Tiktok's enshittification

Cory Doctorow · 21 Jan 2023

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Closing off interoperability is how a platform locks people in, and that lock-in is what lets the service be made worse without losing them.

Their wordsThe temptation to enshittify is magnified by the blocks on interoperability: when Twitter bans interoperable clients, nerfs its APIs, and periodically terrorizes its users by suspending them for including their Mastodon handles in their bios, it makes it harder to leave Twitter, and thus increases the amount of enshittification users can be force-fed without risking their departure.

Also said by Anil Dash

Read the piece on pluralistic.net ↗

7 korrents from this piece ↓

Cory Doctorow did not write this page.

Every claim below was made in this piece, quoted word for word and numbered in the order the piece makes them, so you can read it there rather than take our word for it. The sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording. Each quote was checked against a stored copy of the page at build time; where the two differ, the quote is the fact.

Our reading
Platforms die in a three-stage cycle: first they are good to users, then they abuse users on behalf of business customers, then they abuse everyone to claw the value back for themselves.

Their wordsHere is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves.
Our reading
A platform hands out free attention to creators only until they are committed to it, and then withdraws it and sells what they built.

Their wordsTiktok is only going to funnel free attention to the people it wants to entrap until they are entrapped, then it will withdraw that attention and begin to monetize it.
Our reading
There is no attention economy: attention cannot serve as money, so a platform must always convert it into cash at somebody's expense.

Their words"Monetize" is a terrible word that tacitly admits that there is no such thing as an "Attention Economy." You can't use attention as a medium of exchange.
Our reading
The end-to-end principle -- that a willing speaker's message reaches the willing listeners who asked for it -- is dead at the service level of today's internet.

Their wordsThe end-to-end principle is dead at the service level today.
Our reading
Closing off interoperability is how a platform locks people in, and that lock-in is what lets the service be made worse without losing them.
Mental modelLock-in and switching costs

Their wordsThe temptation to enshittify is magnified by the blocks on interoperability: when Twitter bans interoperable clients, nerfs its APIs, and periodically terrorizes its users by suspending them for including their Mastodon handles in their bios, it makes it harder to leave Twitter, and thus increases the amount of enshittification users can be force-fed without risking their departure.
Our reading
A dominant platform is more fragile than it looks, because pushing users far enough makes even the locked-in ones leave.
Mental modelLock-in and switching costs

Their wordsAn enshittification strategy only succeeds if it is pursued in measured amounts. Even the most locked-in user eventually reaches a breaking-point and walks away, or gets pushed.
Our reading
Policy should secure people's freedom to leave a platform while keeping their community, their purchases and their data, rather than try to keep dying platforms alive.
Mental modelLock-in and switching costs

Their wordsAnd policymakers should focus on freedom of exit – the right to leave a sinking platform while continuing to stay connected to the communities that you left behind, enjoying the media and apps you bought, and preserving the data you created

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The other pieces are the ones whose claims are worded most like this one's. That measures language, not agreement: they may argue the opposite.