3 things I loved & watched lose their soul: Punk Rock, Skateboarding & Blogging

  By Tac Anderson | July 8, 2009 - 8:37 am | New

I’ve made this comparison for years now. The reason I first started studying Computer Media Communications was because I was fascinated by fringe culture and sub-cultures. Then I wanted to study how sub-cultures were using the Internet to connect, grow and communicate.

This is a good video (the voice over was a little canned but I love the comparison).  HT to Michael Triano of the Scalable Intimacy blog.

Owning a skateboard shop years later was taking theory and experiencing it first hand. All fringe movements behave the same.

Punks, skaters, bloggers are driven by passion. It’s not a tactic or a trend it’s a lifestyle. It’s how they (we) self identify. And it can be tough to watch things go mainstream.

I can tell you I almost wept when I saw a retro The Clash t-shirt at Target. The skaters raged when the school jock showed up in Vans shoes. And blogger have been complaining about corporate adoption of the tools. The rest of us realize the inevitable. You can either help the progress and shape the future or leave but you can’t control it. No one can, it’s bigger than all of us now.

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About Tac Anderson

Social media anthropologist. Communications strategist. Business model junkie. Chief blogger here at New Comm Biz.
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  • http://realadvertising.cc Frymaster

    I'm really glad you're not griping, but instead recognize the inevitable movement of fringe to subculture to mainstream. Of course, it's sad when the thing one loves and has spent a good chunk of one's life building get taken over by people with less passion, less commitment and less awareness of the 'why' the thing happened in the first place.

    But we – the innovators, the agitators, the true do-it-ourselves-ers – we'll go to some fresh, unexplored territory and carve out something meaningful. That process – the carving out of something meaningful where nothing had existed – that's what satisfies us. And the followers will never know how that feels.

    So here's to us and whatever comes next.

  • http://tjanderson.wordpress.com/ T.J. Anderson

    the only way to keep something like this from becoming mainstream is to make it flawed. drive people away. The punkers that still hold true to punk as a music, style, and way of life, hold true to the fashions and sounds that are so ridiculous or unappealing that you have to want to like them. When something is simply good, sooner or later people will find it and like it. Or more frequently, find the copy and like that.

  • http://scalableintimacy.com miketrap

    I hear you, Tac. But I agree with the other comments… in the long run, the punk movement brought reality back to music, and blogging will bring truth and democracy back to communication and media.

    Not sure what skateboards did, but you get the idea…

    PS – And it's “Troiano” with an “o” Thanks for the link anyway.

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