Popularity Ruins Everything

[MadImmortalMan]

This is a philosophy thread. The premise is that once a thing becomes widely adopted, it becomes watered down, used for ulterior purposes (like marketing), and can never be quite what it was in the beginning. And that it is this very popularity that attracts the destruction.


This forum started because of gaming. A hobby and in some cases career that most of us shared. But now gaming is cool. And monetized. Incredibly so. I'm a buy-game-play-game guy. Not a buy-game-registercreditcardandmakebudgetforspendingongameforfuckingever, uh guy. It's all casinos now. Believe me, I know. EA, Harrah's and Wynn all hire the same psychologists to manipulate you. FIFA Ultimate Team? It's Caesar's Palace, bitch. Put in a coin and pull the handle like a good little monkey.

Joss Whedon.

His shows were pretty cool back in the day. I especially liked Firefly. But now every idiot in every business meeting, news article or social interaction is talking like a snarky, sarcastic teenage extra from Buffy. All of our tv and movies are written this way now. It's horrid. Instead of metooing the guy, we should have banished the banter.

In the 90's Compuserve and AOL both tried to dominate the internet. Curate your online experience for you. Anyone who can do that can make a ton of money off you. But for whatever reason it didn't work. People made their own websites and built abstract art sculptures out of AOL cds. Languish was born in this time. Nobody owned your time time online. Nobody was your gatekeeper. Then Facebook came along and your grandma suddenly decided to start using the intertubes to see the photos of the grandkids. And the iPhone also appeared.

Suddenly the internet is dangerous and something to be regulated. Suddenly, it's important. Being popular attracts regulation and party-pooping. I got a pic off of what was then the internet of Curt Cobain's crime scene photo. Looked like a pile of hamburger with teeth in it. The Grannys and Gladys Kravitzes of the world were hemming and hawing about the Anarchist's Cookbook. Remember that? They couldn't do anything about it though because there wasn't any single controllable pipeline that could be censored or squelched. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.

Popularity has been turning Dungeons and Dragons into a shithead dating sim. All of your classic franchises are being re-written for a modern audience. US National Parks have become traffic jams in the woods, with busloads of Chinese tourists throwing banana peels at the elk and bison. It would have been awesome to travel Yosemite with Teddy Roosevelt and John Muir.

Anyway, my point is, when stuff gets popular, it gets wrecked.

[mongers]

Fair enough MiM.

So me being very non-popular means I must be pretty damn cool, right?

[grumbler]

Nobody goes to National Parks anymore.  They're too crowded.

[Admiral Yi]

Good music doesn't stop being good if it becomes popular.  Good art.  Good literature.  Good movies.

[Savonarola]

Anyway, my point is, when stuff gets popular, it gets wrecked.

MiM has been replaced by Hipster MiM from a parallel universe. 

Do you have a goatee now? 

[Barrister]

Good music doesn't stop being good if it becomes popular.  Good art.  Good literature.  Good movies.

Yeah I kind of hate this hipsterish impulse to hate something just because it gets too popular.  It's probably doubly so in Canada.

WHat are some of the most popular musical acts that have come from Canada in the last 30 years?  I'm going to name Celine Dion, Nickelback, and Justin Bieber.  All three have tremendous online hate.  But you know what?  They're all really good and talented and made some really good and popular music.

[Jacob]

Good musics - and other good things - don't stop being good because they're popular. That's true, but:

1) There's a certain pleasure in knowing something that's a little exclusive, in belonging to a small group. That is a real thing, and when something you like - especially if you're really into it - becomes super popular, that feeling is diminished.

2) You may have specific associations with something you like before it's popular, which can be diminished when you're exposed to it at the super market, at sports games, at political rallies, at every party you go to etc etc. This can also lead to diminished enjoyment from pure overexposure.

3) If something is super popular it potentially affects the way subsequent output is produced and marketed, as the business logic changes. If you're attached to the qualities of the pre-popular output, it's not unreasonable to be disappointed in the changes once popularity hits.

4) In the case of subcultures and smaller groups, if the band is seen as "one of us" making music as members of that community, reflecting the values and concerns of that community, and being tied to how that community sees itself - it can be jarring to see the band leave that community and enter the larger mass-pop-culture complex, using the community signifiers as their branding.

[Grey Fox]

Good music doesn't stop being good if it becomes popular.  Good art.  Good literature.  Good movies.

Yeah I kind of hate this hipsterish impulse to hate something just because it gets too popular.  It's probably doubly so in Canada.

WHat are some of the most popular musical acts that have come from Canada in the last 30 years?  I'm going to name Celine Dion, Nickelback, and Justin Bieber.  All three have tremendous online hate.  But you know what?  They're all really good and talented and made some really good and popular music.

The clear #1, Drake, also gets crazy amount of hate.

[Barrister]

Good music doesn't stop being good if it becomes popular.  Good art.  Good literature.  Good movies.

Yeah I kind of hate this hipsterish impulse to hate something just because it gets too popular.  It's probably doubly so in Canada.

WHat are some of the most popular musical acts that have come from Canada in the last 30 years?  I'm going to name Celine Dion, Nickelback, and Justin Bieber.  All three have tremendous online hate.  But you know what?  They're all really good and talented and made some really good and popular music.

The clear #1, Drake, also gets crazy amount of hate.

Drake absolutely should be in that list.

But does he actually get crazy amounts of hate?

Hmm... googling suggests he does.

[Grey Fox]

They all do. The Wknd probably gets it too.

Popularity ruins everything.

[crazy canuck]

Good musics - and other good things - don't stop being good because they're popular. That's true, but:

1) There's a certain pleasure in knowing something that's a little exclusive, in belonging to a small group. That is a real thing, and when something you like - especially if you're really into it - becomes super popular, that feeling is diminished.

2) You may have specific associations with something you like before it's popular, which can be diminished when you're exposed to it at the super market, at sports games, at political rallies, at every party you go to etc etc. This can also lead to diminished enjoyment from pure overexposure.

3) If something is super popular it potentially affects the way subsequent output is produced and marketed, as the business logic changes. If you're attached to the qualities of the pre-popular output, it's not unreasonable to be disappointed in the changes once popularity hits.

4) In the case of subcultures and smaller groups, if the band is seen as "one of us" making music as members of that community, reflecting the values and concerns of that community, and being tied to how that community sees itself - it can be jarring to see the band leave that community and enter the larger mass-pop-culture complex, using the community signifiers as their branding.

I really hated it when the alternative music scene became popular.  There I said it. 

[Sheilbh]

Good musics - and other good things - don't stop being good because they're popular. That's true, but:

1) There's a certain pleasure in knowing something that's a little exclusive, in belonging to a small group. That is a real thing, and when something you like - especially if you're really into it - becomes super popular, that feeling is diminished.

2) You may have specific associations with something you like before it's popular, which can be diminished when you're exposed to it at the super market, at sports games, at political rallies, at every party you go to etc etc. This can also lead to diminished enjoyment from pure overexposure.

3) If something is super popular it potentially affects the way subsequent output is produced and marketed, as the business logic changes. If you're attached to the qualities of the pre-popular output, it's not unreasonable to be disappointed in the changes once popularity hits.

4) In the case of subcultures and smaller groups, if the band is seen as "one of us" making music as members of that community, reflecting the values and concerns of that community, and being tied to how that community sees itself - it can be jarring to see the band leave that community and enter the larger mass-pop-culture complex, using the community signifiers as their branding.

Yes - although I think in the last 10-20 years there's been a push to popularisation of everything and more of a "everything is for someone" vibe and so nothing is necessarily bad or niche. I think that was probably a reaction to the very cliquey/snobby subcultures that existed - and were often ultimately about male gatekeeping. It was probably a popular thing.

I get the feeling there is now a slight push back in the opposite direction precisely for what you're saying. I think people are missing ways of defining themselves as music used to or to have "our thing" about something they love. So I think there's a move from popularity is good and actually selling out is a ridiculous concept back to a bit of snobbishness/cliqueishness.

Could be wrong - just a sense I get from reading stuff online.

[Jacob]

Shit I actually wrote "musics"     

[Darth Wagtaros]

I agree about the net.  There was a time when people wrote a few paragraphs.  Now its just a drive by insult.

[Josquius]

Becoming popular doesn't make something bad automatically but the pursuit of becoming popular or the impact of being popular can often make subsequent output worse.

If everyone could come to like my favourite music, games, TV shows, etc... Then welcome! Grab a drink!

However in trying to please all people and avoiding "offending" anyone, corners can be cut and risks avoided which often reduces how awesome things are for the core fan base.