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this post was submitted on 02 May 2024
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Asklemmy
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I think a lot of people also misuse the word and use it as a catch-all for companies doing something they don’t like.
Raising prices is not enshittification, that’s inflation.
Not paying employees well is not enshittification, that’s under-compensation.
YouTube putting more ads in their videos including when the video is paused isn’t enshittification that’s… wait no that is enshittification.
Enshittification refers to offering the same service (often free, or at least with an option to pay more) but making it worse in order to squeeze you onto a paid (or higher paid) tier of service. This sounds good to shareholders but ultimately it alienates their customers and often leads to a company dying.
Yes.
But it screws up entire markets:
So, it
gives users a warped sense of what they deserve by giving away a costly service, and running competitors out of business.
Then it puts a stranglehold on suppliers by holding users hostage.
Then it fucks everybody by extracting value for shareholders.
By this metric youtube is not enshittification to some extent. They are a household name and not some weenie startup.
It being ineffective is a necessary part of it, in my opinion.
It doesn't have to be a paid service, it can also refer to (and usually does) a two-sided market. For example, a site with free users and advertisers. The platform first gains a critical mass of users, then they switch to focus more on the paying advertisers to increase value for shareholders. Over time, the main focus becomes the advertisers.
I understand it to mean the general life cycle of corporations: first valuing users, then shareholders, then themselves, then dying. A quote from Doctorow:
By that definition, everything you described is a likely consequence of enshittification (paying employees less, charging more, more ads, etc.). But the word itself refers to how the company's values shift over time.
This seems similar to Wall Street's "profits must increase every quarter" approach. Once a business gets somewhat popular, Wall St. types start sniffing around and offer to take it public. Once public, Wall St. wrings more profits out of the business every quarter until service/products collapse and customers flee elsewhere.
Exactly. Whatever product or service a business provides, once it goes public, the primary goal becomes profit--everything else is secondary and subject to removal if it promotes the primary objective. Shareholders don't care about the long-term viability of the business--once it peaks, they'll sell and move on. Basically a financial swarm of locusts.
Egads. Perfect anology. I'm going to steal that one. Thank you!
At a certain point, a company’s primary product becomes its stock. Share buybacks, short term gains, etc become the strategy. The goal is no longer to create value for customers, but to create value for shareholders.
That's a very concise point. Thank you for this insight.
No, it's price gouging.