Cory DoctorowEvery podcast appearance, updated as new ones drop

 All the digital spaces we rely on have transformed into giant piles of inescapable shit. The app that used to work, now doesn't. The platform that once connected you, now surveils you. The internet that promised everything, now delivers misogyny, manipulation, conspiracy and fraud. Journalist Cory Doctorow has a word for it, and you've probably already used it – enshittification.   It's a technique that tech giants use to lure users and businesses in. They offer a valuable service with hidden lock-ins, which lets the platforms degrade their services. They then extract value from businesses and users alike, tormenting their captives with impunity.    In a world that's ever-worsening, Doctorow isn't just here to name the rot. He wants to cut it out, question the monopolies, and fight for regulation and our right to privacy. This session was recorded live in Sydney, August 2026. Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist and journalist. He is the author of dozens of books, most recently Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It (nonfiction); and the novel Picks and Shovels. His latest book is The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI, coming in June 2026. Born in Toronto, Canada, he lives in Los Angeles and London.  

Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, journalist, and technology activist, and a special advisor to the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He is the author of dozens of books, including the nonfiction Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It and the novel Picks and Shovels. His work spans tech policy books like The Internet Con and Chokepoint Capitalism, the solarpunk novels Walkaway and The Lost Cause, and the bestselling YA Little Brother series. He holds honorary doctorates from York University and the Open University, writes the daily blog Pluralistic.net, and lives in Los Angeles and London. In this episode, Cory joins Josh Goldberg to talk about his latest book, The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI. They discuss the difference between a centaur and a reverse centaur, why the same AI tools leave some workers empowered and others feeling exploited, why companies impose worse-performing workflows anyway, and what workers can do about it.Sponsorship inquiries:sponsor@softwareengineeringdaily.com The post Cory Doctorow on AI, Work, and Power appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Cory Doctorow returns to the Plutopia podcast to discuss The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI and the struggle over who controls technology in the workplace. He distinguishes between… The post Cory Doctorow: AI, Corporate Power, and the Fight for Worker Control first appeared on Plutopia News Network.

There's only one story in town at the moment. With Dario Amodei running around telling us all how dangerous he and his acolytes are, while Trump tells us we need to deregulate more than we already have, everyone's asking: Is AI about to end the world? Cory Doctorow joins Ava to discuss this, breaking down the good and bad of the industry, and why the problem is far deeper than just the latest software Silicon Valley is imposing on the world. Cory Doctorow's new book The Reverse Centaur's guide to Life after AI is out now: https://www.versobooks.com/en-gb/products/3584-the-reverse-centaur-s-guide-to-life-after-a Subscribe to How to Rebuild Britain now: https://linktr.ee/howtorebuildbritain Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We believe in the marketplace of ideas. That’s why we’ve made it so that Cory Doctorow responds point by point to an article written personally to him by a16z about why his Enshittification thesis is wrong. Then, in the back half, we talk about AI and LLMs as real technologies rather than mystical, theological entities (with mystical, theological market assumptions). Get the whole episode on Patreon here! RILEY ALERT Check out No Gods, No Mayors here! HUSSEIN ALERT Check out 10k Posts here! MILO ALERT Check out Milo's tour dates here: https://www.miloedwards.co.uk/liveshows NATE ALERT Nate's band Second Homes has just released their debut album and you can stream it for free here!

Artificial intelligence companies are spending extraordinary sums on the promise that their technology will transform the global economy. Author and technology critic Cory Doctorow joins Trumponomics host Stephanie Flanders to challenge that sales pitch, arguing that AI may be useful without delivering the cost savings or profits investors expect — and warning of the consequences for workers, markets and the wider economy if the boom ends badly. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We've been told AI is supposed to be a tool for us to use. But more and more it feels like we're the ones being used to feed the machines, before they inevitably replace us. Joining me today is author and journalist Cory Doctorow, whose new book The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI examines how we can survive the post-AI world, and how we can help burst the bubble. SUPPORT THE SHOW ON PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/adamconover SEE ADAM ON TOUR: https://www.adamconover.net/tourdates/ SUBSCRIBE to and RATE Factually! on: » Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/factually-with-adam-conover/id1463460577 » Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0fK8WJw4ffMc2NWydBlDyJ About Headgum: Headgum is an LA & NY-based podcast network creating premium podcasts with the funniest, most engaging voices in comedy to achieve one goal: Making our audience and ourselves laugh. Listen to our shows at https://www.headgum.com. » SUBSCRIBE to Headgum: https://www.youtube.com/c/HeadGum?sub_confirmation=1 » FOLLOW us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/headgum » FOLLOW us on Instagram: https://instagram.com/headgum/ » FOLLOW us on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@headgum » Advertise on Factually! via Gumball.fm See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

AI is set to take all of our jobs. It will irrevocably transform our relationships – and it might even kill us all. These are some of the big claims made about artificial intelligence today. And they are claims that on Novara, we take seriously. This week’s Downstream guest thinks that giving weight to those grand concerns is a mistake. He believes that by talking up the possibility that AI could replace significant amounts of labour – or develop an agency of its own – only serves to exaggerate the capacity of AI – and therefore just helps tech CEOs drive more investors to buy their already overpriced stocks. Cory Doctorow is a writer and activist – who’s written 36 books – spanning non-fiction and science fiction. He famously coined the term “ensh*ttification” to describe the modern trajectory of the internet. And he has a new book on AI – it’s called the “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI”. As Aaron Bastani takes time off on paternity leave, Michael Walker, host of Novara Live, sat down with Cory to ask one of the world’s leading tech writers his burning questions about AI. Is Cory surprised at the speed of AI’s so-called “evolution”? What does the latest AI “Hugging Face” tell us about AI? Does the AI presented to us in 2026 present a threat to life on Earth, or is that just hype? Is it really intelligent, or just a simulacrum of intelligence? Does it matter?  

Leading tech critic Cory Doctorow coined the term "enshittification" to describe the slow decay of the digital platforms most of us are now forced to rely upon to operate in the modern world. So why and how did the internet get bad, and is it too late for people, countries and governments to reclaim technology as a force for humanity and the common good? This episode was recorded on 25 August 2026 at The Wheeler Centre, Australia's first dedicated centre for Books, Writing and Ideas, in partnership with RMIT University for Now or Never festival. Explore more discussions like this one on The Wheeler Centre podcast — available wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow @wheelercentre for updates. Speakers: Cory DoctorowJournalist, technology activist and author, Enshittifcation: Why everything suddenly got worse and what to do about it, The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI and more, podcaster, Who broke the internet? (CBC), and blogger craphound.com Lisa GivenDistinguished Professor of Information Sciences, RMIT UniversityDirector of the Centre for Human AI Information Environments

Tech critic Cory Doctorow on the broken promise of the utopian internet, the systems that sustain it and what it might take to reclaim a more open digital future. With host Professor Lisa M. Given, Director, Centre for Human-AI Information Environments at RMIT University. Originally presented on Tuesday 25 August 2026 by The Wheeler Centre in partnership with Now or Never and RMIT University.You’re not imagining it: the experience of being online is getting worse. Services degrade, platforms shift and what once felt open and useful becomes harder to recognise. What was once good is now… shit. This is not a glitch. In fact, it’s by design. ‘Enshittification’, a term coined by tech critic Cory Doctorow, names what is already happening.In this talk, Doctorow outlines how major platforms like Facebook, Amazon and X are structured to follow this trajectory. First, users are drawn in with convenience and connection. Then, advertisers are invited into the system. Finally, the experience itself is stripped back in the pursuit of profit.Featured music is 'Traveling Again' by Sarah, the Illstrumentalist.The official bookseller was Brunswick Bound. Support the Wheeler Centre: https://www.wheelercentre.com/support-us/donate See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Through stealing your job or simply tanking the stock market—whichever comes first—the rise of artificial intelligence (companies) is a very futuristic sounding problem. It may have some very old-fashioned sounding solutions however. Guest: Cory Doctorow, sci-fi author, journalist, blogger and author of “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI.” This episode originally aired June 26. TBD will be back to regularly scheduled programming next week. Want more What Next? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and across all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen. Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort. Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD. Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Through stealing your job or simply tanking the stock market—whichever comes first—the rise of artificial intelligence (companies) is a very futuristic sounding problem. It may have some very old-fashioned sounding solutions however. Guest: Cory Doctorow, sci-fi author, journalist, blogger and author of “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI.” This episode originally aired June 26. TBD will be back to regularly scheduled programming next week. Want more What Next? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and across all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen. Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort. Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Through stealing your job or simply tanking the stock market—whichever comes first—the rise of artificial intelligence (companies) is a very futuristic sounding problem. It may have some very old-fashioned sounding solutions however. Guest: Cory Doctorow, sci-fi author, journalist, blogger and author of “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI.” This episode originally aired June 26. TBD will be back to regularly scheduled programming next week. Want more What Next? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and across all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen. Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort. Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If you've been anywhere online with an interest in AI you'll have heard of author and activist Cory Doctorow . And if you haven't heard of him, you've almost definitely heard of the term he coined; " enshittification " - the glorious experience of platform decay in tech. Corey joins the show ahead of a weekend of talks about his latest book The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI : How to think about artificial intelligence before it's too late . We dive deep into the mechanics of " enshittification ," the damage of the power imbalance between tech conglomerates and people, the distrust of corporations and government bodies, and the blind trust of governments in these private companies who are taking our private information and making money off it. Doctorow dismantles the corporate narrative that frames tech dominance as inevitable, explaining how market concentration strips dignity from workers, ruins consumer experiences, and cripples government regulation. From the " reverse centaur " dynamic of labor under automation to actionable operational security advice, Doctorow delivers an insightful, sharp, and hopeful roadmap for reclaiming control of our digital future. Cory Doctorow appears at Sydney's Festival of Dangerous Ideas from 22-23 August and Now or Never on 25 August at Melbourne's The Capitol, presented by The Wheeler Centre. The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI published by Verso is available now. LINKS Buy ' The Reverse Centaur's Guide to AI: How To Think About Artificial Intelligence Before It's Too Late ' by Cory Doctorow . See Cory Doctorow at Festival of Dangerous Ideas in Sydney https://festivalofdangerousideas.com/program/enshittification/ . See Cory at The Capitol in Melbourne presented by The Wheeler Centre https://www.wheelercentre.com/events-tickets/season-2026/cory-doctorow-enshittification Follow Corey's writing on Medium at https://doctorow.medium.com/ . Read more about the Electronic Frontier Foundation and their work at https://www.eff.org/ . CREDITS Host : Wil Anderson Guest: Cory Doctorow Executive Producer & Editor : Elise Cooper Video Producer : Michael Campbell Listen to more great podcasts at https://www.listnr.com/ See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It's Cory Doctorow, I'm not going to waste your time explaining who he is. You can find him at pluralistic.net, but I'm going to link you to this post specifically because it talks about how cool and hip I am. Also, you can grab the book mentioned by Will at the beginning here!

Margaret continues her interview with author and activist Cory Doctorow about the role of fiction in making a better world See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Margaret interviews the author and activist Cory Doctorow about the role of fiction in making a better world See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In Episode 492 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with science fiction author, journalist, and digital rights activist Cory Doctorow—who coined the term "enshittification"—about why he believes the AI bubble will prove more damaging than the 2008 financial crisis and rival the equity sell-off of the 2020 Covid pandemic, the theory he has developed to explain why everything keeps getting worse, why the companies leading the AI boom are structurally unprofitable and existentially dependent on a runaway growth narrative, and where the value in AI may actually accrue once the bubble deflates or bursts entirely. The first hour covers the central argument of Doctorow's book on enshittification, which goes beyond simply describing how things are getting worse—from the extractive nature of online relationships to the soul-sucking experience of dealing with burned-out call-center operators and mindless chatbots—to put forward a theory for why, based on what has happened to competition, regulation, interoperability, and the bargaining power of workers. From there, they compare the prevailing business models and unit economics of the early web companies and large platforms to those leading the charge in AI, and why Doctorow believes the latter are not only structurally unprofitable but existentially dependent on a growth narrative of runaway AI that will run out of capital before it ever delivers the promise and profits its investors are banking on. The second hour continues the conversation about the AI boom—how retirement accounts and index-fund concentration have raised the stakes of an eventual bust, and how new forms of regulatory forbearance, including the mechanics of the recent SpaceX public listing, along with other more explicit government bailouts, will be needed to prop up otherwise unsustainable valuations. They close with the narrative gap between AI-driven job displacement and what the data actually tells us, and where the value in AI may accrue once the bubble deflates—from open-source models and cheap hardware to the skilled workers and infrastructure needed to capitalize on them. Subscribe to our premium content—including our premium feed, episode transcripts, and Intelligence Reports—by visiting HiddenForces.io/subscribe . If you'd like to join the conversation and become a member of the Hidden Forces Genius community—with benefits like Q&A calls with guests, exclusive research and analysis, in-person events, and dinners—you can also sign up on our subscriber page at HiddenForces.io/subscribe . If you enjoyed today's episode of Hidden Forces, please support the show by: Subscribi

The race to build the most advanced artificial intelligence continues to dominate the headlines. On this week’s On the Media, who does this new technology actually serve? Plus, how even critical media coverage can feed into the AI hype. [01:00]  Host Brooke Gladstone sits down with Cory Doctorow, journalist, activist, and author of Enshittification, on his new guide to seeing through the relentless, $16 trillion AI hype machine and understanding the technology for exactly what it is, rather than the outlandish stories told about it. [16:47] Brooke continues her conversation with Cory, and they discuss how the hype itself is keeping the AI industry afloat.  [28:47] Brooke asks Cory about his rejection of the notion that AI domination – of our jobs, our lives, our art, and more – is inevitable. Plus, they interrogate the role of the tech in a creative’s life, and why AI art leaves us cold. Further reading / watching: The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI by Cory Doctorow On the Media is supported by listeners like you. Support OTM by donating today (https://pledge.wnyc.org/support/otm). Follow our show on Instagram, Bluesky, TikTok and Facebook @onthemedia, and share your thoughts with us by emailing onthemedia@wnyc.org. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

With billions pouring into AI based on its promises, Jon is joined by Cory Doctorow, author of “The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI,” to separate the hype from reality. Together, they examine how the AI industry relies on inflated expectations, question what AI can genuinely do and whether that even matters when selling a product, and explore how the technology is supercharging problems already embedded in our society, including surveillance, labor exploitation, and corporate consolidation. Plus, Jon answers listeners’ questions about 107 days until the midterms, the Fox Administration, and Punch vs. Jimothy. This episode is brought to you by: UPWORK - Visit https://Upwork.com/TWS right now and post your job for free. AVOCADO GREEN MATTRESS - Find an Avocado near you or shop online at https://AvocadoGreenMattress.com/TWS  — and check out their mattress and bedding sale! Follow The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart on social media for more:  > YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@weeklyshowpodcast > Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/weeklyshowpodcast > TikTok: https://tiktok.com/@weeklyshowpodcast  > X: https://x.com/weeklyshowpod   > BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/theweeklyshowpodcast.com Host/Executive Producer – Jon Stewart Executive Producer – James Dixon Executive Producer – Chris McShane Executive Producer – Caity Gray Producer – Brittany Mehmedovic  Producer – Gillian Spear Video Editor & Engineer – Rob Vitolo Audio Editor & Engineer – Nicole Boyce Music by Hansdle Hsu Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Have you had the funny feeling that content online is just a worse than it used to be – that actually a lot of art – movies, TV, music, comedy is just not has good as 3, 5, 10 years ago? Or maybe you are a person who makes art for a living who feels like the frog in boiling water, slowly being squeezed by the powers that be out of being able to make a living. How did this happen? Why is this the case? To use a word coined by this week's guest Cory Doctorow – Enshittification. That is the title of Cory’s book about how the internet and, in turn, our modern lives slowly and, often intentionally, were made less enjoyable and less functional by the people that control the major tech companies. Cory is an author, professor, and digital rights activist and generally one of the most articulate speakers on how the de facto tech monopolies are degrading our standard of living. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week, Trevor and Eugene sit down with science fiction author and tech activist Cory Doctorow to unpack the concept of "enshittification"—the theory that explains the decay of the modern internet and why massive monopolies are deliberately making our tech worse. From Google tanking its own search results to digital stores clawing back video games you just paid for, Cory exposes how predatory corporate tactics make the average consumer suffer. But it’s not all a capitalist horror show; Cory leaves us with a genuine message of hope, breaking down the massive, unprecedented global coalition that is finally fighting back. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On this episode of Lawfare Daily, Senior Editor Kate Klonick and Senior Editor Alan Rozenshtein speak with Cory Doctorow—science fiction author, activist, journalist, adviser to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the writer who coined "enshittification"—about his new book, “The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI.” Doctorow argues that the most important thing about the AI boom isn't what the technology can or can't do, but the historic investment bubble and the new arrangements of work being built on top of it—the same analytic lens he brought to platform decay, now turned on AI. They discuss whether the AI bubble will actually burst or merely deflate, and the unit economics underneath it; the "reverse centaur," the worker conscripted to serve the machine; and how it maps onto a broader culture and questions of AI "knowledge collapse," the human analogue to AI model collapse. Additional Resources: Cory Doctorow's daily newsletter, Pluralistic Ed Zitron, "The Hater's Guide to the AI Bubble," (Where's Your Ed At, 2025)Andrew J. Peterson, "AI and the Problem of Knowledge Collapse" (arXiv, 2024)Benjamin Recht, “The Irrational Decision: How We Gave Computers the Power to Choose for Us” (Princeton University Press, 2026)This episode also ran as an episode of Scaling Laws with an introduction from Alan Rozenshtein. Find Scaling Laws on the Lawfare website, and subscribe to never miss an episode. To receive ad-free podcasts, become a Lawfare Material Supporter at www.patreon.com/lawfare. You can also support Lawfare by making a one-time donation at https://givebutter.com/lawfare-institute. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Through stealing your job or simply tanking the stock market—whichever comes first—the rise of artificial intelligence (companies) is a very futuristic sounding problem. It may have some very old-fashioned sounding solutions however. Guest: Cory Doctorow, sci-fi author, journalist, blogger and author of “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI.” Want more What Next? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and across all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen. Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort. Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I learned a lot in this conversation with CORY DOCTOROW and in his new book, THE REVERSE CENTAUR’S GUIDE TO LIFE AFTER AI. Rather than fear AI, Doctorow uses it daily, but he is also skeptical. He reminds us that nothing about the way things are unfolding with AI, technology, or society is inevitable, though that is the contention of those who profit from it. He warns that, if - in protesting AI’s threat - we buy into worst-case scenarios of its power, we promote its value.. More than what AI does, we need to pay attention to who AI does it to, and who AI does it for. Timely and useful. His website is craphound.com and he maintains a daily blog at Pluralistic.net. (Photo: digital trends.com) Doctorow Transcript

Cory Doctorow joins me to discuss how capitalist ideology has made AI worse than useless, and if there's a way for us to make AI useful rather than malicious

This week, Adam talks with Cory Doctorow, author, blogger, and tech policy advocate. Cory explains why your boss wants to replace you with an AI, why that won't work, and why they're trying to do it anyhow -- and what you can do about it. Cory and Adam also talk about the AI bubble and how its myth of perpetual growth is fed by greed, along with some terrible misunderstandings of science fiction.  Cory's new book, The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI, is out TODAY Messages:   • Support the show at patreon.com/DreamingAgainstTheMachine   • Follow us on Bluesky and Instagram   • Subscribe to the show wherever you get your podcasts!   • Check out other great podcasts from Multitude like Tiny Matters About the show: Dreaming Against the Machine is a podcast about envisioning a realistic and hopeful future. Each week, the show’s host, journalist and astrophysicist Dr. Adam Becker, will have an earnest (and entertaining!) conversation with a guest about possible futures, seen through the lenses of history, science, and culture. In a world where tech oligarchs and their power fantasies are driving visions of the future, Dreaming Against the Machine aims to take back the terms of the public conversation about what our world can and should be. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Cory Doctorow, guy who coined the term enshittification, has been eviscerating Big Tech oligarchs for many years. He’s now turning his razor-sharp mind onto one of our most/least favorite topics: AI. His new book, The Reverse-Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI, is in many ways a practical guide for how to resist (actually resist, not just feel-good resist) the biggest financial scam in human history. Cory joins us to discuss what we should be really protesting when we protest AI. (And, at the end, we make sure to touch on his idea that Democrats should start prep...

Cory Doctorow, guy who coined the term enshittification, has been eviscerating Big Tech oligarchs for many years. He’s now turning his razor-sharp mind onto one of our most/least favorite topics: AI. His new book, “The Reverse-Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI,” is in many ways a practical guide for how to resist (actually resist, not just feel-good resist) the biggest financial scam in human history. Cory joins us to discuss what we should really be protesting when we protest AI. (And, at the end, we make sure to touch on his idea that Democrats should start preparin...

Jim talked with Cory Doctorow—prolific sci-fi and nonfiction author, journalist, activist, EFF special adviser, and author of Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It—about how structural forces degraded the internet, and what citizens (not consumers) can actually do about it. They discussed: The origin of "enshittification"—Cory's January 2023 blog post, its viral spread, and its naming as Word of the Year by the American Dialect Society Two-sided markets & the persistence of intermediaries Crad Kilodney as a self-publishing illustration, and why platform middlemen survive even when they shouldn't Monopsony vs. monopoly The real statistics of Amazon's dominance of book sales The three-stage enshittification life cycle, using Facebook as the case study The brittle equilibrium of late-stage enshittification—the thin line between "I hate this but can't leave" and mass exodus The metaverse as Facebook's terminal pivot—Zuckerberg's "legless, sexless, low-polygon" avatar world stolen from a 25-year-old cyberpunk novel, and why it still served him by forestalling investor sell-offs Zuckerberg as Rich Uncle Pennybags, not Willy Wonka Amazon's early history & Bezos's "your margin is my opportunity" mantra Amazon's junk fees (now 50–60% and rising) and the $80 billion/year advertising payola business The consumer welfare doctrine—Robert Bork's antitrust theory that monopoly is efficient, and why allowing monopsonies inevitably produces monopolies Jim's personal experience with the Thomson-West legal publishing merger Tech workers as a structural check on enshittification The convergence enabling enshittification: merger to monopoly → regulatory capture → loss of worker leverage → DMCA blocking entrants → abuse The moral decay of business culture—from "we won't do profitable things we think are wrong," to "do whatever's arguably legal," to "do whatever's illegal if the fine is less than the benefit" Google's $20 billion/year payment to Apple to stay off the search market Why predatory pricing cases went unenforced What citizens (not consumers) can do The death of federal antitrust enforcement and international ripple effects State-level antitrust action as a remaining avenue The right to repair as an easy entry point Trump's "Liberation Day" tariffs as a paradoxical opportunity Tech as geopolitical weapon—Microsoft accounts bricked for a Brazilian judge who sentenced Bolsonaro; the ICC chief prosecutor's accounts shut down after the Netanyahu arrest warrant The vision for open, auditable, sovereign digital public goods to replace the enshittified American Internet—run internationally, controlled locally … and much more. Links Episode Transcript Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, by Cory Doctorow The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI: How to Think About Artificial Intelligence Before It's Too Late, by Cory Doctorow Radicalized, by Cory Doctorow The Internet Con, by Cory Doctorow The Bezzle, by Cory Doctorow "TikTok's enshittification," by Cory Doctorow Pluralistic.net Electronic Frontier Foundation Bio Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist, and journalist. He is the author of many books, including the forthcoming The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI: How to Think About Artificial Intelligence Before It's Too Late. Previous works include Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It, the subject of this interview; The Internet Con: How to Seize the Means of Computation, a Big Tech disassembly manual; Red Team Blues, a science fiction crime thriller; Chokepoint Capitalism, nonfiction about monopoly and creative labor markets; the Little Brother series for young adults; In Real Life, a graphic novel; and the picture book Poesy the Monster Slayer. In 2020, he was inducted into the Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame.