Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Nov 28, 2022 45 tweets 45 min read Read on X
Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).

Inside: How monopoly enshittified Amazon; and more!

Archived at: pluralistic.net/2022/11/28/ens…

#Pluralistic 1/ Jean-Leon Gerome's painting...
This Weds (Nov 30), @superwuster and I are appearing in conversation to discuss monopoly and creative labor markets at the @knightfdn's #Informed22 conference in #Miami:

informed22.interkinnect.com 2/
My publisher @torbooks and @goodreads are drawing for a giveaway of advance copies of my next novel, "Red Team Blues," a Silicon Valley forensic accounting thriller about a cryptocurrency heist - If you're in the US or Canada, enter here to win a copy:

goodreads.com/giveaway/show/… 3/ Image
How monopoly enshittified Amazon: Chokepoint Capitalism ruins everything.

4/ Image
Hey look at this

* When Bosses Were Terrorists jacobin.com/2022/11/bosses…

* Who will control the computerised machines b2fxxx.blogspot.com/2022/11/who-wi…

* ooh.directory ooh.directory 5/ Image
#20yrsago @dangillmor: The dotcom bubble was a Big Con web.archive.org/web/2002121515…

#20yrsago GW Bush parodies can't air on UK TV without his permission nytimes.com/2002/11/28/wor…

#20yrsago @EdFelten’s radical technology agenda web.archive.org/web/2002112714… 6/ Image
#20yrsago Harry Potter/Luke Skywalker/Frodo Baggins craphound.com/images/frodoha…

#20yrsago What is Moblogging? links.net/share/write/th…

#20yrsago Imagineeringland: the busiest place on Earth wired.com/2002/12/rebuil…

#20yrsago Me (13) with @cdelint, 1984 craphound.com/images/de_Lint… 7/ Image
#15yrsago French law proposal will force ISPs to spy on users and terminate downloaders without trial arstechnica.com/tech-policy/20…

#15yrsago DHS to firefighters: snoop on emergency victims for evidence of terrorism web.archive.org/web/2007112714… 8/ ImageImage
#15yrsago How Your Creepy Ex-Co-Workers Will Kill Facebook web.archive.org/web/2007112803…

#15yrsago Facebook privacy meltdown: company removed opt-out prior to launch web.archive.org/web/2008120215… 9/
#15yrsago Voice of the London Underground canned for blogging funny fake announcement audio metafilter.com/66883/The-Voic…

#15yrsago Mr Splashy Pants in the lead for Greenpeace whale-naming competition web.archive.org/web/2007112116… 10/ Image
#15yrsago Universal Music CEO: Record industry can’t tell when geeks are lying to us about technology vulture.com/2007/11/univer…

#15yrsago Time’s Joe Klein shoves his foot in his gob on NSA wiretapping wired.com/2007/11/time-c… 11/ Image
#15yrsago Canada’s coming DMCA will be the worst copyright yet memex.craphound.com/2007/11/27/can…

#15yrsago Google says spammers are giving up wired.com/2007/11/spamme…

#15yrsago BBC’s iPlayer sold us out — and then failed theguardian.com/technology/200… 12/ Image
#10yrsago In Finland, piracy fines are orders of magnitude higher than fines for rape, torture and murder web.archive.org/web/2012080100…

#10yrsago Letter from Alabama AG to KKK Grand Wizard: “Kiss my ass” lettersofnote.com/2012/11/26/kis… 13/ Image
#10yrsago Hotel break-ins blamed on flaw in keycard system forbes.com/sites/andygree…

#10yrsago Collaborative critical study of one-line BASIC program written for the Commodore 64 10print.org

#10yrsago Toronto mayor Rob Ford is out cbc.ca/news/canada/to… 14/ Image
#10yrsago Internet of the Dead: the net’s collision course with death locusmag.com/2012/11/cory-d…

#10yrsago Coding Freedom: an anthropologist understands hacker culture memex.craphound.com/2012/11/25/cod… 15/ Image
#10yrsago What Disneyland’s “awkward transitions” teach us about signaling changes with physical cues passport2dreams.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-aw…

#5yrsago Once you have a student’s name, birthday and SSN, the US Department of Education will give you EVERYTHING else krebsonsecurity.com/2017/11/namedo… 16/ Image
#5yrsago Spam was nearly dead, then it became an essential tool for crime and came roaring back theoutline.com/post/2498/spam… 17/ Image
#5yrago Roy Moore is still in the running because “values voters” would support Satan himself if he was anti-abortion and homophobic fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-v… 18/ Image
#5yrsago Citing Trump, Philippines dictator declares himself to be a “fascist” and vows to persecute peaceful left-wing opposition groups telesurenglish.net/analysis/-Dute…

#5yrsago Jeremy Corbyn tears into the Tories over incoherent Brexit bumbling theguardian.com/commentisfree/… 19/ Image
#5yrsago Researchers craft Android app that reveals menagerie of hidden spyware; legally barred from doing the same with iOS theintercept.com/2017/11/24/sta…

#5yrsago Reverse-engineering a connected Furby toy, revealing its disturbing security defects web.archive.org/web/2017112413… 20/ Image
#5yrsago Rightscorp finished Sept 2017 with $3,147 in the bank, warns investors it will likely have to shut down without more cash torrentfreak.com/rightscorp-rev… 21/ Image
#5yrsago Arrogant overreach: Ajit Pai’s plan to totally destroy net neutrality may doom him in court nytimes.com/2017/11/22/opi…"> 22/ Image
#5yrsago A generation after American “libertarians” helped with mass disappearances, torture and murder of left-wing activists, Frente Amplio surge in Chilean elections bloomberg.com/news/articles/… 23/ Image
#5yrsago Investigators claim that Oxbridge and other top UK universities are operating a massive, illegal surveillance dragnet aimed at students/alumni and their friends and families qz.com/1133808/univer… 24/ Image
#5yrsago For the next year, TV, newspapers, and the web will run massive ads from tobacco companies admitting that their products kill people, that they were engineered to be addictive, and that they covered this up abc.net.au/news/2017-11-2… 25/ Image
#5yrsago Melt a Nazi with the Major Toht candle web.archive.org/web/2017120403…

#5yrsago One of the net’s most important freedom canaries died the day the W3C greenlit web-wide DRM; what can we learn from the fight? eff.org/deeplinks/2017… 26/ Image
#5yrsago Trump appointed a loan-shark fixer as an assistant Attorney General, who then wrote a controversial memo justifying the neutering of the consumer finance watchdog theintercept.com/2017/11/27/whi… 27/ Image
#5yrsago Comcast spams social media with Net Neutrality promises, hopes you won’t notice that they used to promise a LOT more arstechnica.com/tech-policy/20… 28/ Image
#5yrsago Religious fanatics go to the Supreme Court for the First Amendment right to trick women into bearing unwanted children theintercept.com/2017/11/27/the… 29/ Image
#5yrsago How an influential economics paper used imaginary environmental overregulation to spur low-density luxury housing dissentmagazine.org/online_article…

#5yrsago Wells Fargo execs sealed their bonuses by gouging the bank’s business customers thehill.com/policy/finance… 30/ Image
#1yrago The Cuban vaccines pluralistic.net/2021/11/28/som…

#1yrago UK ICO: surveillance advertising is dead pluralistic.net/2021/11/26/ico…

#1yrago McKinsey taught Big Pharma how to price-gouge pluralistic.net/2021/11/25/str… 31/ Image
#1yrago Unions are finally fighting two-tier contracts pluralistic.net/2021/11/25/str…

#1yrago The Tesla-financial complex: When your financial instruments are better than your cars pluralistic.net/2021/11/24/no-…

#1yrago Spaniards fight Wall Street landlords pluralistic.net/2021/11/24/no-… 32/ Image
Friday's threads: Citizens United and the FTX meltdown; and more!

33/  Image: Cointelegraph (modi...
My latest book is Chokepoint Capitalism (with @rgibli), nonfiction about monopoly and fairness in creative labor markets.

chokepointcapitalism.com

Signed copies available from @BookSoup:

booksoup.com/book/978080700… 34/
My latest novel 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… 35/
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."

craphound.com/shop/ 36/ Image
Upcoming appearances:

* Conversation with @superwuster, #Informed22/@knightfdn (Miami), 11/30:
informed22.interkinnect.com

* Chokepoint Capitalism: A Conversation/@Northeastern/@BurnesCenter/@NU_CAMD (Boston/webcast), 12/5
northeastern.zoom.us/webinar/regist… 37/ Image
Upcoming appearances (cont'd):

* Library Learning Experience/@ALALibrary (NOLA), 1/27-30
2023.alaliblearnx.org/cory-doctorow

* @Aus_Digital Copyright Forum (Canberra), 2/17:
digital.org.au/2022/11/08/doc…

* Antitrust, Regulation and PolEconomy (Brussels), Mar 2:
brusselsconference.com/registration 38/ Image
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/2022/11/28/ens… 40/
If you're a @Medium subscriber, you can read these essays - as well as previews of upcoming magazine columns and early exclusives on doctorow.medium.com. 41/
My latest @Medium column is "Poe vs. Property: A detective story of shifting rationalizations"

doctorow.medium.com/poe-vs-propert… 42/
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 43/
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… 44/
Today's top sources: @slashdot (slashdot.org). 45/ Image

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More from @doctorow

Aug 20
Forget surveillance capitalism - let's talk about *surveillance infantalism*: the drive by the wealthy to spy on you in order to pursue the toddler's goals of getting everything they want from the people around them, without any reciprocal obligations.

1/ Mark Zuckerberg's Metaverse avatar's head atop the body of a figure from a earth 20th century editorial cartoon; the figure wears a suit, holds a long fork, and stares into the eyepiece of a microscope. The microscope is attached to a sinister scientific apparatus. The microscope is trained on a tiny human figure, limned in red, who shouts through a megaphone back up into the microscope's lens. The background is a 1980s NASA oil painting of the red, rocky surface of Venus.
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/2025/08/20/bil…

2/
After the Snowden revelations, I started to wonder about something fundamental: why spy at all?



3/theguardian.com/technology/201…
Read 40 tweets
Aug 18
When Elon Musk disagrees with someone, he calls them an "NPC" (non-player character). In video-games, an NPC is a machine-puppeted sprite that engages in predictable movements (e.g. Pac-Man ghosts) and utters some scripted (or AI-generated) dialog:



1/ futurism.com/elon-musk-inte…Mark Zuckerberg's metaverse avatar, perched on a legless nude Ken doll body; its eyes are psychedelic pinwheels. Behind the figure is a group shot of child laborer miners from the 1910s, glitched out, blue tinted, and covered with scan lines. The background is a psychedelic swirl of moody colors. They stand atop a filthy checkerboard floor that stretches off to infinity.
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/2025/08/18/see…

2/
Seeing people as automata is probably a side-effect of sitting in the command-center of a big online service, in which you primarily interact with users as statistical aggregates in an analytics dashboard.

3/
Read 30 tweets
Aug 16
When LLM users describe their experience with their chatbots, the results are so divergent that it can sound like they're describing two completely different products.

1/ A vintage photo of two men in front of a slot machine. The men's heads have been replaced by the heads of hooded figures wearing Guy Fawkes mask. The image is sepia toned: the only color is the pay-line of the slot-machine, which is showing three glaring red eyes of HAL 9000 from Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' The slot machine has a sign over the rotor-window that displays the Openai logo and wordmark.   Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg  CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en  --  Frank Schwichtenberg (modified...
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/2025/08/16/jac…

2/
Previously, I've hypothesized that this is because there are two distinct groups of *users*: "centaurs" (people who are assisted by a machine - in this case, people who get to decide when, whether and how to integrate an LLM into their work)...

3/
Read 27 tweets
Aug 13
It's not just that Texas DA Gocha Ramirez charged a woman with murder for having an abortion (not t allowed even in Texas). It's that Ramirez paid for his mistress's abortion, after he impregnated her while having an affair with her *and* her sister:



1/ archive.is/20250812192203…A red, angry mushroom cloud. Sitting atop it, surrounded by blue skies and fluffy clouds, is a smirking business-suited man reclining in an armchair. He wears a MAGA hat and reads a magazine turned to a page showing Donald Trump's face.
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/2025/08/13/the…

2/
This is perfect Magaism, as captured by Wilhoit's Law:

> Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.



3/crookedtimber.org/2018/03/21/lib…
Read 52 tweets
Jul 30
Delta's announced new surveillance pricing: they're feeding an AI your nonconsensually harvested personal info that data-brokers and credit bureaux hold to predict the maximum you're willing to pay, and then price their tickets accordingly:



1/ fortune.com/2025/07/16/del…Hieronymus Bosch's 'The Conjurer,' which depicts a sleight-of-hand artist doing a cup-and-balls routine for a group of amazed yokels. It has been altered. The head of the conjurer has been replaced with the hostile red eye of HAL 9000 from Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' He wears a Delta Airlines logo over his breast. The table on which the cup-and-balls game is playing out sports a crashed jet in Delta livery, smoke rising from the wreckage.   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/2025/07/30/eff…

2/
Data-brokers sell all kinds of data, from the "legitimate" info about everywhere your car's been, to everywhere place the Bluetooth radios on your phone and headphones has been, to everything you've bought, to every sit you've visited and every search you've performed.

3/
Read 61 tweets
Jul 22
Ever notice how many right wing influencers are on the grift?

1/ A carny barker at a podium, gesticulating with a MAGA cap. He wears a Klan hood, and his podium features products from Nu-skin, Amway and Herbalife. Behind him is an oil-painted scene of a steamship with a Trump Tower logo, at a pier in flames.
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/2025/07/22/all…

2/
Like Alex Jones - that guy is basically Gwyneth Paltrow for conservative bros, selling the same "wellness" crap to a male audience (and not for nothing, Paltrow's victims are reliable boosters for RFK Jr's MAHA movement):



3/theweek.com/speedreads/709…
Read 66 tweets

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