Enshittification off-ramp; Cybersecurity fascists; Don’t Steal This Book: Newsletter 11 March 2026
Newsletter 142. Think paying to escape ever-shittier monopolies is the way out? You might not like where that ends up. Plus, women subverting the publishing establishment; escaping the author spending spiral, three people to follow, three books to read, and one way to jumpstart your writing career.
You can’t pay to escape enshittification forever
Everything is going to crap. Cory Doctorow brilliantly explained why in his book Enshittification, which explains how companies pursue monopolies, evade regulation, and then successively screw over their customers, their suppliers, and their advertisers.
When everything is crappy, we get used to the crappiness. It feels normal. Then, if the supplier offers a less crappy service for a fee, we consider paying. This is the enshittification tax.
Take airlines. They merge to reduce competition, crowd seats closer together, charge fees for baggage, invent “basic economy” fares that don’t even guarantee you a seat, and turn air travel into misery for most of us. But not for all. There is an escape (and I don’t mean the emergency exit). You can pay for a few inches of legroom or early boarding with bin space. You can sign up for an expensive credit card that guarantees lounge access and free checked bags. If you spend thousands of dollars flying (usually on the company dime), you can attain status and get some of these perks “for free.”
None of that toll would be possible if they hadn’t made the whole experience as shitty as possible first. (Can you tell I’m writing this in an airport?)
The pattern is repeated in every industry. Surely you’d agree that (at least in the US), health care suffers from high prices, delays, essential services denied, and general misery. Of course, if you pay for concierge health care, you can escape some of that for a fee.
Your bank won’t stop charging you ATM fees unless you maintain a massive balance. Your streaming services cost money and show you ads — unless you pony up even more money. Your school is crowded and the teachers underpaid unless you move to a community with high property taxes.
This morning, when I logged into LinkedIn, I got a pop-up ad for LinkedIn Premium. That’s an invitation to pay to avoid some of the shittiness that has crept into their platform.
You can call this capitalism — better service for more cash. But the problem isn’t the fee for better service. It’s that we’re already paying for products that are getting crappier and crappier, to the point where everyday suffering is the default condition.
I’m reminded of what science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon said when a reporter suggested that 95% of science fiction sucks. “Sure,” he said, “but 95% of everything sucks.” That last statement is the enshittified world in a nutshell.
In monopolized industries, enshittified experiences are the norm, and paying to escape them is typical. We all long to be treated like royalty someday and escape from the crappiness.
Of course, the long-term problem is rage. Treat the mass of people shittily enough and they’ll revolt. It’s no coincidence that politicians like Zohran Mamdani and Graham Platner are gaining traction — because they promise to lift the mass of victims of crappiness to a less crappy level.
If you can afford to pay to escape the crappiness, good for you. But two things are certain.
One, it’s going to be more and more expensive to escape the default enshittification tier. The default experience is not going to get better, it’s going to get worse.
And two, those people you left behind won’t put up with this kind of treatment forever. Users of the world unite. You have nothing to lose but your enshittified platforms.
News for writers and others who think
Sally Collings explains the book spending spiral — how authors get sucked into spending more and more on a book they should have thought about more clearly before they started.
Governments publish cybersecurity documents. Why should the 2026 policy from the Trump Administration matter? Ask Dr. Sybe Izaak Rispens , who says the new policy is a blueprint for cyberwarfare and the violation of international norms and cooperation.
Ten thousand authors put their names on Don’t Steal This Book, a blank book protesting AI theft of content.
The Guardian published a review of all the fraudulent AI offers targeting authors. Writer beware.
Draft2Digital rejects 40% to 75% of all book submissions, mostly AI-generated nonfiction slop.
In Forbes, Amy Shoenthal writes about the women entrepreneurs subverting the publishing hegemony.
Three people to follow
Jennie Nash , founder of the coaching collective Author Accelerator
Nathan Benaich , tracking the impact of AI on the creative world
Douglas Rushkoff , media theorist thinking deeply about the impact of AI on humans
Three books to read
The Next Chapter: Writing in Retirement by Julie Gorges (2024). How to pursue writing as an encore career.
The Secret Language of Work: Hyper-Helpful Scripts for Every Situation by Molly West Duffy (St. Martin’s Press, 2023). What to say and when to say it at work.
Super Skill: Why Storytelling Is the Superpower of the AI Age by Joe Lazer (Prospecta, 2026). You’re a better storyteller than Claude. Use it.
First step for authors
Sign up with the Bernoff Book Coach for next to nothing.