i remember when he was in berlin and had an evening in the wasserturm organized by the bookshop
otherland-berlin,
@Cory Doctorow was very adamant, that just by personal actions like shopping, i.e. refusing to shop at a certain store nothing will change. in an environment that is dominated by a few near monopolies none of your consumption choices will change anything. only state action could interfere in a meaningful way there:
You can't solve this by shopping. Calling the hotel direct won't fix it: they have to be on Expedia to survive, and to be on Expedia, they have to sign up for VIP service, and to keep VIP service, they have to make their prices higher everywhere. To fix this, we need systemic action: the corporate death penalty for the companies that are consuming the structural members of our society.
but could you imagine the actual german chancellor merz holding big corporations accountable for their enshittification ? or any of the spd-politicians? none of the putinistas for sure. and the green aren't on to this either, unluckily ...
#politik #wirtschaft #monopole #CoryDoctorow 
No matter where you shop, you're getting screwed by Amazon. Amazon has found a way to make everything you buy - at Target, at a mom-and-pop shop, even direct from the manufacturer - more expensive. And they're not the only one: Expedia's done the same thing, but for hotel rooms.
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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:
https://pluralistic.net/2026/10/15/enshittipedia/#most-favored-nation1/
