The recent changes with Discord are seemingly to make it more social network like but it seems to me like it would just be better to spin that off as a completely different product (build on the same tech) and keep Discord as is.
Another feature of Digg’s decline was a disastrous redesign that, overnight, soured most of the users on the site. It was basically a speed run of step 5 here.
It reminds me of a bar I used to go to in San Francisco called The Rat and the Raven. There was a bartender there named Storm Large and she was great. This was a long time ago. It was packed every single day. People from all walks of life went there - from bikers to investment bankers.
Then it was bought out. Instead of leaving it alone, they decided they could make it better. They changed it to some kind of upscale thing. Put nice floors down, tables, nice railings.
I went in every once in a while and it was crickets on the weekends. Nobody there ever.
If one goes in there in the due diligence phase of checking it out, and it is packed every night, why fuck with a good thing?
It's not 'a thing' it's a made up word for clickbait
As a user, I've never in my life said "You know, software XYZ does everything I want it to, but since they don't randomly change the UI and update it with unwanted features every few months, it's 'stale' and I won't use it anymore!"
I feel like everything past step 4 is "Developers gotta develop and designers gotta design" and making changes for change's sake rather than the user's sake.
Marketing has the four P's. Software companies seem to just focus on changing one P (the most expensive and disruptive to change) and hoping for a miracle.
1. Platform is created with a strong vision in mind.
2. Platform gains popularity, adding new features. Many will die here, but the most successful projects will create features that positively supplement the core vision. There is a lot of positivity amongst its userbase.
3. Platform eventually becomes one of the leaders amongst its particular niche, typically new features begin to slow down as the platform reaches its ideal feature set and all the low hanging fruit is gone.
4. The platform is no longer causing disruption in the space, but is now the status quo. New competitors or clones will pop up trying to get a piece of the pie, but the network effect keeps users on the platform
5. Despite having an ideal feature set, platforms don't want to completely stop development, so new features continue to come in, but are more and more misaligned to the original vision. UI changes, incorporating clever features from its competitors, or trying to chase the trends in the tech space (NFTs, AI, etc)
6. Users are more and more alienated, but are willing to remain with the platform until a competitor arrives that is viewed to be worth the trouble to switch. As the network effect kept users on the platform, it also opens a floodgate as users quickly switch away.
7. The platform languishes in relative obscurity before being bought out and left in a zombie state.
I think there are quite a few established platforms that remain in stage 5 or so. There's lots of criticism of Facebook, Twitter, Discord, etc. but everyone continues to use them because of the value they feel from other users using the platform. It's only once people leave for greener pastures that they die out (just look at the rise and fall of chat apps like AIM, MSN, Skype, etc. over time).