Cory DoctorowToday's threads (a thread)
Inside: No one wants to read your AI slop; and more!
Archived at: https://pluralistic.net/2026/03/02/nonconsensual-slopping/
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No one wants to read your AI slop: If you must do this, for god's sake, do it privately.
https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic/116158853626133343
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Hey look at this
* Enshittificator https://vimeo.com/1168468796
* Digital products are worsening but the trend can be reversed https://www.forbrukerradet.no/news-in-english/digital-products-and-services-are-getting-worse-but-the-trend-can-be-reversed/
* Distribution of US Wealth 1989- https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/z1/dataviz/dfa/distribute/chart/#quarter:144;series:Corporate equities and mutual fund shares;demographic:networth;population:1,3,5,7,9;units:shares;range:1990.4,2023.1
* After decades of debating the scientific publishing crisis, it's time to decide https://bjoern.brembs.net/2026/02/after-decades-of-debating-the-scientific-publishing-crisis-the-time-as-come-to-decide/
* Disney Parks History in Documents https://www.disneydocs.net/
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#25yrsago Web loggers bare their souls https://web.archive.org/web/20010321183557/https://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/02/28/DD27271.DTL
#20yrsago Fight AOL/Yahoo’s email tax! https://web.archive.org/web/20060303152934/http://www.dearaol.com/
#20yrsago Long-lost Penn and Teller videogame for download https://waxy.org/2006/02/penn_tellers_sm/
#20yrsago Aussie gov’t report on DRM: Don’t let it override public rights! https://web.archive.org/web/20060813191613/https://www.michaelgeist.ca/component/option,com_content/task,view/id,1137/Itemid,85/nsub,/
#20yrsago BBC: “File sharing is not theft” http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/4758636.stm
#15yrsago Hollywood’s conservatism: why no one wants to make a “risky” movie https://web.archive.org/web/20110305083114/http://www.gq.com/entertainment/movies-and-tv/201102/the-day-the-movies-died-mark-harris?currentPage=all
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#15yrsago Eldritch Effulgence: HP Lovecraft’s favorite words https://arkhamarchivist.com/wordcount-lovecraft-favorite-words/
#15yrsago Exposing the Big Wisconsin Lie about “subsidized public pensions” https://web.archive.org/web/20110224201357/http://tax.com/taxcom/taxblog.nsf/Permalink/UBEN-8EDJYS?OpenDocument
#15yrsago Taxonomy of social mechanics in multiplayer games https://www.raphkoster.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Koster_Social_Social-mechanics_GDC2011.pdf
#15yrsago San Francisco before the great fire: rare, public domain 1906 video https://archive.org/details/TripDownMarketStreetrBeforeTheFire
#15yrsago Ebook readers’ bill of rights https://web.archive.org/web/20110308220609/https://librarianinblack.net/librarianinblack/2011/02/ebookrights.html
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#10yrsago 500,000 to 1M unemployed Americans will lose food aid next month https://web.archive.org/web/20160229021021/https://gawker.com/in-one-month-we-will-begin-intentionally-starving-poor-1761588216
#10yrsago FBI claims it has no records of its decision to delete its recommendation to encrypt your phone https://www.techdirt.com/2016/02/29/fbi-claims-it-has-no-record-why-it-deleted-recommendation-to-encrypt-phones/
#10yrsago A hand-carved wooden clock that scribes the time on a magnetic board https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEbmYp5VVcw
#10yrsago Press looks the other way as thousands march for Sanders in 45+ cities https://web.archive.org/web/20160314104804/http://usuncut.com/politics/media-blackout-as-thousands-of-bernie-supporters-march-in-45-cities/
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#10yrsago Crapgadget apocalypse: the IoT devices that punch through your firewall and expose your network https://krebsonsecurity.com/2016/02/this-is-why-people-fear-the-internet-of-things/
#10yrsago Found debauchery: cavorting bros and a pyramid of beer on a found 1971 Super-8 reel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAobW4PtoMY
#10yrsago Trump could make the press great again, all they have to do is their jobs https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/donald-trump-could-make-the-media-great-again/
#10yrsago Federal judge rules US government can’t force Apple to make a security-breaking tool https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/02/government-cant-force-apple-unlock-drug-case-iphone-rules-new-york-judge
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#10yrsago Black students say Donald Trump had them removed before his speech https://web.archive.org/web/20160302092600/https://gawker.com/donald-trump-requested-that-a-group-of-black-students-b-1762064789
#10yrsago Red Queen’s Race: Disney parks are rolling out surge pricing with 20% premiums on busy days https://memex.craphound.com/2016/03/01/red-queens-race-disney-parks-are-rolling-out-surge-pricing-with-20-premiums-on-busy-days/
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Saturday's threads: California can stop Larry Ellison from buying Warners; and more!
https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic/116148035612750012
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My latest novel is "Picks and Shovels," a historical technothriller set in the Weird Era of the PC, about Ponzi schemes, techbros, and the dawn of enshittification:
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels
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My latest nonfiction book is the internationally bestselling "Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It," from MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux:
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/
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My ebooks and audiobooks (from FSGxMCD, Tor Books, Head of Zeus, McSweeneys, Beacon, Verso and others) 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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Upcoming appearances:
* #Victoria: 28th Annual Victoria International Privacy & Security Summit, Mar 3-5
https://www.rebootcommunications.com/event/vipss2026/
* #Victoria: Enshittification at Russell Books, Mar 4
https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cory-doctorow-is-coming-to-victoria-tickets-1982091125914
* #SanFrancisco: Launch for Cindy Cohn's "Privacy's Defender" (City Lights), Mar 10
https://citylights.com/events/cindy-cohn-launch-party-for-privacys-defender/
* #Barcelona: Enshittification with Simona Levi/Xnet (Llibreria Finestres), Mar 20
https://www.llibreriafinestres.com/evento/cory-doctorow/
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Upcoming appearances (cont'd):
* #Berkeley: Bioneers keynote, Mar 27
https://conference.bioneers.org/
* #Montreal: Bronfman Lecture (McGill) Apr 10
https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/artificial-intelligence-the-ultimate-disrupter-tickets-1982706623885
* #Berlin: Re:publica, May 18-20
https://re-publica.com/de/news/rp26-sprecher-cory-doctorow
* #Berlin: Enshittification at Otherland Books, May 19
https://www.otherland-berlin.de/de/event-details/cory-doctorow.html
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Upcoming appearances (cont'd):
* #HayOnWye: HowTheLightGetsIn, May 22-25
https://howthelightgetsin.org/festivals/hay/big-ideas-2
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Recent appearances:
* Should Democrats Make A Nuremberg Caucus? (Make It Make Sense)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWxKrnNfrlo
* Making The Internet Suck Less (Thinking With Mitch Joel)
https://www.sixpixels.com/podcast/archives/making-the-internet-suck-less-with-cory-doctorow-twmj-1024/
* Panopticon :3 (Trashfuture)
https://www.patreon.com/posts/panopticon-3-150395435
* America's Enshittification is Canada's Opportunity (Do Not Pass Go)
https://www.donotpassgo.ca/p/americas-enshittification-is-canadas
* Everything Wrong With the Internet and How to Fix It, with Tim Wu (Ezra Klein)
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/06/opinion/ezra-klein-podcast-doctorow-wu.html
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eof/
2qxImagine you write fairly difficult code and get bombarded with PRs from people who aren't invested enough to begin to learn the computer language the project is written in, or how anything works.
AI is causing serious conflict and erosion in FOSS communities.