In today’s increasingly monopolized digital landscape, Cory Doctorow stands as one of tech’s most incisive critics, dissecting how the internet transformed from an open frontier into what he calls a “enshittified” wasteland. The acclaimed author, digital rights activist, and former European Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation has coined a term that perfectly captures the internet’s systematic degradation: “enshittification” — the process by which platforms decay from user-serving tools into profit-extraction machines.
The Three-Stage Decline of Digital Platforms
Doctorow’s “enshittification” theory outlines a predictable three-stage process that major platforms follow. First, platforms are good to users, offering genuine value and seamless experiences to build market share. Second, they abuse users to benefit business customers — flooding interfaces with ads, manipulating algorithms, and harvesting data. Finally, they abuse both users and business customers to benefit only shareholders, extracting maximum value while providing minimal service. This isn’t accidental degradation; it’s a deliberate business strategy enabled by monopolistic market positions.
Amazon: The Poster Child for Platform Decay
Amazon exemplifies this trajectory perfectly. The e-commerce giant once revolutionized online shopping with customer obsession as its stated mission. Today, search results are cluttered with sponsored products, genuine reviews are buried beneath fake ones, and the platform increasingly resembles a pay-to-play advertising marketplace rather than a customer-focused retailer. Doctorow argues that Amazon has moved “way past its prime,” transforming from a service that helped users find what they needed into one that manipulates them into buying what generates the highest margins.
“The internet is getting worse, fast,” Doctorow observes, “and the reason is that we’ve allowed a handful of companies to consolidate control over our digital lives.”
Cory Doctorow
The Broader Implications of Digital Feudalism
This “great enshittening” extends far beyond inconvenient shopping experiences. When platforms control information flow, they wield unprecedented power over public discourse, democratic processes, and economic opportunity. Search engines manipulate what information we access, social media algorithms determine which voices we hear, and e-commerce platforms decide which businesses succeed. The result is what Doctorow calls “digital feudalism” — a system where a few tech barons control the infrastructure that modern life depends upon.
The privacy implications are equally alarming. As platforms prioritize advertising revenue, user data becomes the primary commodity, leading to surveillance capitalism that treats personal information as raw material for behavioral prediction and manipulation. Users aren’t customers in this model; they’re the product being sold to advertisers.
Key Takeaways
- Enshittification follows a predictable three-stage pattern: attract users, exploit users for business customers, then exploit everyone for shareholders.
- Amazon’s transformation from customer-obsessed retailer to advertising-driven marketplace illustrates this process in action.
- Platform monopolization enables this degradation by eliminating competitive pressure to maintain quality.
- The solution requires regulatory intervention, antitrust enforcement, and user advocacy for digital rights.
Reclaiming the Digital Commons
Doctorow’s critique isn’t merely diagnostic — it’s a call for systemic change. He advocates for antitrust enforcement to break up tech monopolies, interoperability standards that prevent platform lock-in, and digital rights legislation that puts users back in control of their online experiences. The goal isn’t to destroy these platforms but to restore the competitive dynamics that once made them innovative and user-focused.
As we navigate an increasingly digital world, Doctorow’s framework provides essential vocabulary for understanding how we got here and what we must do to build a better internet. The “great enshittening” isn’t inevitable — it’s the result of policy choices that can be reversed with sufficient political will and public pressure.
