As far as I can tell Cory Doctorow only ever just talked a lot. His views have always been pretty lousy, if one were willing and able to dig through the noise firehose he has persistently aimed at anyone near tech for decades, which admittedly is quite difficult.
He's recently come out as gleefully open to warmongering:
> What’s got me so excited is that we’ve got a new coalition in the War on General Purpose Computers: a coalition that includes the digital rights activists who’ve been on the lines for decades, but also people who want to turn America’s Big Tech trillions into billions for their own economy, and > **national security hawks who are quite rightly worried about digital sovereignty.**
[The Post-American Internet](https://doctorow.medium.com/https-pluralistic-net-2026-01-01-39c3-the-new-coalition-4a7a582ff5b7 )
Excited about forming an "unstoppable coalition" with "national security hawks"? "Digital sovereignty"? We know what that looks like. Another one driven power mad by tech.
Personally I don't believe this is cognitive surrender. I also don't believe he has an inner critic that knows LLMs are wrong. I think Doctorow has an internal editor that knows *other people* think LLMs are wrong, and that editor advises him to shape his word fountain carefully. He has his own agenda, and the fact that the overwhelming torrent of words he unleashes on the world sometimes includes combinations we find pleasing does not mean he holds beliefs anything like ours (for any values of "we" and "ours"). The guy is still invited onto "lefty" podcasts even though he clearly outs himself as a right winger over and over again, on the strength of a single neologistic insult to platform capitalism. I think the thing to spot is that the internal editor is loosening his editorial constraints, suggesting Doctorow no longer feels the need to fully dupe this audience. Maybe that's what has him excited.
Anthony
npub1j4…nt0rs
2026-07-28 13:57:18 UTC
in reply to nevent1q…34kj
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2026-07-28 13:57:18 UTCEvent JSON
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"content": "As far as I can tell Cory Doctorow only ever just talked a lot. His views have always been pretty lousy, if one were willing and able to dig through the noise firehose he has persistently aimed at anyone near tech for decades, which admittedly is quite difficult.\n\nHe's recently come out as gleefully open to warmongering:\n\u003e What’s got me so excited is that we’ve got a new coalition in the War on General Purpose Computers: a coalition that includes the digital rights activists who’ve been on the lines for decades, but also people who want to turn America’s Big Tech trillions into billions for their own economy, and \u003e **national security hawks who are quite rightly worried about digital sovereignty.**\n[The Post-American Internet](https://doctorow.medium.com/https-pluralistic-net-2026-01-01-39c3-the-new-coalition-4a7a582ff5b7 )\n\nExcited about forming an \"unstoppable coalition\" with \"national security hawks\"? \"Digital sovereignty\"? We know what that looks like. Another one driven power mad by tech.\n\nPersonally I don't believe this is cognitive surrender. I also don't believe he has an inner critic that knows LLMs are wrong. I think Doctorow has an internal editor that knows *other people* think LLMs are wrong, and that editor advises him to shape his word fountain carefully. He has his own agenda, and the fact that the overwhelming torrent of words he unleashes on the world sometimes includes combinations we find pleasing does not mean he holds beliefs anything like ours (for any values of \"we\" and \"ours\"). The guy is still invited onto \"lefty\" podcasts even though he clearly outs himself as a right winger over and over again, on the strength of a single neologistic insult to platform capitalism. I think the thing to spot is that the internal editor is loosening his editorial constraints, suggesting Doctorow no longer feels the need to fully dupe this audience. Maybe that's what has him excited.",
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