Hey #DC! There's a *very special* invite-only book party for "Chokepoint Capitalism" on Nov 17 and while it's not a public event, there's a limited number of spaces I can distribute on a first come/first serve basis. If you'd like to come, email doctorow@craphound.com! 2/
#5yrsago The secretive wealthy family behind the opioid epidemic are using the same tactics to kill public education salon.com/2017/11/15/the… 11/
#5yrsago Bernie Sanders: to fix the Democratic Party, curb superdelegates, make it easier to vote in primaries, and account for funds politico.com/magazine/story… 12/
#5yrsago Watson for Oncology isn’t an AI that fights cancer, it’s an unproven mechanical turk that represents the guesses of a small group of doctors statnews.com/2017/09/05/wat… 13/
My ebooks and audiobooks (from @torbooks, @HoZ_Books, @mcsweeneys, @beaconPressBks et al) 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."
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My latest Medium column is "The End of the Road to Serfdom"
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Patrick "patio11" McKenzie is a fantastic explainer, the kind of person who breaks topics down in ways that stay with you, and creep into your understanding of other subjects, too. Take his 2022 essay, "The optimal amount of fraud is non-zero":
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:
Astrophysicist Adam Becker knows a bit about science and tech - enough to show, in his book *More Everything Forever* that claims tech bros make about space colonies, mind uploading, and other skiffy subjects are nonsense dressed up as prediction:
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:
Becker investigates the personalities, the ideologies, the coalitions, the histories, and crucially, the *grifts* behind various science fictional pursuits.
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Have you heard that tariffs are going to drive prices up? Me too. There's a good reason we're hearing a lot of talk about tariffs prices: tariffs are a tax that is ultimately paid by consumers.
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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:
It's damned hard to prove an antitrust case: so often, the prosecution has to prove that the company *intended* to crush competition, and/or that they raised prices or reduced quality because they knew they didn't have to fear competitors.
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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:
It's a lot easier to prove *what* a corporation did than it is to prove *why* they did it. What am I, a mind-reader? But imagine for a second that the corporation in the dock is a global multinational.
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A lawsuit filed in February accuses Tesla of remotely altering odometer values on failure-prone cars, in a bid to push these lemons beyond the 50,000 mile warranty limit:
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:
The suit was filed by a California driver who bought a used Tesla with 36,772 miles on it. The car's suspension kept failing, necessitating multiple servicings.
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