Looking at my own purchases from 2025... This is like a "haul" video, without the video.
Yeah, I saw the list, thought, "oh, I've been thinking about getting a camera", looked at the camera he bought, saw it starts at $1200, closed the article.
The tech monoculture is finally breaking
301–310 of 349 posts
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#302> Art Deco is in vogue Is it? I wish it was, but what is the author referencing?
Neo Deco is growing in popularity. There's a few youtube channels dedicated to art deco restoration and influencers showing off art deco motifs in their homes that have spurred the trend. It's just the slow swing of the pendulum away from the AirSpace aesthetic that was the modern interpretation of mid-century modern that came out of the early 2000s. Author is a hipster.
It's so weird, Art Deco was in vogue for a while in the early 90s (see Batman '89, The Rocketeer), and the nostalgia cycle is just coming around again. I'll take Victorian or Art Nouveau instead, please.
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#303Casio f-91w
I bought mine like 6 years ago and at first thought "wow what a cheap piece of plasticky crap. I bet I'm gonna have to replace it every two years or so." I used and abused it every day since then. It never skipped a beat. I took showers with it, I sweated all over it, I dropped it and it only required a single battery replacement since I purchased it. It keeps time well. I'll probably keep using these until the day I…
I'm surprised you already need a battery replacement. My experience with those things is ~10 year battery life.
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#304Earlier quoted context omitted.
Neo Deco is growing in popularity. There's a few youtube channels dedicated to art deco restoration and influencers showing off art deco motifs in their homes that have spurred the trend. It's just the slow swing of the pendulum away from the AirSpace aesthetic that was the modern interpretation of mid-century modern that came out of the early 2000s. Author is a hipster.
It's so weird, Art Deco was in vogue for a while in the early 90s (see Batman '89, The Rocketeer), and the nostalgia cycle is just coming around again. I'll take Victorian or Art Nouveau instead, please.
As long as we can do away with the ultra Minimalism aesthetic, I'm on board.
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#305Looking at my own purchases from 2025... This is like a "haul" video, without the video.
Yeah, I saw the list, thought, "oh, I've been thinking about getting a camera", looked at the camera he bought, saw it starts at $1200, closed the article.
Isn't that simply what cameras cost, since glass needs to be manufactured very precisely?
I'm replacing a 12 year old canon 6D with 4 lenses accumulated over that time period with one-and-done camera. It's precisely the cost of upgrading all of that to the new mirrorless system that pushed me in this direction.
An entry level Canon Rebel is like $600, with an extremely constrained focal range. Essentially any non-prime lens will double that cost.
It's hard to understand how $1200 is considered outrageous for a camera (though for the record, these cost more like $2K, but mine is a used Typ-109 which was $800)?
What are you considering buying?
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#306I think the author is correct to a point but I don't believe the examples they've chosen provide the best support for their case. Gen Z buying iPods and people buying N64 games again is not evidence of the monoculture breaking apart - it's a retreat into the past for the enlightened few because their needs are not being met by modern goods and services. You cannot buy a dedicated MP3 player today with the software po…
> Gen Z buying iPods and people buying N64 games again And Pokémon cards because this generation has less ability to afford big purchases like a house or having a child
I don’t think that has anything to do with not being able to buy a house or have a child. TCG cards are the perfect mixture of consumerism and gambling, and Gen Z has been submerged in both for the entirety of their lives
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#307Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 240g brick pantsing you Sometimes I wish people from 1995 could read our threads and see the things we’re complaining about.
240 grams is twice as heavy as for example an average minidisc player ( https://www.minidisc.wiki/equipment/sony/portable/mz-g750 ) which could often weigh less than 100g. The very first cassette Walkman was about 40 grams light: https://www.soundandvision.com/content/flashback-1979-sony-s... The Rio MP3 player was 109 grams: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/10/diamond-rio-pmp300-m... The classic Creative Nomad w…
> 240 grams is twice as heavy as for example an average minidisc player (https://www.minidisc.wiki/equipment/sony/portable/mz-g750) which could often weigh less than 100g.
The parent comment chose an unusually large DAP with a big screen to compare to. It’s not really a fair comparison.
Also the weights of old devices are usually listed without batteries, which could increase the overall weight by 50% or more.
I had a minidisc player a long time ago. It was a quality one, but it wasn’t the lightest or more robust thing to carry around.
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#308>Looking at my own purchases from 2025, the pattern becomes obvious... Is it me or does this list really goes against almost everything preceeding in the article?
I mentally checked out by the time he mentioned buying ray bans as some radical personal statement on privacy and tech nostalgia.
You're conflating several things.
Tech nostalgia is driven, in part, by a lack of excitement about what current companies are offering. It wasn't really present when we were all excited about Apple, etc.
That nostalgia signals there's a market for alternatives, which we've seen some companies serve, and expect others to enter. This will provide us with more choices apart from "Apple" vs. "Google" end-to-end ecosystems.
Tech is also fun because we have some new categories for the first time, perhaps since mobile. VR isn't popular per se, but I consider it mature. Ray Ban Metas are also a new category (consider an emerging AR application — or more of a glorified camera device, for now). A first person point of view for videos is very different than what's captured by a smartphone; I feel like I'm "there" when I watch travel videos I've taken with them, much more than when I watch what's taken with my phone.
The only personal statement I'm making is that tech seems primed to be fun again (though we probably have to anchor our expectations around a local maxima)
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#309Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mentally checked out by the time he mentioned buying ray bans as some radical personal statement on privacy and tech nostalgia.
The best thing about the internet is that it gave everyone a voice. The worst thing about the internet is that it gave everyone a voice.
The internet is a marketplace of ideas.
Engage with or amplify content you agree with. Create content of your own that represents your values or ideas. If you want, try to persuade others where you think they're wrong.
Overall, if you can feel good about what you've put out there, that's enough. You'll field comments like this no matter what it is.
Re: The tech monoculture is finally breaking
#310The certs need to be updated for this URL.
or can mod update the URL to redirect to http vs https://[1]
[1] http://www.jasonwillems.com/technology/2025/12/17/Tech-Is-Fu...