What is culture? Culture can mean a lot of different things, and in this episode we zero in on our working definitions, along with the brands, consumer behaviors, and trends that we can expect to see more of in 2025

Show notes:

• How to build brand energy by Grace Gordon
• Marcijuš AI Studio
• Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster by Dana Thomas
• Watch us on YouTube

Follow Ana here:

• Newsletter "The Sociology of Business"
• New book "Hitmakers: How Brands Influence Culture"

Follow Rei here:

• Rei's LinkedIn
• Newsletter "The Intersection"
• Rei's global innovation firm I&CO

where did you spend your Christmas and New Year's?

Were you in New York or were you in Miami or somewhere else?

Yeah.

And you're, are you back in New York or are you still

I'm in New York now.

Yeah.

You see, there is no light.

There's no light.

That's right.

Have you been outside today?

so cold, and that's wind.

Well, good to see you and,

uh, excited for this conversation.

Cool.

So today what we are talking about is the very topic of our podcast, Hitmakers, how brands influence culture.

And specifically we actually, I realized when, you know, when Anna,

you and I were chit chatting over WhatsApp about what to talk about.

we never actually talked about, you know, what are the brands that we think are influencing, influencing culture.

And what I thought we could, where we could start is when we say culture, what does that mean?

I mean, it's a sort of an obvious word, you know, we talk about it quite a bit and it's such, Part of everyday conversation

that I actually didn't think about what culture means, and not to get too academic, but just so that you and I have

a common, language that we're speaking about, or even like different, different,

perspective on, on culture in general, you know, what do we mean by culture?

So, welcome everyone, not to overwhelm you with light topics

that Ray is ground running, like let's define culture.

Do you know, Ray, there is an entire area of like cultural sociology, cultural

studies, but no, I think that's a great, I think that's a great question.

So let's start with you.

I'm, a trained cultural sociologist, you know, you, you have a degree in it.

I've been part of it and I've been in an industry that either influence shape or at least be part of it one way or another.

so a couple of things that come to my mind when I think about culture, and this is a very non scientific way of

talking about culture is that I think for something to be cultural, it needs to be in the general public conversation.

So not just like, you know, within a small closed sector between the industry friends or what have you,

but I think it needs to break out of a certain small circle so that let's

say, you know, Would my mom know about it or would my parents know about it?

Or would my, relative who has nothing to do with marketing or branding or the industry that we live in.

So I think he needs to, for something to have cultural influence that

it needs to, break out of the closed circle where it started.

So that would be one thing.

another thing is do people lust.

You know, does it create desire?

So do people want it, whether it's music or whether it's a product or

whether it's entertainment or whether it's a restaurant or what have you?

Do people desire that thing?

And I think that's what, what means to be.

Cultural or to have cultural influence.

Those, those are the two first things that, you know, as we were, as I was thinking about, Oh, what do I talk about?

What, what are the, the company's brands and, things that, that, that I think have cultural influence.

So I'll stop there.

What, what's your take, on, particularly from a sociological perspective.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, this is I'll get to that, but I first want to sort of address what you said that it needs to break.

So you basically say only mass culture is culture because you're saying whatever is good.

Like, I know you're not, but I think like, let's, let's dive deep into that

because it's relevant for brands and it's relevant for consumer behavior.

Yeah.

so basically.

I would argue that micro and that whatever the conversation is, whatever the influences are on that micro

scale and the niche scale, even subculture, scale is what make this culture as aggregation of those niches.

There is no monoculture

anymore.

So now, I know you didn't mean that, so maybe you

one thing that I was gonna mention, and I'm glad that you bring that up because like what culture used

to be when I was growing up versus now, I think it was a lot simpler.

20, 30 years when I was a teenager, you know, 30 years ago, because the media landscape was much simpler

and what my parents knew in terms of like TV programs that they watch or whatever is in the news.

and what I knew the distance between what I knew and what I was into and what they knew, it was much closer.

Whereas now, like I have a very vague idea of what my teenage kids are into.

But like, unless I really dig deep into it and like, there's so many to your point, you know, microcultures or

subcultures that are out there that I have no idea until I click into a tick tock video or I click into a link or

I go into Reddit, you know, there's so many microcultures, infinite number of

microcultures that maybe only a hundred people, are enthusiastic about it.

but there's a rabbit fan base.

I do think that he needs to be more than just one person, you know, talking about something like he needs to have

some kind of aggregation of people who are interested in that topic.

but like what culture used to be and what culture is now, I think

is much more complicated and much more fragmenting that used to be.

Yeah, and then going to the second one, you said desirability.

Yeah.

Yeah.

like,

I think this is a good fodder for me to start because when I look at it, there is no one culture.

There are cultures.

That's first how I think about it.

And then second of all, it's, I look from, as a sociologist, as ecologist, I look from influence perspective.

We never make decisions in isolation from each other.

We never make decisions in isolation from the context, the website design, the TikTok aesthetic, the store design.

We are influenced.

We don't live in a vacuum, human beings.

We are influenced by design of stuff and we are influenced by each other.

So that's how I think about culture.

It's about.

What are the streams of influence, basically?

So you can be influenced by Brats Summer aesthetics,

Yeah.

behavior.

Or a vibe, the mood, or demure mood, but that it has specific aesthetic attached to it.

Or you can just like, if you live in New York and you live downtown, you're going to be influenced by completely

different things than you take subway and you go up, like up, uptown.

And so basically that's what I'm talking about.

What are the sources of influence?

that we are exposed and what are the dominant sources of influence.

So obviously, you know how in monoculture you had like magazines and editors and, and that's what

we talked about, how it all got fragmented and there is not one center.

There are gazillion celebrities and I would even say if there is one person who is doing something relevant, like let's

say Basquiat, or even let's say those very obscure designers or, or artists.

And no one knows about that at that time.

And then later, 20, 30 years later, they hit into the right cultural mood, which means the mindset, the behaviors,

the aesthetic influences are right for that to kind of gain traction.

Then it can become part of culture.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I want to pick one topic that you mentioned, which is brat or Brats Summer.

And that became kind of a thing, in 2024, you know, including I think

Kamala Harris sort of adopting it as part of her campaign.

And that was like one rabbit hole that I went, during the break.

I guess what was fascinating Was how he became such a thing, a cultural thing, you know, relatively short

amount of time, and it broke out of, you know, The music circle and he

went into so many different directions and it's, it's an unusual thing.

And I think it has a sort of an unexpected cultural impact that I don't know if like

Charlie XCX, if she had intended it, or if it was like way beyond her expectation.

yeah, I think that's a great, point and I would.

recommend everyone to read, Grace Gordon's unpacking of that bread campaign.

She published it on my newsletter on the sociology of business.

and I'm bringing it up because that is a masterclass in brand building and the masterclass in brand communication,

Ray, because what she did, she used IRL, like what were, like what was happening in terms of communities

and what people are talking about and what was actually in physical world to make her album gain traction globally.

rather than us unpacking here, I mean, Grace did such a bit, by the way, you guys should also follow Grace Gordon.

She has a fantastic newsletter.

So I would just recommend that, that like, we're not going to surpass the quality of her analysis.

But I think that's a great example.

Of the modern brand building, which of hit making at the end of the day, when you have to do a lot of small

things that poking culture in order to create one program that may or may not

Yeah, yeah, yeah,

explode.

So what I'm personally most interested in, can that be reversed engineered?

So you hit success every time.

Yeah.

So do you wanna start talking about, specific brands or organizations or companies or, or

even individuals and, you know, we don't, once we start unpacking it.

I'm sure we can come up with a lot of, different types of,

brands and, and, entities that are having some cultural impact.

I have a few on my list that I was thinking about.

and then maybe we can just kind of compare the list.

Absolutely, let's let's do it.

Let's

yeah, All right.

So the first one not in any specific order maybe from the the scale I I

said the biggest one the one the first one that came to my mind was netflix.

So netflix As a technological company, that's a company that's been around for two plus decades.

Now they morphed, you know, from one type of technology company to a different technology company.

Yeah.

So they kept themselves to be relevant as a service, you know, they could have gone away, if they didn't evolve.

Right.

And.

It's a company that consistently have been able to produce hit

content, several times a year, and then multiple years throughout.

And then some of them become global, cultural hits.

Some of them might be more local, but they, they, I think that's

one of the companies that's been able to create cultural hits.

consistently at scale.

me into what I'm seeing and what we're going to see more.

So Netflix built its streaming business on the, on algorithm.

And basically on algorithmic recommendations.

And to such a level, and I mean it's, it's famous how they tag their

content and tag their audience and then, then, then fit tags together.

And I think that we are now going, like, people are sort of anti algorithm, anti AI.

And I mean, it's not new.

People have been anti algorithm for the past five years, but I think the power of individual taste, individual

recommendations, and tastemakers is something people recommending to people without AI, without any algorithm.

We are going to see more of that.

And you're seeing that a lot at Substack now.

And Substack has grown incredibly in the past year.

And when you have all those Fashion sub stack, beauty sub stack, furniture sub stack.

It's literally people recommending to people and you have imperfectly, uh, perfect.

that is a service of literally just people getting together and without any optimization.

Algorithmic, AI, anything.

So I think, not that Netflix is gonna suffer at all.

But you will have the obscure, the paintball, the taste driven.

The micro.

yeah, slightly a different topic but as it relates to Netflix and sort of industries interact with each other.

So for instance, a couple of years ago, succession was a pretty big hit, right?

Like two, three, four years ago.

And around that time, quiet luxury also became a bit of a thing.

And like at that time I wasn't really tracking it, but did one influence the other?

No, I think they had the same bad influence.

There is like a mood was right.

It was like eat the rich mood.

Because there was triangle of sadness, there was success.

Succession

Uh, um,

first, but it all came in the same cultural mood of, of Idrit, of backlash against ostentatious

displays of wealth and quite luxury and succession at the same time.

Succession poking fun.

Look, if they're like that, they're like that.

We have nothing to aspire to.

yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So it came from the same place.

And the other thing is I see like look with Netflix algorithm, Netflix Al algorithm tell it that they need to put

Nicole Kidman in the 17 same roles of a matriarch with the king or whatnot, you know, so that's what we are seeing a lot.

And I do think that like that crafted and human is, is really, we are gonna see like a great bifurcation in that sense.

Yeah.

So that's the, the first one.

The second one kind of, derivative in terms of technology, but in a different,

a completely different, different way is open AI as a technological platform.

Okay.

The reason it's sort of an obvious one, but I thought I needed to mention it because I think it's changing the behavior

of people, like how they look for things, and even like how they think about things.

Yeah.

So like I remember about, so I started teaching, at a graduate school maybe about seven or eight years ago.

And one of the professors, and I didn't talk to that professor

directly, but I heard, I read her post or I read her interview somewhere.

And she was talking about how students, young students in their late

teens, early twenties, the way they organize files on their computers.

is completely different in that they don't organize at all.

And I noticed with my, my daughter, who's 15 as well, is that like, she has very little concept of folders.

on a computer, like the folders and directories.

Yeah.

And because that the reason why is that like they find everything through search.

So they just, you know, hit, command space or whatever the key command is to look for the specific file or document.

And then that's how they navigate.

Like I grew

you don't know what you're looking for?

If you don't know exact or you have a vague idea that, you know,

Yeah.

Well, that's how they, I mean, you can, look for either by name, type of content

I never remember any names on any of my files or anything.

So that's

So are you, are you a type of person who like meticulously organize your files or no?

So, but, so how do you, how do

do to an extent, but it lives all over the place.

I'm like that, like search.

But then often, like, I don't remember, like, it's very convoluted.

It's more like you have to use all those hacks to start to try to remember because it's also enough if you remember

the word that was in a document, you don't need to remember the name.

That's, that's fun.

I like

the point, is, is that like technology changes the way people behave.

And even like the way they, intellectually or mentally organize information in their head.

Absolutely.

yeah, there's a clear cognitive difference between, you know,

somebody who's a 40 year old versus somebody who's a 14 year old.

And even though we are same human beings, because of the way we interact with media and the way we

interact with technology, that it like literally wires us differently.

Absolutely.

And honestly, Ray, it's also by design and by values that are designed into technology,

hmm.

is if everything is H, LGBT, tell me X, Y, Z, then that is going to be the preferred interface.

And when you had, like, with the books, you had linearity.

And I think we have a lot of problems with progression and linearity

these days, because the way things are organized are more waterfall.

hmm.

It's more like biological of garden, like something happens slowly and then all at once.

That's how social influence actually works.

When you have those information cascades and it's not linear, the more of the thing is not gonna get you to a tipping point.

It's basically the quality of the nodes and so on.

So I think we are going to see way more, and I think it's not just cognitive.

By the way, there is a writer, Andy Clark, who wrote a lot about distributed cognition, which means how those,

how between us and a computer and the Internet, try writing something without having Internet available.

Just, just knowing it's available, you know, or with our cars, how they

became like total media before it was like a gazillion buttons to push,

yeah, yeah, yeah,

you know?

And so in a sense, it's kind of like that, that changes how we think

about things and cognition, but it also changes how we socialize.

yeah.

You know, once speaking of socialization, one thing that I

wonder now that we are the main interface is changing from a search.

Box input box to a chat window.

over the past, say, you know, 10 to 20 years or so.

I think the way we talk to each other, particularly through texts

and particularly like, again, with my teenage kids, like they are much more.

I don't want to say rude, but very like Kurt.

So they just like text you with, you know, reply to you with yes.

No, maybe like very curt, you know, and I wonder, I wonder that because like, when you are searching, say on Google,

that you just put, you know, a sequence of words to look for information.

Whereas now, like if you use using chat GPT or whatever, you have to type in

a sentence, like you have to give it a prompt and a better prompt you put in.

The better answer you get.

So

I

don't know.

I think you're reading too much into it.

I think they're just like over attention, deficit.

I think it's just overwhelming attention deficit and also like the emojis used and so on.

So I think like, yeah, keep thinking about it.

Maybe, maybe it get maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe it's combination of all those things, you know, but I think

that's a really good point when you say, I think maybe it does evolve.

In, in, in prompts.

But at the same time, what I strongly am believe and I'm seeing is, and you know how everything is so fast and cheap

thanks to ai, that now with the same thing as the, that taste individual

tasting curators, you literally have like craft and handmade again.

And I know we had that since for the past 10 years, but I do think

again, there is gonna be that the differentiation between fast and cheap.

And then it's going to be different.

I think that we're, we're going to experience a new genre, which is human.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And there's going to be a separate genre versus the rest, what's going

on in culture, in material culture, in visual culture, you name it.

Yeah.

Okay.

So that was the second one.

The third one that I have, it's a completely in a different direction.

And I may have mentioned this in a, another conversation.

and this is in the apparel, slash fashion world.

So it's more in your world than mine.

But.

this, tiny, tiny brand called human made

Oh, I love human made.

That's Pharrell's brand.

It's

yeah.

Pharaoh.

I love like, they're amazing.

Yeah.

it's been around quite some time, I think, for about 15 years or so.

But in the last three years, they've grown.

three, four times and, a friend of mine, he's actually a CEO who went from Uniqlo maybe about four years ago and then he

joined as a CEO and now he's become a CEO, but he, yeah, he's doing things.

He's not doing like splashy big things, but he's doing like little things that are.

helping the company and the brand grow pretty quickly.

And again, like he's not doing anything fancy.

but they are now selling in over 80 different countries.

They only have stores in Japan and one in Korea and one in Hong

Kong, but they sell They shipped to over 80 different countries.

Like they have, they have customers from, around the world.

And in the last three, four years or so, they've managed to, create a kind of traction just by doing, and then,

you know, this is, this kind of goes back to one of the topics that I was talking about, the last episode was,

boring is the new cool, like doing boring things, like mundane things.

But like creating cultural consistency between the brand and the customers or the fans And it's like slowly but

relatively quickly It's not it's not like exponential, but I mean they grew three four times in the last

three years You know, so they're doing something right and it's it's

creating that cultural Relevance.

Yeah.

Yeah.

absolutely.

And I think, Ray, that these are one of those brands that have cultural relevance.

Among those who are in the know, the tastemakers, the

gatekeepers almost.

Because you know how internet always was like, for internet

democratization, let's get rid of gatekeepers, everything for everyone.

And now you get those answers, yes, no, maybe.

Because everyone is like, so overwhelmed with like, Content with products with options, too much choice.

And so now everyone is literally like, tell me

what to buy, what to watch, where to go, because you know, it's just, so that's why I also think is just the premise of

information space with no gatekeepers is naturally going to give you gatekeepers if you work in cultural industry.

So I do think that human race is one of those brands that by no means want to be mass brands.

No, no,

they're not

trying to in one of the conversations that we had, and I think this was

the last conversation where you mentioned the return of the middle.

I think in the past, say 10 plus years or so, every.

Brand, once they cer reached a certain scale, the only option was for them to grow, grow, grow.

You know?

And that may be one of the reasons why like luxury started to lose its plot

because like, how can you be luxury if you had to be available to millions of people?

And everybody has the same thing, like he's not.

You know, it's, it doesn't have that exclusivity factor.

So like in the past 10 years, there was this narrative of growth and reaching scale.

And there was that kind of pressure for big brands to grow,

Yeah, is it a narrative or is it the economics?

I think it's actually, it's economic.

Well, maybe it's economics, but also I think economics started to become partially a narrative.

And I wonder

For sure, but I would argue that the growth model was created by these constraining financial structures

which said only that you can grow by creating more and the big is good.

But definitely narrative always needs to cover economics.

yeah Yeah, so I think like an example like human made i'm super interested because I think and there's

room for a small to medium, brands to Not just survive, but thrive

moving forward.

And I think those are the real interesting ones to, to watch.

And even if they don't become a mass brand, there's still, you know, there's

that's a key word.

yeah, there's still enough.

scale for their business to to succeed and They in some cases might start to gain more cultural influence.

Mm hmm.

I think that's a combination of those tastemakers and those brands, and then aggregation of niches across

the globe, but they need, they have endorsement of tastemakers.

Instead of having Google ads, meta ads, giant campaigns, and giant media buys.

Mm hmm.

Because you know, the market was created by those who can afford to reach a giant number of people relatively quickly.

So, okay.

So that was my third example.

So, you know, i'm kind of going from like technology To, technology

driven or technology influence human behavior with open AI.

Human made is an example of a relatively small brand gaining cultural influence and cultural traction.

and then the next one that I have, Well, actually I have two more.

One is, Hive entertainment.

it's a Korean, music entertainment company and it's basically the company that produces K pop.

Amazing.

Let's talk about that.

that's not my domain of expertise, but I do find this company quite fascinating because on, on multiple

reasons, for multiple reasons, one is that almost single handedly this company in the past 10 to 20, 10 to 15 years.

Created this K-pop genre, and they've managed to not only scale

it, but sustain it for quite a few years and then repeat it.

And I was actually listening, to an interview with a K-pop artist I, I, I guess she's part of,

black pink and, she used to go by Rosie, but now she goes by Rose.

She just, you know, released her own, album.

And she was talking about like the training that she went through to become a K pop star.

And it's, it's grew.

Like she would start training at nine, nine 30 and every day train until two o'clock in the morning.

She gets one, she got one day off every two weeks.

And then, and did that for like four years before she became, she, before she debuted and then, you know,

Blackpink became, became an instant success, but they repeat this kind

of cycle and they just keep producing these K pop artisans stars who are.

essentially like produce and even manufactured.

But isn't that the case, like, with the music industry in general, with like, And sync in a sense

here, or like Disney stars, how they put them on track, like that goes

from having a

show to a music career.

This is on a different, this is on a different

On a different, like on accelerated,

Accelerated, much more intense, and like they've been able to replicate the success.

right.

So they found the best practice and just industrial, like it's assembly line, basically.

What

And I don't necessarily subscribe to that, that way of working or that way of training.

And I don't know if it's good for these kids to go through that.

think, Ray?

Make a wild guess here.

yes, exactly.

Make a lot of guests.

Exactly.

Right.

you know, that's

That's like, how do you, how do you create tennis stars?

They just do one thing since they're like five, you

yeah, yeah, yeah, But I, I am impressed and I am, fascinated by a company like Hive Entertainment that

specializes in producing cultural, entertainment entity and content on a regular basis and succeed at, at scale.

And They, you know, they, they, I mean, movie studios and there's so many, you know, music labels and there's

so many companies that have done that for many, many years, but it's, it's a new kind of entertainment company.

And,

I think it's actually fascinating because you know how

like in Hollywood it was like, Oh, nobody knows anything in a sense.

You don't know if your movie or show TV show is going to be a hit or not.

And I guess they take like guessing out of it because they kind of reverse engineering that cultural influence.

And they're saying, Hey, if we train those people, if you listen to data and that's going to do well, they're just basically.

Producing the same thing.

So the upside is you can really quickly create stars.

And I guess the downside is how much of that you become risk averse.

they've been able to figure out what the system or what the formula formula of creating culture

hits is.

Yeah.

And again, like I said, I don't know the formula that they have is necessary.

I mean, it's certainly working.

I don't know if it's a good formula for these kids

Yeah, but they have like luxury brand deals and everyone knows them around the world.

Like, you know, it's, it's kind of crazy level, as you say.

yeah, this, this company, I think it's, it's going to, and I wonder how, you know, in 10 years time, whether

they would have the same level of cultural influence that they have now,

Correct.

And I think that's based what we talked before.

It's kind of like if this is super AI, like super algorithm, like super

manufacturer, is there going to be a backlash across creative industries?

Because maybe we are seeing that now on a very small scale, like people recommending themselves or like those

tastemakers in going for independent designers or handmade stuff and so on.

Is that going to happen on a level of the global music industry when you're going to want to find the complete unknown.

You know, like literally, is it like a small independent movie gonna find distribution?

Because look what A24 is doing.

And that gets me to what, what my, my observation is, that more and more and more brands are in the

business of producing Everything in a sense, it's that universe, that creative universe, that's the thing.

So brands want to own the whole experience.

It's not just for 824 enough to be a distributor.

No, they produce movies, but then they create a membership program.

They create merch, they create, zines.

They create popcorn ever, condiments that you get.

So they own the entire experience.

around their core product and service.

I think more and more brands are going to be doing that.

Just basically, what are we playing with?

Let's own everything around it.

Let's close the loop of the experience around it.

and then my last one, is this is sort of a category as opposed to a specific brand or specific theme,

but think it's, it's something that didn't necessarily exist that much, or maybe it did, but people as brands

like the

has grown unbelievably.

Personal branding has exploded.

Yeah.

Like not last year, in the past few years, but it's been accelerating so much.

It's one of those things that like, it was happening for a long time.

I mean, you know, celebrities existed for a long time anyway,

in the old times, you know, in the traditional times on TV and whatever.

And I think when the internet started to become a thing 20 years ago, yeah, you know, there were these

internet celebrities and, and those characters, but like, It's really

like in the past three to five years, it just like when exponentially and

But I think again, going back to what we were talking, it's basically how technology changes because when you

had mass media, you had mass celebrities and then there was reality TV at the parallel with the beginning of the

Internet nineties, but really like later and now it's like with tick tock.

Literally, every person has audience.

And if you have audience, you're, but you're not a celebrity, but you can be.

yeah, exactly.

You can't be a mini celebrity, you know, you can have 10, 000 followers or 100, 000 followers.

And you know, they're gazillion mini micro influencers with 100, 000 followers or around that number.

And that's still.

Cool.

Cool.

You know, it's not a huge number, but it's still big enough for whatever that they're doing.

You

know?

exactly.

So I think it's again the media and technology really shaped that behavior.

I think we all knew that these influencers do have influence, but, you

know, not to turn this into a political conversation, but I don't think a lot of.

people realize how much influence one person can now have.

And you know, that's why we have now the president elect that we have, whether we like it or not.

And I think a lot of people underestimated the power of personal brands within the past year or two.

And it just like shot up to the level that I don't think a lot of people expected.

so that's my, my last one.

So just to recap, I had Netflix, you know, this technology platform, open

AI, this is, interaction behavior, human made is this boutique.

Brand having influence, Hive Entertainment, a company that's systematically producing culture and then

personal brands or the power of personal brands at a, at a new height that a lot of people didn't expect a year, year ago.

and then on my end, there was anti AI of recommendations, anti algorithmic recommendations.

So in a sense of taste making and taste, individual taste are bad.

It's human made.

and human recommended.

And then it's also building those consistent brand worlds at the scale, I guess, that we haven't,

like the retail and other areas, they're all merging together.

So even no matter what, everyone is entertainment.

That's what we've seen last year, maybe a year before, that's accelerating.

But it's also, it's not about the product and service.

It's about literally the experience you create in culture and how much of that experience you, you get on.

So which is going like, you know, how we were always saying 10 years ago, lifestyle brands.

Well, now it's literally entertainment.

door to door, like back to back, the loop has been closed.

You don't need to leave A24 universe at all, which is going back again to those taste communities, because it's

not for everyone by design, which is again that return of the middle.

yeah,

And I think we're going to have a lot of unexpected trends, like, like

we had last year, because basically the social media by design just allow.

random things to pick steam if they hit the right mood.

yeah.

a lot more unpredictable than it used to be.

Unbelievably so, and it is because of social influence.

Cultural markets are taste markets, and taste is something that it's social, and we're so socially influenced by each

other that it's completely unpredictable how that influence is gonna spread.

yeah.

It'll be interesting to do, like, at the end of last year, we

did the, you know, patterns and predictions for the following year.

It'll be interesting, you know, in December 2025, look back and what were the unexpected.

Trends

Oh, yeah, let's definitely do that.

Let's definitely do that when we do that.

I would love that.

Absolutely.

And then the final thing, it's basically, I think that we are going to see a lot more safety in culture in a sense.

Like the brand, like even more than before, brands are going to play even more safe.

Thank you.

Like, you know how, like, maybe four or five years ago, it was, you

know, like all sorts of equalities, also political statements.

And then there was a gigantic backlash.

And I think we have overall big backlash in culture and society towards conservatism.

So you're not going to be controversial celebrities, controversial statements, controversial aesthetics.

No.

What do you think?

I need to, I need to chew on that.

I need to think about that.

There's a lot to think about there.

You know, I think Riska version is gonna be big.

Interesting.

Does that, this could be a whole different conversation, but does that make things more boring?

I think absolutely, but it also makes, like, it's kind of cancel proof.

You know, so yeah, let's see.

That is sort of like, that's what I'm seeing because there's too much backlash and because of personal brands, personal

influence, and because backlashes can explode as much as successes, brands

are going to want to maximize successes like your hype factory and minimize.

So that's why they're going to stay within algorithmic aesthetics and whatnot.

Right.

Right.

Right.

Right.

Yeah.

Let's see.

I don't know.

I don't know.

Let's keep, let's keep monitoring.

let's keep monitoring.

Yeah.

Yeah.

do, did we want to do a hit

list?

Yeah, sure.

Go

this is a, just a tiny one I came across This, Instagram account and it's a photographer

Oh,

who's, actually producing AI photography.

And what he does.

is combined.

and for those those listeners who are listening to this, let me try to visually describe it.

So the one picture that caught my attention was, an aerial shot.

of a basketball court in some random city, right?

And it looked like a European city, but on the court, it was this beautiful, beautiful Persian, With

these intricate patterns and I'm like, wow, this is an amazing view and amazing photo and amazing design

and I clicked into it and it took me a while to figure out that it was AI generated, but it's this

photographer who's combining, like a design object, like a rug or carpet.

Or even addressed and then putting into an unusual environment, but creating a very, magical scene

out of

it.

And from a technical perspective, like it looks so real that I didn't first doubt that it was air generated.

Or it was, it was real.

And then second, even though I know now know that he was AI generated, that I don't mind it.

Like a lot of AI are like, once I see that, it's AI generated, like

I lose interest, but this is one of the few ones that I came across.

Not too long ago, and I'm like, this, like, this is one of the first, artistic use of AI that I actually like.

I think, have you seen those, tennis courts?

In areas like caves or deserts?

It's the

same thing.

It's a tennis court created in a completely artificial environment.

It does look real.

It looked like, at the first, I was like, is this possible?

But then it's like, why would he be in a cave in Abu Dhabi, you know, or something?

not

exactly, I think there is so much more that that's accelerating.

I don't want to say necessarily, I don't want to go into creativity

discussion, but I do want to go in, in acceleration discussion.

So it's very quickly, you can test ideas, how would they look like?

It's unbelievable for designers for, you know, if you're, if you're interior designer, if you're designing

your home, if you're a fashion designer, if you're like whatnot, architect, you very quickly can test.

ideas how that look like in a very real setting.

So I do think there is just a gigantic accelerator.

On my, I have a hit list that's like not new, but it's very

relevant.

It's like I've been reading Deluxe, How Luxury Lost Its Luster, from 2005.

Okay.

So from 20 years ago, this woman, Dana Thomas, who I strongly recommend, is writing about the, downsides of

luxury is big growth that we are literally going through and are going to continue going through in 25.

Like the scale,

the corporate ownership, the

industrialization, the opening new stores, the going to new markets, like she wrote about it 20 years ago.

All they had to do is like read that and not do it like that.

and it's interesting that this was 20 years ago.

So basically

20 years, 2005.

It was in

2005 when she wrote it.

And I'm like reading about it, and the numbers are off, because luxuries was, market was so much smaller.

But the Directions were on, like they're literally that is the strategy that came home to roost in 25.

Wow.

So history repeating itself and, all these,

Definitely rhyming.

I mean, no, I think this is even worse.

This is literally scenario planning.

This is like, this is where you are.

This is where you're going to be like now get there.

And they

did.

So yeah, I recommend, I really recommend it.

Everyone who is interested in understanding what is going on in luxury, just beyond like, oh, you

increased prices, you saturated markets, they should read it.

Sounds good.

All right.

So I think that's, that's a wrap for the first episode of 2025.

Looking forward to more,

Happy New Year to everyone and

hope it's off at a good start.