this post was submitted on 21 Jun 2025
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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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[–] abfarid@startrek.website 4 points 2 days ago

For sure, taking control away from the users is terrible and scummy, but I think it's an entirely different issue, covered by "right to repair". A very small amount of people had the know how and the confidence to perform the repairs themselves even before this anti consumer practices became so widespread, so I don't think it's a huge factor in decrease of skill. I would say a much bigger factor is the fact that technology has become exponentially more complex. You can't just open up a radio and replace a vacuum tube, everything is a microchip now, and the soldering iron isn't gonna help much there. I guess eventually we will reach technology complexity and abstraction of such a level that no single person can hold the knowledge to "fix" it on their own.