WhatsApp introduces ads in its app

everyone saw this coming the day facebook bought it, but the real issue isn't ads in status . it's that the platform is now locked into meta's attention monetization engine. the founders explicitly said no ads. now not only ads, but paid channels, algorithmic exposure, and user segmentation creeping in. most people won't switch because of network effects, so meta can keep tightening the screws. this isn't about revenue, it's about control. they’re reshaping a private messaging tool into a broadcast platform with tracking hooks. and most users won’t even notice until it’s too embedded to undo

It is becoming painfully apparent that the cycle of enshittification is truly inevitable, right up there next to the second law of thermodynamics.

Maybe not the best example. Whatsapp started out as a paid service (even if it was comparably cheap, somewhere around a dollar per year comes to mind), but that didn't help them. They have followed the same trajectory as everyone else.

No one exists in isolation, if the market values your user base at ten billion then that is what it is. That also indirectly means someone with deep pockets could spend that order of magnitude of resources to compete with you. No one really wants to know how customer acquisition or sausages are made.

The best counter example is perhaps wikipedia. But they exist in a very special niche. Lots of people have tried foundations in other places only to be outspent by a loss leader.

> but that didn't help them

What do you mean that didn't help them? They were doing quite fine up to the acquisition, no?