Today's threads (a thread)
Inside: Stock buybacks are stock swindles; and more!
Archived at: pluralistic.net/2025/09/06/com…
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Today's threads (a thread)
Inside: Stock buybacks are stock swindles; and more!
Archived at: pluralistic.net/2025/09/06/com…
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •The most enshittification-proof way to get the Enshittification audiobook, ebook and hardcover is to pre-order them on my Kickstarter! Help me do an end-run around the Amazon/Audible audiobook monopoly and disenshittify your audiobook experience in the process:
disenshittification.org
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Stock buybacks are stock swindles: Raising the value of a stock without raising the value of the company.
mamot.fr/@pluralistic/11515815…
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Cory Doctorow
2025-09-06 15:53:01
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Hey look at this
* Five for 50 - Anil Dash anildash.com/2025/09/05/five-f…
* How To Touch Grass kickstarter.com/projects/power…
* Why This Economy Feels Weird and Scary thebignewsletter.com/p/why-thi…
* A Navajo weaving of an integrated circuit: the 555 timer righto.com/2025/09/marilou-sch…
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Five for 50 - Anil Dash
Anil DashCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
#20yrsago Interview with mom who won’t pay off the RIAA shakedown web.archive.org/web/2005120402…
#5yrsago Political ads have very small effect-sizes pluralistic.net/2020/09/04/elu…
#5yrsago CO asphyxiation accounts for half of Hurricane Laura deaths pluralistic.net/2020/09/04/elu…
#5yrsago Trump is a salesman pluralistic.net/2020/09/04/elu…
#5yrsago Physicists overestimate their epidemiology game pluralistic.net/2020/09/04/elu…
#1yrago Marshmallow Longtermism pluralistic.net/2024/09/04/def…
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p2pnet.net - the original daily p2p and digital media news site
web.archive.orgCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Yesterday's threads: Why Wikipedia works; and more!
mamot.fr/@pluralistic/11515309…
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Cory Doctorow
2025-09-05 18:26:14
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
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:
us.macmillan.com/books/9781250…
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My next nonfiction book is "Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It," out from MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux on October 7:
us.macmillan.com/books/9780374…
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Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
My ebooks and audiobooks (from 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."
craphound.com/shop/
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Shop | Cory Doctorow's craphound.com
craphound.comCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Upcoming appearances:
* #Ithaca: Enshittification at Buffalo Street Books, Sept 11
buffalostreetbooks.com/event/2…
* #Ithaca: AD White keynote (Cornell), Sep 12
deanoffaculty.cornell.edu/even…
* #Ithaca: Enshittification at Autumn Leaves Books, Sept 13
autumnleavesithaca.com/event-d…
* #Ithaca: Radicalized Q&A (Cornell), Sept 16
events.cornell.edu/event/radic…
* #DC: Enshittification at Politics and Prose, with Rohit Chopra, Oct 8
politics-prose.com/cory-doctor…
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Enshittification: Why Everything Got Worse and What to Do About It
Autumn Leaves BooksCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Upcoming appearances (cont'd):
* NYC: Enshittification at the Brooklyn Public Library, with Lina Khan, Oct 9
bklynlibrary.org/calendar/cory…
* #NewOrleans: DeepSouthCon63, Oct 10-12
contraflowscifi.org/
* #Chicago: Enshittification with Anand Giridharadas (Chicago Humanities), Oct 15
oldtownschool.org/concerts/202…
* #SanFrancisco: Enshittification at Public Works (The Booksmith), Oct 20
app.gopassage.com/events/docto…
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Kara Swisher and Cory Doctorow on “Enshittification” | 10/15/2025 | Old Town School of Folk Music
www.oldtownschool.orgCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Upcoming appearances (cont'd):
* #SanFrancisco: Enshittification at Public Works (The Booksmith), Oct 20
app.gopassage.com/events/docto…
* #Madrid: Conferencia EUROPEA 4D (Virtual), Oct 28
4d.cat/es/conferencia/
* #Miami: Enshittification at Books & Books, Nov 5
eventbrite.com/e/an-evening-wi…
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Booksmith presents: Cory Doctorow Enshittification
Passage - Your event. Your fans. Your mobile box office.Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Recent appearances:
* Nerd Harder! (This Week in Tech)
twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-tec…
* Techtonic with Mark Hurst
wfmu.org/playlists/shows/15565…
* Cory Doctorow DESTROYS Enshittification (QAA Podcast)
soundcloud.com/qanonanonymous/…
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Nerd Harder! | TWiT.TV
TWiT.tvCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
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Pluralistic: Stock buybacks are stock swindles (06 Sep 2025) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
pluralistic.netCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
The most enshittification-proof way to get the Enshittification audiobook, ebook and hardcover is to pre-order them on my Kickstarter! Help me do an end-run around the Amazon/Audible audiobook monopoly and disenshittify your audiobook experience in the process:
disenshittification.org
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Colin Macleod
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •reshared this
Cory Doctorow reshared this.
Cory Doctorow
Unknown parent • • •Arianity
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •"Its shares should be worth less than before"
This seems misleading. The shares should only be worth less *if the number of shares are fixed*. which they aren't, in a buyback. When the company buys back half those shares, those shares stop existing. The 1000 share company only has 500 shares outstanding, post-buyback.
A company worth $500,000 with 500 shares outstanding will have a per share price of $1,000. The same company with 1,000 shares has a per share price of $500. 1/2
Arianity
in reply to Arianity • • •"Why would companies prefer buybacks to dividends?"
-there's actually a worse reason. Buybacks have tax advantages over dividends: Dividends are fully immediately taxed as income; buybacks are not due to cost basis (they can deduct what they initially invested), *and* capital gains tax is deferred to when the shares are sold.
Biden's IRA started to fix this by adding a 1% excise tax to them
(There are also other effects,like buying out certain shareholders concentrating control)
reshared this
RFanciola reshared this.