Cory Doctorow Quote

We left default because I wanted to be part of something where I was more than an inconvenient surplus labor unit. I know I can work here and there’s plenty to do, but it feels contrived. The other day, I totally fucked up some linen processing, ruined thirty sheets. The system just assigned someone else to make new ones and push the blown-out ones through the feedstock processor. The whole thing fails so safe that it doesn’t really matter what I do. If I worked my brains out or did nothing, it would be the same, as far as the system is concerned. I know it’s fucked up and egocentric, but I want to know that I, personally, am important to the world. If I left tomorrow, nothing around here would change.

Cory Doctorow

We left default because I wanted to be part of something where I was more than an inconvenient surplus labor unit. I know I can work here and there’s plenty to do, but it feels contrived. The other day, I totally fucked up some linen processing, ruined thirty sheets. The system just assigned someone else to make new ones and push the blown-out ones through the feedstock processor. The whole thing fails so safe that it doesn’t really matter what I do. If I worked my brains out or did nothing, it would be the same, as far as the system is concerned. I know it’s fucked up and egocentric, but I want to know that I, personally, am important to the world. If I left tomorrow, nothing around here would change.

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About Cory Doctorow

Cory Efram Doctorow (; born 17 July 1971) is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog Boing Boing. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of the Creative Commons organization, using some of its licences for his books. Some common themes of his work include digital rights management, file sharing, and post-scarcity economics.