, but we can at least follow an indicator or two.

3/
Read 31 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Jan 26
The best summary of Trump's trade "philosophy" comes from Trashfuture's November Kelly, who said that Trump is flipping over the table in a poker game that's rigged in his favor because he resents having to pretend to play the game at all.

1/ A detail from a US $100 bill. The bill has been tinted orange. Ben Franklin's face has been replaced with an indistinct blur surmounted by Trump's hair. The lettering in the scrollwork beneath the portrait reads 'TRUMP.' The '100's have been turned into '000's. The writing 'ONE HUNDRED' now reads 'NONE HUNDRED.' The series issue has been changed to '47.' The Secretary of the Treasury's signature has been replaced with Trump's.
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/2026/01/26/i-d…

2/
After all, the global system of trade was designed and enforced by American officials, especially the US Trade Representative.

3/
Read 84 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Jan 17
Ireland is a tax haven. In the 1970s and 1980s, life in the civil-war wracked country was hard - between poverty, scarce employment and civil unrest, the country hemorrhaged its best and brightest. As the saying went, "Ireland's top export is the Irish."

1/ A green Irish pillarbox, standing before a verdant, rolling Irish countryside. The pillarbox is emblazoned with the poop emoji from the cover of 'Enshittification,' with angry eyebrows and a grawlix-scrawled black bar over its mouth. Image: Stuart Caie (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Double_aperture_Irish_pillar_box_in_Dublin_2008.jpg CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en -- Sourabh.biswas003 (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PXL_20231216_105219694-Ballygalley_Larne_UK-_Irish_Countryside-Northern_Ireland_06.jpg CC BY-SA 3.0 ht...
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/2026/01/17/eri…

2/
In desperation, Ireland's political class hit on a wild gambit: they would weaponize Ireland's sovereignty in service to corporate tax evasion.

3/
Read 35 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Jan 6
Code is a liability (not an asset). Tech bosses don't understand this. They think AI is great because it produces 10,000 times more code than a programmer, but that just means it's producing 10,000 times more liabilities.

1/ A shredder, shredding a giant US$100 bill. Benjamin Franklin's head has been replaced with a cliched 'hacker in a hoodie' illustration. The machine's faceplate bears the Claude Code wordmark. The background is the hostile red eye of HAL 9000 from Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' 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/2026/01/06/100…

2/
AI is the asbestos we're shoveling into the walls of our high-tech society:



Code is a liability. Code's *capabilities* are assets.

3/pluralistic.net/2025/09/27/eco…
Read 48 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Dec 16, 2025
We are about to get a "post-American internet," because we are entering a post-American *era* and a post-American *world*. Some of that is Trump's doing, and some of that is down to his predecessors.

1/ Uncle Sam staring into a funhouse mirror that has made him painfully thin. The reflection is wearing a Trump wig and has orange skin. He stands atop a map of the world that stretches to infinity. In the background is a shantytown with the TRUMP logomark rising in the sky over it.
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/2025/12/16/k-s…

2/
When we think about the American century, we rightly focus on America's hard power - the invasions, military bases, arms exports, and CIA coups.

3/
Read 86 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Dec 13, 2025
Look, I'm not trying to say that new technologies *never* raise gnarly new legal questions. But what I *am* saying is that a lot of the time, the "new legal challenges" raised by technology are somewhere between 95-100% bullshit.

1/ A modified FBI badge. It now reads 'Federal Wallet Investigators.' It is made out to 'Timothy J Shotspotter.' It is held in the three-fingered, gloved grip of a cartoon character. Around its edges, we see a cartoon room from a public domain Betty Boop cartoon.
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/2025/12/13/unc…

2/
It's ginned up by none-too-bright tech bros and their investors, and then swallowed by regulators and lawmakers who are either so credulous they'd lose a game of peek-a-boo, or (likely) in on the scam.

3/
Read 68 tweets

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