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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Bluesky now has 24 million users. Jay Graber is still vowing to keep it from enshittification (www.wired.com)

submitted 3 weeks ago by Emperor to c/enshittification@lemmy.world

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cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/20853350

Bluesky has seen massive growth in the weeks following the US election. As of Tuesday, there are 24 million users on the social media platform. With great engagement comes great responsibility, which means Bluesky CEO Jay Graber has to do a lot to keep her promise to not “enshittify” the platform with ads while still funding its explosive growth.

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Enshittification, as its known, generally comes as social media platforms expand and need to squeeze money out of users in order to please investors and keep the lights on. Since Bluesky doesn’t plan to run ads, WIRED senior writer Kate Knibbs asked, how does Bluesky plan to make money? “Subscriptions are the first step,” Graber said, referring to a plan to have users pay a regular fee for the ability to upload higher-quality video, for example, or access certain customization features.

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[–] lvxferre@mander.xyz 15 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

And the scorpion vowed "I'm not going to sting you" to the frog.

[–] Emperor 9 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

It's worse than that - the scorpion might stick to its promise but hops off half-way across to be replaced by a far less amiable scorpion.

[–] lvxferre@mander.xyz 1 points 3 weeks ago

I like this analogy. And... yeah, it's true - even if the current owners might vow to not enshittify their platform, they'll likely cash out in the future, and the next owners will do it for them.