On 6 January, at the New York Times Square Hotel, the 134-year-old American Dialect Society voted that ‘Enshittification’ should be named as the ‘Digital Word of the Year’ for 2023. The decision came after a vote, presided over by Ben Zimmer, chair of the ADS New Words Committee and language columnist for the Wall Stre

Enshittification became popular in 2023 after it was used in a blog post by author of The Internet Con, Cory Doctorow, who used it to describe how digital platforms can become worse and worse:

“Here 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. Then, they die. I call this enshittification.”

“Enshittification,” Cory Doctorow’s coinage describing the process by which internet media platforms become increasingly unusable and un-quittable, has been named 2023’s “Digital Word of the Year.” Here, we break down what the term means and Doctorow’s solution to the internet’s relentless enshittification.

  • Lantern@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    9 months ago

    That’s not what I’m saying here. Voting with your wallet implies that you expect to see some change as a result of your decision, I’m saying that you should make your decision with the expectation that a trend towards negative quality will continue.

    There are suitable alternatives to both subscription based services and filmed media. If you aren’t satisfied with something you’re paying for, it doesn’t make sense to keep on paying for that.