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July 2011

July 26, 2011

July 03, 2011

WSJ: The insidious Evils of 'Like' Culture

The Wall Street Journal

LIFE & CULTURE
JULY 2, 2011

The Insidious Evils of 'Like' Culture

In our age of online view counts and retweets, conformity is becoming the rule

By NEIL STRAUSS

If you happen to be reading this article online, you'll notice that right above it, there is a button labeled "like." Please stop reading and click on "like" right now.

Thank you. I feel much better. It's good to be liked.

There's a growing cultural obsession with being blogged, digged, tweeted and liked. Now add Google's +1 to the mix and it's just like being in high school all over again, says author Neil Strauss.

Don't forget to comment on, tweet, blog about and StumbleUpon this article. And be sure to "+1" it if you're on the newly launched Google+ social network. In fact, if you don't want to read the rest of this article, at least stay on the page for a few minutes before clicking elsewhere. That way, it will appear to the site analytics as if you've read the whole thing.

Once, there was something called a point of view. And, after much strife and conflict, it eventually became a commonly held idea in some parts of the world that people were entitled to their own points of view.

Unfortunately, this idea is becoming an anachronism. When the Internet first came into public use, it was hailed as a liberation from conformity, a floating world ruled by passion, creativity, innovation and freedom of information. When it was hijacked first by advertising and then by commerce, it seemed like it had been fully co-opted and brought into line with human greed and ambition.

But there was one other element of human nature that the Internet still needed to conquer: the need to belong. The "like" button began on the website FriendFeed in 2007, appeared on Facebook in 2009, began spreading everywhere from YouTube to Amazon to most major news sites last year, and has now been officially embraced by Google as the agreeable, supportive and more status-conscious "+1." As a result, we can now search not just for information, merchandise and kitten videos on the Internet, but for approval.

Masterfile

You 'like' me! Even rock stars agonize over their Facebook and Twitter stats.

Just as stand-up comedians are trained to be funny by observing which of their lines and expressions are greeted with laughter, so too are our thoughts online molded to conform to popular opinion by these buttons. A status update that is met with no likes (or a clever tweet that isn't retweeted) becomes the equivalent of a joke met with silence. It must be rethought and rewritten. And so we don't show our true selves online, but a mask designed to conform to the opinions of those around us.

Conversely, when we're looking at someone else's content—whether a video or a news story—we are able to see first how many people liked it and, often, whether our friends liked it. And so we are encouraged not to form our own opinion but to look to others for cues on how to feel.

"Like" culture is antithetical to the concept of self-esteem, which a healthy individual should be developing from the inside out rather than from the outside in. Instead, we are shaped by our stats, which include not just "likes" but the number of comments generated in response to what we write and the number of friends or followers we have. I've seen rock stars agonize over the fact that another artist has far more Facebook "likes" and Twitter followers than they do.

Because it's so easy to medicate our need for self-worth by pandering to win followers, "likes" and view counts, social media have become the métier of choice for many people who might otherwise channel that energy into books, music or art—or even into their own Web ventures.

The same is true of the productivity of already established writers and artists. I was recently on a radio show with an author who, the interviewer said, had tweeted, on average, every 20 minutes for the past two years. Yet, despite all the time and effort spent amassing and catering to followers, as soon as a social network falls out of use, like MySpace, all that work collapses like a castle built of sand.

The psychoanalyst Erich Fromm presciently wrote over 60 years ago that man has "constructed a complicated social machine to administer the technical machine he built…. The more powerful and gigantic the forces are which he unleashes, the more powerless he feels himself as a human being. He is owned by his creations, and has lost ownership of himself."

So let's rise up against the tyranny of the "like" button. Share what makes you different from everyone else, not what makes you exactly the same. Write about what's important to you, not what you think everyone else wants to hear. Form your own opinions of something you're reading, rather than looking at the feedback for cues about what to think. And, unless you truly believe that microblogging is your art form, don't waste your time in pursuit of a quick fix of self-esteem and start focusing on your true passions.

And please, despite what I said earlier, do not +1, tweet, StumbleUpon, like or comment on this article. You'll only be making it worse.

—Mr. Strauss is the author of seven best-selling books. His latest book is "Everyone Loves You When You're Dead: Journeys Into Fame and Madness."

Posted on July 03, 2011 at 06:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

WSJ: A Fashionista's Secret Weapon - Cheap

The Wall Street Journal

FASHION
JUNE 30, 2011

A Fashionista's Secret Weapon: Cheap Tops

The Stars of Store Floors Now Are Colorful, Embellished and Less Than $30; How to Find the $3.80 Bargain Blouse

By TERI AGINS

"Oooh, I really love that top," a restaurant waitress told me last month as she showed me to my table. The mushroom-colored peasant blouse did look spiffy with stretch khaki Capris and bronze satin stiletto mules, and I should have played it cool. But all at once I blurted out, "Thanks, and can you believe that it was only $18?"

I love to splurge on garments that are truly unique, like a $1,100 sheath dress from Italian designer Roberto Cavalli. But when it comes to tops, I'm all about cheapskate chic. I've bought dozens of cute, trendy tops for under $30—or far, far less.

My greatest under-$5 triumph: a cotton and spandex V-neck blouse I found on Forever21.com for $3.80. I bought it in four rich shades—mustard, charcoal, crimson and purple. Almost a year later, these substantial, soft tops are still holding up.

The larger fashion reality is that the cheap top has become a fashion star. In the early 1990s, nobody paid basic knitwear any mind beyond staples like the $12 Gap pocket T-shirt. But now, fast-fashion retailers such as Forever 21, Zara, H&M and Topshop have mastered the art of churning out colorful fashion tops with embellishments that go far beyond basic—shirring, ruching, sequins, ruffles, embroidery and flutter sleeves.

As a result, tops have taken over the prime real estate on sales floors, upstaging dresses, jackets, pants and jeans. "The top is the driving point of the business," says Shelda Hartwell-Hale, vice president of Directives West, a retail consulting firm in Los Angeles. She estimates five tops are made for every one bottom, while less than 10 years ago, there were "maybe three tops for every two bottoms manufactured."

In a tough economy, a cheap blouse is an instant pick-me-up, accessible to all. It helps that the bottoms of the moment are, simply, jeans. Fashionistas rely on fancy tops to freshen up their look. "Dressy isn't a suit anymore, but something embellished, like a shiny top," says Michael Weiss, chairman and CEO of Express Inc., the 600-store fashion chain.

Most of these fancy cheap tops are being made by fast-fashion's sophisticated suppliers—overseas factories that can create huge quantities of many different styles. "The number of units they produce are the key factor, hundreds of thousands, and that is why these manufacturers have to be really good," says Norma Kamali, a veteran womenswear designer who created a sportswear line for Wal-Mart for three years, ending this spring.

Ms. Kamali, known for her innovative sportswear like the down "sleeping bag" coat, says she was intrigued by the challenge when she signed up to create a Norma Kamali collection for Wal-Mart. She worked with 16 suppliers and factories, mainly in China and Indonesia, to turn out tops from $7 to $15, as well as $20 jumpsuits and $35 puffer coats.

One reason cheap tops are so good—often better than other budget garments—is that they are easier to make than dresses, jackets and pants. They don't require much in the way of fine tailoring or numbered sizes. "Cheap tops work better as knits in small, medium and large that work for a greater span of bodies," Ms. Kamali says.

Suppliers can shave costs with bulk orders of fabric and trimmings. The factories use state-of-the-art specialty machines that can be programmed to cut, sew and apply details like tucking on a peasant top or intricate embroidery. Such high-tech sewing machines attach the sequins and beading that are suddenly ubiquitous in mass apparel.

With demanding retailers scrutinizing prices, suppliers have learned to consider every aspect of design right down to the penny. If you shorten a shirt by a half inch, for example, you can save thousands of dollars in fabric on a big run of shirts.

"I will show them the top I want to do, and we review some of the things that we can do, like not taking away the button but getting a better price for it. They have the sources who can provide good alternatives," says Ms. Kamali. Wal-Mart declined to comment.

The result: tops that are tantalizing and cheap enough to buy on impulse.

When I hit the floor at fast-fashion chains, I want a style that can provide real punch to my black pencil skirt or my high-waisted skinny jeans. Scanning the sea of tops, I look for a clever silhouette, such as a peasant blouse or a one-shoulder number, and a pop of color. (I gravitate to red, purple, polka dots and stripes.) Ruffles, tucks or shiny fabric finishes can provide surface interest.

The trick to picking a cheap top is the fabric. Say yes to jersey and cotton with a bit of stretch and no to acrylic, which tends to pill. Say no again to white: Often, it won't be heavy or opaque enough. Saturated red, purple, orange and mushroom gray tend to look beefier and thus more expensive.

I hold each top up in the mirror to eyeball the size, aware that I may take a small in some narrow-cut styles and a medium in others. I prefer a top with a tapered cut. If it's too boxy, I usually pass. A flattering neckline is key.

To keep cheap tops looking fresh, don't just toss them in the washer. I machine-wash basic pieces in cold water on a delicate cycle and hand-wash those with decoration, drying them with care to preserve their shape. Not having to dry- clean just means more hidden savings.

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