The author reflects on their annoyance with Fitbit’s automatic exercise notification, which highlights a larger issue in product development known as "enshittification." This term, coined by Cory Doctorow, describes how platforms degrade over time, often due to the pressure on developers to show measurable success. In Fitbit's case, the product team prioritized metrics like engagement over user experience. By adding notifications to track user activity, they could demonstrate that their feature was being used, even if it annoyed the users. The article outlines a cycle where individual contributors, driven by the need to prove their value through metrics, inadvertently harm user experience. Developers optimize for these metrics—like "calls initiated" in messaging apps—rather than focusing on what might genuinely benefit users. This leads to frustrating features, such as a button that’s easy to hit accidentally, which exists solely to boost numbers. The author argues for a shift towards principles in design that prioritize user experience over purely quantitative measures. Principles like not interrupting users unless they ask for it or avoiding features that annoy can help create a more user-centered product. Ultimately, the piece emphasizes the need for product teams to trust their judgment about what’s right for users instead of relying solely on metrics, which can distort priorities and lead to a progressively hostile product. The author highlights the importance of treating users as people rather than mere data points in a dashboard.