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Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
@doctorow
Jan 30, 2023 • 39 tweets • 40 min read • Read on X
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Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).

Inside: The real scandal is overclassification; The Australian Chokepoint Capitalism Tour; and more!

Archived at: pluralistic.net/2023/01/30/i-c…

#Pluralistic 1/ Image
The real scandal is overclassification: I'd explain it, but I'd have to kill you.

2/ Image
The Australian Chokepoint Capitalism Tour: Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra (twice!).

3/ Image
Hey look at this

* Exaggerating China’s military spend, Fed breaks all statistical rules with misleading graph geopoliticaleconomy.com/2023/01/23/chi…

* The Cause of Stagflation economicsfromthetopdown.com/2023/01/26/the…

* D&D Scraps Plans to Update Its Open Game License gizmodo.com/dungeons-drago… 4/ Image
#20yrsago Feral hippos haunt druglord’s estate web.archive.org/web/2003021020…

#20yrsago McDonald’s can award A-levels in UK news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/e…

#20yrsago Category Management: retail trendiness or criminal anti-trust? web.archive.org/web/2003020705… 5/ Image
#20yrsago Finnish recording industry demands royalties for kindergarten singing web.archive.org/web/2003020718…

#15yrsago Tipping-point skeptic says that super-Influencers are overrated fastcompany.com/641124/tipping… 6/ Image
#15yrsago @sfwa European Hall of Fame: a chance to read sf from outside of the Anglo Bubble memex.craphound.com/2008/01/28/sfw…

#15yrsago #Romanian #manga — manga meets Metal Hurlant meets Marvel forbes.com/2008/01/09/rom… 7/ Image
#15yrsago Good As Lily — ass-kicking girl-positive graphic novel for young readers memex.craphound.com/2008/01/30/goo…

#10yrsago Guy makes a game about his crappy job working for Canadian tax authority, loses his crappy job thestar.com/news/gta/2013/… 8/ Image
#10yrsago @jonathancoulton responds to Fox/Glee’s plagiarism of his song by “covering” it and making rival version available for sale web.archive.org/web/2013012203…

#10yrsago @aaronsw’s San Francisco memorial will make you stand up and salute archive.org/details/AaronS… 9/ Image
#10yrsago What the ban on unlocking phones means (worse than you think) eff.org/is-it-illegal-…

#10yrsago #WTO gives #Antigua the right to sell pirated American copyrighted goods torrentfreak.com/antiguas-legal… 10/ Image
#10yrsago American insurers charge reckless rich drivers less than safe poor drivers consumerfed.org/pdfs/PR.AutoIn…

#5yrsago What #KenThompson’s seminal (terrifying!) “#OnTrustingTrust” tells us about the #Spectre and #Meltdown bugs community.cadence.com/cadence_blogs_… 11/ Image
#5yrsago Analysis of North America’s weeds reveal the crops, trade, and cuisine of early indigenous people sciencedirect.com/science/articl… 12/ Image
#5yrsago Fitness app releases data-set that reveals the location of sensitive military bases, patrol routes, aircrew flightpaths, and individual soldiers’ jogging routes theguardian.com/world/2018/jan… 13/ Image
#5yrsago Apple’s long-awaited podcast data-transparency reveals an ad-listening audience with no clear format-preferences wired.com/story/apple-po… 14/ Image
#5yrsago Property developer caught using critic’s photo in promotional materials, demands an end to criticism as a condition of paying for the use spitalfieldslife.com/2018/01/29/a-r… 15/
#5yrsago New York Times profiles a sleazy Twitter follower-farm, the sleazy serial liar who made millions on it, and the celebs, politicians, sports figures and “influencers” who paid him nytimes.com/interactive/20… 16/ Image
#5yrsago One quarter of New Orleans’ catch-basins were clogged to uselessness with 93,000 lbs of plastic #MardiGrasBeads nola.com/news/politics/… 17/ Image
#5yrsago A 1×1 tracking pixel was used as evidence of treason against 30,000 Turks, sent tens of thousands to jail cbc.ca/news/world/ter…

#5yrsago Academic audit of HUD budget finds $351 million in unaccounted-for spending since 1998 msutoday.msu.edu/news/2017/msu-… 18/ Image
#5yrsago Majority of Democrats now hold favorable views of mass-murdering simpleton George W Bush news.libertasbella.com/story/libertas… 19/ Image
#5yrsago #ScottWalker is terrified that Democrats will win special elections to fill vacant seats, so he’s leaving thousands of Wisconsinites without state reps web.archive.org/web/2018090100… 20/ Image
#5yrsago Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway, JPMorgan Chase announce new health insurer ‘free from profit-making incentives and constraints’ money.cnn.com/2018/01/30/new…

#5yrsago After industry adopts open video standards, #MPEG founder says the end is nigh blog.chiariglione.org/a-crisis-the-c… 21/ Image
#5yrsago Meet Hereditary Congressman #DanLipinski, an anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ Illinois “Machine Democrat” who opposes the $15 minimum wage theintercept.com/2018/01/29/dan… 22/ Image
#5yrsago Convicted criminal Silvio #Berlusconi returns to Italian politics as a kingmaker nytimes.com/2018/01/29/wor…

#5yrsago #Berlin regulates Airbnb and safely deflates its housing bubble while returning 8,000 rentals to the market dw.com/en/berlin-hous… 23/ Image
#5yrsago What #youthquake? Jeremy #Corbyn’s election surge was drawn from all age groups, not a mob of first-time young voters blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpol…

#5yrsago Inside big tech’s last-minute scramble to comply with Europe’s new privacy rules nytimes.com/2018/01/28/tec… 24/ Image
#5yrsago Starlings: razor-sharp stories and poems from @BlueJo memex.craphound.com/2018/01/30/sta…

#5yrsago The in-depth tale of #Bylock, the #Turkish messenger app whose 1×1 tracking GIF was the basis for tens of thousands of treason accusations arrestedlawyers.org/2018/01/21/eve… 25/ Image
#1yrago The battle for Ring Zero: The esoteric argument I have been having with myself since 2002 pluralistic.net/2022/01/30/rin…

#1yrago California's chance for universal health care pluralistic.net/2022/01/28/ame… 26/ Image
#1yrago The #RightToRepair: A stupendous new book on a very urgent subject pluralistic.net/2022/01/29/pla…

#1yrago No, payday lenders aren't nice guys pluralistic.net/2022/01/29/pla… 27/ Image
Friday's threads: Podcasts are hearteningly enshittification resistant; Red Team Blues excerpt; and more!

28/ Image
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… 29/
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… 30/
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/ 31/
Upcoming appearances:

* Chokepoint Capitalism: Can It Be Defeated? (@UCLLaws), 2/1
ucl.ac.uk/laws/events/20…

* Avid Reader (#Brisbane), 2/8
avidreader.com.au/pages/6834-Cho…

* Future of Arts/Culture/Tech, @ACMI, (#Melbourne), 2/14
acmi.net.au/whats-on/in-co… 32/ Image
Upcoming appearances (cont'd):

* @statelibrarynsw (#Sydney), 2/15
sl.nsw.gov.au/events/chokepo…

* ANU/@canberratimes Meet The Author (#Canberra), 2/16
anu.edu.au/events/in-conv…

* @Aus_Digital Copyright Forum (#Canberra), 2/17:
digital.org.au/2022/11/08/doc… 33/ Image
Upcoming appearances (cont'd):

* #Antitrust, Regulation & Political Economy (#Brussels), 3/2:
brusselsconference.com/registration 34/ Image
Recent appearances:

* @davidpakmanshow


* TikTok Isn’t For Creators Anymore (@Slate ICMY)
slate.com/podcasts/icymi…

* Lunch on Laotian food (Eating the Fantastic)
scottedelman.com/2023/01/27/cor… 35/
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/2023/01/30/i-c… 36/
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.

My latest Medium column is "'Conversational' AI Is Really Bad At Conversations"

doctorow.medium.com/conversational… 37/
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 38/
Are you trying to wean yourself off Big Tech? You can read my work elsewhere, but it is now a #TwitterCrime to tell you how. Please visit my site, pluralistic.net, for links to find me on less-unhinged places (I can only imagine that my days here are numbered). 39/

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More from @doctorow

Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Mar 3
I get a special pleasure from citing Milton Friedman. I like to imagine that as I do, he groans around the red-hot spit protruding from his jaws, prompting howls of laughter from the demons who pelt him with molten faeces for all eternity.

1/ Oil derricks superimposed against a 'code waterfall' as seen in the credit sequences of the Wachowskis' 'Matrix' movies. In the foreground is Trump's hair.
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/2025/03/03/fri…

2/
If you're lucky enough not to know about Friedman, here's the short version. Friedman was a kind of court sorcerer to Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Augusto Pinochet, and other assorted authoritarian, hard-right leaders who set us on the path to the hellscape we inhabit today.

3/
Read 56 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Feb 20
The commercial surveillance industry is almost totally unregulated. Data brokers, ad-tech, and everyone in between - they harvest, store, analyze, sell and rent every intimate, sensitive, potentially compromising fact about your life.

1/ A towering figure with the head of HAL 9000 from Stanley Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey,' surmounted by Trump's hair, wearing a tailcoat with a Google logo lapel pin. It peers through a magnifying glass at a distressed, tiny Uncle Sam figure perched in its monstrous palm. 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/2025/02/20/pri…

2/
Late last year, I testified at a Consumer Finance Protection Bureau hearing about a proposed new rule to kill off data brokers, who are the lynchpin of the industry:



3/pluralistic.net/2023/08/16/the…
Read 41 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Feb 18
In 2013, Thomas Piketty had an unexpected bestseller (a 750 page economics book translated from French!) *Capital in the 21st Century*.

1/ A Gilded Age editorial cartoon of a frowning Uncle Sam giving a blood transfusion to a gargantuan business-man whose waistcoat is labeled 'protected monopolies.' The businessman's head has been replaced with the hostile red eye of HAL 9000 from Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.' The background has been replaced with a halftoned EU flag whose blue field is covered in circuit-board traceries. The floor beneath the figures is an abstract, pinkish pattern. Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed....
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/2025/02/18/pik…

2/
It offers a very convincing explanation of our political decay, and it continues to serve this purpose as the decay undergoes alarming acceleration:



3/memex.craphound.com/2014/06/24/tho…
Read 62 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Feb 17
Theory-free inference is a hell of a drug. For years, Big Data advocates - the larval form of today's AI weirdos - have insisted that if you have enough data, you can infer causal relationships between complex phenomena without ever having to understand how x causes y.

1/ https://pluralistic.net/2025/02/17/caliper-ai/#racism-machine A phrenological illustration of a man's face in profile, with his skull divided up into sections with illustrations of what each area is meant to govern, e.g., appetite, artistic aptitude, aggression, ardor. A pair of gleaming silver calipers, wielded by the hostile red eye of HAL 9000 from Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey,' measures the figure's skull. 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/2025/02/17/cal…

2/
Thus, we can slay the dread "correlation is not causation" beast. This is cousin to Milton Friedman's famous economic catechism:



3/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essays_in…
Read 36 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Feb 12
Remember the Tiktok ban? I know, it was ten million years ago (in Musk years, anyway), so it may have slipped your mind, but let me remind you: Congress passed a law saying Tiktok was banned. Trump said he wouldn't enforce the law. The end.

1/ An official portrait of the US Supreme Court, with the justices sitting and standing before a red velvet curtain. Their faces have been replaced with the green 'Mr Yuck' logo. Floating in the middle of the image, obscuring several judges, is the Tiktok logo, with Trump's hair.
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/2025/02/12/you…

2/
No, really. I mean, sure, there's a bunch of bullshit about whether Trump will pick up the ban again after Tiktok's grace period ends, depending on whether they sell themselves to his creepy wax museum pal Larry Ellison. Maybe he will.

3/
Read 39 tweets
Cory Doctorow NONCONSENSUAL BLUE TICK Profile picture
Feb 11
Let me tell you about the most wasteful US federal government spending I know about. It's a humdinger. You and everyone you know are mired in it for weeks, or perhaps months, every year.

1/ A halftoned 2025 IRS 1040 form. To the left is a bloated billionaire figure in top hat, white gloves and tux, with the pouting face of Elon Musk. With one hand, he is yanking on a lever made out of a gilded dollar-sign. With the other hand, he contemptuously dangles a street urchin. The podium to which the lever is attached bears the Turbotax logo, a white checkmark in a red circle. To the left is a cascade of gold coins, falling out of an upended sack. Image: Wcamp9 (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Elon_Musk_-_March_28,_2024_%28cropped%29.jpg CC BY 4.0 https://creative...
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/2025/02/11/dou…

2/
It will cost you, personally, thousands of dollars over your lifetime. I'm talking about filing your taxes.

Not *paying* your taxes. Paying your taxes is fine.

3/
Read 29 tweets

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