> "What the fuck happened to the old, good internet?"
It was "free," which is impossible because software (especially usable software) is actually very expensive to create and services cost money to run. Since "free" is and always has been a lie, the market found all kinds of alternative ways to monetize. These are called "enshittification."
The concept is useful but I find his views on it oversimplified and one-sided to the point of being infantile. He avoids addressing the elephant in the room: the combination of users being price-anchored on "free" with the fact that software and services are anything but free. This dissonance guarantees a perverse market.
As someone who isn't a fan of Cory Doctorow, I find his writing on enshittification to be great, this piece included.