Enshittification
In Post-Capitalism Studies, enshittification explains the corporate lifecycle through three characteristic stages: Democratization, the proletariat erasure, and the rugpull.
Democratization
In common Tech©️Bro™️ jargon, democratization describes the initial stage of any corporate offering: a product in the form of a service (a produce) is promoted as disruptive, upsetting the status quo, truly revolutionary, and also blazingly fast (where applicable).
The produce is introduced in a deeply honored ritual known as the launch video featuring the messianic founder. In a well-lit but cringily staged setting, holding an uncomfortable relaxed posture, he (always) explains how him and his team of other bros paid more attention and were smarter than everybody else, and selflessly decided to build the produce because their souls are pure. The Product will be much better than the other Products, and permanently change people's lives for the better, where "lives" is a shorthand for "occupational productivity."
A chief imperative during democratization is that the produce cannot be seen as costing money. It is entirely an altruistic inititative to remove complexity and slowness from the world. Instead, it focuses on growth: attracting attention, and sometimes users, so that the gospel may spread and the world can be saved before it's consumed by the status quo. As the ratio of "what's that" to "will you shut up about it" reaches equilibrium, growth can be said to have been achieved.
The defining trait of growth is that growth must grow, always, and so the chief imperative of any produce is that more people should use it more. The growth stage is, however, closely followed by the "fuck what happened" stage, where the underlying system start revealing its non-linearities. Thus are telegraphed the tangible traits of enshittification: Service outages, data corruption, privacy breaches, product defects going unmitigated; exposed weaknesses and naïveté in the hearts of the founder and his foundlings. The natural reponse is to establish a narrative shield around the produce, commonly phrased as "we're a small indie company," "it's still early days," and "Kevin did it."
Proletariat erasure
Recovering from the collapsed jenga tower of Some Dude's Code, it has been made clear that That Popular Feature is not sustainable, and must be unceremoniously killed. Under the guise of "focusing on the core business" and "ensuring we can continue to bring value," limits are imposed, quotas are slashed, liberties are curtailed, and solemn promises are unceremoniously unkept. If your product was "freely upload unlimited things," it is now "pay to sometimes upload a few things, but be reasonable." When done right, this is seen as taking Responsibility™️to ensure Longevity™️and a Healthy Business Going Forward™️.
Eventually, the produce stabilizes and starts to bring in money, not only from individuals but also other businesses. Businesses, allegedly, have more money than people do, and so is announced the Pro Plan (sometimes called Product Plus, Product Max or Product Zero) where a corporate entity is allowed access to services entirely centered around exploitation.
Ultimately, the product stops caring about its users and will instead harvest their data in search of business opportunities. This is known as a pivot. In many cases, users will defend or even celebrate this: In one notable example, Imgur was created as an image host for Reddit, but could not figure out how to turn paying for bandwidth into a business.
By progressing this stage, the business customers become the real customers, humans become data, and the product can be seen as full enshittified in the eyes of the average observer.
The rugpull
As Elon Musk famously never said, "don't let facts get in the way of having a jolly old time." Despite rampant user dissatisfaction, declining revenues from "attention-enhancing initiatives," and a general sense that maybe the world didn't yearn for a blazingly fast recipe gathering app, The Founder surveys his haggard, overworked, vitamin D-deficient litter, and is faced with the uncomfortable realization that their business customers are making money that should be rightfully his. The solution? A full 360-degree pivot!
Introducing: The Everything Feature. Its sole goal is to replicate existing competitor functionality, but shittily, and un-opt-outable. Clicking links? Links to outside? There are bears outside! Links should be removed and replaced with The Everything Feature, further fertilizing the fun funnel, as should typing things such as "I don't like this anymore" or "please I'm stuck app won't close." Growth, in this stage, means "I will eat every single one of yous."
The final stage of the rugpull strictly follows this formula:
- Keep the helicopter on standby
- If the product didn't previously have chat, add chat
- If the product didn't previously have video, add video
- If the product didn't previously have gaming, add gaming
- Any genuinely useful feature killed in the proletariat erasure stage should be brought back in a premium-only shade of its former self, nerfed to oblivion and laughably broken
- Design a new logo and go for an IPO
- Take the cash, leave
- Start a podcast about "what I learned as an serial entrepreneur"