7 ms·

Also if this resulted in the "grow at any cost - monopolize - enshittify" playbook finally dying, I think it would in fact make the world a better place by a si

by xg15 3y ago

Also if this resulted in the "grow at any cost - monopolize - enshittify" playbook finally dying, I think it would in fact make the world a better place by a significant margin.

raincole 3y ago
It's a good strategy until everyone is doing it. Kinda like technical analysis.
- iamacyborg 3y ago
  I don’t think technical analysis has ever been a good strategy
- JumpinJack_Cash 3y ago
  Technical analysis only works if everyone is doing it.
- gopher_space 3y ago
  What does technical analysis mean in this context?
api 3y ago
That will only die when people start seeing “free” as a negative or a red flag, especially when it’s on a highly polished piece of software or a service that costs money to run. Until then it’s impossible to bootstrap because you’ll be eaten alive by someone with funding dumping on the market.
- phkahler 3y ago
  That will only die when people start seeing “free” as a negative or a red flag, especially when it’s on a highly polished piece of software or a service that costs money to run. August 1st Facebook shut down the servers for EchoVR, a formerly popular VR game. The announced it months ago. In the days leading up to the shutdown, people were still making fun of those who paid for optional items. You know, supported the game we were all going to miss. I said maybe if more people paid they might not shut it down. I think one kid actually had a bit of an epiphany.
  - dotnet00 3y ago
    That's not really the user's fault though. They didn't pay because the things to buy were not appealing enough. The developers should've either chosen a better monetization strategy or made the optional items sufficiently appealing. I've seen some other games too where people felt compelled to throw money at them because they feared that otherwise development would be halted and the servers shut down, and it has always been indicative of a game in a bad state (since it typically means that the players are seeing the player count on Steam etc and realizing that the game is likely financially unsustainable).
    - phkahler 3y ago
      >> That's not really the user's fault though. They didn't pay because the things to buy were not appealing enough. My point was that people not only don't pay if they don't have to, they ridicule those who do, even while enjoying the benefit provided by those who do. It's a weird disconnect rooted in selfishness.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      >They didn't pay because the things to buy were not appealing enough. There are a lot of things I don't buy (both online and off) because I'm not willing to pay what they're sold for--which may or may not be what they cost. I don't have an unlimited pile of money. And most things end eventually although if they're commoditized enough they may end up continuing to be offered by somebody/somebodies at some price.
- BaseballPhysics 3y ago
  That entire playbook is predicated on cheap and plentiful VC money. If that money dries up--which was the premise of the original comment--that strategy will die off, regardless of consumer behaviour.
baq 3y ago
Enshittification is basically monetization, so… it’s only going to get worse as they invent new ways of ‘extracting value’.
- Gigachad 3y ago
  Tbh I’m only bothered by the annoying and shitty ways they do it. Stuff like spamming notifications, spamming my email, annoying popups, addiction mechanics, etc. I’m quite happy with the products where you just directly pay them and receive a service. Fastmail monatizes their users and doesn’t have to do it in a shitty way.
  - moffkalast 3y ago
    The problem, as I understand it, is that direct monetization only provides fixed growth and isn't enough for what venture capitalists demand. So the only solution that satisfies them is to continuously invent new and more insidious dark patterns to monetize the existing users.
    - ghaff 3y ago
      >continuously invent new and more insidious dark patterns to monetize the existing users. Which by and large doesn't work but staves off the inevitable for a while. A lot of news has been in this boat for a while. More obnoxious patterns trying to get you to subscribe. More ads. While cutting staff to the bone and more. (And that's not even VCs for the most part.) A lot of things that people want, not enough are willing to actually pay for.
      - mrguyorama 3y ago
        >A lot of things that people want, not enough are willing to actually pay for. Except in a capitalistic system, owners will not be satisfied with ANY price because the number has to keep going up.
      - dredmorbius 3y ago
        A lot of traditional newspaper orgs have been bought be private equity, with Alden Global Capital being among the most notorious at present, ranked as the second-largest newspaper operator in the US as of July of this year: <https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/11/alden-global-capital-killing-americas-newspapers/620171/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/11/alden-g...> <https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/11/business/media/maine-newspapers-nonprofit.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/11/business/media/maine-news...>
blantonl 3y ago
significant margin That's what is missing in these cases
nologic01 3y ago
Without precluding such positive surprises, there is currently little available evidence that they are coming soon.
rhyme-boss 3y ago
Surely the solution is higher executive compensation and more coding challenges in engineer interview process.
- dehrmann 3y ago
  These concerns are mostly orthogonal to the "grow at any cost - monopolize - enshittify" playbook. That, and startup executives at this stage are doing ok, but not spectacularly well.
yieldcrv 3y ago
enshittify seems like it came from an MBA targeted podcast one that I dont listen to I’ve only seen that word on Hackernews How are you all influenced to repeat that word? Which “thought leader” hooked you?
- zomglings 3y ago
  I believe it was Cory Doctorow: https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/ https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/
  - yieldcrv 3y ago
    is there something to know about him aside from being a writer at Wired? is he a guest author with additional clout? are people really reading Wired and influenced by it? its surprising how the data brokers haven't gotten me stuck in this algorithm based echo chamber. Its like his works must get shared around FAANG company chats, or a mailing list that all YC applicants get subscribed to out of prerequisite.
    - dredmorbius 3y ago
      <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Doctorow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Doctorow> <https://craphound.com/bio/ https://craphound.com/bio/>
    - pastage 3y ago
      Such a strange question, I do not know what you value! He has written good books that cover complication of DRM etc. in a popular way, and is a prolific writer. Has made it easier for me to discuss these things with unintiated. I was never into Boing Boing but it was really shared a lot back in the day.
      - yieldcrv 3y ago
        I value adults using words that aren't attempts at being edgy while masquerading as a refined lexicon I would say its a very niche group thats out of touch, but actually maybe Cory is on to something modern, he needed to become relevant to everyone that wasn't still reporting capital loss carryovers from 1999 mission accomplished
tschellenbach 3y ago
Well, the same playbook is happening right now for AI
pembrook 3y ago
That playbook has been around loooong before the 2010s VC-boom. It's pretty much as old as history itself. Aristotle complained about some dude corning the market in Olive Presses back in 300ish BC. I wouldn't bet on humans changing any time soon.

by xg15 3y ago

Also if this resulted in the "grow at any cost - monopolize - enshittify" playbook finally dying, I think it would in fact make the world a better place by a significant margin.

raincole 3y ago

It's a good strategy until everyone is doing it. Kinda like technical analysis.

iamacyborg 3y ago
I don’t think technical analysis has ever been a good strategy
JumpinJack_Cash 3y ago
Technical analysis only works if everyone is doing it.
gopher_space 3y ago
What does technical analysis mean in this context?

api 3y ago

That will only die when people start seeing “free” as a negative or a red flag, especially when it’s on a highly polished piece of software or a service that costs money to run. Until then it’s impossible to bootstrap because you’ll be eaten alive by someone with funding dumping on the market.

phkahler 3y ago
That will only die when people start seeing “free” as a negative or a red flag, especially when it’s on a highly polished piece of software or a service that costs money to run. August 1st Facebook shut down the servers for EchoVR, a formerly popular VR game. The announced it months ago. In the days leading up to the shutdown, people were still making fun of those who paid for optional items. You know, supported the game we were all going to miss. I said maybe if more people paid they might not shut it down. I think one kid actually had a bit of an epiphany.
- dotnet00 3y ago
  That's not really the user's fault though. They didn't pay because the things to buy were not appealing enough. The developers should've either chosen a better monetization strategy or made the optional items sufficiently appealing. I've seen some other games too where people felt compelled to throw money at them because they feared that otherwise development would be halted and the servers shut down, and it has always been indicative of a game in a bad state (since it typically means that the players are seeing the player count on Steam etc and realizing that the game is likely financially unsustainable).
  - phkahler 3y ago
    >> That's not really the user's fault though. They didn't pay because the things to buy were not appealing enough. My point was that people not only don't pay if they don't have to, they ridicule those who do, even while enjoying the benefit provided by those who do. It's a weird disconnect rooted in selfishness.
  - ghaff 3y ago
    >They didn't pay because the things to buy were not appealing enough. There are a lot of things I don't buy (both online and off) because I'm not willing to pay what they're sold for--which may or may not be what they cost. I don't have an unlimited pile of money. And most things end eventually although if they're commoditized enough they may end up continuing to be offered by somebody/somebodies at some price.
BaseballPhysics 3y ago
That entire playbook is predicated on cheap and plentiful VC money. If that money dries up--which was the premise of the original comment--that strategy will die off, regardless of consumer behaviour.

baq 3y ago

Enshittification is basically monetization, so… it’s only going to get worse as they invent new ways of ‘extracting value’.

Gigachad 3y ago
Tbh I’m only bothered by the annoying and shitty ways they do it. Stuff like spamming notifications, spamming my email, annoying popups, addiction mechanics, etc. I’m quite happy with the products where you just directly pay them and receive a service. Fastmail monatizes their users and doesn’t have to do it in a shitty way.
- moffkalast 3y ago
  The problem, as I understand it, is that direct monetization only provides fixed growth and isn't enough for what venture capitalists demand. So the only solution that satisfies them is to continuously invent new and more insidious dark patterns to monetize the existing users.
  - ghaff 3y ago
    >continuously invent new and more insidious dark patterns to monetize the existing users. Which by and large doesn't work but staves off the inevitable for a while. A lot of news has been in this boat for a while. More obnoxious patterns trying to get you to subscribe. More ads. While cutting staff to the bone and more. (And that's not even VCs for the most part.) A lot of things that people want, not enough are willing to actually pay for.
    - mrguyorama 3y ago
      >A lot of things that people want, not enough are willing to actually pay for. Except in a capitalistic system, owners will not be satisfied with ANY price because the number has to keep going up.
    - dredmorbius 3y ago
      A lot of traditional newspaper orgs have been bought be private equity, with Alden Global Capital being among the most notorious at present, ranked as the second-largest newspaper operator in the US as of July of this year: <https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/11/alden-global-capital-killing-americas-newspapers/620171/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/11/alden-g...> <https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/11/business/media/maine-newspapers-nonprofit.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/11/business/media/maine-news...>

blantonl 3y ago

significant margin That's what is missing in these cases

nologic01 3y ago

Without precluding such positive surprises, there is currently little available evidence that they are coming soon.

rhyme-boss 3y ago

Surely the solution is higher executive compensation and more coding challenges in engineer interview process.

dehrmann 3y ago
These concerns are mostly orthogonal to the "grow at any cost - monopolize - enshittify" playbook. That, and startup executives at this stage are doing ok, but not spectacularly well.

yieldcrv 3y ago

enshittify seems like it came from an MBA targeted podcast one that I dont listen to I’ve only seen that word on Hackernews How are you all influenced to repeat that word? Which “thought leader” hooked you?

zomglings 3y ago
I believe it was Cory Doctorow: https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/ https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/
- yieldcrv 3y ago
  is there something to know about him aside from being a writer at Wired? is he a guest author with additional clout? are people really reading Wired and influenced by it? its surprising how the data brokers haven't gotten me stuck in this algorithm based echo chamber. Its like his works must get shared around FAANG company chats, or a mailing list that all YC applicants get subscribed to out of prerequisite.
  - dredmorbius 3y ago
    <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Doctorow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cory_Doctorow> <https://craphound.com/bio/ https://craphound.com/bio/>
  - pastage 3y ago
    Such a strange question, I do not know what you value! He has written good books that cover complication of DRM etc. in a popular way, and is a prolific writer. Has made it easier for me to discuss these things with unintiated. I was never into Boing Boing but it was really shared a lot back in the day.
    - yieldcrv 3y ago
      I value adults using words that aren't attempts at being edgy while masquerading as a refined lexicon I would say its a very niche group thats out of touch, but actually maybe Cory is on to something modern, he needed to become relevant to everyone that wasn't still reporting capital loss carryovers from 1999 mission accomplished

tschellenbach 3y ago

Well, the same playbook is happening right now for AI

pembrook 3y ago

That playbook has been around loooong before the 2010s VC-boom. It's pretty much as old as history itself. Aristotle complained about some dude corning the market in Olive Presses back in 300ish BC. I wouldn't bet on humans changing any time soon.