1 00:00:11,040 --> 00:00:14,375 Mike Rugnetta: Friends, hello, and welcome to Never Post, a 2 00:00:14,375 --> 00:00:16,855 podcast for and about the Internet. I'm your host, Mike 3 00:00:16,855 --> 00:00:22,135 Rugnetta, and we have a refined show for you this week. In this 4 00:00:22,135 --> 00:00:25,495 episode, Georgia chats with journalist, critic, and New 5 00:00:25,495 --> 00:00:30,510 Yorker staff writer Kyle Chaeka about the formulation of taste 6 00:00:30,670 --> 00:00:34,910 and how the Internet helps and hinders that process. Do you 7 00:00:34,910 --> 00:00:38,910 really like what you like? How do you know in the first place? 8 00:00:39,230 --> 00:00:44,235 Does it matter? Will the band Geese be mentioned? But first, 9 00:00:44,235 --> 00:00:46,795 we're gonna take a quick break, and you'll listen to some ads, 10 00:00:46,795 --> 00:00:49,435 unless you're on the member feed. And when we return, 11 00:00:49,435 --> 00:00:52,235 Georgia, Kyle, and a taste of the Internet. 12 00:01:02,760 --> 00:01:06,360 Georgia Hampton: For the last month and some change, my social 13 00:01:06,360 --> 00:01:10,600 feeds have been having what seems to be a mass crash out 14 00:01:10,285 --> 00:01:21,085 about personal taste. The message I keep seeing plastered 15 00:01:21,085 --> 00:01:24,470 across headlines and declared cynically through tweets was 16 00:01:24,470 --> 00:01:30,470 that personal taste, developing it, having it, is dead. It is no 17 00:01:30,470 --> 00:01:34,790 longer possible to trust the things we like or trust our 18 00:01:34,790 --> 00:01:39,965 ability to choose things to like because, as it turns out, we 19 00:01:39,965 --> 00:01:44,125 don't really get to choose what to enjoy anymore. Everything we 20 00:01:44,125 --> 00:01:50,205 see online is nothing more than a big PR stunt trick. And the 21 00:01:50,205 --> 00:01:54,330 epicenter of the discourse, the thing that launched a million 22 00:01:54,330 --> 00:01:58,890 articles and posts about the end of personal taste, is the 23 00:01:58,890 --> 00:02:00,810 Brooklyn based rock band, Geese. 24 00:02:00,810 --> 00:02:04,010 Geese: God of the sun, I'm ticking you down on the inside. 25 00:02:09,545 --> 00:02:12,665 Georgia Hampton: Geese has been making music since 2021, but 26 00:02:12,665 --> 00:02:18,220 they really blew up last year, like majorly. An appearance on 27 00:02:18,220 --> 00:02:22,860 SNL, a write up in The New Yorker, even a glowing review 28 00:02:22,860 --> 00:02:27,900 from The Guardian declaring them the saviors of rock and roll all 29 00:02:27,900 --> 00:02:31,865 in the span of a couple of months. And according to an 30 00:02:31,865 --> 00:02:36,105 article from Wired that came out in April of this year, the band 31 00:02:36,105 --> 00:02:40,025 skyrocketed to fame not because of a natural uptick in 32 00:02:40,025 --> 00:02:43,945 listenership, but because Geese is the client of Chaotic Good 33 00:02:43,945 --> 00:02:47,690 Projects, a marketing firm that helps bands go viral. 34 00:02:48,410 --> 00:02:53,450 Representatives from CGP are not shy about their methods. Co 35 00:02:53,450 --> 00:02:57,450 founder Adam Tarcia proudly told Wired how the rockstar sausage 36 00:02:57,450 --> 00:03:01,205 gets made, Namely, through coordinated online campaigns 37 00:03:01,205 --> 00:03:05,125 using thousands of bot accounts that generate discourse all over 38 00:03:05,125 --> 00:03:06,645 TikTok and YouTube. 39 00:03:07,205 --> 00:03:10,805 The bots may start the conversation, but the goal is to 40 00:03:10,805 --> 00:03:15,110 get real people to start chiming in and keeping it going. More 41 00:03:15,110 --> 00:03:19,670 discourse, artificially created but maintained by real people, 42 00:03:20,070 --> 00:03:24,070 juices the algorithm, which then shows Geeze's music to more 43 00:03:24,070 --> 00:03:29,125 people and drives up the band's popularity. And clearly, it 44 00:03:29,125 --> 00:03:34,245 worked. CGP was, I should say, quick to add that their methods 45 00:03:34,245 --> 00:03:38,885 wouldn't work if Geese wasn't a good band, that no amount of 46 00:03:38,885 --> 00:03:42,990 Blitz marketing campaigns could actually make popular to the 47 00:03:42,990 --> 00:03:46,270 degree that they now are. And maybe that would have been 48 00:03:46,270 --> 00:03:50,190 easier to believe if Geese was an outlier in their use of this 49 00:03:50,190 --> 00:03:51,150 kind of marketing. 50 00:03:51,630 --> 00:03:54,990 But they aren't. The puppeteering of online interest 51 00:03:54,990 --> 00:03:59,535 isn't just the business of one New York based rock band. Chapel 52 00:03:59,535 --> 00:04:05,455 Rowan is a client of CGP, and so is Zara Larsen and Somber and 53 00:04:05,455 --> 00:04:14,090 Oak Glue and many others. Popularity has always had a 54 00:04:14,090 --> 00:04:17,690 fraught relationship to Taste. Popularity is determined by 55 00:04:17,690 --> 00:04:21,610 metrics, where the band sits on the Billboard 100, how many 56 00:04:21,610 --> 00:04:25,530 downloads an album has on Spotify, record sales, Grammy 57 00:04:25,530 --> 00:04:26,810 wins, the list goes on. 58 00:04:27,535 --> 00:04:30,975 And those things don't always reflect the actual opinion of 59 00:04:30,975 --> 00:04:35,615 real people who listen or don't listen to that music. I mean, 60 00:04:36,015 --> 00:04:39,935 look at the best new artist winner at the Grammys for, oh, 61 00:04:39,935 --> 00:04:45,470 the last two decades. Popularity is equatable to ubiquity. And 62 00:04:45,470 --> 00:04:49,470 the persistent presence of something is very easy to force 63 00:04:49,470 --> 00:04:51,870 with the right amount of money and the right kind of 64 00:04:51,870 --> 00:04:55,310 connections. This has been true since the days of Payola. 65 00:04:55,945 --> 00:05:00,025 But the way that geese became popular through the tools of the 66 00:05:00,025 --> 00:05:05,865 Internet felt different and worse to fans. And a lot of the 67 00:05:05,865 --> 00:05:10,130 conversation I see about why it feels worse comes from the fear 68 00:05:10,130 --> 00:05:14,690 that everything is an ad and that you can't trust any posts 69 00:05:14,690 --> 00:05:18,210 because they all must be financially incentivized. And 70 00:05:18,210 --> 00:05:21,810 therefore, if you like any of those things, you've just been 71 00:05:21,810 --> 00:05:28,345 tricked. But I don't really agree with that, at least not 72 00:05:28,345 --> 00:05:33,065 entirely. If the CGP marketing campaign worked on you and you 73 00:05:33,065 --> 00:05:37,390 genuinely like the band Geese because you saw them online, I 74 00:05:37,390 --> 00:05:39,310 really don't think that's a bad thing. 75 00:05:39,310 --> 00:05:42,750 Geese: God of the sun, I'm taking you down on the inside. 76 00:05:49,595 --> 00:05:51,915 Georgia Hampton: But there's another interesting problem here 77 00:05:51,915 --> 00:05:57,275 worth exploring because I think that the way that our personal 78 00:05:57,275 --> 00:06:02,395 taste is presented back to us online winds up making us lose 79 00:06:02,395 --> 00:06:06,700 interest in the things we actually like and leaves very 80 00:06:06,700 --> 00:06:14,540 little in its place. Taste is a hard thing to define properly 81 00:06:14,540 --> 00:06:19,795 because its very nature is so subjective. Susan Sontag, in her 82 00:06:19,795 --> 00:06:24,755 essay on camp, described it as a sensibility. Certainly not 83 00:06:24,755 --> 00:06:30,195 something so concrete as an idea. It's I mean, it's a vibe. 84 00:06:31,400 --> 00:06:35,960 Taste is made up of the stuff you like and what you buy, the 85 00:06:35,960 --> 00:06:39,000 clothes you wear, the movies you go watch, the concerts you pay 86 00:06:39,000 --> 00:06:43,720 to see. But all those things amount to more than just stuff. 87 00:06:44,315 --> 00:06:47,035 Kyle Chayka: A lot of times people think of good taste as 88 00:06:47,035 --> 00:06:50,875 this rule book, like what is cool or what is not cool. They 89 00:06:50,875 --> 00:06:53,995 think of it as a list of things they should like or should not 90 00:06:53,995 --> 00:06:58,955 like. But I think through my work, I've argued that taste is 91 00:06:59,210 --> 00:07:02,890 more than just a personal preference. It's kind of what 92 00:07:02,890 --> 00:07:07,050 things mean to you. Like, what kinds of culture you identify 93 00:07:07,050 --> 00:07:11,370 with, what things build your sense of self, what moves you. 94 00:07:12,225 --> 00:07:13,425 Georgia Hampton: That's Kyle Czaca. 95 00:07:13,425 --> 00:07:15,985 Kyle Chayka: I'm a staff writer at The New Yorker where I write 96 00:07:15,985 --> 00:07:19,105 a weekly column about the Internet called Infinite Scroll. 97 00:07:19,105 --> 00:07:22,225 And I've also written books including Filter Worlds, which 98 00:07:22,225 --> 00:07:24,785 was about algorithms and cultural homogenization. 99 00:07:25,250 --> 00:07:27,490 Georgia Hampton: Kyle's definition of taste is the most 100 00:07:27,490 --> 00:07:31,010 relatable version I've been able to find because it quickly does 101 00:07:31,010 --> 00:07:35,490 away with the idea of good and bad taste and focuses instead on 102 00:07:35,490 --> 00:07:40,755 your relationship to your own taste. Like I said, taste is so 103 00:07:40,755 --> 00:07:44,595 subjective, as it should be. I don't really subscribe to the 104 00:07:44,595 --> 00:07:48,835 idea that we must all bend the knee to a select group of taste 105 00:07:48,835 --> 00:07:53,860 makers pointing us to the right or more pointedly cool movies or 106 00:07:53,860 --> 00:07:57,860 music or clothes. At the end of the day, it's always up to you. 107 00:07:58,340 --> 00:08:02,820 The greatest value of taste, cultivating it, having it, 108 00:08:02,900 --> 00:08:06,900 changing it over time, lies in the relationship it helps you 109 00:08:06,900 --> 00:08:08,180 build with yourself. 110 00:08:08,795 --> 00:08:12,475 Kyle Chayka: Anyone can have taste. Like, the everyone does 111 00:08:12,475 --> 00:08:16,315 have taste. The baseline of taste is just what do you enjoy 112 00:08:16,315 --> 00:08:20,155 and what is meaningful to you in in culture or aesthetic 113 00:08:20,155 --> 00:08:24,480 experience. Good taste to me is good personal taste, which is 114 00:08:24,480 --> 00:08:28,160 knowing what you personally like and being secure in your own 115 00:08:28,160 --> 00:08:32,160 enjoyment of it and knowing why you like it and knowing what the 116 00:08:32,160 --> 00:08:35,600 thing is. Just having this like confident sense of what is 117 00:08:35,600 --> 00:08:36,320 meaningful to you. 118 00:08:36,755 --> 00:08:40,195 But that can be anything. I mean, like, Disney adults are 119 00:08:40,195 --> 00:08:43,795 very secure in their taste for Disney. It doesn't doesn't have 120 00:08:43,795 --> 00:08:47,155 to be, you know, Wong Kar wai films or whatever. 121 00:08:47,475 --> 00:08:49,235 Georgia Hampton: If you feel confident in the things you 122 00:08:49,235 --> 00:08:52,720 like, the popularity of any one of those things doesn't really 123 00:08:52,720 --> 00:08:59,520 matter. Like, I really loved Rosalia's new album Luxe. And in 124 00:08:59,520 --> 00:09:03,760 a couple weeks, I'm gonna go see her perform it at a huge stadium 125 00:09:03,760 --> 00:09:13,585 show with thousands of other people. Now would it have been 126 00:09:13,585 --> 00:09:17,825 more financially helpful to me if this album wasn't as popular 127 00:09:17,825 --> 00:09:20,785 and I could have seen her at a smaller venue for less money? 128 00:09:21,470 --> 00:09:22,110 Sure. 129 00:09:22,430 --> 00:09:26,030 But that doesn't affect how much I love the album. I know I love 130 00:09:26,030 --> 00:09:29,390 it because of the way it sounds, the themes of the songs, 131 00:09:29,390 --> 00:09:32,510 Rosalia's voice, and a million other reasons that have 132 00:09:32,510 --> 00:09:38,025 everything to do with me and what I like. Personal taste can 133 00:09:38,025 --> 00:09:42,265 always change and does always change. And as we all ride the 134 00:09:42,265 --> 00:09:45,865 wave of our personal taste as it grows and shifts, the feeds of 135 00:09:45,865 --> 00:09:49,305 social platforms can be a great way to discover new things to 136 00:09:49,305 --> 00:09:53,200 like. I learned that Rosalia was coming out with a new album 137 00:09:53,200 --> 00:09:56,800 because the song Berghain kept getting sampled across TikTok. 138 00:09:57,520 --> 00:10:01,280 But my feed isn't just accounting for my interest in 139 00:10:01,280 --> 00:10:05,435 Rosalia. It's gathering data about countless other posts 140 00:10:05,435 --> 00:10:09,275 about her, about the album, discourse about her that's 141 00:10:09,275 --> 00:10:12,555 getting popular on other parts of the Internet that make it to 142 00:10:12,555 --> 00:10:14,395 me whether I like it or not. 143 00:10:14,690 --> 00:10:17,490 Kyle Chayka: I mean, peep users online, all of us are so 144 00:10:17,490 --> 00:10:21,650 bracketed in by the formats of digital platforms, by the 145 00:10:21,650 --> 00:10:27,810 incentives behind what we post, by the ads and recommendations 146 00:10:27,810 --> 00:10:32,005 and brands that clutter up the spaces in which we create and 147 00:10:32,005 --> 00:10:36,325 consume culture. And so I think it becomes harder to feel like 148 00:10:36,325 --> 00:10:40,005 you have a grip on what you're seeing or what you're listening 149 00:10:40,005 --> 00:10:41,845 to or what you're watching. 150 00:10:42,330 --> 00:10:46,010 Georgia Hampton: As I swipe, I'm rushed through entire parts of 151 00:10:46,010 --> 00:10:49,850 the Internet that I've never looked for and don't care about. 152 00:10:50,490 --> 00:10:54,170 The stuff I want to see is also there, jockeying for position. 153 00:10:54,935 --> 00:10:58,135 But when all of it is being thrown at me at the same time, 154 00:10:58,535 --> 00:11:02,615 it's hard to control the balance. I desperately cling to 155 00:11:02,615 --> 00:11:06,535 videos that are doing lyric analysis of the tracks on Luxe, 156 00:11:06,775 --> 00:11:10,620 but they get shoved aside by videos with more views that are 157 00:11:10,620 --> 00:11:13,980 trying to decipher whether or not Rosalia was singing live at 158 00:11:13,980 --> 00:11:18,220 her London show. And the sheer volume of content makes it 159 00:11:18,220 --> 00:11:21,660 harder to actually get at the things that are to my taste. 160 00:11:22,505 --> 00:11:25,625 The taste I had originally developed online. 161 00:11:25,865 --> 00:11:30,425 Kyle Chayka: And that noise, like that distraction and chaos, 162 00:11:30,425 --> 00:11:34,025 I think, prevents you, the individual user, from really 163 00:11:34,025 --> 00:11:36,425 thinking about what you're seeing in front of you and 164 00:11:36,425 --> 00:11:40,030 thinking about what you're experiencing online, and thus it 165 00:11:40,030 --> 00:11:43,230 becomes harder to have your own sense of personal taste. Which 166 00:11:43,230 --> 00:11:46,750 is not to mention like the the overwhelming presence of 167 00:11:46,750 --> 00:11:51,710 algorithmic feeds that that crowd your taste with everyone 168 00:11:51,710 --> 00:11:56,165 else's taste. Like, algorithms take in the data of everyone on 169 00:11:56,165 --> 00:11:59,685 a platform and then use that to predict what kinds of content 170 00:11:59,685 --> 00:12:02,565 you'll like, and they often end up just promoting what is 171 00:12:02,565 --> 00:12:03,605 already popular. 172 00:12:04,405 --> 00:12:07,420 Georgia Hampton: Volume is the name of the game here. If the 173 00:12:07,420 --> 00:12:11,260 feed is like an infinite buffet of stuff you might like, the 174 00:12:11,260 --> 00:12:15,420 algorithm is the spoon heaping piles of food onto your plate. 175 00:12:15,900 --> 00:12:19,605 Surely, you might find something you'd enjoy eating. But when 176 00:12:19,605 --> 00:12:23,525 that mountain of macaroni salad and eggplant Parmesan and puppy 177 00:12:23,525 --> 00:12:27,925 chow gets higher and higher with no sign of stopping, it can be 178 00:12:27,925 --> 00:12:32,500 easy to lose that delicious morsel you actually enjoyed. In 179 00:12:32,500 --> 00:12:36,100 order to really get into Rosalia's new album, I had to 180 00:12:36,100 --> 00:12:38,740 step away from the feed and listen to the music on my own. 181 00:12:39,300 --> 00:12:43,620 My taste about Luxe couldn't really form completely through 182 00:12:43,620 --> 00:12:47,300 the channels of the feed because I was being surrounded by noise. 183 00:12:47,865 --> 00:12:52,025 10,000 voices shouting at me about a bunch of things I wasn't 184 00:12:52,025 --> 00:12:58,025 interested in. But it's sort of impossible to avoid a degree of 185 00:12:58,025 --> 00:13:02,185 this. Even if you fine tune your algorithm to show you things to 186 00:13:02,185 --> 00:13:06,330 your preference, a few things will always sneak through the 187 00:13:06,330 --> 00:13:09,850 cracks by the sheer amount of attention, artificial or 188 00:13:09,850 --> 00:13:14,250 otherwise, paid to it. Sometimes, my TikTok feed will 189 00:13:14,250 --> 00:13:18,645 feebly try to present me with NBA Finals Supercuts or the 190 00:13:18,645 --> 00:13:22,085 third video in a series of seven about the latest drama between 191 00:13:22,085 --> 00:13:24,405 two YouTubers I've never heard of. 192 00:13:24,405 --> 00:13:26,005 Geese: Oh my god. 193 00:13:26,005 --> 00:13:28,245 Georgia Hampton: I regularly refer to things like this as 194 00:13:28,245 --> 00:13:33,710 topics I've learned against my will. Data that came to me not 195 00:13:33,710 --> 00:13:37,710 by my own search for it, but just by the fact of existing on 196 00:13:37,710 --> 00:13:38,350 the Internet. 197 00:13:38,350 --> 00:13:40,990 Kyle Chayka: I mean, I I always think of this famous bit of 198 00:13:40,990 --> 00:13:44,990 marketing research that advertising works best after 199 00:13:44,990 --> 00:13:48,350 someone is exposed to the same thing. I think it was six or 200 00:13:48,350 --> 00:13:51,605 seven times. And that's on the sixth or seventh time of 201 00:13:51,605 --> 00:13:54,405 exposure, that's when the conversion happens. Like, that's 202 00:13:54,405 --> 00:13:58,245 when the customer actually buys the thing or clicks through, 203 00:13:58,245 --> 00:14:02,990 let's say. So I feel like that kind of exposure, not therapy, 204 00:14:02,990 --> 00:14:07,710 but like ex weaponized exposure, let's say, is behind a lot of 205 00:14:07,710 --> 00:14:10,430 that knowing things against your will online. 206 00:14:10,670 --> 00:14:14,430 Like the eighth time you see a Sabrina Carpenter video or 207 00:14:14,430 --> 00:14:17,765 something, it's just gonna stick in your brain more. The the 208 00:14:17,765 --> 00:14:22,005 twentieth time you hear espresso. To use a slightly 209 00:14:22,005 --> 00:14:26,085 outdated reference point, it's gonna stick in your head and 210 00:14:26,085 --> 00:14:28,405 that's and then you will know who Sabrina Carpenter is 211 00:14:28,405 --> 00:14:29,605 essentially against your will. 212 00:14:35,200 --> 00:14:38,560 Georgia Hampton: CGP's marketing strategy banks on this format of 213 00:14:38,560 --> 00:14:42,800 engagement. Fill your FYP with a clip of a song by one of their 214 00:14:42,800 --> 00:14:46,605 clients enough times, and it becomes impossible to ignore. 215 00:14:47,245 --> 00:14:51,165 But knowing about Sabrina Carpenter and liking her music 216 00:14:51,485 --> 00:14:52,765 are not the same thing. 217 00:14:53,165 --> 00:14:56,285 Kyle Chayka: You see so many things just flash by you on a 218 00:14:56,285 --> 00:15:00,170 screen, and you have enough time to register a few bare 219 00:15:00,170 --> 00:15:06,970 sensations like blonde hair, pop star, bubblegum music, you know, 220 00:15:06,970 --> 00:15:10,490 and that's that's all that sticks with you. And so instead 221 00:15:10,490 --> 00:15:13,050 of deep engagement, you have this repeated superficial 222 00:15:13,050 --> 00:15:13,690 engagement. 223 00:15:14,105 --> 00:15:17,865 Georgia Hampton: Yeah. And it it does make me feel like I I mean, 224 00:15:17,865 --> 00:15:20,985 I'm not surprised to say this. I think the algorithmic feeds make 225 00:15:20,985 --> 00:15:24,665 it abundantly easy to just gather sort of fun facts and not 226 00:15:24,665 --> 00:15:26,505 actual deep elements of culture. 227 00:15:27,110 --> 00:15:30,710 Kyle Chayka: Fun fact culture is a good one. That's we're living 228 00:15:30,710 --> 00:15:31,110 we're 229 00:15:31,110 --> 00:15:31,510 Georgia Hampton: living in 230 00:15:31,510 --> 00:15:35,590 Kyle Chayka: a real fun fact age where it's like the what were 231 00:15:35,590 --> 00:15:39,270 those v h one pop up videos with just the little annotations on 232 00:15:39,270 --> 00:15:39,670 them? 233 00:15:39,670 --> 00:15:41,510 Georgia Hampton: It's like, did you know? Those are her real 234 00:15:41,510 --> 00:15:42,150 shoes. 235 00:15:42,150 --> 00:15:44,675 Kyle Chayka: Yeah. That's that is our level of cultural 236 00:15:44,675 --> 00:15:45,955 discourse at this point. 237 00:15:46,995 --> 00:15:52,835 Georgia Hampton: The culture of fun facts is great for 238 00:15:52,835 --> 00:15:59,170 platforms. To extend the food metaphors from before, it's like 239 00:15:59,170 --> 00:16:03,810 giving you infinitely refillable access to deliciously salty, 240 00:16:03,810 --> 00:16:08,050 buttery popcorn. Little bites for you to enjoy and come back 241 00:16:08,050 --> 00:16:13,095 for and enjoy and come back for again. Snackable content. But 242 00:16:13,095 --> 00:16:15,415 you will never fill up on popcorn. 243 00:16:16,215 --> 00:16:20,135 Having a repertoire of fun facts is not the same thing as taste. 244 00:16:23,750 --> 00:16:40,025 After the break, more thoughts on the content buffet. The 245 00:16:40,025 --> 00:16:44,585 Feed's endless buffet of stuff is a potable source of discovery 246 00:16:44,905 --> 00:16:49,465 if you use it as just that, the starting place. And so long as 247 00:16:49,465 --> 00:16:52,820 you have confidence in your own taste, that security that Kyle 248 00:16:52,820 --> 00:16:57,940 was talking about, then the popularity, the ubiquity of a 249 00:16:57,940 --> 00:17:01,780 song like espresso may not bother you. But I think the 250 00:17:01,780 --> 00:17:05,380 trouble here is that the feed overstays its welcome a lot of 251 00:17:05,380 --> 00:17:05,700 the time. 252 00:17:06,535 --> 00:17:10,055 The first few times I heard espresso, for example, I really 253 00:17:10,055 --> 00:17:13,495 liked it. That marketing ploy Kyle was talking about totally 254 00:17:13,495 --> 00:17:17,255 worked on me. By the fifth or sixth listen, I thought, oh, 255 00:17:17,255 --> 00:17:24,600 Okay, this is fun. But then I heard it, oh, 38,000 more times, 256 00:17:25,000 --> 00:17:27,960 and I got so sick of it that I never wanted to hear it again. 257 00:17:27,960 --> 00:17:28,920 Geese: God of the sun 258 00:17:29,080 --> 00:17:31,640 Georgia Hampton: And I bet a lot of people felt this way hearing 259 00:17:31,640 --> 00:17:34,680 fifteen second clips of Geese's music for the upteenth time. 260 00:17:35,595 --> 00:17:39,035 You're being confronted with the unavoidable presence of a band 261 00:17:39,115 --> 00:17:41,675 you at first maybe didn't care about 262 00:17:41,835 --> 00:17:42,235 Geese: What the hell? 263 00:17:42,315 --> 00:17:45,115 Georgia Hampton: And eventually hated Mommy. Because of sheer 264 00:17:45,115 --> 00:17:48,475 repetition and the dogged insistence by your feed that 265 00:17:48,475 --> 00:17:54,930 this is important. Even if you strongly disagree with that. And 266 00:17:54,930 --> 00:17:59,090 that will make you a fan of geese. If anything, it'll make 267 00:17:59,090 --> 00:18:04,635 you a staunch hater of geese or at least a hater of the chorus 268 00:18:04,635 --> 00:18:08,635 of Cameron Winter's solo track Love Takes Miles, which played 269 00:18:08,635 --> 00:18:12,235 on my FYP what felt like 10,000 times last year. 270 00:18:13,595 --> 00:18:17,180 But the problem of volume isn't just applicable to stuff we 271 00:18:17,180 --> 00:18:21,500 don't like and yet keep on seeing. Even things we do like, 272 00:18:21,820 --> 00:18:26,700 that we know we like, can get treated to the same process. And 273 00:18:26,700 --> 00:18:30,665 the result, unfortunately, is exactly the same. 274 00:18:30,665 --> 00:18:33,065 Kyle Chayka: I mean, my own Instagram Discover page is now 275 00:18:33,065 --> 00:18:38,345 like mid century modern decorations in Mexico City and 276 00:18:38,345 --> 00:18:43,480 abandoned European villas that are for sale for like $50. So 277 00:18:43,480 --> 00:18:48,120 it's just like even even those things which I do really like 278 00:18:48,120 --> 00:18:52,520 and like to look at by overexposing them to me, 279 00:18:52,520 --> 00:18:56,475 throwing them back in my face over and over again, it makes me 280 00:18:56,475 --> 00:19:00,155 dislike them actually. Like, it makes me go from identifying 281 00:19:00,155 --> 00:19:02,315 with my taste and being interested in these things to 282 00:19:02,315 --> 00:19:07,195 being like, oh my god. Like, why is this the thousandth Milanese 283 00:19:07,755 --> 00:19:09,675 villa that I've seen today? 284 00:19:10,600 --> 00:19:13,240 Georgia Hampton: That overexposure works against 285 00:19:13,240 --> 00:19:18,040 things we actually like and ends up making us sick not just of 286 00:19:18,040 --> 00:19:22,840 the content, but of our own personal taste. And then our 287 00:19:22,840 --> 00:19:27,495 taste, when presented back to us ad nauseam, starts to feel 288 00:19:27,495 --> 00:19:31,495 foreign. We become unmoored to the deeper connection we may 289 00:19:31,495 --> 00:19:36,215 feel toward the architectural style of Italian villas. Or in 290 00:19:36,215 --> 00:19:41,730 the case of my IG Discover page, content about astrology. There's 291 00:19:41,730 --> 00:19:46,050 this very unsettling anesthetic quality to the flattening of 292 00:19:46,050 --> 00:19:46,690 taste. 293 00:19:47,410 --> 00:19:52,765 Watching a topic I very genuinely love get shaved down 294 00:19:52,765 --> 00:19:56,765 into bite sized content. And then having that content fed to 295 00:19:56,765 --> 00:20:01,725 me over and over and over and over again makes me bored by it. 296 00:20:02,125 --> 00:20:05,960 And then it makes me forget why I liked it in the first place. 297 00:20:06,360 --> 00:20:11,000 And after all this, what happens to my desire to seek out more 298 00:20:11,000 --> 00:20:11,560 stuff? 299 00:20:12,680 --> 00:20:16,920 Kyle Chayka: It slows it down, I would say. I mean, if we get 300 00:20:16,920 --> 00:20:20,200 overexposed to something before we learn enough about it, I 301 00:20:20,200 --> 00:20:26,575 think it's alienating. Like, I would love to know more about 302 00:20:26,575 --> 00:20:30,495 abandoned European castles or whatever. Like, I would I would 303 00:20:30,495 --> 00:20:34,175 love to learn about things, but this is not learning or 304 00:20:34,175 --> 00:20:38,430 deepening my knowledge. It's just throwing the images in my 305 00:20:38,430 --> 00:20:39,550 face all the time. 306 00:20:39,550 --> 00:20:42,350 So I think it kind of turns us off of things that we might 307 00:20:42,350 --> 00:20:44,270 otherwise be interested in. 308 00:20:44,430 --> 00:20:47,470 Georgia Hampton: The work of looking carefully at things is a 309 00:20:47,470 --> 00:20:52,875 necessary part of taste, maybe even the essence of taste. The 310 00:20:52,875 --> 00:20:56,795 platforms are a great distributor of potential objects 311 00:20:56,795 --> 00:21:02,315 of personal taste, but they cannot and will not dive deeper 312 00:21:02,315 --> 00:21:03,435 on your behalf. 313 00:21:03,995 --> 00:21:07,540 Kyle Chayka: The algorithm is tasteless. And I think we have 314 00:21:07,540 --> 00:21:12,820 to embrace that idea that the taste belongs with the human and 315 00:21:12,820 --> 00:21:20,825 with the individual. You know, you can see something anywhere. 316 00:21:20,825 --> 00:21:25,385 You can watch your feeds. You can subscribe to whatever 317 00:21:25,385 --> 00:21:26,425 magazine you want. 318 00:21:26,425 --> 00:21:29,065 You can run your Instagram however you want. But 319 00:21:29,065 --> 00:21:33,240 ultimately, the responsibility of making meaning out of your 320 00:21:33,240 --> 00:21:37,480 experiences and building your sense of self is just within 321 00:21:37,480 --> 00:21:44,360 you. Like, you have to go back to the internal thought process 322 00:21:44,360 --> 00:21:48,415 of what does this thing mean to me? What does this film mean? 323 00:21:48,415 --> 00:21:50,575 What does this influencer account mean? 324 00:21:50,575 --> 00:21:54,895 What does this shirt mean? And that's work. Like, we have to 325 00:21:54,895 --> 00:21:58,895 take on more work, whereas the technology constantly promises 326 00:21:58,895 --> 00:22:00,495 to take work away from us. 327 00:22:05,190 --> 00:22:08,870 Georgia Hampton: Taste is an essentially embodied experience, 328 00:22:09,670 --> 00:22:12,950 and it cannot flourish completely if it is flattened 329 00:22:12,950 --> 00:22:18,565 into the same ten second clip from the same song. And to me, 330 00:22:19,125 --> 00:22:22,805 this is the bigger crisis of taste plaguing us online, well 331 00:22:22,805 --> 00:22:26,805 beyond the influence of CGP or any of its kin. A lot of the 332 00:22:26,805 --> 00:22:29,365 posts I saw in the wake of those articles about Geese being a 333 00:22:29,365 --> 00:22:33,350 PSYOP were coming from people proclaiming that they always 334 00:22:33,350 --> 00:22:36,950 knew that this band wasn't the real deal. But what it really 335 00:22:36,950 --> 00:22:39,750 felt like they were saying was that they had been so 336 00:22:39,750 --> 00:22:43,670 overexposed to geese that they had learned about geese against 337 00:22:43,670 --> 00:22:48,165 their will for too long and craved a kind of vindictive 338 00:22:48,165 --> 00:22:52,325 satisfaction in seeing that band dragged through the mud for 339 00:22:52,325 --> 00:22:55,445 overstaying their welcome on the feeds of people who didn't like 340 00:22:55,445 --> 00:23:02,030 them. The ferocity of this discourse felt just as 341 00:23:02,030 --> 00:23:04,270 superficial as the content that created it. 342 00:23:04,670 --> 00:23:08,510 Content I really don't care about and would love to never 343 00:23:08,510 --> 00:23:13,575 see again. More volume, more junk, more stuff keeping me 344 00:23:13,575 --> 00:23:17,655 distracted and numb away from the things I actually wanna see. 345 00:23:18,615 --> 00:23:23,095 I hate to bring up the no press is bad press adage of yore, but 346 00:23:23,255 --> 00:23:28,440 I mean, if the shoe fits. And I think if we're ever going to 347 00:23:28,440 --> 00:23:33,240 figure out a way to maintain a real embodied relationship to 348 00:23:33,240 --> 00:23:37,480 our own personal taste online, I think we need to know when to 349 00:23:37,480 --> 00:23:41,985 engage and when to disengage. The buffet is going to keep 350 00:23:41,985 --> 00:23:43,345 refilling our plates. 351 00:23:43,585 --> 00:23:48,385 We get to choose, and I think we have to choose when to dine 352 00:23:48,385 --> 00:23:48,945 there. 353 00:23:49,105 --> 00:23:51,025 Kyle Chayka: Because the temptation is there to engage 354 00:23:51,025 --> 00:23:55,210 with everything, to to weigh in on every new discourse and every 355 00:23:55,210 --> 00:23:57,850 new meme and every new phenomenon that happens. 356 00:23:57,850 --> 00:23:59,930 Georgia Hampton: It's like you don't have a choice. You have to 357 00:23:59,930 --> 00:24:02,490 you have to weigh in on this article about geese. 358 00:24:02,490 --> 00:24:08,165 Kyle Chayka: It's a trap. It's a it's a terrible trap. But to to 359 00:24:08,165 --> 00:24:11,445 have that taste to be like, this just isn't my thing. I'm not 360 00:24:11,445 --> 00:24:15,445 even gonna engage with it at all. That's a a powerful act 361 00:24:15,445 --> 00:24:16,085 now, I think. 362 00:24:21,440 --> 00:24:25,280 It's like you're a scavenger in the dangerous woods. Like, go go 363 00:24:25,280 --> 00:24:29,360 out there, find find your favorite band on Spotify or 364 00:24:29,360 --> 00:24:32,880 whatever, and immediately go to their band's camp and buy their 365 00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:36,605 album. Or go, you know, subscribe to your favorite 366 00:24:36,605 --> 00:24:41,165 writer's Patreon or something like that or, like, piece that's 367 00:24:41,165 --> 00:24:43,485 been missing, I think, is that second step. 368 00:25:01,975 --> 00:25:04,375 Georgia Hampton: A massive thank you to Kyle Shaika for talking 369 00:25:04,375 --> 00:25:07,975 to me about taste and the algorithm and how those two 370 00:25:07,975 --> 00:25:10,855 things interact with each other. I'll leave ways you can read 371 00:25:10,855 --> 00:25:12,535 more of his work in the show notes. 372 00:25:34,725 --> 00:25:37,285 Mike Rugnetta: That is the show we have for you this week. We 373 00:25:37,285 --> 00:25:41,205 are gonna be back here in the main feed on or around Thursday, 374 00:25:41,285 --> 00:25:46,950 June 11. Did you know that fewer than a thousand of you are 375 00:25:46,950 --> 00:25:51,590 members? We run this show on a shoestring budget, so just 376 00:25:51,590 --> 00:25:55,350 imagine what we could do with a few more bucks in the bank. A 377 00:25:55,350 --> 00:25:57,350 few more of your bucks, perhaps. 378 00:25:57,510 --> 00:26:01,325 I know you also live on a shoestring budget. Every buck 379 00:26:01,325 --> 00:26:04,765 helps. Become a member at neverpost.st, and for $4 a 380 00:26:04,765 --> 00:26:07,645 month, you'll get access to an ad free feed, sideshows like 381 00:26:07,645 --> 00:26:10,685 Slow Post, and the satisfaction of listening to the show do 382 00:26:10,685 --> 00:26:14,300 something cool or adventurous, and being able to say, hey. I 383 00:26:14,300 --> 00:26:15,820 did that. I helped. 384 00:26:16,060 --> 00:26:21,900 Neverpo.st, $4 a month. Become a member today. Never Post's 385 00:26:21,900 --> 00:26:24,940 producers are Audrey Evans, Georgia Hampton, and the 386 00:26:24,940 --> 00:26:28,225 mysterious doctor first name, last name. Our senior producer 387 00:26:28,225 --> 00:26:32,305 is Hans Buto. Our executive producer is Jason Oberholzer. 388 00:26:32,305 --> 00:26:36,945 And the show's host, that's me, is Mike Rugnetta. I needed 389 00:26:36,945 --> 00:26:42,590 something beyond or not myself that could get me there. I tried 390 00:26:42,590 --> 00:26:46,990 to imagine the distance or how, to breach what I couldn't, save 391 00:26:46,990 --> 00:26:51,310 for a machine that worked upon something I couldn't see. May 392 00:26:51,310 --> 00:26:56,110 call it mystical. Excerpt of Radio by C. 393 00:26:56,110 --> 00:27:00,865 M. Burrows. Never Post is a production of Charts and Leisure 394 00:27:00,865 --> 00:27:13,760 and it's distributed by Radiotopia. Hi.