The Rebirth of Media

I grew up in the 80s, and while some people love 80s pop culture, I was never a fan. The music was, in my opinion, abysmal and what got played on radio or made it to you in records or cassettes went through very few large music labels. While I'm no fan of Madonna or Michael Jackson, I do respect that pop-culture is something very difficult to do well, because you have to appeal to such a large segment of society. We got to choose between very inane sit-coms like ALF, Who's the Boss, Family Ties, and the Wonder Years. In the early 90s we all watched 90210 because everyone else did...and this may be one of the worse uses of my time given to me on this planet. I saw the birth of MTV, a channel who's sole purpose was to try and tell teens what is cool, and I really despise few things in pop culture more than the stupidity that flows from MTV. Anyway I lived with pop culture and although I may have never embraced it there weren't many alternatives out there as far as media sources.

Today pop culture may be even dumber than it was in my youth. Shows like The OC, Jersey Shore and The Real Housewives of (some city)  are shows that appeal to only the lowest common denominator in all of us. Musicians (I use the term lightly for some) that appear today are in many ways even more vapid then the pop stars who came before them. While I'm sure some are very impressed with the likes of Lady GaGa or some of these American Idol types that fill up gossip columns and entertainment headlines more often than the airwaves, there is a very good sized part of the population that won't pay them much attention. The internet is killing pop culture and I couldn't be happier about it.