Every month I wrote analysis on cultural things that are happening to our world. I posted these on my strategy slack channel where the department interacted and gave t h e i r P O V. I loved writing these, I got to flex my creative writing skills on how young kids consume media. Here are some writing samples on music, how we treat our IG dm channels, Lil Nas X, and other GenZ stuff, Thanks for reading! - Ta i K o g a
Long-ish cultural analysis: Lip Syncing
It’s easy and it’s free. Lip Synching is the Gen-z’s Democratic Party P l a t f o r m f o r c r e a t i v i t y. Any teen with a song and a phone is now a studio.
L a s t S u n d a y, J u n g k o o k , one of the members from a Kpop boy band BTS, posted a short video to t h e b a n d ’ s o f f i c i a l Tw i t t e r account. He goofily lip syncs and dances along to Billie Eilish’s smash “ b a d g u y. ” S u p e r c a t c h y song, def take a listen.
One million people “talked about” this video. Lip syncing videos have fueled the popularity of T i k To k - t h e m o s t downloaded app among teenagers - and now Instagram’s latest update to its most popular format, Stories. https:// w w w. y o u t u b e . c o m / w a c h ? v=rO4l27g91aQ
It’s a simple format that is increasingly becoming the cheat codes for mobile vid popularity (god damnit im not saying viral!) and t e e n a g e c r e a t i v i t y. I h a v e a strong feeling that inhouse agencies at record labels are excited about this new phenomenon. It’s a democratic spring board for some of the most creative uses of mobile phones by amateurs like you and I. And with Instagram’s new feature, lip syncing videos may become even more central to teen culture.
So what exactly is it about lip syncing videos that make them so irresistibly watchable on mobile?
I crunched the numbers and looked at TPS reports.
The key to lip syncing videos catching on is their combination of silliness + polish. The polish comes from the music. Real pop hits are a simple hack to mimic a professional video. But the act of lip syncing is g o o f y, c a s u a l a n d s e l f deprecating, a way to show the less serious side of your personality that younger people are more likely to share on social media than their perfection-chasing older counterparts.
This format is a democratic platform for c r e a t i v i t y. W h e r e a s i n t h e past, polished special effects-driven videos (Adobe premier+AfterEffects) would only be accessible to professionals, mobile phones have opened the door for lip syncing to become an easy and fun way for anyone to make polished + goofy videos. This is a safe place. What songs did you lipsync when nobody is looking?
Long-ish cultural analysis: Spotify’s new feature. ‌My most-anticipated media product.
Spotify is testing a feature that lets friends control music together and listen to the same songs together at the same time. I cannot wait until this is publicly available. A c c o r d i n g t o t h e Tw i t t e r u s e r, J a n e M a n c h u n Wong- the feature is only available to Spotify employees at the m o m e n t . B u t w h e n i t ’s released to the public it will fill a gigantic gap in my life.
Choppin’ it up with my private + group chats are the tastiest part of my d a y. A n d f o r y e a r s , t h e group chat is where I’ve been sharing countless music discoveries songs, albums, artists, mixes, playlists. It helped that my group chats are made up of friends who have an insatiable appetite for new music to listen to.
But the impulse to share a new sound you’re loving with a friend - an impulse for connection, to experience something with someone that you know they’ll love quickly gives way to distraction and disappointment. Kind of like the goofy shit I send to this slack channel. Lol and I feel like this Yo u T u b e v i d e o . h t t p s : / / w w w. y o u t u b e . c o m / watch?v=cKkr6fV29Io
There’s no way to know if they really clicked the link and heard the music. Often they do, b u t h o u r s o r d a y s l a t e r. By then, my enthusiasm for that song or mix or album have gone away and I’m obsessed with something else. Then I share that. The cycle continues. The we drown in too much music.
This new Spotify feature cleverly compares it to the late, turntable.fm. That was a very fun web site while it lasted. I vividly remember DJ’ing for my college friends in front of their computers with their headphones on.
Hopefully this new Spotify Social Listening feature brings back the feeling of playing something for a friend, since our friendships now are increasingly virtual and geographically dispersed. That used to be one of my favorite things in the world to do, is it true 4 u?
Imma speak my mind.
Rock, blues, and punk music came from black creatives. These giant creative waves were born from black creatives, pushing boundaries making art from nothing.
So much of that narrative has been swept under the rug. (exmp Elvis with c h u c k b e r r y ) F i n a l l y, minority groups with the aid of their own social platforms -they  get to push what they feel is i m p o r t a n t . Ya k n o w ? They (general population) gets to decide what is true and what is not. The protectionism from white crowds might come from the fear of erasure of their own community only on the basis of c u l t u r a l r e l e v a n c y.
B u t l e t ’s t a k e t h i s b a c k t o Nelly and Tim McGraw days. They were the first to plant this seed.
So much has changed since 2001/2002? (our behavior online, pop culture, new academic concepts of discrimination that is accessible to us). Why didn’t this song get the recognition and the hype it deserves as much as Lil Nas X? There was a different driving force that made Lil Nas X feel more significant than the Nelly song.
Ta i K o g a [ 9 : 3 8 A M ] Long-ish culture alert: music discovery
I’m fascinated by how kids growing up right now discover music and what they end up listening to. It’s clear that music to them is a completely flat landscape. In the sense that time, place and genre don’t matter or don’t seem to be a guide to what they should care about.
Billiie Eilish recently put a mixtape on Apple Music that was taken down on that platform but recreated by her fans on S p o t i f y. It’s great! It’s 100 songs.
The first thing I noticed is that in addition to an extremely deep knowledge of current hip hop, plus a few harmless pop choices, was that there’s a lot of music from outside the US, like UK grime, reggae, afrobeat, French house and flamenco. Some picks are cliche and some are cool.
Ta i K o g a [ 9 : 2 3 A M ] Long-is culture analysis “closed off real communication”
I have opinions I would never share with people outside of a few of my best long-running group chats. These are opinions that, a lot of people I know wouldn’t even understand because those people are in their own bubbles. We would lack the shared language to even begin discussing these o p i n i o n s . I n a w a y, i t ’ s l o n e l y.
But in other ways it’s extremely liberating. Like you I have a secret s o c i e t y, i n s i d e r s w h o k e e p knowledge that outsiders can’t touch. It’s our own local gossip.
There is this fantastic piece written by Dean Kissick on how communication is increasingly being forced underground, with our most honest and most interesting communications happening within group chats and private social media accounts meant only for close friends.
According to Kissick, we’ve been forced into these smaller groups because the greater public sphere - namely social media - has a tendency to make us conform. If we do not conform our identity and our opinions to fit the “narrowly prescribed range of thought” of public discourse we are shouted down or worse. So we only say what we really think in self-selected small groups.
These “gated communities� are where the most exciting ideas are b e i n g f o r m e d n o w, where we can be ourselves with the people we know best.
“ To d a y w e l i v e i n private once more, along interlocking chains of secret societies and microcultural enclaves, inside of which we can develop niche ideas and aesthetics among likeminded folk.� -Kissick
Kissick explains: “We’re left with two d i s t o r t e d p e r c e p t i o n s o f reality: the public sphere in which e v e r y b o d y i s pretending to be something they’re not, and the private in which everybody encourages one another’s worst impulses.”
So as a comms objective wouldn’t it be awesome to have an Awareness objective called :
Make it to the DMs.
I am taking a break from my longish culture analysis this week.
But i wanted to resurface Kissick’s idea that communication is increasingly being forced underground, with our most honest and most interesting communications happening within group chats and private social media accounts meant only for close friends.
Spike is a pub that looks at culture at niche lvls, but its mad fascinating 2 me. This month, Kissick pushed this argument even further: the conversations we have with selfselected groups of new or familiar people are more exciting right now than even art or content itself.
Radio shows scattered in Chinatown are poof that this is happening. Look at Montez Press Local gossip that  is streamed once and then just like that, its gone.
additional thought: I’m slowly thinking that brand building starts with building curiosity first so that it makes you and me want to look into it deeper on our own.
Ta i K o g a [ 11 : 5 9 A M ] Cancelled
When something is canceled in culture it’s usually not a good thing. Like if somebody incredibly fucked up ethically then you can say that they are canceled in your life. After Jake Paul posted that yt video of him in JapanJake Paul is cancelled.
The word is usually a t t a c h e d t o a s h o w, a person, or a brand. To t h e y o u t h , a celebrity attached to that word is a declaration of death of consumption. It’s almost as if there was an awakening on their end that “wait I have the power to make people relevant in media.
Why am I amplifying this fool on my social and letting them occupy my finite time and mental space.”
Another example, after that Kanye m e e t i n g w i t h Tr u m p or that TmZ interview “Kanye West is cancelled until further notice”
Also it probably came from B l a c k Tw i t t e r.
Ta i K o g a [ 1 0 : 1 7 A M ]
I’ve been thinking about streaming services since Jd got me a 3 month Spotify account for secret gift exchange and Manali signed onto her hbo account on my c o m p u t e r. T h a n k y o u
I want to talk to you about this idea called container over content. Last week, a new survey from MoffettNathanson confirmed something I’ve been noticing for a while now: we care less now about the quality of content than we do the way we get it.
Skip credits. Autoplay next episode. Autoplay previews. These features reflect the company’s obsession with Engagement. It’s designed to keep you watching. We like streaming itself more than we like music or the prestige drama. We like the container and don’t really care what goes in it.
Another reason not mentioned in this recode article is that respondents ranked above the shows and movies on Netflix is that they “can choose what to watch.� We really just want content when we want it, how we want it. How good, or how thought-provoking, the content is can be besides the point. Making us feel comfortable takes precedence over pushing us out of our comfort zone.
TV has always been genius - it gave us Seinfield, Sopranos, and L a w a n d O r d e r. I t t a u g h t me English.
Once I money up - I’d like to own cable someday down the road. F o r n o w, t h e r e w i l l b e a race amongst Netflix, S p o t i f y, D i s n e y, Y T, e t c to improve the product experience to promote engagement, and the types and quality of content will most likely f o l l o w.