The long aughts

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pioneer98
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Re: The long aughts

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ghostrunner wrote:
May 25 21, 2:46 pm
Will just say as a parent with two boys in school I don’t think they lack for cultural markers. It’s very Internet/phone based but I don’t see a real problem there. That big blender pioneer talked about above is extremely positive IMO. The pop culture timeline where x leads into y and into a seems like a pretty temporary situation in the long view. Things used to develop more locally before “pop culture” and that too ended for many people.

There’s also a [expletive] ton of good music and movies from the last several years, as far as that goes. When I’m able to spend some time on it I’m never disappointed or discouraged.

The only thing that discourages me is what’s going on politically on the right and how the urban/rural divide is so deep.
Art generally is a reflection of the culture at the time it was made. Like the album I've been revisiting is The Downward Spiral. I've been thinking a lot about that era. The art of that time was holding up a mirror and showing us "Hey, look, our culture is actually violent as hell". This is the era of Pulp Fiction, and the rise of ultimate fighting. Even in my small town, people turned out in record numbers to watch beer league hockey players beat the hell out of each other. Something about violence at that time resonated with people. It was a weird moment. What does the stuff being made today say about our culture? I have no idea, I'm asking.

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pioneer98
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Re: The long aughts

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G. Keenan wrote:
May 24 21, 2:11 pm
I think the culture is actually better than it was in the past in lots of ways when it comes to its understanding of the social justice issues that have plagued us since the beginning. The tension of the moment comes largely from those who feel threatened by the ascendent voices in the culture being unable to sweep the discussion aside and bury it under the the promise of "the good life" through consumerism. That's not cutting it anymore. Rather than listen, or engage in introspection or dialogue, the old cultural forces have chosen instead to construct a parallel universe to inhabit that is less challenging to their sensibilities. I'd be interested in hearing from people who lived through the 60s & 70s as adults on this. Those were decades of open cultural warfare that were indeed more violent in terms of urban rioting and political violence than today, though we may be getting there more quickly than we think and could surpass it in very ugly ways.

The thing though is that the big powers that be have figured out how to package that social justice sensibility and sell it back to us. I don't think it's "bad", but it definitely rings of phoniness. The right is correct to point out a lot of this stuff is BS, but they are calling it that for the wrong reason. It's not bad because it's incorrect. It's bad because they're only doing it for profit and it's hollow.

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pioneer98
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Re: The long aughts

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The big budget stuff (such as superhero movies) today is test-screened and algorithmed to the point that there really is no art in it left at all. That's not new, but it's never been done to the extreme it is today. These movies (and a lot of music) have the appearance of a big blockbuster type thing, but there is zero substance behind it. It's like a shell or placeholder. It exists because that space has to be filled. Again, it's not really new, but never has this bubble been bigger and emptier.

Maybe it goes in cycles and the bubble will pop. The defining feature of the 90s was that their algorithm had stopped working, so they just said "screw it" and turned the music industry over to the freaks and geeks who were totally outside the previous mainstream. The movie industry did this to a lesser extent. That moment didn't last long because after a few years they figured out how to algorithm this new stuff.

Today is there is nothing that exists outside the mainstream. Spotify has absorbed all music and the algorithm plays obscure bands that sound like other music you like. Youtube and Netflix have absorbed all movies and videos and have algorithms that make similar suggestions. So if the profits of these platforms starts declining, where do they turn? They've already got every single thing ever made. I guess they try to push down royalties and salaries of the talent? Oops Spotify is already doing that and movies are making fully digital characters and TV has reality shows galore. Where does this road lead?

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Jocephus
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Re: The long aughts

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plus every app can be synced with every other app. people seem to like not having to look into things themselves and be told "you would like this"...which kinda makes sense how over worked we are (at least in US) and/or little free time we actually do have. thats certainly not the only reason but clearly, people dont mind a consumerism version of the patriot act, where everything is tracked and monitored "for your benefit". even though its like binge eating and you'll ultimately feel bad about it, in the moment, it feels good to watch a superhero movie and buy things from amazon because modern life, unless wealthy, is kind of a drag.

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Re: The long aughts

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pioneer98 wrote:
May 25 21, 3:58 pm
The big budget stuff (such as superhero movies) today is test-screened and algorithmed to the point that there really is no art in it left at all. That's not new, but it's never been done to the extreme it is today. These movies (and a lot of music) have the appearance of a big blockbuster type thing, but there is zero substance behind it. It's like a shell or placeholder. It exists because that space has to be filled. Again, it's not really new, but never has this bubble been bigger and emptier.

Maybe it goes in cycles and the bubble will pop. The defining feature of the 90s was that their algorithm had stopped working, so they just said "screw it" and turned the music industry over to the freaks and geeks who were totally outside the previous mainstream. The movie industry did this to a lesser extent. That moment didn't last long because after a few years they figured out how to algorithm this new stuff.

Today is there is nothing that exists outside the mainstream. Spotify has absorbed all music and the algorithm plays obscure bands that sound like other music you like. Youtube and Netflix have absorbed all movies and videos and have algorithms that make similar suggestions. So if the profits of these platforms starts declining, where do they turn? They've already got every single thing ever made. I guess they try to push down royalties and salaries of the talent? Oops Spotify is already doing that and movies are making fully digital characters and TV has reality shows galore. Where does this road lead?
Disagree with a lot of this. Mostly because I think your memory of the 90s is way too generous. Musically there were a couple good years there as far as rock goes and lot of just pure dreck. I think hip hop really kind of took over in terms of cultural relevance. Generally though, I think current day commentary is the exception vs the rule and it’s always been that way.

My only quarrel with Spotify is what they pay artists, but as far as how it works I think it’s great and I’ve been exposed to a lot of new stuff. Most people aren’t and have never been very adventurous anyway. If you are, it’s a great resource. It’s certainly no worse than how radio worked when I was a kid. Depending on the station you’d hear essentially same stuff ever hour or every day. Good luck hearing new artists at all. MTV was better but started off very narrow and then stopped being a mostly music channel.

As far as movies go there have always been a ton of bad blockbusters. I think Independence Day is very bit as empty as any modern superhero movie but apparently people think fondly of that movie. The 90s had a bubble of copycat psycho thrillers. There was an absolute glut of forgettable westerns in the 50s.
Today, a lot of the more thoughtful dramatic work has moved to television. Reality tv is popular, but there’s more scripted shows than ever, to the point that tv writers constantly worry there’s too much of it. But I think the wheat/chaff ratio is pretty good. HBO alone has a ton of good programming.

I can’t speak well to the 2000s, as I was playing a lot of catch-up on music or listening to WOXY out of Cincinnati, which wasn’t focused on popular stuff. Movies were like always. 70% of the popular movies were relatively mindless fun and the more consistently good stuff was made more independently. The late 90s are probably the last time I recall popular movies being interesting and having something to say but that was short lived.

I do think it’s been somewhat cyclical but like I said last page I think we may be past that kind of shared culture.

Having said that, Tik tok is a huge cultural thing now and I think it’s actually pretty great. Kids do amazing [expletive] on there that takes a lot of talent, planning and thought, and there’s also a lot of crude mindless stuff that’s also funny and entertaining. Tons of politically relevant material.

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G. Keenan
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Re: The long aughts

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Is Snapchat still a thing?

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