Enshittification

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What is enshittification?

The phenomenon of online platforms gradually degrading the quality of their services, often by promoting advertisements and sponsored content, in order to increase profits. (Cory Doctorow, 2022, extracted from Wikitionary) source

The lifecycle of Big Internet

We discuss how predatory big tech platforms live and die by luring people in and then decaying for profit.

Embrace, extend and extinguish

We also discuss how naturally open technologies like the Fediverse can be susceptible to corporate takeovers, rugpulls and subsequent enshittification.

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YouTube. Im sure this has been a thing for a while... but this is getting out of hand. (lemmy.ca)

submitted 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) by Setiyeti93@lemmy.ca to c/enshittification@lemmy.world

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It'll keep continuing until you get one FPS and no audio without paying for premium.

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[–] chisel@piefed.social 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Adding new features and charging for them can absolutely be a component of enshitification.

[–] warm@kbin.earth 3 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Nah, because if them features didnt exist, they havent affected the original service/product by being introduced, thus hasnt enshittified it. If access to the original is affected, then that would enshittification.

[–] chisel@piefed.social 0 points 6 days ago (1 children)

If your product stays current/modern with paid new features and the free portion is left to rot, it is enshitification. Enshitification is not a specific behavior or feature set. It is a product lifecycle of first tailoring your product to the customers to increase market share, then tailoring to advertisers to increase revenue and solidify market dominance, then tailoring to investors and squeezing your customers and advertisers for every last penny and cutting costs wherever possible as your product becomes worse and worse for the original customers. It's the shifting of target audience and abandonment of the previous that is a natural byproduct of infinite growth.

Enshitification is not simply "product becomes worse because x". Though, I'd argue that diverting resources to premium features while allowing the non-premium features to become obsolete is a tangable worsening of a product.

[–] Carrot@lemmy.today 3 points 5 days ago

If your product stays current/modern with paid new features and the free portion is left to rot, it is enshitification.

I disagree. If your free version isn't changing, then it isn't enshitification. This is the freemium model. It gives basic functionality to everyone in hopes of converting them to (or using them to attract) paid users. That's not enshitification. That's giving someone a free sample.

Enshitification is not a specific behavior or feature set. It is a product lifecycle of first tailoring your product to the customers to increase market share, then tailoring to advertisers to increase revenue and solidify market dominance, then tailoring to investors and squeezing your customers and advertisers for every last penny and cutting costs wherever possible as your product becomes worse and worse for the original customers. It's the shifting of target audience and abandonment of the previous that is a natural byproduct of infinite growth.

This I agree with, I just don't think it is an accurate description of the situation above.