8 ms·

The tyranny of the algorithm: why every coffee shop looks the same

74 points by carrozo 3y ago

anigbrowl 3y ago
I differ from a few people here in thinking that everything is not gravitating toward the average: it's gravitating toward the lowest common denominator, which is usually significantly below-average.
deterministic 3y ago
So the “problem” is that companies optimize their offerings to appeal to as many people as possible and the author doesn’t like the outcome? I would call that a hipster first world problem. The amount of “the world has to change to accomodate my tastes” narcissism demonstrated online nowadays is amazing.
carrozo 3y ago
The author’s sequel to their 2016 essay on the Verge, “Welcome to Airspace” https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12325104/airbnb-aesthetic-global-minimalism-startup-gentrification https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12325104/airbnb-aesthetic-...
- Animats 3y ago
  That may be from Charles Stross's "Laundry" novels, which occasionally mention "Hotelspace". There's an implication that all hotel interiors are somehow connected.
carefulobserver 3y ago
I stopped reading when the author started to lean into how this must be a representation of "whiteness." No, how about it's an artifact of Internet enabled oligarchic capitalist technocracy like you started with? Ironically, the author's performative racism is part of the same trend.
- jjulius 3y ago
  It's unfortunate that you stopped reading in the one paragraph that touched on whiteness when there's so much of the article left to be read after that. Had you continued, you'd see that they don't stay on that subject. In fact, a CTRL+F for "white" shows that the instance of "whiteness" in that paragraph is the last time that "white" shows up at all - and every time "white" shows up before that paragraph, it's about colors in a coffee shop. They touch on it because someone that they interviewed mentioned it, and then they move right back to how it's "an artifact of Internet enabled oligarchic capitalist technocracy" in the very next paragraph. I don't know why people so willingly bury their heads in the sand sometimes...
  - mixmastamyk 3y ago
    Timely: I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
  - carefulobserver 3y ago
    I have the same response to people randomly mentioning how the solution to everything is accepting Jesus into my heart. Whether secular or non secular, this kind of thing is a tell for low quality content because it is indicative of the uncritical acceptance of nonsense. I'm aware of what they're peddling, and I don't have time for people who think like this, which is different from burying my head in the sand, I suspect.
    - jjulius 3y ago
      You came into this thread and said that you threw your hands up and walked away from the article when someone that they interviewed mentioned "whiteness". It was then pointed out to you that that was the only time in the article that race was discussed, and that everything you didn't read was actually about the subject you hoped it would've been about. You proceeded, just now, to double-down and refuse to hear any more of it. In point of fact, you're not "aware of what they're peddling" because you're demonstrating a clear misunderstanding of the article to those of us who actually read it, and you seem proud to do so after you've been called out for it. That's the definition of burying your head in the sand. Hell, your reaction to my comment is basically you trying to wiggle all the way down so that you're buried up to the waist. But hey, you do you. Ignorance is bliss, and such.
kridsdale1 3y ago
Is this a consequence of global optimized supply chains? Maybe we’re all manipulated in to wanting this because it’s actually what interior product companies can make a high profit on.
JohnMakin 3y ago
This is hipsterism taken to its logical conclusion, the true irony being that in an effort to be fashionable/unique, everyone else just copied it to the point it was no longer so.
- jjulius 3y ago
  Is "hipsterism" still even a thing anymore? It feels like that kind of morphed into the whole holistic/burner culture trend that seems to be growing rapidly these days.
  - JohnMakin 3y ago
    I don't know, but the time this author notices this trend beginning, early/mid 2010's, was definitely when it was full force and I still in my head associate these "trendy" pop ups with that culture.
    - sph 3y ago
      This trend has been developing since the 90s, when hipsterism wasn't even a thing. As I mentioned elsewhere, it's a result of a data first digital culture, not bearded white guys in tshirts. Hipsterism is almost dead, the trend towards average is still accelerating.
  - klyrs 3y ago
    Eh, the term "hipster" itself has been through the laundry at least once; the last iteration became "hippies"
  - colechristensen 3y ago
    No. "Hipster" was mostly a millennial youth thing, there's still recognizable bits around but the culture moved on. Especially from the word "hipster". Peaked around 2012. There are still kids who try too hard to be unique, quirky, and authentic in a way that makes them all do the same stuff... but it's a different vibe than a decade ago. Look, a graph!: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=hipster&hl=en-GB https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=h...
angiosperm 3y ago
There must be a reason why Clovis spear points looked the same all across North America, up until the comet strike 12,800 ya. It is probably because they were a trade good, so that anything different would be less tradeable. After the comet strike and its continent-wide wildfires, evidently the trade network broke down, and local styles drifted, freed from conformity. People often talk about a "Clovis culture", but it is unlikely that a single culture spanned the continent. What we know about is just the spear points.
- inglor_cz 3y ago
  The Mousterian (Neanderthal industry) is even more extreme example. Extant for 120 000 years, fairly similar from Portugal to Mongolia, in absence of any known long-distance trade network.
- pkdpic 3y ago
  Such an excellent context to put this in. Even just thinking more broadly about the unimaginably long stretches of relative stability / homogeneity in ancient and prehistoric cultures. The Old / Middle / New Kingdoms (c. 2,700-1,100 BCE), Aurignacian (c. 60,000-24,000 BCE) and Gravettian culture (c. 30,000-15,000 BCE) come to mind but the examples are basically endless.
- mcmoor 3y ago
  Reminds me of Mediterranean Omni-Spear https://acoup.blog/2023/11/10/collections-the-mediterranean-iron-omni-spear/ https://acoup.blog/2023/11/10/collections-the-mediterranean-... but for this case looks like it's not because of trade, but maybe technology?
127361 3y ago
I think this also applies to the scourge of "modern" user interface design, with its low contrast text, bland color schemes, monochrome icons and excessive whitespace. I was wondering for a long time if there was something going on behind the scenes (e.g. due to social media) to cause this mindless conformity and here we have an explanation for it.
- MattDaEskimo 3y ago
  Mostly frameworks that follow guidelines like Material-UI, the insane aspect ratios and resolutions, and then features like Dark/Light mode.
  - 127361 3y ago
    Material design came out right at the very beginning when this "hipsterism" started happening. Then everyone started copying it. I absolutely hated it, and still do to this very day, with so much passion. It is the worst user interface design I have ever been forced to use in my life. It's like they designed it for children or something. And from then it spread to general Web design and to software including GNOME, with GTK3 and the Adwaita theme. Suddenly everything became low contrast and low density, with oversized buttons and excessive whitespace.
    - GuB-42 3y ago
      > low density, with oversized buttons and excessive whitespace. That part is mostly because of smartphones and their small touchscreens. You don't really have a choice with these fat fingers. And for consistency purposes for multiplatform apps/webpages, desktop interfaces followed. The unfortunate thing is that we have had smartphones for 20 years and no one could develop a paradigm with good desktop and mobile ergonomics. UIs improved massively from the 1980s to the 2000s, but from the 2000s to the 2020s, there is essentially no improvement. I understand the disruption caused by smartphones, but not the lack of progress. If anything, modern UIs are objectively worse than they were 20 years ago. Look at that mess that is Windows 11, nothing is consistent, even when you only consider what is shipped with the OS itself.
Animats 3y ago
All this stuff was cool once. SOMA in the 1980s. That was forty years ago.
baggachipz 3y ago
I've noticed that all new fast-food buildings (McDonalds, Wendy's, Taco Bell, etc.) all look very similar. I don't know the name for it, but square/rectangle with vertical "wood" planks outside, sparse interior with touchscreens and no registers inside. It seems designed to be as bland and uninspiring as possible. I suspect this "design" motif is due to focus groups and boardrooms though.
- chankstein38 3y ago
  My girlfriend and I say these have been "Turned into Cog buildings" referencing a game we've both played a lot throughout our lives, ToonTown. Basically, the Cogs take over buildings and make them boring and corporate.
bradgessler 3y ago
I think this is great. It proves how well good ideas can quickly replicate around the world and improve the quality of services and products that we consume. Will they all look the same? Probably, but the market will seek next great novel idea and more rapidly replicate it to become the new standard.
- groby_b 3y ago
  This line of thought completely discounts the value of difference, though. The idea that a single structure works well for everybody assumes everybody values things equally. And usually, above a certain baseline, that's not true. I mean, yes, nobody wants burnt coffee and dirty tables. We can agree there. But the question is, what can you build on top of that. And I think there's room for differentiation, even at a very local level. As a simple example: I will never want a hyper-efficient coffee store that has my order ready the moment I come in. I want a more lengthy engagement with the staff - i.e. I like to chat. Others might want instant service and as little human contact as possible. Neither one is an optimal experience for the customer who doesn't seek that specific experience The idea that there is a single global maximum is fundamentally broken.
  - bradgessler 3y ago
    I disagree—It ratchets up. Before Starbucks, the median coffee was worse. They showed the world that coffee is something more than Folgers or something you drink out of a carafe that’s been warmed for 6 hours. When Starbucks came along it showed the world that coffee is a highly customizable beverage that could be served in thousands of modern stand-alone cafes around the world. That idea spread like a wild fire to the point where Starbucks became the norm, so today’s specialty cafes that this article criticizes popped up to elevate coffee even more. Today we’re probably near some peak of “craft coffee in a loft cafe” that will become the new norm and the whole process will repeat itself again, elevating coffee even more. Even if this process reaches a global maximum we’ll see demand for novelty spread out into tea, Kambucha, etc.
    - mecha_ghidorah 3y ago
salamanderman 3y ago
The author should check out the 2013 Edgar Wright movie The World's End, pointing out the growing uniformity of local pubs. Also, it has awesome fight scenes.
- siquick 3y ago
  Love that film.
somethoughts 3y ago
The two comments/critiques I would have on the article are: - Having a shared global design aesthetic also means there are likely open communication channels through which a shared global understanding might be achieved. If the citizens of the world can understand and appreciate each other through design, what else might they understand and appreciate about each other? - Instead of critiquing existing designs - it'd be helpful to have a vision of what locally culturally distinctive designs for a coffee shop or AirBNB could look like. Help us readers envision what a better world - that's more "design inclusive" - might look like. The advice to the author would be - "use your outlet to be the change you want to see." Highlight that cafe in Mexico City... or Morocco... serving coffee authentically that us readers should visit.[1][2] [1] Mexico City coffee chain - Cielito_Querido_Cafe - looks distinct from a hipster SF coffee shop - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g150800-d2459156-Reviews-Cielito_Querido_Cafe-Mexico_City_Central_Mexico_and_Gulf_Coast.html#photos;aggregationId=&albumid=101&filter=7 https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g150800-d24591... [2] Morocco coffee chain replicating across Asia - Bacha Coffee - also distinct from hipster aesthetics https://www.timeout.com/hong-kong/restaurants/bacha-coffee https://www.timeout.com/hong-kong/restaurants/bacha-coffee
- dangus 3y ago
  I mentioned it in another comment, but this has parallels to the Irish Pub. I think we can just admit that good design is good design. This is extremely appealing to business owners because minimalism equals low setup costs. It’s also appealing to patrons because it’s aesthetically pleasing. Some things become popular around the globe because the idea is so universally appealing. Coffee itself is a great example of such a phenomenon. Most coffee shops aren’t located in places that grow coffee.
- Apocryphon 3y ago
  > If the citizens of the world can understand and appreciate each other through design, what else might they understand and appreciate about each other. While I don't discount the utopian sentiment behind this, it elides the fact that it is not all citizens of parts of the world understanding each other, but rather specific subsegments of the same. So while young, well-educated, white collar urban professionals might grok each other's vibe, that is immaterial even as we head into what seems to be a new era of nationalism and tribal competition.
dangus 3y ago
I think this article is being really dramatic about how “bad” and “oppressive” this is supposed to be. Is the Irish Pub a bad thing? You can find an Irish Pub anywhere. It’s a deliberate export [1]. But that’s not oppressive or exclusionary. The Irish Pub is just good design that has universal appeal. I wish the article would just admit that this is an appealing, perhaps timeless style that appeals business owners across the globe. Its roots in minimalism equates to low setup costs. The aesthetics are pleasing to spend time in. What’s to complain about? Then there’s the paragraph addressing the homogenous nature of the clientele. I have to push back on that one: I doubt that coffee shops in China or Japan with this aesthetic are mostly patronized by white people. Also, you know, affluent people are allowed to have their own tastes and culture. That fact alone is not oppressive to anyone else by default. Affluent people who like expensive coffee, minimalism, MacBook Pros, and house plants are just existing, minding their own business patronizing a class of businesses they enjoy. In this case it’s not like they’re hunting endangered animals, they’re just drinking overpriced coffee. [1] https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/04/12/523653040/episode-764-pub-in-a-box https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/04/12/523653040/epis...
- Sai_ 3y ago
  The issue is that wealthy people in your comment aren’t choosing the aesthetic reflective of their geography and heritage. They’re choosing an aesthetic prescribed and circumscribed by what they see on social media. For example, I live in a tropical country with hot summers and monsoons. Historically, dwellings here have had tall ceilings, narrow windows, little glass. Still, of late, builders have embraced larger windows with tinted glass, lower ceilings, commode style toilets instead of Orissa pan toilets, and other such stylistic choices. I’m sure no one told them to adopt this style. They simply converged on this through some combination of their own exposure to Instagram and pricy designers showing them catalogs of what dwellings in other parts of the world look like. This break from local rootedness to global interconnectedness is what the article is about.
  - dangus 3y ago
    I just think the article is too negative about the shift toward global interconnectedness. Like I said, there are trends that are appealing to everyone on the globe. In your example, the availability of air conditioning and improvements in building materials (insulation) and glass technology (…insulation) are too important to omit. Also, these building technologies mean that you don’t have to have a have a specific aesthetic to achieve comfort and efficiency goals. You can build a concrete and glass building with the same airflow and insulating properties as traditional construction. One example I heard about recently is the new jewelers complex in India. It’s a skyscraper complex that uses a wind funneling system to send airflow down the main promenade and reduce the need for air conditioning. Of course, the design is nothing like traditional Indian architecture, but it accomplishes its goals effectively. The toilet example is another one where the obvious comfort advantage of the Western toilet makes it universally appealing. As much as nature’s flow prefers squatting, there are obvious ease of use and accessibility advantages to sitting on a chair. I think of global interconnectedness being more like everyone being able to make more discoveries. If Danish people eat more Chinese food because they think it tastes better than their local cuisine, it’s not some kind of perverse negative of global interconnectedness that they abandoned their roots. They just got exposed to a new idea that they liked and decided it was the way to go. Being interconnected with the entire globe means that more ideas can be shared.
lifefeed 3y ago
It's not coffee shops, it's everything. I read an essay last year on this topic, "The age of average" by Alex Murrell ( https://www.alexmurrell.co.uk/articles/the-age-of-average https://www.alexmurrell.co.uk/articles/the-age-of-average ) and it's stayed in my mind ever since. Cars, home interiors, instagram photos, skylines, self help books, franchise movies. The design of everything in our lives has become so relentlessly optimized we have a global culture that's stuck a risk-free local maxima.
- chankstein38 3y ago
  As much as I will admit the Cybertruck is ugly and don't really _want_ one, this is why I was/am tempted by them. I can barely tell the difference between a Chevy, Ford, or Dodge truck at this point. They all look the same. Cars too. But the Cybertruck actually looks different. Not here shilling for the Cybertruck... Musk sucks and it seems like the truck does as well but it looks different than this boring average we're in and I kind of dig that.
  - mixmastamyk 3y ago
    Not what I heard (the truck sucks): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6WDq0V5oBg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6WDq0V5oBg
  - qwerpy 3y ago
    I’m unashamedly getting one pretty much for this reason. I’m bored of driving the same amorphous blob-shaped cars for the past couple of decades (including my blob shaped model Y). It will be fun to drive something that tries to push the envelope for once.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - chankstein38 3y ago
      Right?! I'm excited for you and I hope you love it! I want that moment of walking out to my driveway, not really thinking about it, and seeing this thing and, for just a minute, thinking "Why is there a Warthog from Halo 1 sitting in my driveway?" haha Enjoy!
stevage 3y ago
It's a great time to be alive if you're into that aesthetic. Personally, I'm not. And I find these spaces noisy and uncomfortable to be in, with their concrete floors and lack of any soft furnishings. I miss the grungy cafes with couches and armchairs and rugs and wall hangings collected from wherever.
drewcoo 3y ago
So now the reason is "the algorithm" and not ubiquitous Friends reruns? No mention of the contrast between the status quo and the rise of cottage industry tech was supposed to promise.
- jjulius 3y ago
  >So now the reason is "the algorithm" and not ubiquitous Friends reruns? I don't really think that the aesthetic described here matches the aesthetic of the Friends coffee shop, no? Or am I crazy?
- petre 3y ago
  The Friends Coffe Shop seemed quite cozy compared to modern incarnations. The hipster shops in my city all sell awful light roast sour coffee that is not drinkable without milk. Italians would most probably pull disgusted faces. At least the roastery that I have been passing on my way to school years ago still sells decent coffee.
- carrozo 3y ago
  Have you read “How a TV Sitcom Triggered the Downfall of Western Civilization”? https://gen.medium.com/how-a-tv-sitcom-triggered-the-downfall-of-western-civilization-336e8ccf7dd0 https://gen.medium.com/how-a-tv-sitcom-triggered-the-downfal...
neuralRiot 3y ago
Everything has a turning point, and when the “algorithm generation” find out the excitement and pleasure of discovering things by oneself there will be a comeback. That was the magic of the video store shelves, the bookstore, the “let’s eat here” and the: “I want the same as that men in that table”
zwieback 3y ago
Well written, good follow-up to the Airspace thing (won't buy the book though). My question: doesn't this just open up opportunities for people with off-algorithm offerings for those that prefer that? Algorithm could even be a template for "things to avoid and replace with unique/local items". The observations in the article are valid but people should stop complaining and offer or do their own thing, this is the golden age of DIY and creative self expression. Everything from craft, art, engineering, music is so much more accessible now, nobody says you have to produce according to likes, the problem only crops up if you start monetizing and at that point you will have to follow popular taste, even if that forces succulents or latte-art on you.
sph 3y ago
> If you've ever wondered why every poster and every trailer and every TV spot looks exactly the same, it's because of testing. It's because anything interesting scores poorly and gets kicked out. This is talking about TV but is applicable to everything; in the modern digital/computerized age, "data" is everything. Everything is measured and tracked, whether it's sales or Instagram likes. The result is always choosing what sells the best, trending towards the same, boring average.
- tnecniv 3y ago
  This phenomena gets more interesting when you considering increasingly global markets for things like TV and movies. For example, I read about ten years ago (so I don’t have the source, sorry), that humor in big Hollywood movies has been transitioning from dialogue to visual humor because the latter is much easier to translate for a global audience. Something I noticed before I found that article was also that, at least in my anecdotal experience is that older movies often had quicker moving dialog (characters talked faster, talked over each other, etc.). I’ve wondered if that’s been just a style choice or driven by the global market as well, since slowing dialog down makes it easier for non-native speakers to follow and presumably makes translation easier.
  - dan_hawkins 3y ago
    I'm really not sure about the humor. Take a look at "Every Frame a Painting: Edgar Wright - How to Do Visual Comedy": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FOzD4Sfgag https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FOzD4Sfgag
NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
My parents recently suffered the loss of their neighborhood coffee shop, and they're absolutely crushed by this. They don't discuss emotions, but I can discern by their reaction that there is now a huge hole in their social life. And it's true. This place was the community hub for everyone who matters to them. They all converged there and met, every morning or every week. Mom and Dad both had their favorite dishes and drinks, and Dad would go nuts if they ran out of his bagel type. He would call ahead just to reserve it! They absolutely thrived on walking up (about 8 blocks away) and hanging out there, just to read the paper and chat with other locals. They knew everyone. They were immersed in all the gossip, about how the place was run (by a pair of husbands) and the guy down the street and all their friends. They had a special meeting on Sundays with some church friends. When I used to visit them, they'd still go every morning and invite me along. Once I came back with bizarre blood-sugar readings because I had been drinking an XL Vanilla Milkshake and cream-cheese jalapeño-cheddar bagel every single day. My parents introduced me around to everyone, and they were usually really nice. I spotted an ex-girlfriend there once, but she didn't notice me. The owners had another location a few miles away, but I think that's been closed down, too. My Dad is now going by every day to glean some sort of news about what's become of the building, whether it's got new owners or tenants, and whether it's going to continue as a coffeehouse. Meanwhile, they've set up shop at a different place, two blocks away.
kdwikzncba 3y ago
[dead]
1vuio0pswjnm7 3y ago
"It was the kind of cafe that someone like me - a western, twentysomething (at the time), internet-brained millennial acutely conscious of their own taste - would want to go to." Is it their own taste, though. If the internet substitutes as their brain, then it's possible their preferences are not their own.

74 points by carrozo 3y ago

I differ from a few people here in thinking that everything is not gravitating toward the average: it's gravitating toward the lowest common denominator, which is usually significantly below-average.

deterministic 3y ago

So the “problem” is that companies optimize their offerings to appeal to as many people as possible and the author doesn’t like the outcome? I would call that a hipster first world problem. The amount of “the world has to change to accomodate my tastes” narcissism demonstrated online nowadays is amazing.

carrozo 3y ago

The author’s sequel to their 2016 essay on the Verge, “Welcome to Airspace” https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12325104/airbnb-aesthetic-global-minimalism-startup-gentrification https://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12325104/airbnb-aesthetic-...

Animats 3y ago
That may be from Charles Stross's "Laundry" novels, which occasionally mention "Hotelspace". There's an implication that all hotel interiors are somehow connected.

carefulobserver 3y ago

I stopped reading when the author started to lean into how this must be a representation of "whiteness." No, how about it's an artifact of Internet enabled oligarchic capitalist technocracy like you started with? Ironically, the author's performative racism is part of the same trend.

jjulius 3y ago
It's unfortunate that you stopped reading in the one paragraph that touched on whiteness when there's so much of the article left to be read after that. Had you continued, you'd see that they don't stay on that subject. In fact, a CTRL+F for "white" shows that the instance of "whiteness" in that paragraph is the last time that "white" shows up at all - and every time "white" shows up before that paragraph, it's about colors in a coffee shop. They touch on it because someone that they interviewed mentioned it, and then they move right back to how it's "an artifact of Internet enabled oligarchic capitalist technocracy" in the very next paragraph. I don't know why people so willingly bury their heads in the sand sometimes...
- mixmastamyk 3y ago
  Timely: I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- carefulobserver 3y ago
  I have the same response to people randomly mentioning how the solution to everything is accepting Jesus into my heart. Whether secular or non secular, this kind of thing is a tell for low quality content because it is indicative of the uncritical acceptance of nonsense. I'm aware of what they're peddling, and I don't have time for people who think like this, which is different from burying my head in the sand, I suspect.
  - jjulius 3y ago
    You came into this thread and said that you threw your hands up and walked away from the article when someone that they interviewed mentioned "whiteness". It was then pointed out to you that that was the only time in the article that race was discussed, and that everything you didn't read was actually about the subject you hoped it would've been about. You proceeded, just now, to double-down and refuse to hear any more of it. In point of fact, you're not "aware of what they're peddling" because you're demonstrating a clear misunderstanding of the article to those of us who actually read it, and you seem proud to do so after you've been called out for it. That's the definition of burying your head in the sand. Hell, your reaction to my comment is basically you trying to wiggle all the way down so that you're buried up to the waist. But hey, you do you. Ignorance is bliss, and such.

kridsdale1 3y ago

Is this a consequence of global optimized supply chains? Maybe we’re all manipulated in to wanting this because it’s actually what interior product companies can make a high profit on.

JohnMakin 3y ago

This is hipsterism taken to its logical conclusion, the true irony being that in an effort to be fashionable/unique, everyone else just copied it to the point it was no longer so.

jjulius 3y ago
Is "hipsterism" still even a thing anymore? It feels like that kind of morphed into the whole holistic/burner culture trend that seems to be growing rapidly these days.
- JohnMakin 3y ago
  I don't know, but the time this author notices this trend beginning, early/mid 2010's, was definitely when it was full force and I still in my head associate these "trendy" pop ups with that culture.
  - sph 3y ago
    This trend has been developing since the 90s, when hipsterism wasn't even a thing. As I mentioned elsewhere, it's a result of a data first digital culture, not bearded white guys in tshirts. Hipsterism is almost dead, the trend towards average is still accelerating.
- klyrs 3y ago
  Eh, the term "hipster" itself has been through the laundry at least once; the last iteration became "hippies"
- colechristensen 3y ago
  No. "Hipster" was mostly a millennial youth thing, there's still recognizable bits around but the culture moved on. Especially from the word "hipster". Peaked around 2012. There are still kids who try too hard to be unique, quirky, and authentic in a way that makes them all do the same stuff... but it's a different vibe than a decade ago. Look, a graph!: https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=hipster&hl=en-GB https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=h...

angiosperm 3y ago

There must be a reason why Clovis spear points looked the same all across North America, up until the comet strike 12,800 ya. It is probably because they were a trade good, so that anything different would be less tradeable. After the comet strike and its continent-wide wildfires, evidently the trade network broke down, and local styles drifted, freed from conformity. People often talk about a "Clovis culture", but it is unlikely that a single culture spanned the continent. What we know about is just the spear points.

inglor_cz 3y ago
The Mousterian (Neanderthal industry) is even more extreme example. Extant for 120 000 years, fairly similar from Portugal to Mongolia, in absence of any known long-distance trade network.
pkdpic 3y ago
Such an excellent context to put this in. Even just thinking more broadly about the unimaginably long stretches of relative stability / homogeneity in ancient and prehistoric cultures. The Old / Middle / New Kingdoms (c. 2,700-1,100 BCE), Aurignacian (c. 60,000-24,000 BCE) and Gravettian culture (c. 30,000-15,000 BCE) come to mind but the examples are basically endless.
mcmoor 3y ago
Reminds me of Mediterranean Omni-Spear https://acoup.blog/2023/11/10/collections-the-mediterranean-iron-omni-spear/ https://acoup.blog/2023/11/10/collections-the-mediterranean-... but for this case looks like it's not because of trade, but maybe technology?

127361 3y ago

I think this also applies to the scourge of "modern" user interface design, with its low contrast text, bland color schemes, monochrome icons and excessive whitespace. I was wondering for a long time if there was something going on behind the scenes (e.g. due to social media) to cause this mindless conformity and here we have an explanation for it.

MattDaEskimo 3y ago
Mostly frameworks that follow guidelines like Material-UI, the insane aspect ratios and resolutions, and then features like Dark/Light mode.
- 127361 3y ago
  Material design came out right at the very beginning when this "hipsterism" started happening. Then everyone started copying it. I absolutely hated it, and still do to this very day, with so much passion. It is the worst user interface design I have ever been forced to use in my life. It's like they designed it for children or something. And from then it spread to general Web design and to software including GNOME, with GTK3 and the Adwaita theme. Suddenly everything became low contrast and low density, with oversized buttons and excessive whitespace.
  - GuB-42 3y ago
    > low density, with oversized buttons and excessive whitespace. That part is mostly because of smartphones and their small touchscreens. You don't really have a choice with these fat fingers. And for consistency purposes for multiplatform apps/webpages, desktop interfaces followed. The unfortunate thing is that we have had smartphones for 20 years and no one could develop a paradigm with good desktop and mobile ergonomics. UIs improved massively from the 1980s to the 2000s, but from the 2000s to the 2020s, there is essentially no improvement. I understand the disruption caused by smartphones, but not the lack of progress. If anything, modern UIs are objectively worse than they were 20 years ago. Look at that mess that is Windows 11, nothing is consistent, even when you only consider what is shipped with the OS itself.

Animats 3y ago

All this stuff was cool once. SOMA in the 1980s. That was forty years ago.

baggachipz 3y ago

I've noticed that all new fast-food buildings (McDonalds, Wendy's, Taco Bell, etc.) all look very similar. I don't know the name for it, but square/rectangle with vertical "wood" planks outside, sparse interior with touchscreens and no registers inside. It seems designed to be as bland and uninspiring as possible. I suspect this "design" motif is due to focus groups and boardrooms though.

chankstein38 3y ago
My girlfriend and I say these have been "Turned into Cog buildings" referencing a game we've both played a lot throughout our lives, ToonTown. Basically, the Cogs take over buildings and make them boring and corporate.

bradgessler 3y ago

I think this is great. It proves how well good ideas can quickly replicate around the world and improve the quality of services and products that we consume. Will they all look the same? Probably, but the market will seek next great novel idea and more rapidly replicate it to become the new standard.

groby_b 3y ago
This line of thought completely discounts the value of difference, though. The idea that a single structure works well for everybody assumes everybody values things equally. And usually, above a certain baseline, that's not true. I mean, yes, nobody wants burnt coffee and dirty tables. We can agree there. But the question is, what can you build on top of that. And I think there's room for differentiation, even at a very local level. As a simple example: I will never want a hyper-efficient coffee store that has my order ready the moment I come in. I want a more lengthy engagement with the staff - i.e. I like to chat. Others might want instant service and as little human contact as possible. Neither one is an optimal experience for the customer who doesn't seek that specific experience The idea that there is a single global maximum is fundamentally broken.
- bradgessler 3y ago
  I disagree—It ratchets up. Before Starbucks, the median coffee was worse. They showed the world that coffee is something more than Folgers or something you drink out of a carafe that’s been warmed for 6 hours. When Starbucks came along it showed the world that coffee is a highly customizable beverage that could be served in thousands of modern stand-alone cafes around the world. That idea spread like a wild fire to the point where Starbucks became the norm, so today’s specialty cafes that this article criticizes popped up to elevate coffee even more. Today we’re probably near some peak of “craft coffee in a loft cafe” that will become the new norm and the whole process will repeat itself again, elevating coffee even more. Even if this process reaches a global maximum we’ll see demand for novelty spread out into tea, Kambucha, etc.
  - mecha_ghidorah 3y ago

salamanderman 3y ago

The author should check out the 2013 Edgar Wright movie The World's End, pointing out the growing uniformity of local pubs. Also, it has awesome fight scenes.

siquick 3y ago
Love that film.

somethoughts 3y ago

The two comments/critiques I would have on the article are: - Having a shared global design aesthetic also means there are likely open communication channels through which a shared global understanding might be achieved. If the citizens of the world can understand and appreciate each other through design, what else might they understand and appreciate about each other? - Instead of critiquing existing designs - it'd be helpful to have a vision of what locally culturally distinctive designs for a coffee shop or AirBNB could look like. Help us readers envision what a better world - that's more "design inclusive" - might look like. The advice to the author would be - "use your outlet to be the change you want to see." Highlight that cafe in Mexico City... or Morocco... serving coffee authentically that us readers should visit.[1][2] [1] Mexico City coffee chain - Cielito_Querido_Cafe - looks distinct from a hipster SF coffee shop - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g150800-d2459156-Reviews-Cielito_Querido_Cafe-Mexico_City_Central_Mexico_and_Gulf_Coast.html#photos;aggregationId=&albumid=101&filter=7 https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g150800-d24591... [2] Morocco coffee chain replicating across Asia - Bacha Coffee - also distinct from hipster aesthetics https://www.timeout.com/hong-kong/restaurants/bacha-coffee https://www.timeout.com/hong-kong/restaurants/bacha-coffee

dangus 3y ago
I mentioned it in another comment, but this has parallels to the Irish Pub. I think we can just admit that good design is good design. This is extremely appealing to business owners because minimalism equals low setup costs. It’s also appealing to patrons because it’s aesthetically pleasing. Some things become popular around the globe because the idea is so universally appealing. Coffee itself is a great example of such a phenomenon. Most coffee shops aren’t located in places that grow coffee.
Apocryphon 3y ago
> If the citizens of the world can understand and appreciate each other through design, what else might they understand and appreciate about each other. While I don't discount the utopian sentiment behind this, it elides the fact that it is not all citizens of parts of the world understanding each other, but rather specific subsegments of the same. So while young, well-educated, white collar urban professionals might grok each other's vibe, that is immaterial even as we head into what seems to be a new era of nationalism and tribal competition.

dangus 3y ago

I think this article is being really dramatic about how “bad” and “oppressive” this is supposed to be. Is the Irish Pub a bad thing? You can find an Irish Pub anywhere. It’s a deliberate export [1]. But that’s not oppressive or exclusionary. The Irish Pub is just good design that has universal appeal. I wish the article would just admit that this is an appealing, perhaps timeless style that appeals business owners across the globe. Its roots in minimalism equates to low setup costs. The aesthetics are pleasing to spend time in. What’s to complain about? Then there’s the paragraph addressing the homogenous nature of the clientele. I have to push back on that one: I doubt that coffee shops in China or Japan with this aesthetic are mostly patronized by white people. Also, you know, affluent people are allowed to have their own tastes and culture. That fact alone is not oppressive to anyone else by default. Affluent people who like expensive coffee, minimalism, MacBook Pros, and house plants are just existing, minding their own business patronizing a class of businesses they enjoy. In this case it’s not like they’re hunting endangered animals, they’re just drinking overpriced coffee. [1] https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/04/12/523653040/episode-764-pub-in-a-box https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/04/12/523653040/epis...

Sai_ 3y ago
The issue is that wealthy people in your comment aren’t choosing the aesthetic reflective of their geography and heritage. They’re choosing an aesthetic prescribed and circumscribed by what they see on social media. For example, I live in a tropical country with hot summers and monsoons. Historically, dwellings here have had tall ceilings, narrow windows, little glass. Still, of late, builders have embraced larger windows with tinted glass, lower ceilings, commode style toilets instead of Orissa pan toilets, and other such stylistic choices. I’m sure no one told them to adopt this style. They simply converged on this through some combination of their own exposure to Instagram and pricy designers showing them catalogs of what dwellings in other parts of the world look like. This break from local rootedness to global interconnectedness is what the article is about.
- dangus 3y ago
  I just think the article is too negative about the shift toward global interconnectedness. Like I said, there are trends that are appealing to everyone on the globe. In your example, the availability of air conditioning and improvements in building materials (insulation) and glass technology (…insulation) are too important to omit. Also, these building technologies mean that you don’t have to have a have a specific aesthetic to achieve comfort and efficiency goals. You can build a concrete and glass building with the same airflow and insulating properties as traditional construction. One example I heard about recently is the new jewelers complex in India. It’s a skyscraper complex that uses a wind funneling system to send airflow down the main promenade and reduce the need for air conditioning. Of course, the design is nothing like traditional Indian architecture, but it accomplishes its goals effectively. The toilet example is another one where the obvious comfort advantage of the Western toilet makes it universally appealing. As much as nature’s flow prefers squatting, there are obvious ease of use and accessibility advantages to sitting on a chair. I think of global interconnectedness being more like everyone being able to make more discoveries. If Danish people eat more Chinese food because they think it tastes better than their local cuisine, it’s not some kind of perverse negative of global interconnectedness that they abandoned their roots. They just got exposed to a new idea that they liked and decided it was the way to go. Being interconnected with the entire globe means that more ideas can be shared.

lifefeed 3y ago

It's not coffee shops, it's everything. I read an essay last year on this topic, "The age of average" by Alex Murrell ( https://www.alexmurrell.co.uk/articles/the-age-of-average https://www.alexmurrell.co.uk/articles/the-age-of-average ) and it's stayed in my mind ever since. Cars, home interiors, instagram photos, skylines, self help books, franchise movies. The design of everything in our lives has become so relentlessly optimized we have a global culture that's stuck a risk-free local maxima.

chankstein38 3y ago
As much as I will admit the Cybertruck is ugly and don't really _want_ one, this is why I was/am tempted by them. I can barely tell the difference between a Chevy, Ford, or Dodge truck at this point. They all look the same. Cars too. But the Cybertruck actually looks different. Not here shilling for the Cybertruck... Musk sucks and it seems like the truck does as well but it looks different than this boring average we're in and I kind of dig that.
- mixmastamyk 3y ago
  Not what I heard (the truck sucks): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6WDq0V5oBg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6WDq0V5oBg
- qwerpy 3y ago
  I’m unashamedly getting one pretty much for this reason. I’m bored of driving the same amorphous blob-shaped cars for the past couple of decades (including my blob shaped model Y). It will be fun to drive something that tries to push the envelope for once.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - chankstein38 3y ago
    Right?! I'm excited for you and I hope you love it! I want that moment of walking out to my driveway, not really thinking about it, and seeing this thing and, for just a minute, thinking "Why is there a Warthog from Halo 1 sitting in my driveway?" haha Enjoy!

stevage 3y ago

It's a great time to be alive if you're into that aesthetic. Personally, I'm not. And I find these spaces noisy and uncomfortable to be in, with their concrete floors and lack of any soft furnishings. I miss the grungy cafes with couches and armchairs and rugs and wall hangings collected from wherever.

drewcoo 3y ago

So now the reason is "the algorithm" and not ubiquitous Friends reruns? No mention of the contrast between the status quo and the rise of cottage industry tech was supposed to promise.

jjulius 3y ago
>So now the reason is "the algorithm" and not ubiquitous Friends reruns? I don't really think that the aesthetic described here matches the aesthetic of the Friends coffee shop, no? Or am I crazy?
petre 3y ago
The Friends Coffe Shop seemed quite cozy compared to modern incarnations. The hipster shops in my city all sell awful light roast sour coffee that is not drinkable without milk. Italians would most probably pull disgusted faces. At least the roastery that I have been passing on my way to school years ago still sells decent coffee.
carrozo 3y ago
Have you read “How a TV Sitcom Triggered the Downfall of Western Civilization”? https://gen.medium.com/how-a-tv-sitcom-triggered-the-downfall-of-western-civilization-336e8ccf7dd0 https://gen.medium.com/how-a-tv-sitcom-triggered-the-downfal...

neuralRiot 3y ago

Everything has a turning point, and when the “algorithm generation” find out the excitement and pleasure of discovering things by oneself there will be a comeback. That was the magic of the video store shelves, the bookstore, the “let’s eat here” and the: “I want the same as that men in that table”

zwieback 3y ago

Well written, good follow-up to the Airspace thing (won't buy the book though). My question: doesn't this just open up opportunities for people with off-algorithm offerings for those that prefer that? Algorithm could even be a template for "things to avoid and replace with unique/local items". The observations in the article are valid but people should stop complaining and offer or do their own thing, this is the golden age of DIY and creative self expression. Everything from craft, art, engineering, music is so much more accessible now, nobody says you have to produce according to likes, the problem only crops up if you start monetizing and at that point you will have to follow popular taste, even if that forces succulents or latte-art on you.

sph 3y ago

> If you've ever wondered why every poster and every trailer and every TV spot looks exactly the same, it's because of testing. It's because anything interesting scores poorly and gets kicked out. This is talking about TV but is applicable to everything; in the modern digital/computerized age, "data" is everything. Everything is measured and tracked, whether it's sales or Instagram likes. The result is always choosing what sells the best, trending towards the same, boring average.

tnecniv 3y ago
This phenomena gets more interesting when you considering increasingly global markets for things like TV and movies. For example, I read about ten years ago (so I don’t have the source, sorry), that humor in big Hollywood movies has been transitioning from dialogue to visual humor because the latter is much easier to translate for a global audience. Something I noticed before I found that article was also that, at least in my anecdotal experience is that older movies often had quicker moving dialog (characters talked faster, talked over each other, etc.). I’ve wondered if that’s been just a style choice or driven by the global market as well, since slowing dialog down makes it easier for non-native speakers to follow and presumably makes translation easier.
- dan_hawkins 3y ago
  I'm really not sure about the humor. Take a look at "Every Frame a Painting: Edgar Wright - How to Do Visual Comedy": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FOzD4Sfgag https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FOzD4Sfgag

NoZebra120vClip 3y ago

My parents recently suffered the loss of their neighborhood coffee shop, and they're absolutely crushed by this. They don't discuss emotions, but I can discern by their reaction that there is now a huge hole in their social life. And it's true. This place was the community hub for everyone who matters to them. They all converged there and met, every morning or every week. Mom and Dad both had their favorite dishes and drinks, and Dad would go nuts if they ran out of his bagel type. He would call ahead just to reserve it! They absolutely thrived on walking up (about 8 blocks away) and hanging out there, just to read the paper and chat with other locals. They knew everyone. They were immersed in all the gossip, about how the place was run (by a pair of husbands) and the guy down the street and all their friends. They had a special meeting on Sundays with some church friends. When I used to visit them, they'd still go every morning and invite me along. Once I came back with bizarre blood-sugar readings because I had been drinking an XL Vanilla Milkshake and cream-cheese jalapeño-cheddar bagel every single day. My parents introduced me around to everyone, and they were usually really nice. I spotted an ex-girlfriend there once, but she didn't notice me. The owners had another location a few miles away, but I think that's been closed down, too. My Dad is now going by every day to glean some sort of news about what's become of the building, whether it's got new owners or tenants, and whether it's going to continue as a coffeehouse. Meanwhile, they've set up shop at a different place, two blocks away.

kdwikzncba 3y ago

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1vuio0pswjnm7 3y ago

"It was the kind of cafe that someone like me - a western, twentysomething (at the time), internet-brained millennial acutely conscious of their own taste - would want to go to." Is it their own taste, though. If the internet substitutes as their brain, then it's possible their preferences are not their own.