{"id":9079,"date":"2025-07-12T17:39:44","date_gmt":"2025-07-12T16:39:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.markwilson.co.uk\/blog\/?p=9079"},"modified":"2025-07-30T15:26:05","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T14:26:05","slug":"is-this-really-progress-the-myth-of-the-app-economy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.markwilson.co.uk\/blog\/2025\/07\/is-this-really-progress-the-myth-of-the-app-economy.htm","title":{"rendered":"Is this really progress? The downsides of the app economy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A simple plan goes sideways<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I should have just phoned the local taxi company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But no. I listened to my son \u2014 who, to be fair, meant well \u2014 and took a modern, app-based approach. \u201cUse Bolt,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just like Uber. I use it all the time.\u201d And that, it turns out, was the problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019re on holiday in Andaluc\u00eda, trying to get to a nearby village for dinner. I booked the ride through Bolt, selecting a pickup slot between 17:00 and 17:10. The app stressed the importance of punctuality: we<\/em> had to be outside on time, or the driver might only wait five minutes before cancelling. Fair enough. So at 16:57 we were all standing by the road, ready to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By 17:10, nothing had happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then the app admitted defeat. \u201cNo drivers available.\u201d Ride cancelled. “WTF? I booked that hours ago”, thought I. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Platform to nowhere<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

OK, so Bolt has no drivers and our evening plans are in disarray. So I tried Uber. First, it quotes a price. Then it suggests paying extra to \u201cincrease the chance of getting a ride\u201d. You know, because surge pricing and nudging people into premium options is apparently what counts as innovation now. Unsurprisingly, that didn\u2019t work either. After taking my money and several minutes of repeatedly trying to get a driver to take the ride, feasting on my iPhone battery and drinking my mobile data allowance, it finally gave up on the cutesey “sorry about the wait” and admitted that there we no drivers available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So here we are. No car. No ride. No confidence that we\u2019d even get back if we somehow found our own way there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I did everything right. I booked in advance. I turned up early. I trusted the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the system is broken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The slow death of a good idea<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

This is the very definition of enshittification<\/em> \u2014 the gradual degradation of a service as it prioritises growth, then revenue, then cost-cutting. What starts out as a great user experience slowly turns to dust as the platform corners the market and lets quality slide. First they undercut local businesses, drawing customers in. Then they ration supply, push up prices, and shrug when things go wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talking with my son about his experience back home, and it seems the traditional minicab firms are fewer and fussier \u2014 because they\u2019ve been undercut too. Just like high street shops were when Amazon trained us to expect fast, cheap delivery with no human interaction. And what happens when the competition\u2019s gone? Well, you can guess what happens to the prices and service levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

App-based everything<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s not just transport or retail. It\u2019s food delivery, hotel bookings, eBooks, music, even how we consume the news. Everything\u2019s an app. Everything\u2019s global. Everything\u2019s slick \u2014 until it isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And I\u2019m clearly not alone in thinking this. I recently reshared a post on LinkedIn<\/a> that echoed a lot of my frustrations. From self-checkouts to smart homes, booking travel to banking queries, we\u2019ve been sold the idea that technology makes everything easier. But the pattern seems to be this: companies use technology to reduce their own costs \u2014 while shifting the work onto us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We scan our own groceries. We manage our own bookings. We dig through online portals to find PDFs that digitise our paper records. We chat to bots that often can\u2019t help, and fill in digital forms just to get the most basic of services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grumpy Old Man<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

So yes, I may joke about my Grumpy Old Man Syndrome<\/em>, but the underlying point stands: just because we can<\/em> do something digitally, doesn\u2019t mean we should<\/em>. Especially when the “innovation” really just amounts to taking humans out of the loop and putting consumers to work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, some people prefer the new ways. Not everyone wants to chat with a travel agent or ring up a cab office. For many, the ability to access data and services 24\/7 is empowering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Progress means keeping options open<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

But what matters most \u2014 and what so often gets forgotten \u2014 is that there should still be a choice. Because if everything goes digital with no fallback, we risk excluding those who can’t (or don’t want to) play the app economy game. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Maybe I am just an old man yelling at the cloud (service). But the app-based, gig-driven, digitally transformed economy isn\u2019t always a step forwards. The frictionless experience often hides a lot of pain behind the scenes \u2014 for drivers, small businesses, and occasionally, for frustrated tourists standing by a road in southern Europe, hoping the app will work this time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The world is increasingly run by tech bros in California. And we\u2019re all a little poorer \u2014 culturally and economically \u2014 for it.

Featured image: created by ChatGPT<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Post Script<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

[14\/7\/25] Yesterday morning, I walked to the local tourist office. I know, really old school! There, I spoke to a really helpful lady, who advised me on local buses and taxis. We called a central number for taxis in the town \u2014 no advanced bookings can be made but the first off the rank came to collect us. And we had our evening in the next village. It was lovely.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A simple plan goes sideways I should have just phoned the local taxi company. But no. I listened to my son \u2014 who, to be fair, meant well \u2014 and took a modern, app-based approach. \u201cUse Bolt,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just like Uber. I use it all the time.\u201d And that, it turns out, was … Continue reading Is this really progress? The downsides of the app economy<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9080,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[218,758,38],"tags":[856,851,857,639,490],"class_list":["post-9079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","category-travel","category-inane-waffle","tag-app-economy","tag-customer-experience-cx","tag-digital-inclusion","tag-digital-transformation","tag-travel"],"yoast_head":"\nIs this really progress? 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