"Hello, and welcome to Decoder. This is Sarah Jeong, features editor at The Verge. I'm standing in for Nilay for one final Thursday episode here as he settles back into full-time hosting duties. Today, we've got a fun one. I'm talking to Cory Doctorow, prolific author, internet activist, and arguably one of the fiercest tech critics writing today. He has a new book out called Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It."
"Enshittification as a term is relatively new - Cory only coined it a few years ago to explain a phenomenon you'll hear him call platform decay, or the experience of a piece of software or a website becoming worse and worse over time. But the term has since become a kind of rallying cry among creatives, tech theorists, and others trying to make sense of where, exactly, the internet went so wrong."
"Now, with generative AI, it feels like everything in our digital lives is becoming enshittified in ways that are plainly obvious to even the most casual user of technology. So you'll also hear Cory and I delve into that intersection between the rise of so-called AI slop and enshittification - and why it's important that these two themes have so much overlap."
Enshittification names platform decay where software or websites become worse over time. The term was coined a few years ago to describe this phenomenon. The label has become a rallying cry among creatives, tech theorists, and others trying to make sense of where the internet went wrong. Everyday products and platforms feel meaningfully more terrible to users as a result. Generative AI contributes to enshittification by introducing pervasive AI slop that degrades digital experiences. Debates over copyright, Section 230, and other U.S. legal forces have influenced the shape and incentives of the tech industry.
Read at The Verge
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