agentic-search/notes/enshittification.md

Enshittification, origin and meaning - example prompt and response

I had a chat with Mark Dalgarno, he asked me if I knew the term Enshittification. I do, but I got the author wrong. I decided to ask some local llms, and they were mostly funny, but not accurate about the source, and also not always the meaning. Llama3.1 was honest, and said it did not know.

So I fed it into the agentic search using a similar prompt as the ddd studies

Prompt

*Research What is enshittification, and who came up with it? Analyze Developments around enshittification in the last five years, and related concepts. Answer What is enshittification, and what does it mean for society?

Processing

It performed at least three searches on Duck Duck Go, and it got rate limited for the first time. The script I use to interface with DDG tries to behave itself. See pyproject.toml for source.

'it' was hf.co/unsloth/Qwen3-30B-A3B-GGUF:Q5_K_M

Search queries generated

All with a count of 5 (5 results?) and SafeSearch 'moderate'.

• origin of enshittification term
• enshittification developments last 5 years

This query got rate limited. It is interesting to see in the 'think' section below that the LLM noticed the errors and dealt with it. It tried related concepts to enshittification and that failed as well.

Thinking tokens

The interesting bit is at the bottom "Since the tool calls are causing issues, it's better to use the existing data to formulate the response."

Okay, the user is asking about the origin of the term "enshittification." Let me check the tools available. There's the ddg-search-duckduckgo_web_search function, but the previous attempt resulted in errors like "DDG detected an anomaly" and "Rate limit exceeded." Hmm, maybe the user tried to fetch too many results or there's a limit on the number of searches. Since the initial search didn't work, perhaps I should try a different approach. Wait, the user provided some search results from Wikipedia, etymonline, Merriam-Webster, Wiktionary, and Know Your Meme. Maybe I can use that information directly instead of calling the function again. The user might not need the tool call if the answer is already in the provided results. Let me summarize the origin based on those sources. The term was coined by Cory Doctorow in 2022, meaning the deliberate worsening of services for profit. The Wikipedia entry mentions it's also called platform decay. Etymonline says it's from "enshittify" meaning to make worse. Merriam-Webster explains the structure of the word. So, combining these points, the answer should cover the origin, definition, and examples from the sources provided. Since the tool calls are causing issues, it's better to use the existing data to formulate the response.

Response

The term "enshittification" was coined in 2022 by Canadian-English tech writer Cory Doctorow. It describes the process by which online platforms or services deliberately degrade in quality over time, often to prioritize profit over user experience. Here's a breakdown of its origin and meaning based on the sources:

1. Coined by Cory Doctorow:

   • The term originated as a satirical take on "crapification" or "platform decay," reflecting how companies shift focus from users to shareholders, leading to worse services (e.g., invasive data collection, ad overload, reduced functionality).

2. Etymology:

   • Combines the prefix "en-" (meaning "to cause to be") with "shittier" (a vulgar slang term for worse) and the suffix "-ification" (denoting a process of making). It literally translates to "making something shittier."

3. Definition:

   • A deliberate strategy by companies to degrade their offerings over time, often to maximize profits. For example, Twitter's evolution under Elon Musk was cited as an example of "enshittification" in some sources.

4. Popularization:

   • While Doctorow popularized the term, it has since been adopted in discussions about tech ethics, corporate accountability, and the decline of user-centric platforms.

For more context, you can explore the Wikipedia entry or etymonline. Let me know if you'd like further details!