Vigilant

Little Brother

by Cory Doctorow

In a new Little Brother story from Cory Doctorow, when schools make war on their own students, something has to give. . .


At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Fiction, Cyberpunk

37 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 24, 2024

About the author

Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist, journalist and blogger — the co-editor of Boing Boing and the author of the YA graphic novel In Real Life, the nonfiction business book Information Doesn’t Want To Be Free, and young adult novels like Homeland, Pirate Cinema, and Little Brother and novels for adults like Rapture Of The Nerds and Makers. He is a Fellow for the Electronic Frontier Foundation and co-founded the UK Open Rights Group. Born in Toronto, Canada, he now lives in Los Angeles.

Reviews

[Kam Yung Soh · Rating 3 out of 5]

A story about a hacker who tries to help a student who suffers from anxiety at school, causing him to take his exams from home. Only, this is worse, as the anti-cheating software installed on his computer to scrutinize him as he takes the exam makes him even more anxious. The hacker tries to help him by circumventing the anti-cheating software, only to finally realize that he should really listen to what the student wants and that, sometimes, technology isn't the help that is needed.

[GONZA · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although I sometimes get lost in the computer jargoon, I always find Doctorow's stories extremely informative.

Anche se a volte mi perdo nel jargoon informatico, trovo le storie di Doctorow sempre estremamente istruttive.

[Kieran McAndrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

A draconian school system has to be taken down.

A clever little story, which Doctorow uses as a simple educational tool to explain how Virtual Machines and malware work.

[Joshua Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Little Brother ftw

Cory’s writing is often cited for being entertainingly instructive—which it is—but, at its best, it’s also compassionate and thoughtful in a way you don’t often get in near-future sci-fi or hacker-punk. The Little Brother series has aged incredibly well, and with this new short, we get a glimpse of Marcus starting to understand what the world is like now (same same, but different) and how he fits into it.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely tale of beating enshitification in education.

[briz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short story/novella, featuring the Cory-like protagonist - a civil rights-oriented hacker in the Bay Area - who goes to Oakland to help an anxious teenage get around their Orwellian surveillant edtech. Features my favorite Cory-isms: deep, joyful dives into tech nerdery (here: how malware checks if it's in a virtual machine or not; the glorious true tale of Marcus Hutchins, a British teenager, and how he defeated a global malware infecting Microsoft) + thoughts about collective action and collective liberation. I appreciated that, in this story, the Cory-avatar realizes that these Big Tech problems don't necessarily need technical solutions - they need political ones. Sob sob. So true!

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

A smart postlude in which Little Brother's Marcus helps a school kid circumvent a draconian online test-taking app, but not in the way he expects.

As I've come to love about Doctorow's fiction, this one's got hacking, emotional intelligence, and a whole lot of heart.

Read for free at Reactor

[Venneh · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book that is half about the absolutely nightmareish surveillance apps that schools can sometimes install on student computers, and the other half is about systematically hacking it to inflict misery on the people who originally implemented the app, and further humiliating them in public by systemically showing how much it sucks and is biased. Ultimately hopeful in that there's any consequences whatsoever, and at the time I'm writing this, let me tell you, there are not near enough of those.

[Ken Richards · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read it here https://reactormag.com/vigilant-cory-...

A fine short story from the 'Little Brother' universe.
Marcus helps a student whose anxiety prevents him from attending school. So he must do tests at home. But his schools paranoia that students working from home might cheat on tests is go extreme that they use surveillance software to detect 'academic dishonesty'.

Marcus learns also that he must not jump to conclusions about how the student wishes to be 'helped'.

[Katherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

This was much better than the novella that came out at the same time. I thought the pacing was really well done, and the subject matter and overall theme of the story really worked well. Doctorow manages to stick a bunch of useful info into an interesting story.

[David Blaylock · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am envious of Marcus and his abilities.

[Pedro L. Fragoso · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit on the geeky side for my taste, but interesting. I don't believe Cory Doctorow can write uninteresting stuff. (Heard it read by the author in his much estimed podcast.)

[Kevin Postlewaite · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short, I didn't find as interesting as I usually find Doctorow's stories.

[Roberto · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fuck bossware, even at school

[Bill Philibin · Rating 4 out of 5]

(4.0 Stars)

This was a quick little story set in the Little Brother world. I liked it!

[Ben Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I relate to this too much

[C. Steinmann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short, but constructive instructive.

[Jacob Blank · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m so glad I exited education before eLearning became a necessity.

[Cory O'Brien · Rating 5 out of 5]

A VERY short story, but still a fun read. Cory Doctorow's books are always an interesting look into the technology of today, and the ways it can go bad or be used for bad things by bad people, and this one is no exception.