newspeak
A real-time "tech fascism" translator for the web.
Paste a URL and see the same page, same layout, same fonts, exposed: newspeak.cunicode.com
Euphemisms become clear language about economic practices and political intentions.
Screenshots of newspeak live:
What it does
Translates corporate and political doublespeak into direct descriptions (130+ living translations)
Preserves original site design while highlighting substitutions
Generates a shareable link and screenshot for documentation
Supports a public archive of community submissions
Why it matters
Tech power hides behind language: "AI" as neutral progress, "Smart City" as safety.
Newspeak makes the manipulation visible so people can read what is really being said.
George Orwell’s “Newspeak” described a controlled language that shrinks vocabulary to limit critical thought.
This project flips that logic: we expand clarity and restore meaning inside the same visual frame of power.
How it works
A web proxy re-renders the page and swaps targeted phrases in place
The living dictionary updates through community input and expert review
Processing aims to be lightweight and transparent; the goal is clarity, not clickbait
How to use it
Find an article that obfuscates language
Run it through newspeak.cunicode.com
⚠️ unstable prototype: most sites work but CNN or BBC sometimes have strong re-flush scripts that wipe newspeak replacements :(
Share the exposed link with someone who needs it
What we prototyped so far
Functional web app with real-time replacements and highlight toggles
Submission pipeline for the archive and living publication
Under the hood (tech)
Server: Node.js with a small Express proxy (`server.js`) handling HTTP/HTTPS fetch, caching headers, and response rewriting
Parsing: HTML is streamed and parsed; replacements applied using a lightweight DOM transform (e.g., Cheerio/JSDOM) to avoid breaking layout
Dictionary: Plain JSON rules (`replacements.json`) with scoped patterns, order, and exceptions
Client: Minimal JS for highlight toggles and before/after view in `public/index.html`; no heavy frameworks
Protocols: Standard HTTP(S); CORS handled at proxy; content-security considerations to preserve fonts/CSS
Scripts: NPM scripts for local run and build; single-command start for demo
Open source stack: Node.js, Express, Cheerio/JSDOM, and standard web APIs; designed to be forkable and auditable.
Not yet published
What’s next
Expand the dictionary with more community translations
contextual (natural language) filtering
it currently replaces in wipe mode, so it makes funny mistakes: i.e “X was a smart decision” would be treated as “smart” in tech context. -_-
Improve the diff view and per-site tuning
Make it robust and stable
Add language toggles and better export options
newspeak replacements
{
"Gig Economy": "Exploitative labor without protections",
"Disruption": "Profit-driven destruction",
"Disrupt": "Destroy for profit",
"Disruptive": "Destructive to public good",
"Platform": "Private marketplace masquerading as infrastructure",
"Innovation": "Profit-driven novelty ignoring social costs",
"Innovate": "Profit from novelty",
"Innovative": "Profitable but socially harmful",
"Smart": "Surveilled and privately governed",
"AI": "Statistical guesswork from unpaid labor",
"A.I.": "Automated inequality masquerading as intelligence",
"Artificial Intelligence": "Pattern-matching marketed as thinking",
"Big Data": "Mass behavioral information extraction",
"Cloud": "Someone else's corporate computer",
"Tech Solution": "Technocratic fix avoiding systemic change",
"Digital Transformation": "People replacement with automation",
"Transform": "Replace humans with machines",
"Human Capital": "People reduced to productivity units",
"Scalability": "Expansion without accountability",
"Scalable": "Expandable without oversight",
"Scale": "Expand without accountability",
"Synergy": "Meaningless collaboration justifying mergers",
"Productivity": "Output optimized for others' benefit",
"Productive": "Beneficial to owners only",
"Agile": "Flexible workers, inflexible bosses",
"Lean": "Under-resourced and overstretched",
"Efficiency": "Cost-cutting that harms humans",
"Efficient": "Profitable through human harm",
"Upskilling": "Training to remain exploitable",
"Leadership": "Centralized power under personal brand",
"Lead": "Exercise centralized power",
"Pivot": "Abandonment without accountability",
"User": "Data source and ad target",
"Users": "Data sources and ad targets",
"Engagement": "Addiction optimization",
"Engage": "Addict and manipulate",
"Engaging": "Addictive and manipulative",
"Content": "Human creativity flattened for monetization",
"User Experience": "Submission interface design",
"UX": "Submission interface design",
"Personalization": "Behavioral profiling sold back",
"Personalize": "Profile and manipulate behavior",
"Personalized": "Behaviorally profiled and manipulated",
"Intuitive": "Designed to bypass conscious resistance",
"Recommendation System": "Algorithmic profit feedback loop",
"User-Centered Design": "Market-centered design in disguise",
"Seamless": "Unnoticeably surveilled",
"Onboarding": "Behavioral conditioning for data extraction",
"Smart City": "Privatized urban surveillance infrastructure",
"Predictive Policing": "Algorithmic racial profiling",
"Security": "Surveillance justified by manufactured fear",
"Secure": "Surveilled under fear justification",
"Compliance": "Behavioral conformity under threat",
"Compliant": "Behaviorally conforming under threat",
"Risk Management": "Preemptive life control",
"Access Control": "Selective exclusion system",
"Transparency": "Your visibility, our opacity",
"Transparent": "Visible to power, opaque from power",
"Governance": "Power without participation",
"Govern": "Exercise power without input",
"Monitoring": "Nonconsensual observation",
"Monitor": "Observe without consent",
"Accountability Dashboard": "Oversight theater",
"Digital Native": "Surveillance-born generation",
"Online Community": "Monetized social interaction",
"Influencer": "Human brand asset",
"Creator Economy": "Platformized unpaid emotional labor",
"Network Effects": "Monopolies disguised as benefits",
"Decentralization": "Disguised centralization",
"Decentralized": "Centralized in disguise",
"Tokenization": "Cultural speculation asset creation",
"Tokenize": "Turn culture into speculation",
"Metaverse": "Ad-driven 3D shopping mall",
"Web3": "Financialized internet for early adopters",
"Digital Sovereignty": "Nationalist surveillance tool control",
"Neural Network": "Marketing-appealing neuron math",
"Machine Learning": "Biased data pattern matching",
"Training Data": "Unpaid human knowledge extraction",
"Bias Mitigation": "Justice-theater PR effort",
"Model Accuracy": "Narrow metric performance judgment",
"Natural Language Processing": "Speech standardization for exploitation",
"Anonymized Data": "Traceable invasive information",
"Data Ethics": "Safeguard-theater workshop",
"Benchmarking": "Research-shaping competitive comparison",
"Explainable AI": "Black box transparency fantasy",
"AI-powered": "Algorithmically biased",
"AI-driven": "Automated without accountability",
"Artificial General Intelligence": "Total automation pipe dream",
"AGI": "Human judgment replacement fantasy",
"Marketplace": "Freedom-framed extraction hub",
"Freemium": "Hook-first billing model",
"Subscription Model": "Digital goods perpetual rent",
"Paywall": "Collective knowledge barrier",
"Optimization": "Smoother extraction process",
"Optimize": "Make extraction smoother",
"Optimized": "Extraction-smoothed",
"Monetization": "Attention and labor financialization",
"Monetize": "Turn attention into money",
"Revenue Stream": "Profit-pointed human needs",
"Viral Growth": "Weaponized attention spread",
"Shareholder Value": "Social good sacrifice for short-term gain",
"Burn Rate": "Capital and labor waste speed",
"Digital Public Infrastructure": "Civic-masked corporate platform",
"Public-Private Partnership": "Public-bannered privatized control",
"Resilience": "Exploitation endurance with fewer resources",
"Resilient": "Capable of enduring exploitation",
"Tech Policy": "Lobbyist-written regulations",
"Cybersecurity": "Surveillance technology arms race",
"E-Governance": "Human accountability software replacement",
"Interoperability": "Market dominance data sharing",
"Tech Diplomacy": "Surveillance regime export",
"Digital Rights": "Undefined, unenforced, co-opted protections",
"Inclusive Innovation": "Harmful tech diversity window-dressing",
"Human-Centered AI": "Harm-deflecting PR terminology",
"Trustworthy AI": "Trust-undefined corporate marketing",
"Ethical Tech": "Branding-outsourced morality",
"Tech for Good": "Extractive structure feel-good masking",
"Neutral Platform": "Responsibility-dodging mythology",
"Post-Political": "Ideological choice technical pretension",
"Disintermediation": "Human decision-making elimination",
"Frictions": "User manipulation obstacles",
"Empowerment": "Rights-absent self-responsibilization",
"Empower": "Self-responsibilize without rights",
"Global Innovation": "WiFi-enabled neocolonial extraction",
"Game-Changer": "Short-term advantage hype term",
"Next-Gen": "Endlessly marketed slight upgrade",
"Breakthrough": "Rebranded old ideas",
"Frictionless": "Thought-process eliminating",
"Exponential": "Collapse-ignoring growth fetishization",
"Transformative": "Optimism-selling undefined concept",
"Edge AI": "Marginal surveillance",
"Ambient Computing": "Inescapable embedded tracking",
"Techno-optimism": "Harm-as-bug belief system"
}
Glossary:
