A few days ago we brought you word that Google was looking to crack down on “sideloaded” Android applications. That is, software packages installed from outside of the mobile operating …
The infuriating part of the Google enshittification process is that there is absolutely nothing the user can do about it.
Literally the only thing that motivates Google is profit. Controlling side-loaded apps will almost certainly boost their profits by a infinitesimal fraction of a percent, therefore it will be done. Even if consumer uproar causes Google to back down in the short term, they’ll simply implement this a few months later. Late-stage Capitalism sucks.
I think they are more conscious than to be driven by small margins (another example of such underestimation is Lenin’s “they’ll sell us the rope we’ll use to hang them”).
It’s like boiling frogs - a very slow process of attracting users, slowly killing competition and diversity, slowly making the ecosystem more and more controlled, then slowly making “neutral” systems not neutral anymore (like those features of Chrome making security exceptions for Google services found a few years ago), and slowly desensitizing people to leaps of faith they do trusting Google (and other companies), while the trust accumulates into total control.
The infuriating part of the Google enshittification process is that there is absolutely nothing the user can do about it.
Literally the only thing that motivates Google is profit. Controlling side-loaded apps will almost certainly boost their profits by a infinitesimal fraction of a percent, therefore it will be done. Even if consumer uproar causes Google to back down in the short term, they’ll simply implement this a few months later. Late-stage Capitalism sucks.
You can stop using all Google products. Now I understand their market share on the web means they’re going to continue to shape the web.
But make no mistake. There is something, however small, that you can do. De-Google.
I think they are more conscious than to be driven by small margins (another example of such underestimation is Lenin’s “they’ll sell us the rope we’ll use to hang them”).
It’s like boiling frogs - a very slow process of attracting users, slowly killing competition and diversity, slowly making the ecosystem more and more controlled, then slowly making “neutral” systems not neutral anymore (like those features of Chrome making security exceptions for Google services found a few years ago), and slowly desensitizing people to leaps of faith they do trusting Google (and other companies), while the trust accumulates into total control.