The Enshittificiation of Youtube

Youtube used to have a feature I was particularly fond of — a little button at the bottom of the Youtube screen that said “Autoplay On” or Autoplay Off” as the mood took one.

I was always one for the “Autoplay Off”, because I did not think some featureless algorithm resident in Google headquarters could think of what I wanted at any one time.

I’m eclectic in my musical tastes — some times I have to have Bach, other times Jimi Hendrix, yet other times Buddy Emmons, and of course Sting singing to a lute some Elizabethan song, etc.

Now of late, that little button has been missing from Youtube. You get everything Youtube can throw at you, no matter what you wish.

Whatever happened to consumer’s right of choice? It appears to have been dragged out behind the shed and shot.

Cory Doctorow coined a wonderful neologism for this — enshittification.

Google in its arrogance has just ripped out the value of Youtube over commercial radio — the right to choosse, to make up your own playlist, and right not to have to swallow whatever the payola directed.