#cory docterow

[discrepancybot]

This is an essay version of the 2024 McLuhan Lecture given by writer Cory Doctorow in Berlin. A vid of his lecture (and more) is included in the link below.

The inventor of the word "enshittification" outlines the process in detail. He describes this era as the "enshittocene". Before you despair, he does offer some remedies.

Pluralistic: My McLuhan lecture on enshittification (30 Jan 2024) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow

An excerpt...

[T]he capitalism of 20 years ago made space for a wild and woolly internet, a space where people with disfavored views could find each other, offer mutual aid, and organize. The capitalism of today has produced a global, digital ghost mall, filled with botshit, crapgadgets from companies with consonant-heavy brand-names, and cryptocurrency scams. The internet isn't more important than the climate emergency, nor gender justice, racial justice, genocide, or inequality. But the internet is the terrain we'll fight those fights on. Without a free, fair and open internet, the fight is lost before it's joined.

If you'd like to see the internet de-enshittified, quit using platforms which contribute to the process. Not mentioning names, but they're run by multi-billionaires who could afford to buy entire countries.

While no platform is 100% perfect, Tumblr has been rather resistant to enshittification. Cory Docterow has an account here if you wish to follow him.

@mostlysignssomeportents

The tech oligarchs have turned the internet into a tool for extracting resources from us as if we were one large collective strip mine. Their only goals seem to be the preternatural accumulation of even more wealth and the ability to manipulate those in power. We need to become more aware of our own part in this and put distance between ourselves and the monopolies which we now help to prop up.

If you remember nothing else from this...

DON'T FEED THE OLIGARCHS.