Cory Doctorow

This week on my podcast, I present an hour-long excerpt from the audiobook for The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI , which is currently on pre-order through my latest Kickstarter campaign : A short, provocative guide to what’s good, bad, and stupid about AI and the discourse around AI, by the author of Enshittification. In modern tech parlance, a centaur is a person who is able to use technology to be a better, more productive version of themself. A reverse centaur is a person who is forced by technology to work at an inhuman pace—a driver made to deliver all day long, nonstop; a warehouse worker made to work without food or bathroom breaks; a programmer made to crank out impossible amounts of code. The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI is not another anti-AI screed. Cory Doctorow uses AI in his work every day. As a creative person, he has no moral or dogmatic issue with AI—he thinks the technology is useful, even exciting, and full of potential. And yet. AI has arrived surrounded by unprecedented hype driven by a tech industry desperate to maintain its unprecedented valuation based on its own promises of endless financial growth. Despite the fact that almost all of AI’s real-world implementations have proved underwhelming, AI is projected to be worth more than $16 trillion—a number that only makes sense if AI replaces vast swathes of the wage-earning human workforce. To justify that level of “value,” every story about AI must be presented as inevitable, world-changing disruption. Even the tales of the robot apocalypse are a calculated attempt to bolster the fearsome power of AI. For Doctorow, it is imperative to see through that hype to the real story, to understand the technology not just for what it does, but for who it does it to and who it does it for. From that point of view, the story of AI is indeed dramatic and unprecedented, having generated an investment bubble so big that it endangers the entire world economy. In The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI—as he so successfully did in Enshittification—Doctorow recounts both how we found ourselves in this dire situation and how we can get through it, to a life “after” AI in which the tools work for us, not the other way around. MP3

Cory Doctorow, author, journalist, and activist, believes that the internet — once a space of promise and connection — has been systematically degraded by corporate greed. In his new book “Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It,” he details how the platforms we depend on have become more expensive and more exploitative. In our conversation, Cory Doctorow shares how this process unfolds, first platforms serve users, then they exploit businesses to make money, and finally they squeeze both to please shareholders. Together, we explore how this pattern has reshaped everything from social media and streaming to online shopping and even our smart cars. Is this why our digital lives now feel so constrained and costly? About Cory Doctorow: Cory Doctorow is a blogger, journalist, and activist. For more than twenty years, he has worked with the Electronic Frontier Foundation on campaigns to safeguard and further our human rights online. He was coeditor of the weblog Boing Boing for nineteen years and now maintains a daily(ish) newsletter at Pluralistic.net. He has written more than thirty books, including nonfiction books, many science fiction novels, collections of short stories and essays, young adult novels, graphic novels, and even a picture book. Born in Toronto, he now lives in Burbank, California. Follow Cory Doctorow on Twitter @doctorow and Medium @doctorow Cory’s book “ Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, ” is available wherever you get your books! Follow The Intersect: Theintersectshow.com Instagram TikTok YouTube Newsletter See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info .

Cory Doctorow joins me to talk about Enshitification , his new book about the long decline of the internet. We go through how platforms start out good for users, turn on them once they’re locked in, and finally become unrecognizable corporate machines. Cory explains how this pattern connects to monopoly power, labor exploitation, and government capture, and why it’s not just a tech problem but a political one. Cory Doctorow’s links: https://craphound.com/ https://craphound.com/shop/ https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/ https://x.com/doctorow My links: https://linktr.ee/skepticalleftist

This week on my podcast, I conclude my reading of my 2003 Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine story, Nimby and the D-Hoppers” ( here’s the first half ). The story has been widely reprinted (it was first published online in The Infinite Matrix in 2008 ), and was translated (by Elisabeth Vonarburg) into French for Solaris Magazine , as well as into Chinese , Russian , Hebrew , and Italian . The story was adapted for my IDW comic book series Cory Doctorow’s Futuristic Tales of the Here and Now by Ben Templesmith. I read this into my podcast 20 years ago , but I found myself wanting to revisit it. Don’t get me wrong — I like unspoiled wilderness. I like my sky clear and blue and my city free of the thunder of cars and jackhammers. I’m no technocrat. But goddamit, who wouldn’t want a fully automatic, laser-guided, armor-piercing, self-replenishing personal sidearm? Nice turn of phrase, huh? I finally memorized it one night, from one of the hoppers, as he stood in my bedroom, pointing his hand-cannon at another hopper, enumerating its many charms: “This is a laser-guided blah blah blah. Throw down your arms and lace your fingers behind your head, blah blah blah.” I’d heard the same dialog nearly every day that month, whenever the dimension-hoppers catapaulted into my home, shot it up, smashed my window, dived into the street, and chased one another through my poor little shtetl, wreaking havoc, maiming bystanders, and then gateing out to another poor dimension to carry on there. Assholes. It was all I could do to keep my house well-fed on sand to replace the windows. Much more hopper invasion and I was going to have to extrude its legs and babayaga to the beach. Why the hell was it always my house, anyway? MP3

This week on my podcast, I once again read my 2003 Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine story, Nimby and the D-Hoppers” The story has been widely reprinted (it was first published online in The Infinite Matrix in 2008 ), and was translated (by Elisabeth Vonarburg) into French for Solaris Magazine , as well as into Chinese , Russian , Hebrew , and Italian . The story was adapted for my IDW comic book series Cory Doctorow’s Futuristic Tales of the Here and Now by Ben Templesmith. I read this into my podcast 20 years ago , but I found myself wanting to revisit it. Don’t get me wrong — I like unspoiled wilderness. I like my sky clear and blue and my city free of the thunder of cars and jackhammers. I’m no technocrat. But goddamit, who wouldn’t want a fully automatic, laser-guided, armor-piercing, self-replenishing personal sidearm? Nice turn of phrase, huh? I finally memorized it one night, from one of the hoppers, as he stood in my bedroom, pointing his hand-cannon at another hopper, enumerating its many charms: “This is a laser-guided blah blah blah. Throw down your arms and lace your fingers behind your head, blah blah blah.” I’d heard the same dialog nearly every day that month, whenever the dimension-hoppers catapaulted into my home, shot it up, smashed my window, dived into the street, and chased one another through my poor little shtetl, wreaking havoc, maiming bystanders, and then gateing out to another poor dimension to carry on there. Assholes. It was all I could do to keep my house well-fed on sand to replace the windows. Much more hopper invasion and I was going to have to extrude its legs and babayaga to the beach. Why the hell was it always my house, anyway? MP3

Michael Krasny interviewed best-selling author Cory Doctorow (with over 150 million book sales globally), initially exploring his personal and national backgrounds. They discussed why Doctorow sees himself as more closely tied to science fiction as a genre, despite the range of his writings. They delved into how he became so knowledgeable about technology and why he dropped out of four different colleges. The interview also touched on his surname and the likely lack of blood kinship to acclaimed American author E.L. Doctorow. They explored the source of his prolific drive and the challenges he faces managing physical pain. Krasny asked about didacticism in his fiction, and they discussed his early novel "Little Brother," the origin of the name of his co-edited blog Boing Boing, the best sci-fi writers, and Daniel Pinkwater, a writer Doctorow greatly admires. Listener questions followed, covering topics such as copyright laws, the effect of AI and blockchains, emerging technologies, Doctorow's definition of a monopoly, Apple users, and Apple surveillance. The interview concluded with a discussion of immigration and the need for labor-intensive workers.

Today for my podcast, I read Precaratize Bosses , a recent essay from my Pluralistic.net newsletter. I recorded this on a day when I was home between book-tour stops (I’m out with my new techno crime-thriller, The Bezzle ). Catch me this Thursday (May 2) in Winnipeg with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives , then in Calgary with Wordfest on May 3 , then in Vancouver at Massy Arts om May 4 , then in Tartu, Estonia for a series of events with the Prima Vista Literary Festival (May 6-11) , and beyond! The canonical link for the schedule is here . Combine Angelou’s “When someone shows you who they are, believe them” with the truism that in politics, “every accusation is a confession” and you get: “Every time someone accuses you of a vice, they’re showing you who they are and you should believe them.” Let’s talk about some of those accusations. Remember the moral panic over the CARES Act covid stimulus checks? Hyperventilating mouthpieces for the ruling class were on every cable network, complaining that “no one wants to work anymore.” The barely-submerged subtext was their belief that the only reason people show up for work is that they’re afraid of losing everything – their homes, their kids, the groceries in their fridge. MP3 Here’s that tour schedule! 2 May, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Winnipeg https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cory-doctorow-tickets-798820071337 3 May, Wordfest, Calgary https://wordfest.com/2024/event/wordfest-presents-cory-doctorow-2/ 4 May, Massy Arts, Vancouver https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/solo-reading-cory-doctorow-the-bezzle-tickets-876989167207 5-11 May: Tartu Prima Vista Literary Festival https://tartu2024.ee/en/kirjandusfestival/ 6-9 Jun: Media Ecology Association keynote, Amherst, NY https://media-ecology.org/convention ( Image: Vlad Lazarenko , CC BY-SA 3.0 , modified )

Today for my podcast, I read Capitalists Hate Capitalism , my latest column from Locus Magazine . It’s a meditation on the difference between feudalism and capitalism, and how to know which one you’re living under. I recorded this on a day when I was home between book-tour stops (I’m out with my new techno crime-thriller, The Bezzle ). Catch me this Wednesday (Apr 17) in Chicago at Anderson’s Books , then in Torino for the Biennale keynote on Apr 21 , then in Marin County at Book Passage Corte Madera on Apr 27 , then in Winnipeg , Calgary , Vancouver , and beyond! The canonical link for the schedule is here . Varoufakis’s argument turns on an important distinction between two types of income: profits and rents. These terms have colloquial meanings that are widely understood, but Varoufakis is interested in the precise technical definitions used by economists. For an economist, ‘‘profit’’ is income obtained by mixing capital – tools, machines, systems – with your employees’ labor. The value created by that labor is then divided between the worker, who draws a wage, and the capitalist, who takes the rest as profit. ‘‘Rent,’’ meanwhile, was income derived from owning something that the capitalist needs in order to realize a profit. In feudal times, hereditary lords owned plots of land that serfs were bound to, and those serfs owed an annual rent to their lords. This wasn’t a great deal for the serfs, but it also needled the nascent capitalist class, who would have very much preferred to have those lands enclosed for sheep grazing. The sheep would produce wool, which could be woven into cloth in the ‘‘dark, Satanic mills’’ of the industrial revolution. The former serfs, turned off their land, could be set to work in those factories. MP3 Here’s that tour schedule! 17 Apr: Anderson’s Books, Chicago, 19h: https://www.andersonsbookshop.com/event/cory-doctorow-1 19-21 Apr: Torino Biennale Tecnologia https://www.turismotorino.org/en/experiences/events/biennale-tecnologia 2 May, Canadian Centre for Policy

Today for my podcast, I read Subprime gadgets , originally published in my Pluralistic blog : I recorded this on a day when I was home between book-tour stops (I’m out with my new techno crime-thriller, The Bezzle ). Catch me on April 11 in Boston with Randall Munroe , on April 12th in Providence, Rhode Island , then onto Chicago, Torino, Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver and beyond! The canonical link for the schedule is here . The promise of feudal security: “Surrender control over your digital life so that we, the wise, giant corporation, can ensure that you aren’t tricked into catastrophic blunders that expose you to harm”: https://locusmag.com/2021/01/cory-doctorow-neofeudalism-and-the-digital-manor/ The tech giant is a feudal warlord whose platform is a fortress; move into the fortress and the warlord will defend you against the bandits roaming the lawless land beyond its walls. That’s the promise, here’s the failure: What happens when the warlord decides to attack you? If a tech giant decides to do something that harms you, the fortress becomes a prison and the thick walls keep you in. MP3 Here’s that tour schedule! 11 Apr: Harvard Berkman-Klein Center, with Randall Munroe https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/enshittification 12 Apr: RISD Debates in AI, Providence 17 Apr: Anderson’s Books, Chicago, 19h: https://www.andersonsbookshop.com/event/cory-doctorow-1 19-21 Apr: Torino Biennale Tecnologia https://www.turismotorino.org/en/experiences/events/biennale-tecnologia 2 May, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Winnipeg https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cory-doctorow-tickets-798820071337 5-11 May: Tartu Prima Vista Literary Festival https://tartu2024.ee/en/kirjandusfestival/ 6-9 Jun: Media Ecology Association keynote, Amherst, NY https://media-ecology.org/convention ( Image: Oatsy , CC BY 2.0 , modified )

Today for my podcast, I read The majority of censorship is self-censorship , originally published in my Pluralistic blog . It’s a breakdown of Ada Palmer’s excellent Reactor essay about the modern and historical context of censorship. I recorded this on a day when I was home between book-tour stops (I’m out with my new techno crime-thriller, The Bezzle . Catch me tomorrow (Monday) in Seattle with Neal Stephenson at Third Place Books . Then it’s Powell’s in Portland , and then Tuscon . The canonical link for the schedule is here . States – even very powerful states – that wish to censor lack the resources to accomplish totalizing censorship of the sort depicted in Nineteen Eighty-Four. They can’t go from house to house, searching every nook and cranny for copies of forbidden literature. The only way to kill an idea is to stop people from expressing it in the first place. Convincing people to censor themselves is, “dollar for dollar and man-hour for man-hour, much cheaper and more impactful than anything else a censorious regime can do.” Ada invokes examples modern and ancient, including from her own area of specialty, the Inquisition and its treatment of Gailileo. The Inquistions didn’t set out to silence Galileo. If that had been its objective, it could have just assassinated him. This was cheap, easy and reliable! Instead, the Inquisition persecuted Galileo, in a very high-profile manner, making him and his ideas far more famous. But this isn’t some early example of Inquisitorial Streisand Effect. The point of persecuting Galileo was to convince Descartes to self-censor, which he did. He took his manuscript back from the publisher and cut the sections the Inquisition was likely to find offensive. It wasn’t just Descartes: “thousands of other major thinkers of the time wrote differently, spoke differently, chose different projects, and passed different ideas on to the next century because they self-censored after the Galileo trial.” MP3 Here’s that tour schedule! 26 Feb: Third Place Books, Seattle, 19h, with Neal Stephenson (!!!) https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/cory-doctorow 27 Feb: Powell’s, Portland, 19h: https://www.powells.com/book/the-bezzle-martin-hench-2-9781250865878/1-2 29 Feb: Changing Hands, Phoenix, 1830h: https://www.changinghands.com/event/february2024/cory-doctorow 9-10 Mar: Tucson Festival of the Book: htt

Defeat chokepoint capitalism to get artists paid. Talk by Cory Doctorow at Elevate Festival 2023 on Chokepoint Capitalism, the book he co-wrote with Rebecca Giblin. Links chokepointcapitalism.com – Defeat chokepoint capitalism to get artists paid Get the DRM-free e-book and audiobook via Cory’s website Thanks a lot to Cory Doctorow and the wonderful team of Elevate Festival 2023! Support Wenn du mich und den The Diner Podcast unterstützen möchtest, findest du alle Möglichkeiten auf der Supportseite

The profit of big tech should rightfully go to others. Five giant publishers, four giant studios, three giant record labels, two companies that do all the ad tech and ads and one company that does all the ebooks and audiobooks mean one thing: we have a problem. Cory Doctorow about how the big tech business models work, how they deprive creatives from getting payed fairly and what we can do about it. Links Cory Doctorow Chokepoint Capitalism Fobazi Ettarh: Vocational Awe (YT link; to watch it without Google analyzing you, use invidio.us or another proxy service) The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation Elevate Festival Cory’s talk at the Elevate Festival 2023 (bonus episode) Support Wenn du mich und den The Diner Podcast unterstützen möchtest, findest du alle Möglichkeiten auf der Supportseite