Listened to the rest. Here is a quote from Doctorow towards the end of the podcast in response to whether he is optimistic or pessimistic about fixing enshitification.
“So here's a way out of that trap. And it's to throw away pessimism and throw away optimism, which are both fatalism, right? Pessimism, the belief things are going to get worse no matter what we do.
Optimism, the belief things are going to get better no matter what we do. What we do matters, right? We are steering history.
And what we call that belief is hope. And hope is the belief that even though you can't see your way from here to the end state that you want to achieve, that if you ascend the gradient towards that future, that as you ascend it, you will attain new vantage points from which will be revealed to you terrain that was invisible when you were at that lower spot. And that that will be your next step.”