I’m over this word enshitification. There are far simpler ways to say it, but everyone online has latched on to this moronic term.
Honest question: What are the alternstives?
I agree that enshittification is a, well, shitty term, but I know obly it to describe the problem at hand.
Alternstives I think of are walled gardens, collapse of the internet as we know it, lockdown of social media sites, etc. - none of them all that simple and miss the point enshittification has.
The only other good term for Enshittification I’ve seen used is Platform Decay. It was even coined by the same person who coined enshittification.
Decay is a natural process however that just happens if you don’t stop it. I still think ‘enshittification’ fits it best because it implies a bit of intentionality on the part of the shittifiers.
The term is sticky (ewww) and I think we are stuck with it.
I mean, it’s unavoidable. Everyone draws their own line in the sand based on what they think is “right” and “wrong”, using whatever best tools and ideas are available to them, picked from the avalanche of options.
The line will not stay put from generation to generation, that’s not a reasonable thing to ask for. If we go back 50 years when tv was king, it’s not like all the tv shows were equally good, or stayed good.
So, it’s kinda just on us to seek out and pick the right things to support, and be prepared in case those change too. It’s kinda the whole reason I’m personally here on the Fediverse. I mean, back in the stone age our ancestors had to do the same things, its not like their environments always just stayed perfect. If something changes and you don’t want to starve to death, you gotta just do something. Can’t just wish it away.
Death is unavoidable.
Doesn’t mean I stand in a ditch waiting to die.
I’ll rage against the dying light thank you very much.
Thing is, most people don’t want to pay for services that to them seemed to be free since forever. And this creates collective social pressure to follow suit. Nothing a big company offers is ever free. You’re just paying in alternate currency.
Screw em companies, only Lemmy devs get my money.
It’s also reasonable to donate to your instance admin (although in your case for lemmy.ml, that’s the same people).
It’s gross though. Say you started to pay, they would still force ads into their product because they’re greedy and demanding more money. We’re seeing this with streaming sites now.
The funny thing is with youtube, for example, I am a premium user. I deactivated all tracking of my habits on there. Now I am greeted, as a homepage, with nothing else than a call to action to reactivate said tracking. As a paying customer I see less (as in none at all) content on the homepage than an anonymous user would. I am subbed to 170+ channels. Yet they tell me they cannot come up with suggestions unless they can track my every step on their platform. sus. And when saying funny I mean extremely aggravating.
It was like this in the late 90s…early 2000s, late 2000s,early 2010s…late 2010s…early 2020s…fuck
Ha! Recently went to breakfast with a couple of new neighbors (partners).
They were asking me what apps I enjoyed and I told them that I WAS enjoying Apollo. Told them I left Reddit. They sort looked at me. They later said they both worked at home. Their job was creating ad space for the web. One of them gave me the enshitification face. Sigh.
