Technofeudalism and Enshittification: Paying Rent to our App Lords

We discuss two very sad yet important contemporary ideas about how enormous companies like Apple, Google, Meta, and Amazon rule over us today. The first is Technofeudalism, a word coined by Yanis Varifoukas, which argues that capitalism has been replaced by a landscape of digital fiefdoms. The second is Enshittification, a word coined by Cory Doctorow, which explains why the apps we can never get enough of (Instagram, X, Amazon, and Facebook) continue to deteriorate while their parent companies make more and more money. 

Sagi insists throughout that whether or not we have transitioned from capitalism to a digital fiefdom, a Protestant ideology, one of labor and manifest destiny, continues to function and serve the hearts of all our beloved CEOs. 

Jack offers us an important history of the creation of Silicon Valley, tying a certain entrepreneurial optimism to a strange conflation of academia and the industrial military complex.

Andy reads technofeudalism as a kind of vampiric disease, where everyone is either becoming their own Dracula, holed up in their castle, or the rats and peons that will soon be devoured.

Jake gives as many examples as he can from Doctorow's book Enshittification, which he highly recommends.