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On Labubu and the Hyperreal

2earth.github.io

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Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#41

Post by teaearlgraycold »

freetime2 wrote: post #5

My kids never had any interest in Labubu, but have been caught up in other fads like Pokemon cards. My sense is that these kinds of trends are mostly driven by scarcity. If you manage to get your hands on one, then you get the feeling of owning something rare, exclusive, and desirable amongst your peers - which is enough reason on its own to want something. You can also convince yourself that paying the normal MSRP i…

All of these gambling box toys are a way to simulate a reality where you can actually afford meaningful and expensive things - like real estate, nice cars, etc. When those are entirely out of budget for someone they might cope with a $30 toy they purchased for $200, which then can get milked by installing onto your belt.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#42

Post by JMiao »

it used to coalesce into organized religion and its local institutions. what's new is that those sources of meaning and connection were not explicitly commercial ventures.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#43

Post by Veserv »

john_strinlai wrote: post #36
freetime2 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m referring specifically to the cards, which exploded in popularity after Logan Paul paid $5 million for a rare card in 2021. The prices are completely driven by artificial scarcity - obviously they could easily print any card in unlimited numbers, but they intentionally print some cards in limited quantities that can only be obtained by getting lucky with a random pack. Most buyers don’t even play the card game. I…

> I’m referring specifically to the cards, which exploded in popularity after Logan Paul paid $5 million for a rare card in 2021. the cards have been popular for significantly longer than 5 years. my kid's entire class (the entire school, really) brought their binders of pokemon cards to school every day in ~2002 until the school banned pokemon cards on premise because they were such a distraction and causing issues…

Their popularity is a fad. You are talking about their popularity when they first released in the US. They faded significantly for at least a decade if not two until seeing a recent resurgence so massive even random corner stores carry pokemon card packs these days.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#44

Post by RedNifre »

Nursie wrote: post #37
alephnerd wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> probably around the same age as the average HN user. Based on the references and speech patterns I've seen on HN, I think the average HNers is at least a decade older than Pokemon. The first Pokemon videogame only came out in 1996. Y'all are boomers - nothing wrong with that, but HN has become an older monoculture.

10 years older than pokemon isn’t even Gen X, it’s millennial…

They probably meant "Boomer" in the colloquial sense of "somewhat old person" like how "Boomer Shooters" are for GenX and older Millenials.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#45

Post by 2earth »

yieldcrv wrote: post #2

extrapolated all of this not only 7 months too late beyond the trend’s implosion, while missing the way more obvious fact that being trendy attracted women of the same age range this was also the tail end of the fashion trend based on muting masculinity in favor of catering to the female gaze, an adaptation once again for women’s comfort until women realized they hate feminine men more than they thought they briefly…

Hey, op, thanks for the points - a quick reply here:

-I'm very out of date, yes...I wrote a lot of notes ages ago and came around to finishing the article a long time later. I also don't use social media for good reasons so am not aiming to provide info that anyone doesn't already have. The article was mostly an excuse to read Baudrillard, and goddamn that is hard work ;-)

-i did not miss the point that being trendy attracts others of the same age. As women account for 80% of sales that is clearly not the key cause of the trend but is relevant for some

-agree my 'analysis' is lacking, could have conducted interviews, analysed multiple social media platforms.......

-the story of 'i saw this dude in a supermarket' is partly used to create a narrative in the article. And, obviously, I am not going to ask a guy 10 years younger than me why he is wearing a toy!

-'does he play with it at home' - how could I have been clearer that I doubt he plays with it and that it's for ornament, and possibly to attract girls.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#46

Post by tamimio »

alephnerd wrote: post #4

Alternatively - who cares? If some people feel happy playing with Labubus, mechanical keyboards, or why do you care? It's their life and not yours. Additionally, this article also clearly fails to deep dive into how Pop Mart basically exported Asian style marketing strategies to the West. Back in Asia, conspicuous consumption and quick commerce is not viewed negatively the same way it is amongst Western HN/Redditors,…

Pretty much, it’s just another form of collecting stuff, this happens to be a trendy thing. Some do with hello kitty, hot wheels, some with music bands, CDs, others with tools, among many, and I am sure who wrote it also collect stuff as well. And yeah, posting few Reddit posts is an indirect way to make fun of something, we all know Reddit is always hyped and cringy about anything, regardless you see it as bad or good, I think the article is trying to portray some picture about who buys or collect X.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#47

Post by pokememon »

nippoo wrote: post #30
pokememon wrote: post #22

Trading Card Games (TCG), and generally any item relying on gacha mechanics, are this generation's "scratchers". It's amazing seeing grown adults who would scoff at their peers buying lotto tickets and scratchers enthusiastically burn cash on TCG without the slightest sense of hypocrisy. The secret is "social head canon". "Head canon" is when you fill in the plot holes to make sense of your favorite narratives. "Soci…

Except scratch cards are a guaranteed statistical loss. Trading cards, if you're skilled and know what you're doing, can be a sensible side-income. It's the difference between poker and roulette...

Another similarity is the endless line of credulous people who "have a system".

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#48

Post by 2earth »

alephnerd wrote: post #4

Alternatively - who cares? If some people feel happy playing with Labubus, mechanical keyboards, or why do you care? It's their life and not yours. Additionally, this article also clearly fails to deep dive into how Pop Mart basically exported Asian style marketing strategies to the West. Back in Asia, conspicuous consumption and quick commerce is not viewed negatively the same way it is amongst Western HN/Redditors,…

Hey op here. You make a great point regarding marketing and conspicuous consumption - it just wasn't the focus of the article for me to investigate those cultural differences. It would certainly add more context.

I didn't aim to be judgemental and sorry it came off that way, yet, it's difficult to comment on something otherwise (from a personal standpoint). I do think it's wasteful - environment is a focus of my blog.

On using reddit - I don't use any social media, reddit was a quick way to get some pictures to illustrate the points. Obviously, I don't propose this is research grade work.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#49

Post by alephnerd »

buildbot wrote: post #29
alephnerd wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> probably around the same age as the average HN user. Based on the references and speech patterns I've seen on HN, I think the average HNers is at least a decade older than Pokemon. The first Pokemon videogame only came out in 1996. Y'all are boomers - nothing wrong with that, but HN has become an older monoculture.

I don’t think this is true. HN was well known to CS people in my undergrad and I’m barely a millennial.

I'm roughly the same age (maybe a bit older) as you and frankly, we are middle age. Yet by HN standards we skew young.

Re: On Labubu and the Hyperreal

#50

Post by miladyincontrol »

2agshf wrote: post #3

Labubus have one of the most sophisticated marketing on Twitch and YouTube, by the same people who are paid to promote anime and gaming "conferences". I agree that reality and fiction unfortunately merges for a subset of the population. The gaming addicted are also most likely to develop an AI addiction, because LLMs and agent setups are basically a computer game.

Huh, most anime cons have horrendous if any marketing. Beyond basic social feeds most of their reach these days are from inviting "influencers" to join in on panels, cosplay judging contests, etc. Which in turn pisses off a lot of the con's main audience as rarely are these influencers sufficiently knowledgable on the topics (ie little knowledge on costume making, barely aware of a given series, etc).

Few if any western anime cons have managed to get any sort of meaningful virality in terms of marketing, whether organic or manufactured. And especially little from the labubu type crowd given cons are more male dominated, and labubu far more of a women's interest.

The big thing labubus had beyond the gambling aspect was that its something you can put on your bag and actually bring around places, far more visibility than most other "viral" goods. It was an accessory.

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