Writers maybe JK Rowling and GRRM. In the 80s-90s it was maybe Stephen King and Grisham.

Fairly sure you don't need to know anything about journalists or Philosophy. In the 80s you probably should have known about HST. For philosophy Wittgenstein was likely the latest with any name recognition.

For psychologist it's still probably just Freud. Maybe extra points for Jung.

For economist you'll likely get by with Marx and Adam Smith still.

Politicians? Should you know anything about classic communists like Castro, Stalin or say Mao. African dictators. Do any of them have any name recognition. Same with South-America and Asia.

Criminals/Terrorists. There's likely no contemporary criminals tbh. Maybe that one Cartel guy from Mexico. El Chapo. Escobar might still be relevant. For terrorists after Bin Laden there's likely no one.

Revolutionaries. Likely all blank after Che. Mandela is maybe in the contention and Gandhi.

Serial killers. Likely good with just Manson.

Clothing. Typical high end brands likely Gucci. Hype beast brands like Supreme and Off-White. Traditional Hip-Hop brands like say North Face or Polo. Brands from other subcultures Fred Perry or Doc Martens.

Sneakers in general. Adidas Superstars, Nike AF1 or All star Chucks. Later additions like Yeezys or things with ethnic connection like Nike Cortez. Is any of this relevant to know?

Theater. Hamilton. Cats and Rent. Maybe one scene from Street car named desire. Then about 300 years where nothing happened and then Shakespeare who did two plays, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth. And before that there was nothing.

Sports. No idea about American Football. With Soccer maybe Pele, Maradona, Zidane, Zlatan and Messi. Beckham is likely there somewhere and brits have their own lists. With hockey there's Gretzky and that might be the extent of names from people that don't follow it. Outside US with baseball there's maybe Babe Ruth. Basketball maybe Jordan and Magic Johnson. Other sports Tony Hawk.

If we take this thread as re-education of PLOP we're going to need some American voices. Also we need the region where PLOP resides esp. for music and sports. Say doubt you need to know who Mac Dre is outside the Bay.

As a foreigner in a sense i only scrape the surface. Though American soft influence as a strategy has been very successful. I know most about American pop-culture after local culture. As a European i also know bits about UK, Sweden, Italy and Germany. And bits about Japan. I know almost nothing about other countries.

Apparently Anime is now something you should be aware of. I think you were set the whole 20th century if you had seen Akira and Ghost in a shell. And maybe something from that guy that did cutesy shit. Porco Rosso and some other stuff.

On the other hand you might not need to know anything about HK cinema today. Before you might have needed to know about John Woo.

Also Japanese cinema might have passed us. Maybe you should know who Takeshi Kitano is and Kurosawa for old times sake.

Today you might need to know something about K-pop. I don't know anything about that. I like one song from Black Pink.

As random thought i don't know how much we need to know about people that popularized tropes in cinema. Or pioneers of popular music for that matter. Is it relevant to know anything about Elvis or Beatles?

Thinking about it Ginsberg is likely the last poet that was a part of pop culture. Likely not today and same applies to other writers from Beat generation like Burroughs and Kerouac. Similarly characters that were behind the scenes of hippy movement like Albert Hofmann and Alexander Shulgin. Today, if you look for what made Hofmann relevant, you're likely to get derivatives of Shulgin's many alphabet drugs. Oh maybe Neruda is there for poets. Dunno. Somewhere literature became the thing of housewives where they dictated what is popular. Somewhat like how teenage kids dictate popular music's success.

From PFA's Dune thread almost none that are mentioned there are part of today's pop culture even though they very much molded it. From the writers like Herbert and Dan Simmons. To writers they referenced like Keats, Baudalaire or James Joyce. Or the illustrators like Giger and Moebius. As a director maybe Ridley Scott is there. Luc Besson might not be there. If you haven't read Joyce before, don't.

From the criterion thread even less is relevant.

Pornstars. Holmes and Ron Jeremy. Traci Lords and maybe Jenna Jameson. Contemporary likely no male stars and for females Riley Reid is likely closest. Rocco might be somewhat known still, likely Steve Holmes and Manual Ferrera should deserve some recognition. For current starlets the market is just too splintered.

Boxers Ali and Tyson. Likely still only names anyone that doesn't follow the sport knows.

For wrestling Hulk Hogan and maybe Andre the Giant. Rock for other merits.

O.J Simpson athlete and actor best known for killing his wife.

Country music Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash. Miley Cyrus's dad that weaseled in to Old town road remake a year ago that no one remembers now. And that's likely the future of country. Also popularized by tik tok where things live around 3 months and then are forever erased from memory.

Names to know from Tik Tok and IG someone else needs to fill. I'm under the impression that Facebook and Twitter have no ability to blow anyone up. Correct me if i'm wrong. Also people that are Youtube famous with any reach outside the platform and longevity besides maybe Pewdiepie.

The Andy Warhol Diaries - Netflix

I have made reference over the years to Warhol as if I had any clue. The 1st episode was fantastic. I clearly had no real idea who he was as a person.

I looked at my wife and said, “this is more a documentary of that era using Warhol as a central character”. A smack in the face as to truly how times have changed. I lived it and I am gobsmacked.

interview magazine. I didn’t realize what a precursor that was. You can connect TMZ to Interview.

the birth of reality tv with Warhol TV.

the Catholicism, appearance, homosexuality in that era. The Yuppy Handbook. The celebrities of that era which is what Warhol was about. The commissioned portraits for revenue. What a capitalist Warhol was at heart reeeeaaally surprised me. I had categorized Warhol as a eunuch tbh. The shooting. What The Factory was really like. All this was Easter eggs for me.


I think as I got deep in episode 2 I got too overwhelmed by the homosexuality. I’m no homophobe and am socially liberal as can be. That aspect just became overwhelming and a bit boring. This is where I stopped.

I have cancelled my current cable service because my $300/mo. xFinity bill became an arbitrary line in the sand I chose not to cross. I took the new customer discount with Comcast and I gotta fuck with piece-meal Netflix etc as it isn’t included. I know I will drag my feet on that.

i usually wash dishes wearing a thong and a pair of slippers while my ladyfriend reads random definitions from the dictionary of cultural literacy, second edition. i have to name the term associated with the definition and if i get one wrong she whips me savagely with a riding crop.

I forgot to mention the best part of the Andy Warhol Diaries. The use of AI to recreate Warhol’s voice throughout the documentary.

Another movie I am anticipating, “Roadrunner”, is using the same AI to recreate Anthony Bourdain’s voice.

We are so close with visual deep fake as well. Social media and news will never be the same and it’s “virtually” (clever, huh?) here. It’ll be accessible to everyone before you know it. That’s what tech do, son.

You think Ukraine reporting has been filled with skepticism. I’ve seen (or more properly heard) the future. It’s gonna be chaos. Buckle up.

more destruction than nukes.

predictably flawless, seems coge

"What we need is a commentator with the anger and the wit of a Swift or a Wilde; what we get is someone being amusing on Twitter." - alex larman

hat tipping warhol in this thread is so spectacular because of his '15 minute of fame' concept. like tiktok has proven to be the bridge between the past and the future he predicted. at the time his comment was largely interpreted to point to the democratization of fabulousness but whats actually taken root is the increasingly fleeting nature of stardom, where there is this explosive period of adoration that implodes and rots in weeks/months instead of years/decades.