Discover and read the best of Twitter Threads about #Enshittification
Most recents (24)
Amazon is a perfect #enshittification parable - platforms subsidize end users until they're locked in, then make life good for business customers at users' expense, until *they're* locked in, then claw back all the value they can, leaving just enough to keep the lock-in going.
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/06/14/fly…
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pluralistic.net/2023/06/14/fly…
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In a new report for @SOMO, @margaridasilva2 describes how the end-stage enshittification of Amazon is playing out in the #EU, with Amazon repeating its US playbook.
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Big Tech steals from news, but it doesn't steal *content* - it steals *money*. In my @EFF series "Saving News From Big Tech," I show how #AdTech and #AppStore monopolies yield vast transfers from news to tech, starving newsrooms and gutting reporting:
eff.org/deeplinks/2023…
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eff.org/deeplinks/2023…
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/06/13/cer…
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pluralistic.net/2023/06/13/cer…
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Now we've published the final part, describing how social media platforms hold audiences hostage, charging media companies to reach the subscribers who asked to see what they have to say.
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“you could simply describe Trump as a never-ending poop cruise, guaranteed to create new content daily. And I don’t know how Licht can solve that systemic problem, with or without Trump.”
#CNN
I have ideas in the next post…
vox.com/2022/8/26/2332…
#CNN
I have ideas in the next post…
vox.com/2022/8/26/2332…
Imagine a network that filled those no-breaking-news hours with mind-blowing civic education and systems-level narratives. Examples: What @maddow did with #Ultra. @doctorow dissections of the #enshittification of big tech and media. @HC_Richardson-style historical parallels…
Explaining how fascism works and why it works, the Tolerance Paradox, etc. Blowing the minds of white suburban people (like me!) with the history of redlining and stories like this…
It's no longer controversial to claim that #BigTech is a parasite on the #news business. But there's still a raging controversy over the nature of the parasitism, and, much more importantly, *what to do about it*.
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/05/18/ste…
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pluralistic.net/2023/05/18/ste…
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This week on @EFF's Deeplinks blog, I kick off a new series on the abusive relationship between Big Tech and the news, analyzing four different dirty practices and proposing policy answers to all four:
eff.org/deeplinks/2023…
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eff.org/deeplinks/2023…
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#Google's #AIHype Circle: We have to do #Bard because everyone else is doing #AI; everyone else is doing AI because we're doing Bard.
doctorow.medium.com/googles-ai-hyp…
doctorow.medium.com/googles-ai-hyp…
Google's plummeting search quality made the company desperate to please its "activist investors"
doctorow.medium.com/googles-ai-hyp…
#SecurityThroughObscurity #SearchQuality #Enshittification #Google
doctorow.medium.com/googles-ai-hyp…
#SecurityThroughObscurity #SearchQuality #Enshittification #Google
Google can improve search, or it can chase stock gains through #AIHype. It chose the latter
doctorow.medium.com/googles-ai-hyp…
doctorow.medium.com/googles-ai-hyp…
🚨🚨 Wondering why I'm pushing my 2023-2024 cycle Dem candidate fundraising pages so heavily this early? There's three reasons:
1. Best to lock in funding early, of course;
2. Virginia & New Jersey (as well as KY, LA & MS) have legislative and/or statewide elections THIS year;
1. Best to lock in funding early, of course;
2. Virginia & New Jersey (as well as KY, LA & MS) have legislative and/or statewide elections THIS year;
The *third* reason, however, is the most concerning: Due to Elon Musk's #Enshittification (h/t @doctorow) of Twitter, visibility/reach of my tweets has plummeted...which means these links aren't being seen by nearly as many people.
So...I'm pushing them even harder this cycle.
So...I'm pushing them even harder this cycle.
I hope this explains why I've been irritating folks feeds with links to XforZ.us as well as the individual fundraising pages.
The stakes are higher than ever this cycle. Dems MUST win at the federal, statewide *and* legislative levels!!
The stakes are higher than ever this cycle. Dems MUST win at the federal, statewide *and* legislative levels!!
It's a double-whammy that defines 21st century US life: a company is caught doing something exploitative or even murderous and a government agency steps in - but there's nothing it can do, because Reagan/Trump/Clinton/Bush I/II stripped the agency of enforcement powers.
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/05/08/cap…
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pluralistic.net/2023/05/08/cap…
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Man, that feels *awful*. The idea that extremists gutted our democratically accountable institutions so that there's *nothing* they can do, no matter how egregious a corporation's conduct is so demoralizing. Makes me feel like giving up.
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I'm many kinds of writer - novelist, journalist, activist, editorialist, screenwriter - but at core, I'm a #blogger. Every bit of interesting stuff that crosses my path gets turned into a blog post, which gets lodged in both a #WordPress database and my mind.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/05/06/peo…
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pluralistic.net/2023/05/06/peo…
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There, the ideas rub up against other interesting stuff and crystallizes into longer, more considered pieces:
doctorow.medium.com/the-memex-meth…
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doctorow.medium.com/the-memex-meth…
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Amazon is *very* proud of its #flywheel: first, they subsidized customers, luriing in sellers. Then they demanded lower prices, luring more buyers. With more customers, more sellers piled in. Faster the flywheel spins, creating the #EverythingStore:
fourweekmba.com/amazon-flywhee…
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fourweekmba.com/amazon-flywhee…
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/gre…
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pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/gre…
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The flywheel is everywhere - they even teach it in business-schools. But Amazon is not a reliable narrator. It doesn't tell the truth about the flywheel. To understand what's really going on with the flywheel, you have apply #enshittification to it.
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Growing up in #Toronto, I held #NYC in awe. Per the joke, one Torontonian changes the lightbulb, the other goes New York to make sure lightbulbs are still in. I had a *great* place to stay in the City: my cousin Maxine's rent-controlled place in a midtown doorman building.
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/04/21/bon…
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pluralistic.net/2023/04/21/bon…
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Max was impossibly glamorous: a perfectly coiffed office manager at Colgate-Palmolive who earned an anthropology degree at CUNY, volunteered at the Brooklyn Zoo, and knew every trick for getting cheap tickets for museums, galleries and shows.
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Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).
Inside: SVB bailouts for everyone - except affordable housing projects; and more!
Archived at: pluralistic.net/2023/04/15/soc…
#Pluralistic
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Inside: SVB bailouts for everyone - except affordable housing projects; and more!
Archived at: pluralistic.net/2023/04/15/soc…
#Pluralistic
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There's just TWO DAYS left in the @Kickstarter for the audiobook of my anti-finance finance thriller about #SiliconValley scams, *Red Team Blues*. #Audible won't carry my audiobooks because they're #DRM free. Crowdfunding makes them possible!
redteamblues.com
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redteamblues.com
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SVB bailouts for everyone - except affordable housing projects: Even the shareholders got billions.
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#Enshittification is platforms devouring themselves: first they tempt users with goodies. Once users are locked in, goodies are withdrawn and dangled before businesses. Once business customers are stuck, all value is claimed for platform shareholders:
pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/pot…
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pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/pot…
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/alg…
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pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/alg…
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Enshittification isn't just another way of saying "fraud" or "price gouging" or "wage theft." Enshittification is intrinsically digital, because moving all those goodies around requires the flexibility that only comes with a *digital* businesses.
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When students of statistics are introduced to creating and interpreting models, they are introduced to George Box's maxim:
*All models are wrong, some are useful.*
It's a call for humility and perspective, a reminder to superimpose the messy world on your clean lines. 1/
*All models are wrong, some are useful.*
It's a call for humility and perspective, a reminder to superimpose the messy world on your clean lines. 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/04/03/all… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/04/03/all… 2/
Even with this benediction, modeling is forever prone to the cardinal sin of insisting that complex reality can be reduced to "a perfectly spherical cow of uniform density on a frictionless plane." 3/
As tech reaches terminal #enshittification, so hollowed that they're barely able to keep end-users or business customers locked in, capital's running the final #rugpull, where all value is transfered from those who make things for a living to those who own things for a living. 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/03/21/tec… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/03/21/tec… 2/
"#ActivistInvestors" have triggered massive waves of tech layoffs, firing so many #TechWorkers so quickly that it's hard to even come up with an accurate count. The total is somewhere around *280,000* workers:
layoffs.fyi 3/
layoffs.fyi 3/
Today's Twitter threads (a Twitter thread).
Inside: Spirit warned investors that merging with Jetblue would be illegal; and more!
Archived at: pluralistic.net/2023/03/12/the…
#Pluralistic 1/
Inside: Spirit warned investors that merging with Jetblue would be illegal; and more!
Archived at: pluralistic.net/2023/03/12/the…
#Pluralistic 1/
Spirit warned investors that merging with Jetblue would be illegal: Exhibit A for the prosecution.
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Hey look at this
* Freely readable 2023 #NebulaAwards nominees superpunch.net/2023/03/links-…
* Why Weren't #SiliconValleyBank Depositors Using CDARS? creditslips.org/creditslips/20…
* Users, advertisers – we are all trapped in the net's ‘#enshittification’ theguardian.com/commentisfree/… 3/
* Freely readable 2023 #NebulaAwards nominees superpunch.net/2023/03/links-…
* Why Weren't #SiliconValleyBank Depositors Using CDARS? creditslips.org/creditslips/20…
* Users, advertisers – we are all trapped in the net's ‘#enshittification’ theguardian.com/commentisfree/… 3/
Back in 2017 Long Island Ice Tea - known for its undistinguished, barely drinkable sugar-water - changed its name to "Long Blockchain Corp." Its shares surged to a peak of 400% over their pre-announcement price. 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/03/09/aut… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/03/09/aut… 2/
The company announced no specific integrations with any kind of blockchain, nor has it made any such integrations since. 3/
"End to End," is my new column for @LocusMag, proposing a policy for a better internet: the "#EndToEnd" principle (#E2E), a bedrock of the original design for the internet, updated for the modern, monopolized web, as a way of #disenshittifying it:
locusmag.com/2023/03/commen… 1/
locusmag.com/2023/03/commen… 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/03/07/dis… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/03/07/dis… 2/
The original E2E marked the turning point from telco-based systems where power was gathered at the center, controlled by carriers, to the packet-switched internet, where power moved to the edges. Under the old model, only the network operator could add new features. 3/
This week on my #podcast, I read #Twiddler, a recent @Medium column in which I delve more deeply into #enshittification, and how it is a pathology of digital platforms, distinct from the rent-seeking of the analog world that preceded it:
doctorow.medium.com/twiddler-1b5c9… 1/
doctorow.medium.com/twiddler-1b5c9… 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/02/27/kno… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/02/27/kno… 2/
Enshittification, you'll recall, is the lifecycle of the online platform: first, the platform allocates #surpluses to end-users; then, once users are locked in, those surpluses are taken away and given to business-customers. 3/
In 1998, two Stanford students published "The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine," in which they wrote, "Advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of consumers."
research.google/pubs/pub334/ 1/
research.google/pubs/pub334/ 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/02/24/pas… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/02/24/pas… 2/
The co-authors were Lawrence Page and Sergey Brin, and the "large-scale hypertextual web search-engine" they were describing was their new project, which they called "#Google." They were 100% correct - prescient, even! 3/
The DoJ's antitrust lawsuit against #Google triggered an avalanche of pearl-clutching editorials from establishment lawyers and economists who argue that such a move is both counterproductive and legally incoherent. 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/02/13/the… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/02/13/the… 2/
These Very Bad Takes are only to be expected, since they emanate from ideologues who volunteered to serve as Renfields for vampiric monopolists. 3/
When George Hayward was a Facebook data-scientist, his bosses ordered him to run a #NegativeTest, updating Messenger to deliberately drain users' batteries to determine how power-hungry various options were. Hayward refused. FB fired him. He sued:
nypost.com/2023/01/28/fac… 1/
nypost.com/2023/01/28/fac… 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/bat… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/bat… 2/
Hayward balked because he knew that among the 1.3 billion people who use Messenger, some would be placed in harm's way if Facebook deliberately drained their batteries. 3/
#Netflix has unveiled the details of its new anti-#PasswordSharing policy, detailing a suite of complex gymnastics that customers will be expected to undergo if their living arrangements trigger @netflix's automated enforcement mechanisms:
thestreamable.com/news/confirmed… 1/
thestreamable.com/news/confirmed… 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/02/02/non… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/02/02/non… 2/
Netflix says that its new policy allows members of the same "#household" to share an account. 3/
In the #enshittification cycle, a #platform lures users with a good deal at first, then it lures business customers (advertisers, sellers, creators) by handing them the #surplus; finally, it takes all the surplus for itself, creating a pile of shit:
pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/pot… 1/
pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/pot… 1/
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
pluralistic.net/2023/01/27/ens… 2/
pluralistic.net/2023/01/27/ens… 2/
When a company is neither disciplined by #competition nor by #regulation, enshittification inevitably ensues. 3/
A fun coda to this. When Twitter brought in pay-for-blue-or-we'll-hide-your-tweets-from-your-followers, they changed the pop-up text for "legacy" ticks to "Verified account. This is a legacy verified account. It may or may not be notable."
However, the literal *instant* I paid $8, the tooltip changed to "Verified account. This account is verified because it's notable in government, news, entertainment or another designated category."
The amount of verification New Twitter undertook to transform the old tooltip to the new one is, of course, zero.
New Twitter trusts Old Twitter's judgments of "notability," but only when $8 changes hands.
The only thing they "verified" was that I had $8.
New Twitter trusts Old Twitter's judgments of "notability," but only when $8 changes hands.
The only thing they "verified" was that I had $8.
