💩 I’ve been sitting on linking to the very good Cory Doctorow thing from last week because I thought I might have something to add. Turns out I do not. (But, anecdotally, I used to call the process by which we perfected an app/service and then kept on adding to it making it worse with each update “Shiterative Design” and thought I was oh so clever.) Anyway, what he said is all true and depressing and I genuinely miss enjoying being online.

This is enshittification: surpluses are first directed to users; then, once they’re locked in, surpluses go to suppliers; then once they’re locked in, the surplus is handed to shareholders and the platform becomes a useless pile of shit. From mobile app stores to Steam, from Facebook to Twitter, this is the enshittification lifecycle.