Cory Doctorow says confirmed Enshittification translations now span much of Europe, Asia and the Americas, while foreign editions of The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI are starting to follow. The author published the rights rundown after what he described as a strong stretch for his recent books.
Doctorow said the list was prepared by the foreign rights team at Farrar, Straus and Giroux. He framed it as a practical answer for readers outside the Anglophone market who have asked whether they can share the books with friends who would rather not read a dense technopolitics argument in English. Fair request. Even internet people eventually run into non-internet people.
According to Doctorow, the confirmed editions are separate from other negotiations, particularly for Reverse Centaur, which he said is only a month old. Translation rights, as he described them, are mostly driven by foreign publishers asking to license a book, although his publisher also markets those rights and attends book fairs where such deals are made.
Which Enshittification translations are confirmed?
Doctorow listed confirmed Enshittification editions with publishers in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth outside Canada, Brazil, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Poland, Portugal, Quebec, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, Thailand, Türkiye and Ukraine.
- Farrar, Straus and Giroux is publishing the U.S. and Canada edition, with the hardcover dated October 2025 and paperback September 2026.
- Verso Books is publishing in the U.K. and Commonwealth outside Canada, with the hardcover dated October 2025 and paperback September 2026.
- Aufbau has a German edition scheduled for May 2026.
- Agave Konyvek has a Hungarian edition, titled A Nagy Elszaródás, scheduled for March 2026.
- Wydawnictwo Otwarte has a Polish edition, Gównowacenie, scheduled for August 2026.
- Capitán Swing has a Spanish edition, Mierdificación, scheduled for March 2026.
- Next Wave Media has a South Korean edition scheduled for July 2026.
Other confirmed Enshittification editions include Grupo Editorial Record in Brazil for early 2027, Éditions Eyrolles in France for February 2027, Impress Corporation in Japan for January 2027, Éditions Québec Amérique in Quebec for April 2027, Acropolis in Taiwan for the first quarter of 2027, Salt Publishing in Thailand for October 2026, and Okuyanus in Türkiye for fall 2026. Italy's Iperborea, PRH Portugal, Slovenia's Mladinska Knjiga and Ukraine's Athena Publishing are confirmed but not yet scheduled, Doctorow said.
What about The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI?
The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI is also in the rights pipeline, though the list is shorter. Farrar, Straus and Giroux has the U.S. and Canada paperback dated June 2026, and Verso has the U.K. and Commonwealth excluding Canada hardcover for June 2026.
Doctorow also listed Hungarian and Spanish Reverse Centaur editions as confirmed but not yet scheduled. The Hungarian version is listed as A Nagy Összemolás, translated by Doctorow in the post as “The Big Collapse.”
The useful bit for readers is the process. A translation deal is not the same thing as a fan translation: an established local publisher licenses the rights, translates and packages the book, then gets it into national booksellers and distribution channels. Doctorow said readers who want a missing language can ask a local publisher to contact Farrar, Straus and Giroux’s foreign rights team.
Doctorow also said the past two months brought a Locus Award for Enshittification, a New York Times bestseller for Reverse Centaur, the addition of “enshittification” to the Oxford English Dictionary, and more than a month with Reverse Centaur as Canada’s top-selling nonfiction paperback.
This story draws on original reporting from Pluralistic.