Voyager Books

Makers: An Interview with Cory Doctorow

We published the hardback of Makers by Cory Doctorow in October, to great acclaim. To celebrate publication we asked him some questions about the book, and about his writing. The paperback of Makers will be out this July, so we thought you might be interested to see what he has to say about the novel, and For the Win, his new novel which came out last month…

MAKERS is concerned with the end of the economy. Can you see the changes that occur in the plot ever coming to pass?

Not as such – this isn’t meant to be predictive so much as allegorical. The kinds of microcapitalized, microprofitable firms in MAKERS are already here today in the form of millions of web-startups that needed little or no money to get going, and that needed to innovate all the time to stay profitable.

LITTLE BROTHER has won, or been nominated for, several notable awards. Has this changed your writing in any way?

I don’t think so! Every book is different, of course, because I’m in different circumstances every time. The book I’m writing now, FOR THE WIN, is the first book I wrote as a father, which means that the time to write it has been stolen in smaller, more intense sips than previous books; it’s also the first book I ever set out to research almost from scratch, reading hundreds of books and articles and travelling all over Asia for it. That, too, effected the writing – I feel like these macro-factors change the work more than awards (also, I had previously won and been nominated for many of the same awards!)

You have been described as a ‘digital-rights activist’. Do you feel that this comes across in your novels?

Yes, of course. I think sf is best at describing the social changes wrought by technological change; an activist tries to *steer* the social changes wrought by technological change. Describing and steering are closely related activities.

One of the things I found most enjoyable about MAKERS was the strong characterisation. Did you have a favourite character to write?

I think I had the most fun with the villain, Freddie, who epitomizes the kind of sleazy, cynical, lazy technologist that frustrates me the most. Getting into his head was a real adventure.

What can we expect from you in your next books?

In the twenty-first century, it’s not just capital that’s globalized: labour is, too. The Webblies are a union of ‘gold-farmers’ who labour day and night in video-games, amassing virtual gold that’s sold on to rich players. They fight their bosses, the people who own the games, and the  rich speculators who trade in derivatives of game-gold for the right to organize a trade-union. And they do it all under the noses of the ruling elites in China and the rest of Asia by using video-games to outsmart them.

FOR THE WIN is a book that explains labour politics and macroeconomics for kids, using an army of clever, dedicated, and endangered boys and girls who play video-games to do it. The Webblies fight pitched battles in every flavour of cyberspace, in the ports of Los Angeles, on container ships, in the slums of Mumbai, in the red light district of Singapore, and in South China’s enormous industrial cities.

They are so successful that they provoke a worldwide general strike – and incur the wrath of the rich and powerful around the world.

Blending near-future speculation with the exuberant gamer underground and the globalized net-culture, this is a book that gives young people the frame to understand economic meltdown, Ponzi schemes, and overheated investment bubbles.