My Losing Battle With Enshittification

Enshittification. It’s everywhere. It’s the current reality of the Internet. From Web pages that look like Christmas trees with popups, auto-playing videos and reloading ads with flashy graphics, to the mind-control rectangle you may be using to read this page.

But can you fight back? Believe me, I’ve tried. It’s the reason this blog has returned. I couldn’t keep donating my delicious data to super-villainous billionaires and corporations that will use it to train useless AI, or worse. Let me introduce you to my war against the shitty Web.

Xitter

• App Status: uninstalled.
• Use: account archived and left to rot.
• Alternative: I am now on Bluesky.
• W/L: W. I lost touch with a good number fine accounts, but it’s their fault they’re clinging to that shitshow.

YouTube

• App Status: uninstalled.
• Use: strictly from a browser with Ad Blocker.
• Alternative: paying for YouTube Premium? LOL, no. They lost all my good will by going scorched-earth with ads in their free version to goad me to pay for it. I’d pay for an ad blocker a million times.
• W/L: W

Facebook

• App Status: uninstalled.
• Use: on one browser I use exclusively for Facebook, so it doesn’t keep track of my Web surfing.
• Alternative: I am fine logging to Facebook once every other week, and not lingering there long.
• W/L: W

Netflix

• App Status: installed.
• Use: subscribed and sharing my account.
• Alternative: if you think I was going to say other streaming services, ha. If you think I was going to say piracy, hi-ho!
• W/L: W. If I have to drop it, I know where to go.

Amazon

• App Status: installed.
• Use: subscribed to Prime.
• Alternative: no serious challengers. A sad, boxy store with a massive parking lot?
• W/L: L

Apple Music

• App Status: installed.
• Use: they deleted 20 years of personal curated playlists because I failed to pay for their cloud services.
• Alternative: this app became terminally enshittified when it changed its name from iTunes. The option is Spotify, but I travel and they geo-fence my account and I am not always listening to music while online.
• W/L: L

Google

• App Status: installed.
• Use: far more than I’d like.
• Alternative: their services are getting worse each day. I am eyeing DuckDuckGo for search. For mail, I am screwed.
• W/L: L

WhatsApp

• App Status: uninstalled.
• Use: I deleted my account years ago, the random spam messages to my number made me uncomfortable.
• Alternative: no shortage of apps that do the same, but it’s scary the amount of small business that decide the best way to contact them is through WhatsApp.
• W/L: L

Reddit

• App Status: installed.
• Use: it’s gathering dust in my mind-control rectangle.
• Alternative: everything has gone to hell.
• W/L: L

Every Commercial Software

• App Status: installed?
• Use: I am happy to pay for a reasonable one-time purchase. If they offer nothing but a subscription, they aren’t getting a single penny from me.
• Alternative: open-source alternatives or avast, sail-ho ye mateys.
• W/L: W

What isn’t enshittified in 2024?

Wikipedia

The undisputed best page in the Web. All the information you’re looking for with no popups, ads, auto-playing videos, paywalls, share-raising gimmicks like crypto nor AI-generated content. Why? Their business model is similar to your local library’s¹.

RSS

I needed a feed that isn’t tracking my every move, isn’t curating information based on a manipulative algorithm. Turns out, we had it all along. Many Web sites still support good ol’ RSS, and there are a few apps out there that help you customize your experience. My RSS app has replaced almost every social media app out there. Do I miss the comments? What do you think? Would you?

It’s not difficult to guess. The expectation of corporations to report infinite growth to shareholders comes at the expense of destroying the quality of their products, services and the job stability of their employees. Remove that expectation, and go from there.