The Frenzy of Fads - Part 1

[Stuart Cosgrove]

One of my favorite subjects is the euphoria of fads.

As an academic, broadcaster and writer for the NME, The Face etc I have always written about those fascinating particles of pop culture that flare up and then recede. (Anyone interested in a longer study of a fad might like my essay on The Zoot Suit which was written for the British Academy and The Smithsonian.

Some of you will remember that I posted a polemic months back, Twitter – the Teasmaid of Technology which probed away at the micro-blogging tool Twitter. It was knowingly blasphemous most fads provoke an almost religious zeal in participants and to even to use the word fad is to invite scorn.
Across time I’ve identified that there are seven deadly signs of a popular fad and that Twitter corresponds with all seven:

• Fads must be by their nature ephemeral.
• Fads always touch a basic human and are proxies for something more important
• Fads must evince their own language.
• Fads usually have a strong element of play, display or behavioral narcissism
• Fads often attach themselves to sub-cultures or pre-ordained tribes
• Fads usually provoke a ‘blame and claim’ matrix
• Fads attract investment value which is always hard to sustain long term.

Twitter is ephemeral but it undoubtedly touches a very basic human need – micro-communication - and in many ways is a technological variation of the numerous short-form communications that society has used in the past, from the shopping-list to one of the great corporate innovations, the post-it note. Twitter also has a strong element of playfulness, the bird-like name and brand livery are cleverly infantile. Like Morse code, CB Radio and SMS text messaging Twitter has already established its own language. For its predecesor in real-time communciation, the CB Radio and its promotional TV show, The Dukes of Hazard a key word was “handle” for Twitter it is “tweets” and "twitterrific". As for behavioral narcissism, the very idea that people might ‘follow’ you, and be ‘fascinated’ by the minutiae of your day is one of the greatest gestures to self-love since the invention of the decorative hand-mirror in Victorian England.

The word fad has been so denigrated and discounted over decades that some will undoubtedly argue that Twitter is not a fad and that its ephemeral nature masks a deeper public purpose. That too is one of the subtle dynamics of the fad and its acoytes. Twitter took off in a musical context as a band recommendation tool at the Festival, South by Southwest, but like many musical fads before, Twitter broke out from the rock ghetto. The Twist dance-craze had similar origins and the same self-defensive mechanism. It was pioneered not in Silicon Valley but at the Peppermint Lounge by Joey Dee and was ‘endorsed’ by numerous celebrities, some with more cache than Twitter’s Stephen Fry. The most famous twist aficionado Jackie Kennedy famously claimed that the dance helped her “keep fit”. Notice it was not to have a good time, or be looked at in a nightclub but to “keep fit”.

Twitter is a technology for casual intra-communication but it has been elevated to a tool that “saves lives”. So far it has been there like a guardian angel at Mumbai, the Hudson River and on every cascading mountain, applying artificial resuscitation to the dying. This desire to attribute meaning, and substance is an understandable human anxiety: when we fear being vacuous, wasting our time or worse still simple enjoying ourselves, there is a tendency to search for a more purposeful explanations. This is one of the great paradoxes of the fad. Confronted with the vacuity of my hobby for Northern Soul I often go into long detours talking about the civil rights movement in the 60s. Even the linked essay on Zoot Suits seeks to connect a fashion item to social protest and resistance. It seems we are uncomfortable with vacuity.

The conclusive evidence that Twitter is a fad which is enjoying a brief euphoria, is to be found in the last two signs in the list of seven, ‘the blame and claim matrix’ and ‘unsustainable long term investment paradigm.’

Rather than wrestle with their complexity now I will address them in Parts 2 and 3 of The Frenzy of Fads. I have to go now I have something much more trivial to deal with.

To be continued.

[Stuart Cosgrove]

Iagree that you can make money from fads but not lasting value. Also believe that many digital media platforms and activities are not fads, whether they succeed or not. Google's core algorithmic search engine is not a really fad, for example. It has a very low level of play and display, with only the ocassional design flourish on the name at say Valentine's day.

Twitter is a fad and since I use the word without the moral judgment that has wrongly attached to the word I an say it without reservation, nor would I wish people to feel in anyway comprmomised by the term. Nothing wrong with zoot-suits or frisbeees.

[Elaine Russell]

Interesting debate.

In the fast moving internet world, it's a race for speed instead of technology. Whoever comes up with an idea and gets it out to the market ahead of everyone else is the winner. But then there's another more important factor to determine a success - the inevitable test of internet user behaviour. Who can tell and predict the user behaviour (you may call it fad) accurately?

I am amazed by the success of the not-that-glamours craigslist attracting more than 10 million unique visitors per month and with a presence in 175 cities across 34 countries. (from bbc news). Started about 10 years ago, they have quietly emerged as one of the top 10 internet companies in the world in terms of page views.

A fad can be created by ordinary people with insight, bravery, speed and routine hard work. If it catches the user factor (a bit of luck), it will soar. Craigslist is never a fad. It's a classic now and still earning money - lots of them.

[David Hamill]

That's an interesting opinion Stuart. I'll know it's a fad when its popularity dies out or something better comes along. Until then I don't care too much. I will admit to getting bored of all the twords people keeping trying to twinvent.

The last time I cared about something being a fad was when I decided against buying tartan jeans when I was at primary school. I knew I'd have to wear them long after the fad had died, so I went for normal jeans instead. Just thought I'd share that.

[Paul Durrant]

I enjoyed reading that post Stuart....and you are dead right with your final bullet point about sustaining value long term....but isn't it interesting how there are also smart folk along the way who manage to take a profit out of a fad even though the value doesn't sustain with subsequent acquirers. I guess that's being in the right place at the right time as ever...but it's also spotting the wave to ride and when to get off. The other thing is when you make the fad or no fad judgement - if part of the criteria is long term value you may have to wait a while to find out. I remember when Hotmail seemingly became a fad in 1996 in it's intial free-to-use form with a line of self-promotion tagged on...the original investors were quick to spot the right wave hopped on and hopped off again smartly in 1997 when Microsoft paid $400m (allegedly) for it in order to bag to 8.5 million subscribers...not sure if that value sustained for Microsoft as users migrated to other free email services over time but it certainly gave a great exit for the investors and perhaps it gave value to the community in terms of inspiring ubiquitous webmail (so perhaps it was never a fad even though it seemed like one early on??). I suppose fads are also a bit like the fable of the King's new clothes with everyone admiring until the naked truth is outed.....so please tell us all in part 2 or 3 how to make money out of fads even though the value doesn't sustain! (You could even do it in a Googley US accent and tell us "how to monetise our content.....")

[Richard Saville-Smith]

Blimey, this is refreshing!