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Cory Doctorow - Rescuing the Internet From “Enshittification” | The Daily Show

2025-12-10 Comedy
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The Daily Show
The Daily Show
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Cory Doctorow on Deconstructing the "Enshittification" of the Internet

Understand the three stages by which Big Tech platforms degrade service for users and businesses, and learn the four policy levers needed to restore a user-centric internet.

Short Summary

  • The Enshittification cycle describes platform decay: starting good, locking users in, monetizing via business customers, and finally extracting maximum value from everyone.
  • Blame for this widespread degradation belongs primarily to specific policy failures, not consumer apathy or inevitable market forces.
  • Restoring a fair internet requires enforcing antitrust laws, empowering tech worker unions, and mandating interoperability across platforms. This discussion illuminates Cory Doctorow’s framework for understanding why services like Facebook and Amazon have become worse over time. Doctorow frames this decay as a deliberate, policy-enabled process, offering clear steps to reverse the trend and ensure digital tools serve the public interest over corporate profit.

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Description

Journalist, internet activist, and author Cory Doctorow talks to Ronny Chieng about the concept behind his latest book, “Enshittification,” which breaks down how tech giants like Facebook, Amazon, and Google have made the internet worse for everybody by locking in users only to turn on them. He also stresses how the blame for the “enshittification” of the internet shouldn’t be placed on consumers, but on policy makers, and points to anti-trust enforcement, tech worker unions, and interoperability as the keys to remaking an internet that benefits users instead of billionaires. #DailyShow #CoryDoctorow #Internet Subscribe to The Daily Show: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwWhs_6x42TyRM4Wstoq8HA/?sub_confirmation=1 Follow The Daily Show: Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheDailyShow Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thedailyshow Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thedailyshow Stream full episodes of The Daily Show on Paramount+: http://www.paramountplus.com/thedailyshow Follow Comedy Central: Twitter: https://twitter.com/ComedyCentral Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ComedyCentral Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/comedycentral About The Daily Show: Jon Stewart and The Best F**king News Team host The Daily Show, an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning program analyzing the biggest stories in news, politics, and culture through a sharp, satirical lens. The Daily Show redefined the late night show category on TV and, with an audience of over 51M across social media platforms, has become a launching pad for some of the biggest stars in entertainment. The Daily Show airs weeknights at 11/10c on Comedy Central.

Top Comments (10)

@jankypox 2025-12-10

Only Cory and Ronny could talk fast enough and effectively enough to successfully fix a jam packed 45 minute interview into a 15 minute and 52 second long segment. Well played, boys!

846 11 replies
@oracleofwater 2025-12-10

Cory has polished that enshittification description to a mirror finish.

699 7 replies
@HerrK90 2025-12-10

„Let’s get rid of the parasitic billionaires“ applies to so many more fields than just internet platforms 😅

624 18 replies
@TrrsnSmrg 2025-12-10

I rewatched this just because I love hearing Cory insult zuck

520 6 replies
@eric120-m6b 2025-12-10

Love Corey but this interview is why folks should go find a longer form interview with him. Much easier to understand what he is talking about if he has 30 to 40 minutes instead of 7

331 16 replies
@TacticalFluke09 2025-12-10

"the kind of neurological injury specific to having paid for an economics degree" is a magnificent sentence

257 8 replies
@bradenhazle4378 2025-12-10

The phone network analogy for social media is probably the most accurate I've heard. It does not matter what network you're on you can still contact whoever you want on a phone, and it makes sense it should be the same for social media.

152 6 replies
@Dismantledasystem 2025-12-10

I love that Ronny let him talk without interrupting. It’s frustrating to me when interviewers get in the way.

144 7 replies
@m.a.e.n 2025-12-10

Cory is a machine gun of exquisitely scathing analogies.

102
@gildedageproductions6704 2025-12-15

"Temporarily embarrassed founders" goes so hard.

43 1 replies

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