Norway's Consumer Council takes aim at enshittification
Norway's Forbrukerrådet consumer council is taking aim at the creeping enshittification of modern life in a 100-page report – and a splendid four-minute video which we highly recommend.
"Breaking Free: Pathways to a fair technological future" is a new report from Forbrukerrådet. The report itself is a light read: it's in English, and while it is 100 pages long [PDF], it is in fact enjoyable and even amusing – we laughed quite a few times when reading it. For one thing, it contains a surprising number of puns and the occasional starred-out swearword, such as "Do androids dream of electric s***." A stodgy bureaucratic report this is not.
Another bit of evidence that the report is both fun and accessible is that to go with it, the agency commissioned a short – and hilarious – film about the problem from NewsLab. It's called "A Day in the Life of an Ensh*ttificator," it's a second under four minutes long.
Youtube Video
In its own words, "the Norwegian Consumer Council is an independent, governmentally funded organization that advocates for consumers' rights." And while Forbrukerrådet is a Norwegian agency, those rights are routinely not so much infringed as shredded and stamped upon by companies all around the world, mostly from outside Norway. As such, the report is in English – and very accessible English at that.
The five main sections of the report are "The internet we want," "What is enshittification?," "How does enshittification happen?," "Generative AI is the next frontier of enshittification," and "A path to revive the internet: policy recommendations". It also gives credit where it's due:
Any Register reader is doubtless aware of the general trend – The Register interviewed Doctorow about it in 2024 – but this has concrete examples, and gives you non-technical material to explain the problem to managers and other powers that be.
As well as social media, with section headings such as "Enter the Metaworse," it discusses the problem of renting access to material instead of owning it – notably with a section on video games, called "Insert coin to continue." It looks at the unfairness of Tiktok's prioritization algorithms ("Drop it like it's hot"). It discusses the increasing restrictions from services such as Netflix in "Streaming Pile." In "Hell on Wheels," it talks about the problems of constantly digitally connected cars – a particular issue in Norway, which has the highest proportion of EV sales in the world. The Driven reported earlier this month that 98 percent of new car sales were EVs, with just 12 petrol car sales nationally in February.
In "Home Invasion," it looks at the problem of smart devices, and in "Print Scream" at printers with DRM-locked supplies. It looks at Microsoft's control over browser choice ("Close to the Edge"), how much Google pays Apple to be iDevices' default search engine, at dating apps ("A match made in hell"), at ride-hailing apps in "Drive fast and break things," at ownership of social networks in "Competition is for Zuckers". Seriously, come for the section headings, then stay for the text.
It does touch upon the greater issues of digital sovereignty, tech regulation, and so on, but this is from the consumer council. We do hope that it encourages some similar studies focusing on business, as well. The issues of ownership and renting-not-buying apply on an even bigger scale to SaaS and cloud computing in general. It is part of a campaign and the agency also has open letters to the Norwegian authorities [PDF, på norsk 🇳🇴] and European policymakers [PDF, in English].
It's not as long as it sounds – there are multiple full-page illustrations, and 20 pages of footnotes at the end. It's recommended reading for anyone trying to fight this trend, whether you're trying to persuade your parents or the board of directors.
Finn Lützow-Holm Myrstad, director of digital policy at the Norwegian Consumer Council, told The Register:
"We wanted to outline a more positive vision for what digital services could look like in the future – and how to get there. We are really happy to see that our report resonates with a lot of people, and will use this as a foundation for our advocacy work going forward – to help foster services built on open source and open protocols, interoperability, portability and decentralization, shift the power imbalance between consumers, Big Tech and alternative service providers, and work for stronger enforcement of the DMA and competition law more broadly.
"This is clearly a cross-boarder issue, illustrated by having more than 70 organizations from from Europe an the US joining our campaign." ®
