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Comment by HWR_14 | Hacker News Reader

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HWR_14·

> This, however, isn’t shrinkflation. This is supply chain, demand, and uncertainty.

It most certainly is shrinkflation. It's rising input costs decreasing the product quality.

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That is an unusual definition of shrinkflation. I always understood it as quantity going down not quality.

I think at its root, the general idea of shrinkflation is that some desirable attribute of a product - quantity or quality - is slowly eroded while keeping the price the same. As a way to either increase margins, or preserve the price point. With there being some insinuation of malice, where the company is theoretically (...probably fully intentionally...) hoping consumers don't notice, at least for a while, that the deal keeps getting altered.

I think that’s right, with the ire coming from the perception of being cheated somehow. There’s a fair group of people who think anything other than changing the price or the product name is deceptive, and they’ll keep talking about it that way even if other people don’t see it as worse than a price increase.

The ire comes from the actual deception. Why do companies make products worse rather than bumping the price? It's not because they think that's what people prefer. It's because they hope that at least some buyers won't notice the change. People think it's deceptive because it is.

No, you’re combining two different concepts. Shrinkflation is the price remaining constant when the quantity decreases. Enshittification is when the quality of service decreases while prices remain constant or rise.

Less RAM in the same package (Deluxe Model X!) is exactly shrinkflation.

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