YouTube disallowing adblockers, Reddit charging for API usage, Twitter blocking non-registered users. These events happen almost at the same time. Is this one of the effects of the tech bubble burst?
I think it’s a consequence of higher interest rates drying up VC money, meaning that tech companies now have to actually be profitable, rather than just grow.
If the plan was grow now, profit later, then later has come
This is also a great example of why higher interest rates aren’t automatically a terrible thing. In general, it’s probably a good sign for the economy that companies are expected to be profitable. Means resources are being used well. The limitless VC money kinda meant any dumb idea regardless of merit got funding.
I wish we lived in a society where not everything needed to be profitable. People deserve treats and sucks to have things that made our lives better go awake because shareholders demand money
Whether we like the ongoing enshittification of Reddit or not, I think it’s fair that shareholders expect a return on their investment and they have the right to pressure spez to seek aggressive monetization of the platform.
That problem wouldn’t have existed if Reddit was a non-profit though, like the Wikimedia Foundation.
Nailed it, investors are demanding profit increases, it’s not just interest rates (though they’re the main reason) but also the corporate tax cuts in 2018 basically dumped a ton of profit onto corporations because they repatriated all their offshore cash they’d been hoarding.
That bump lasted 2 years, but the expectation of higher revenue is still there, it doesn’t matter if you got lucky at slots last month, if you make your normal salary this month investors will be absolutely pissed.
This sounds too stupid to be real but I was working for one of the largest corporations in the world during this period and we were congratulated on 20% growth even though we did nothing. Of course we didn’t get an extra bonus or anything but they acted like we had an incredible year when we really just had an average year with a massive tax cut.
Then the next year, our goal was to grow at 20% again and when we missed it by 17%, no one got a bonus or raise.
This timeline is the stupid one.
Capitalism: “Numbers go brrrrr”
This is what irritates me. You still made money just not as much as you wanted or hoped so your company punishes you. You can’t have infinite growth
You can’t have infinite growth
Every publicly-traded company: “Hold my beer”
Capitalism.
Capitalism is like cutting off your wings because you believe the reduced weight will make you fly higher.
It’s shocking how accurate at how the oblivious and infuriating it is.
Companies expect infinite profit growth
Venture capital has shifted very quickly from companies HOSTING content to companies SCRAPING content (LLM’s). This means renting compute is now very expensive and moving into the hands of ‘AI’ companies. It’s like trying to fly a plane while monkeys are tearing the wings of.
Short answer : Enshittification.
Long and brilliant explanation here : https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/
Original on Cory Doctorow’s own site here
This concept is also why I’m so hopeful for federated software. The federated model means that there’s no single instance that holds all the power. Many of these instances are run by admins of their own kindness and initiative. And at worst, if any instance were to start being “enshittified,” people could easily move to another instance and continue participating in the greater network.
Between all of what we’ve seen unfold in the last few months, and even weeks, on Twitter and Reddit, it’s safe to say that “enshittification” could be reaching critical mass. That’s why I came here, after all, and I’m looking forward to seeing this community simply persist here on the web.
Well, I hope the Fediverse works out. Otherwise I think were gonna have to go back to hand printing zines.
You joke, but Reddit did something to piss me off a few months before the current fuckery, and I decided to find an alt and there weren’t really any, like I found Mastodon but that’s more of a Twitter replacement, never encountered this site while searching. What I ended up doing was downloading a bunch of books and putting them on my phone, then putting the books app where my Apollo app used to be on my homescreen. Now, more often than not, when I go to scroll, I end up just opening a book. I’ve got a little over 40 on there, they keep my progress, even across devices, and they work when there’s no signal so I no longer have to fear public toilets with shitty cell signal lol.
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What app? I could use that for sure
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I’m ok with the YouTube one. Twitter dumb. Reddit not that bad but should have just charged people.
