“Stop linky, no thanks”

Although more than four out of five households today have a Linky smart meter, the anti-Linky controversy has not weakened in the context of a judicialization of the conflicts in recent years. This article reconstructs the methods of denunciation and mobilization of ordinary consumers, and more precisely of the most resistant fringe among them. In the first part, it proposes a model of engagement in the ‘anti-Linky’ cause, from suspicion to scandal. It shows how customers become involved in politicization in several registers of denunciation (electromagnetic waves and their effects on health, false promises of energy transition, alleged commercial abuses, and risks of surveillance). Their engagement is fostered by the mutualization of arguments, allowing accusations against the meters to protect not only their own homes, seen as intimate spaces, but also those of vulnerable people. The second part describes the stages of ‘home mobilization’ and ‘neighbourhood solidarity’ strategies aimed at pragmatically combatting the installation of the meter and promoting the quest for a non-Linky society, supported by norms of digital sobriety, anti-consumerism and a lifestyle based more on solidarity.