- Cory Doctorow has a theory as to why technology platforms are deteriorating.
- He calls this process “encitization.”
- Doctorow believes that technology platforms intentionally create a poor user experience after locking users in.
Corey Doctorow has a theory as to why technology platforms seem to be stripped of all their joy. He calls it the great “encitization.”
The 52-year-old Canadian-British author coined the term as a way to describe the growing sense that the platforms run by Big Tech companies are fading beyond recognition.
It causes so many problems because billions of people are under their care.
The dangers of “hardened” platforms
Platforms play an almost essential role in today’s digital economy.
They connect buyers and sellers. They help people communicate from all corners of the world. and make information widely available.
For Doctorow, the platform itself is not the problem, as it plays an important intermediary function between the two sides of the market.
The problem for him is that they are now in an “encited” state where they appear to be “more important than the intermediaries on both sides of the market.”
“Why is Uber more important than drivers and passengers? Why is Amazon more important than sellers and buyers? Why are Facebook and Twitter more important than publishers and readers?” he told Business Insider.
His theory of how they got there involves a multi-step process.
First, the platform plays well with potential users and engages them. Think about how social media companies first started their business by offering free sign-ups, or how companies like Netflix captured consumers’ attention with cheap subscriptions. please look.
Second, start locking in users. Companies like Facebook have cannibalized the market by acquiring competitors like Instagram, and have spent heavily to consolidate them. As a result, it becomes easier to extract more funds and data from users.
“Once a company takes control of a market and takes extra rent from the market, it becomes very difficult to regulate that company,” Doctorow said.
And then the platform starts attacking other people.
Apple isn’t immune either.
For Doctorow, the recent developer backlash against Apple over App Store changes made to comply with EU digital market law is a perfect example of this stage of “encitization.” The context is:
The European Commission has forced Apple to change the way it distributes apps on iPhones after ruling that the App Store is acting as an unfair “gatekeeper.” Apple will only allow developers to sell apps through its digital store and will take a 30% commission.
Although this change was supposed to be advantageous to developers, many deplored the change and even called it “hot garbage.” Apple will continue to maintain tight control over how apps are distributed by deciding which third-party digital stores to distribute them to. It will be available to users within the EU.
There will also be a new “core technology fee”, meaning developers will have to pay around 50 euro cents “for the first annual install of an app that exceeds the 1 million annual threshold”.
“This is absolutely shocking, and what they’re really saying is, we have $3 trillion and you’re only 500 million Europeans, fuck you,” Doctorow said. said. “Depending on how the European Commission and the EU act, and how Apple responds, we will be in a battle to shape the landscape for the next 10 years.”
It remains to be seen how much longer Doctorow can keep the platform going this way.
There’s always a risk that tech companies will continue to wield power against what he calls “narrative capitalism,” the idea that carefully crafted public image campaigns can help rebrand their platforms.
Zuckerberg’s transformation of Facebook into Meta may be one such example. The rebrand comes after the company came under intense scrutiny in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, which led to Zuckerberg’s first appearance on Capitol Hill.
Now, the company is putting AI first as its bet on the Metaverse isn’t paying off. Zuckerberg said AI will be the company’s biggest investment in 2023, as Meta embarks on its “year of efficiency.”
Will companies continue to engage in “ensiting”? Doctorow believes there are limits. “We intuitively know that it can’t happen forever.”