Audiobooks are hands-down the most enshittified aspect of publishing, which is why I make my own audiobooks and pre-sell them on Kickstarter, which is how I get around the fact that Amazon *refuses* to carry my audiobooks:
--
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2025/08/25/dis…
1/
Questa voce è stata modificata (1 settimana fa)
reshared this
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Why are audiobooks so enshittified? Because they have the two essential characteristics for enshittification:
1) They are digital, which means the rules for them can be shifted on a per-customer, per-usage basis; and
2) They are controlled by a monopoly, Amazon, whose Audible division is responsible for 90% of popular audiobook sales.
pluralistic.net/2022/09/07/aud…
2/
Pluralistic: 07 Sep 2022 We published an Audible Exclusive about the monopolistic abuses of Audible – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
pluralistic.netCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Amazon refuses to sell any audiobook unless it is first wrapped in the company's proprietary encryption (AKA "Digital Rights Management" or "DRM"). This DRM permanently locks Audible's audiobooks to the apps it approves, because US copyright law makes it a *felony* to tamper with that DRM.
3/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
That means that neither the author nor the publisher can authorize you to take your Audible purchases to a rival platform, and if they try, *Audible can have them imprisoned for up to five years*:
pluralistic.net/2024/01/18/des…
Which is why none of my books are for sale on Audible. I'm not gonna submit to conditions that will let Audible take you, my reader, hostage.
4/
Pluralistic: Demon-haunted computers are back, baby (17 Jan 2024) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
pluralistic.netCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Not only does that make you vulnerable to whatever evil shit Amazon thinks up (remember a couple years ago, when they experimented with putting *ads* in the audiobooks you *paid for*?!), but that also makes *me* (and every other author) vulnerable, because if you can't leave Audible, neither can we:
pluralistic.net/2022/07/25/can…
Which is why I do these Kickstarters for my audiobooks!
5/
Pluralistic: Why none of my books are available on Audible; Sarah Gailey’s “Just Like Home” (25 Jul 2022) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
pluralistic.netCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Since 2013, I've either paid narrators (like Wil Wheaton and Amber Benson) to perform my books, or I've gone into Skyboat Media's studios myself, to record under the expert direction of the legendary Gabrielle de Cuir:
skyboatmedia.com/
That's what I did this time, recording my forthcoming book *Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What To Do About It* in early August.
6/
Skyboat Media - Skyboat Media
Skyboat MediaCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
You can listen to a generous, one-hour sample of the entire first section of the book here:
archive.org/download/enshittif…
The audiobooks and ebooks I sell through my Kickstarters are sold without *any* DRM, and also without any "terms and conditions." You are *buying* these books, not "licensing" them. That means you can do anything with these books that copyright law allows: sell 'em, give 'em away, lend 'em to a friend. Just don't violate copyright law and we're cool.
7/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
This book, *Enshittification*, synthesizes all the essays, speeches and panels I've done on the subject of platform decay into a single, coherent argument designed to be accessible to everyone, even (especially) your normie friends who know that everything sucks but don't understand why and are paralyzed about what to do about it.
8/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
The book's not out until October - it'll be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (US/Canada) and Verso (UK/Commonwealth), but it's already getting *fantastic* early notices. The *Financial Times* has already longlisted it for 2025's best business book of the year:
ft.com/bookaward
It's gotten starred reviews and raves from trades like *Kirkus*, *Library Journal*, and *Publishers Weekly* and we've sold foreign rights in more than a dozen countries, all over the world.
9/
Client Challenge
www.ft.comCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
There's also a 2026 graphic novel edition (adapted by Koren Shadmi) coming from First Second's 23rd Street Books.
Just as exciting is the Enshittification *documentary*, which is currently in pre-production, directed by Emily James (Just Do It), edited by Kurt Engfehr (Fahrenheit 9/11) and produced by Eve Marson (Web of Make Believe: Death, Lies and the Internet).
10/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
You can pre-purchase tickets to the theatrical run and a DRM-free download here; your early support will help raise the $75,000 we need for principle photography:
patreon.com/posts/one-time-137…
We recorded a sizzle reel at the Teardown conference in Portland last spring, and Kurt's edited it into an *amazing* trailer:
vimeo.com/1111178798?share=cop…
11/
Enshittification Kickstarter
VimeoCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
The documentary is a road-movie, with a crew following me on tour and interviewing me and other experts on the subject (think *Inconvenient Truth*, but for platform decay). We've got *quite* a tour planned: I'll be in Boston (with Randall "XKCD" Munroe); DC (with former CFPB chair Rohit Chopra); New Orleans; Chicago (with Kara Swisher); LA (with *The American Prospect*'s David Dayen); Calgary; San Francisco; Portland; Seattle (with Ed Zitron); Vancouver; Calgary, Montreal...
12/
Debby 📎🐧 reshared this.
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Toronto, New York City (with Lina Khan); Miami; Burbank; Lisbon; London; Hay-on-Wye; and Madison, CT. Other tour dates are still being finalized - more details to follow.
I developed enshittification as a series of posts on Pluralistic.net, my blog/newsletters/social media feed. Each edition of Pluralistic goes out with a graphic, usually a collage I've made from public domain and Creative Commons materials:
flickr.com/photos/doctorow/alb…
13/
Pluralistic collages
Cory Doctorow (Flickr)Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Making these collages has turned into one of my major creative outlets, and dozens of readers have asked if I would ever do a book of them. Then, last year, I got to talking to Creative Commons CEO Anna Tumadóttir about her plans for CC's 25th anniversary and we cooked up a plan to publish a little book of my Pluralistic collages to give to major donors as a premium.
14/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Anna needed 400 of these, but my printer gives me a quantity break at 500 copies, so I'm making 100 signed, numbered copies available for backers of this Kickstarter.
The books are *gorgeous*. Cyberpunk icon and electronic art impresario Bruce Sterling wrote me a wonderful introduction. It's designed by John D. Berry, president of the Association Typographique Internationale, a legend of type and book design:
johndberry.com/biographical-no…
15/
Biographical note | John D. Berry
johndberry.comCory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
For production, I've tapped Pasadena's Typecraft, a 118-year-old printer who ran the book on 100lb Mohawk paper. It's a gorgeous little 4.75" x 6.75" paperback, and this is the only run I plan on doing (though if people like it, I might do future volumes collecting more collages).
One of the things I love about these campaigns is the chance to work with so many wonderful partners.
16/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
There's Skyboat Media and director Gabrielle de Cuir; editor John Taylor Williams of Wryneck Studios; Emily, Kurt and Eve working on the documentary; John Berry, Bruce Sterling and Typecraft for my art book. I'm also working with some of my favorite booksellers in the world to fulfill print book orders: in LA, I've got Secret Headquarters (the best comics shop in the world!), who'll fulfill US orders as well as worldwide orders for signed books and *Canny Valley*.
17/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
For Canadian hardcover orders, I'm working with Winnipeg's McNally-Robinson. For EU orders, I'm once again working with Berlin's magnificent Otherland Books. Orders in the UK will be fulfilled directly by Verso. Working with local shippers means we don't have to fuck around with the Trump tariffs.
*Enshittification* is the product of my open-access publishing program.
18/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
I don't charge anything for the essays I publish nearly every day on Pluralistic.net, and I release them under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license, which lets anyone reproduce and adapt them, including commercially. Releasing my work this way means that it gets spread far and wide, which means everything to me, and I'm so glad to see everyone from scrappy progressive news sites to Conde Nast taking my work and reprinting it widely.
19/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Readers frequently ask me how they can support my work, whether I have a Patreon or some other way to accept donations. I don't have anything like that. What I have, instead, are these books, which I can't seem to stop writing. The best way to thank me for my work is to buy the books, in any (or every) format.
20/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
Selling books benefits a whole community of people who are important to my work, including my publishers and agents, and also all the people who work on publishing, fulfillment and production with me. These people don't just work on my projects, of course: they have many partners of their own.
21/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
When you buy my books, you help ensure that I'll keep doing what I do - and you help all my partners keep doing what *they* do. And the best way to support my work is to back it on these Kickstarter campaigns. The extraordinary generosity of my Kickstarter backers since 2020 has made a huge difference to my artistic career and my family's financial stability. If you backed one of those campaigns, I thank you, sincerely.
22/
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Sensitive content
And whether you've backed before, I hope you'll consider backing this one:
kickstarter.com/projects/docto…
eof/
Jan
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Commenting to let people know that software exists that can help them to listen to the audiobooks they paid for on a device or app of their choice. Such a tool would retrieve the activations_bytes to decrypt and convert their audiobooks they paid for to a more convenient file format.
Thanks for being a good example where such shenanigans are not needed.
Jordan Kendrick
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Cory Doctorow
in reply to Jordan Kendrick • • •Helen LH
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Cory Doctorow reshared this.
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Helen LH • • •crashbox
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Cory Doctorow reshared this.
Cory Doctorow
in reply to crashbox • • •Bent Chinrest
in reply to crashbox • • •Also not a complaint, because I'm proud to support authors and artists delivering on their own terms!
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Bent Chinrest • • •Matthew
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Cory Doctorow
in reply to Matthew • • •Matthew likes this.
Methodist_Coloring_Book
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Nils
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •Also really looking forward to your book on becoming a better AI critic!
Cory Doctorow reshared this.
Cory Doctorow
in reply to Nils • • •wouterla
in reply to Cory Doctorow • • •As soon as @pluralistic opens up a new Kickstarter, I order. And this one in particular, because it's just such an important topic.
The weird thing is, I never listen to audiobooks! But buying the hardcover directly from the author is a much better way to support them. Adding the audio book and epub is just a nice bonus...
Cory Doctorow reshared this.