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You're really making a value judgment on how the world works in general based on Old Town Road?

• ilaksh 7y ago
  That was one example. Look at popular music in general. Or popular movies versus good movies. Look at the example of social researchers creating a line of actors in downtown Las Vegas. The line went to nowhere. But simply by virtue of having several people in it, it seemed popular. So it grew in popularity to become a very long line. That went nowhere. The thing that was popular had no merit because it did not exist. Or look at Juicero. Very popular with investors to the tune of $120 million.
  • atentaten 7y ago
    Do you happen to have a link related to the Las Vegas line of actors experiment?
    • ilaksh 7y ago
      https://youtu.be/k2F_7B_-FI4 https://youtu.be/k2F_7B_-FI4
  • smolder 7y ago
    I don't really believe that what's popular in music is simply a reflection of what people want. It's more like what someone's marginally accurate model of the public wants. Same with movies. Studios experiment and when they find something that is commercially successful, they make more of it. A lot of good stuff doesn't get made or promoted because they think it wouldn't have the broad appeal to be commercially successful. A lot of what's popular just got that way through promotion, not because of its overwhelming merit.