I was just thinking about how a lot of people here seem to consider the 90s to be one of the more transformative decades in modern history, that 1999 was a dramatically different universe compared to 1990. Personally, I used to feel this way 100% myself, but while I would still agree that a lot evolved about popular culture during that stretch of time, it's likely that my date of birth has magnified my own understanding of how 1999 contrasted to 1990, and my guess is the same case may be true for a lot of other people here, who were born close to me.

Having come into this world on August 18, 1992, I have no personal recollection whatsoever of the early 90s and only began developing cinematic memories around mid-1995, a bit over halfway through the decade. By 1999, I was in grade school and fully immersed in kid fads like Pokémon, Nintendo 64, and so forth, and even remember being exposed to some of the pop music of the time like the Spice Girls and Madonna's Ray of Light album. For a while, these details made it seem almost incomprehensible to me that 1999 occurred during the same decade that at one point, fashion was still very big and 80s, most home video games were primitive and 8-bit, and which I never personally experienced being the present day. By only the early 2000s, any year prior to 1995 already felt like ancient history to me, so old that it was actually almost scary to my undeveloped mind. I never felt this way since about any period that was presently a decade old; I may think 2007 is more dated now, but I never look at it and say, oh my god is that forever ago the way I always would about a year like 1993 by 2003.

I've gradually reconsidered the progression of the 1990s over time, and honestly, I think more and more, I can say that 1999 wasn't actually that different from 1990, not necessarily any more than 2009 differed from 2000 or 1989 differed from 1980. As much as the fashion got extremely different by the end of the decade, the global politics, way of life, and even elements of music are actually not too difficult to differentiate when you really think about it.

Here's a list of things in which I honestly think 1990 and 1999 are fairly similar:

* Typical video quality, especially television in particular. Image resolution, for the most part, wasn't necessarily any better in 1999 than it was in 1990. The S Club in Miami television series, for example, may look modern on the surface due to its blatant Y2K-era fashion, but the 4:3 aspect ratio and colour scheme are frankly on par with your average show from 1990. I recently came across clips from VHS's I owned that were released in 1990, and they sound and look just as crisp. I know the comparison is random, but it still does perfectly illustrate the contrast between where the 90s did change a lot and where they did not. There's a far greater difference between 1980 and 1989 (from grainy in a 60s-ish sense to clear in a 90s-ish sense), as well as 2000 and 2009 (when HD became standard)

* Video format. In 1990 and 1999 alike, VHS was your go-to way of watching videos at home. DVD's were not yet a big thing at the end of the 90s, but VHS was already very much mainstream at the start of the 90s. Additionally, both 1990 and 1999 were years dominated by cable television.

* International politics. For the most part, not too much really changed about the political climate of the 90s. They were a rather peaceful, uneventful period of small-scale conflicts and economic prosperity sandwiched in between the two major events of the Fall of the Berlin Wall and 9/11.

* Certain aspects of music. In 1999, new-jack swing, a dominant force in 1990, was still pretty influential to Max Martin-produced teen pop and a fair amount of other music as well. A lot of 1999's biggest hip hop stars, like Will Smith, Puff Daddy, and such, were not a tremendous leap from the pop rappers of the early 90s and were definitely far removed from even the snap-rappers of the mid-late 2000s. While Timbaland was gradually revolutionizing hip hop production at the time, even gangsta rap was by no means a new phenomenon in 1999, looking back to Ice Cube and such. Nu-metal also wasn't necessarily that groundbreaking when the late 80s and early 90s already had the Anthrax cover of "Bring the Noise," early Beastie Boys, Run-D.M.C., and Rage Against the Machine, among other things.

* A comfortable majority of people in 1999 still didn't use the Internet. I think, similar to 1990, 1999 was a time when it was mostly common to own a personal computer but not really use the Internet.

* While video games as a whole definitely changed a lot in the 90s, due to the advent of 3D and mature gaming, portable video games barely evolved whatsoever, starting with the original Game Boy in 1990 and only concluding with Game Boy Color in 1999. The change in the 2000s was much more radical, beginning with Game Boy Color and primitive wrist games but ending with the DS Lite and even Smartphone games really taking off.

I'll go into greater detail if you'd like, but my basic point is, even though I vividly remember 1999 but didn't yet exist in 1990, I'm much more willing to believe the two years were part of the same decade upon leaving out how the timing of my early childhood influenced my perception of them. I'm wondering if, say, any of you born in 1999 have felt the same way about the early 2000s as I always did about the late 80s and early 90s?

Great analysis and I do agree with most of it.

To me, what makes 1999 and 1990 seem so different is that in 1990 you still had '80s fashion everywhere and that was gone by 1999.  Also, in 1990 you still had new jack swing, hair metal, and lingering echos of '80s synth-pop.  All of that was gone by 1999.  Another big difference was politics.  In 1990, we were at the tail-end of the conservative Reagan Revolution culture.  Things got much more liberal after 1993.  By the end of the decade, it was common for shows and movies to feature LGBT characters.  You wouldn't see that in 1990.

In terms of technology though, I would agree that the '00s was much more transformative than the '90s.  Computers in 1999 were much better and could do far more than they could do in 1990, but overall the role that computers played in people's lives wasn't that different.  The biggest difference was that more people had computers and more people were online.  Still, computers were a novelty and a luxury item back then and you could get by just fine without one.  Fast forward to 2009 and broadband Internet, Web 2.0, and the mobile revolution had changed the world.

To me, what makes 1999 and 1990 seem so different is that in 1990 you still had '80s fashion everywhere and that was gone by 1999.  Also, in 1990 you still had new jack swing, hair metal, and lingering echos of '80s synth-pop.  All of that was gone by 1999.

Well, like I said, new jack swing did technically still exist in 1999 if you zero in on how certain songs were produced. Songs like "Larger Than Life," "Someday," and "U Know What's Up" can be technically considered more evolved versions of new jack swing if you specifically focus on their marriage of funky, double-time, synthesized swing beats with melodiously poppy melodic progressions.

Another big difference was politics.  In 1990, we were at the tail-end of the conservative Reagan Revolution culture.  Things got much more liberal after 1993.  By the end of the decade, it was common for shows and movies to feature LGBT characters.  You wouldn't see that in 1990.

I agree with you on LGBT representation, but the Clinton era wasn't honestly that fundamentally different from the late "Reagan Revolution" era. The Stock Market Crash of 1987 was already three years past, and Bush the Elder was already heading in a more centrist, less idealistic direction than his predecessor. Clinton, on the other hand, opened up the debate on certain social issues that weren't touched upon much in the 80s, but otherwise was really just as much of a free market neoliberal as Reagan and Bush were. He was certainly no FDR or LBJ.

In terms of technology though, I would agree that the '00s was much more transformative than the '90s.  Computers in 1999 were much better and could do far more than they could do in 1990, but overall the role that computers played in people's lives wasn't that different.  The biggest difference was that more people had computers and more people were online.  Still, computers were a novelty and a luxury item back then and you could get by just fine without one.  Fast forward to 2009 and broadband Internet, Web 2.0, and the mobile revolution had changed the world.


Yep, you could barely get by in life as a normal person without being connected in 2009, whereas you could still very much stick to basic living room appliances and machines back in 2000.

I always thought I was the only one who thought this but I agree 50%. Since I was born in 2000 I obviously have no recollection of that year, fast forward to the end of 2009 where I was an actual functioning person who could do things by myself, had a clear memory, had a relatively good understanding of the world and was only about a year away from starting High School, obviously those years are going to feel extremely far apart to me. For me at least, I sometimes find it strange that I was alive during 2000, just because of how old it looks when watching videos or looking at pictures from then becasue I didn't really experience that world, it seems about 10 worlds away from what I experinced in 2009 playing online video games with my friends, watching videos on YouTube, seeing smartphone commercials on TV, hearing artists such as Lady Gaga and Katy Perry on the radio which is why I find it difficult to think these years belong in the same decade and I know that my age throughout the decade helps make these differences  bigger.
However, I say I only agree 50% becasue the 2000s were in fact a very changeful decade, huge amounts of globalisation occurred, many changes in technology with the use of Internet and cellphones in everyday life, even smartphones starting to become popular so I'm pretty sure most people would view the 2000s as a very changeful decade, regardless of age.

It's hard to truly describe my perception of the Early 2000s. In many ways, it has always felt like a different world to me, but never quite to the same extent as how you described your perception of 1990 in comparison with 1999 back when you were younger. The circumstances are a bit different though. You mentioned that you have no memories of the Early '90s at all, which is why you would have originally perceived them as being so massively different to 1999. The similarities wouldn't have really been apparent, because you never got a chance to truly experience the Early '90s.

In my case, because I was born in 1999, I actually do have vague memories of 2001-2002, as well as crystal-clear memories of 2003. So I can actually remember what the Early 2000s were like and the differences between 2000 and 2009 have never really been anything too substantial. I mean, sure, there are quite a lot of differences between 2000 & 2009 and I have always been aware of many of those differences. However, I have never perceived the two years as being 100% different from each other, due to having properly experienced a significant part of the Early 2000s.

I guess my perception of 2000 and 2009 is also due to how the decade itself panned out. The 2000s weren't a particularly changeful decade in terms of pop culture. In fact, there are still several aspects of Early 2000s pop culture which remain relevant today, even though we are vast approaching the 2020s. If I had of been born in 1989, I probably would of perceived more differences between 1990 and 1999, than I would in my current situation of perceiving the differences between 2000 and 2009.

I guess my perception of 2000 and 2009 is also due to how the decade itself panned out. The 2000s weren't a particularly changeful decade in terms of pop culture. In fact, there are still several aspects of Early 2000s pop culture which remain relevant today, even though we are vast approaching the 2020s. If I had of been born in 1989, I probably would of perceived more differences between 1990 and 1999, than I would in my current situation of perceiving the differences between 2000 and 2009.


I agree with this as somebody who considers the aughts to be 'my decade'.  The aughts, in terms of pop culture (especially music), were not particularly changeful.  Pretty much everything that would come to define the decade was already with us in 2000.  The decade saw a much better transformation in terms of technology and its place in our lives.  Computers were still by and large a novelty in 2000 while in 2009 you could hardly get by if you didn't have one.  If you were a teenager, it was considered "uncool" and "nerdy" in the early 2000s to be into technology and especially social media.  By the late 2000s, that was no longer the case and everyone was on social media.

Another thing that would define the 2000s compared with previous decades is reality TV.  We already had that in 2000.  Survivor premiered and basically made reality TV a new fad.  Paris Hilton had her show in 2003-04 and in 2007 the Kardashians got their show.

I do want to ask though, what elements of the early 2000s do you think are still with us today?

It's hard to truly describe my perception of the Early 2000s. In many ways, it has always felt like a different world to me, but never quite to the same extent as how you described your perception of 1990 in comparison with 1999 back when you were younger. The circumstances are a bit different though. You mentioned that you have no memories of the Early '90s at all, which is why you would have originally perceived them as being so massively different to 1999. The similarities wouldn't have really been apparent, because you never got a chance to truly experience the Early '90s.

In my case, because I was born in 1999, I actually do have vague memories of 2001-2002, as well as crystal-clear memories of 2003.

Were you born in early 1999? Because it surprises me you'd have memories of 2001 when I personally don't recall a damn thing about 1994 except for the fact that my family moved to a different house, and even that is just represented in still images and isn't sequential. I don't even remember my sister being born in November that year.

My memories started getting crystal clear around the second half of 1996, perhaps plateauing in the last third, when I started preschool at an actual school. I do vividly remember Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame being brand new, and that came out in late June, although I didn't fully recall the plot the way I would with Hercules and Mulan.

So I can actually remember what the Early 2000s were like and the differences between 2000 and 2009 have never really been anything too substantial. I mean, sure, there are quite a lot of differences between 2000 & 2009 and I have always been aware of many of those differences. However, I have never perceived the two years as being 100% different from each other, due to having properly experienced a significant part of the Early 2000s.

I suppose your timing at least does cause you to view the late 90s as a semi-mythic age? You've gone on and on about how cheesy that period was.

I guess my perception of 2000 and 2009 is also due to how the decade itself panned out. The 2000s weren't a particularly changeful decade in terms of pop culture. In fact, there are still several aspects of Early 2000s pop culture which remain relevant today, even though we are vast approaching the 2020s.

Which ones specifically? The main things that come to my mind personally would be reality television, Pokémon, Shrek-influenced kid movies, and the fact that we're still essentially in a War on Terror.

If I had of been born in 1989, I probably would of perceived more differences between 1990 and 1999, than I would in my current situation of perceiving the differences between 2000 and 2009.

Did the 2000s used to feel more transformative to you than the 1990s?

Were you born in early 1999? Because it surprises me you'd have memories of 2001 when I personally don't recall a damn thing about 1994 except for the fact that my family moved to a different house, and even that is just represented in still images and isn't sequential. I don't even remember my sister being born in November that year.

My memories started getting crystal clear around the second half of 1996, perhaps plateauing in the last third, when I started preschool at an actual school. I do vividly remember Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame being brand new, and that came out in late June, although I didn't fully recall the plot the way I would with Hercules and Mulan.

I suppose your timing at least does cause you to view the late 90s as a semi-mythic age? You've gone on and on about how cheesy that period was.

Which ones specifically? The main things that come to my mind personally would be reality television, Pokémon, Shrek-influenced kid movies, and the fact that we're still essentially in a War on Terror.

Did the 2000s used to feel more transformative to you than the 1990s?


Though you aren't talking to me here, I was born in August 1999 and I do have a memory that took place in the summer of 2001.

Were you born in early 1999? Because it surprises me you'd have memories of 2001 when I personally don't recall a damn thing about 1994 except for the fact that my family moved to a different house, and even that is just represented in still images and isn't sequential. I don't even remember my sister being born in November that year.


Yep. I was born on the 13th March 1999. My memories of 2001 are just "still images" though, they're pretty vague.

I suppose your timing at least does cause you to view the late 90s as a semi-mythic age? You've gone on and on about how cheesy that period was.

Actually, it's funny that you should say that, because I pretty much view the Late '90s (rather than the Early 2000s) in the same way that you used to perceive the Early '90s. I can't believe that I was even alive and breathing in the '90s. In regards to the cheesiness, it's more so just the Y2K-era of music which I view as being a bit cheesy.

Which ones specifically? The main things that come to my mind personally would be reality television, Pokémon, Shrek-influenced kid movies, and the fact that we're still essentially in a War on Terror.

Pretty much the examples you provided. I would have also said that Pink's continual popularity is another example as well.

Did the 2000s used to feel more transformative to you than the 1990s?

Not really, to be honest. As a kid, I didn't have as good of knowledge of the '90s as I do now, but I still thought the '90s (and the 60s-80s) were a much more transformative time. The trouble is, I experienced my core childhood between 2004-2009, which for the most part, was a relatively consistent era. People overstate how transformative it was, which is why we have these completely ridiculous "Late 2006" and "Late 2008" shift threads. I mean, of course, there were changes in the direction of pop culture and the overall vibe during that time, but it wasn't to the extent that many people make it out to be. I can understand the argument for Late 2008 being transformative (because I can remember it being so), but it didn't immediately rush in Early 2010s culture, like some people believe.

Also, the talk you hear of people pinpointing the launch of social media websites as changing everything in the Mid 2000s is BS. In retrospect, it was transformative for our society, but it didn't drastically change things at the time. For instance, Facebook was launched in 2004, but I don't remember it becoming popular until about 2008. People think that things change overnight, but they don't, it's gradual. My core childhood years were relatively similar, in the grand scheme of things. Now, if I had of experienced my core childhood between 1994-1999, that would be a completely different story. I wish I had of experienced my childhood during that time. The Mid 2000's were a pretty ordinary time to grow up in.


I agree with this as somebody who considers the aughts to be 'my decade'.  The aughts, in terms of pop culture (especially music), were not particularly changeful.  Pretty much everything that would come to define the decade was already with us in 2000.  The decade saw a much better transformation in terms of technology and its place in our lives.  Computers were still by and large a novelty in 2000 while in 2009 you could hardly get by if you didn't have one.  If you were a teenager, it was considered "uncool" and "nerdy" in the early 2000s to be into technology and especially social media.  By the late 2000s, that was no longer the case and everyone was on social media.

Another thing that would define the 2000s compared with previous decades is reality TV.  We already had that in 2000.  Survivor premiered and basically made reality TV a new fad.  Paris Hilton had her show in 2003-04 and in 2007 the Kardashians got their show.

I do want to ask though, what elements of the early 2000s do you think are still with us today?


Yep, I completely agree with you. In comparison with other decades, the 2000s were generally quite consistent. The aspects of Early 2000s culture which I think are still relevant today are pretty much the examples #Infinity provided.

Not really, to be honest. As a kid, I didn't have as good of knowledge of the '90s as I do now, but I still thought the '90s (and the 60s-80s) were a much more transformative time. The trouble is, I experienced my core childhood between 2004-2009, which for the most part, was a relatively consistent era. People overstate how transformative it was, which is why we have these completely ridiculous "Late 2006" and "Late 2008" shift threads. I mean, of course, there were changes in the direction of pop culture and the overall vibe during that time, but it wasn't to the extent that many people make it out to be. I can understand the argument for Late 2008 being transformative (because I can remember it being so), but it didn't immediately rush in Early 2010s culture, like some people believe.

Also, the talk you hear of people pinpointing the launch of social media websites as changing everything in the Mid 2000s is BS. In retrospect, it was transformative for our society, but it didn't drastically change things at the time. For instance, Facebook was launched in 2004, but I don't remember it becoming popular until about 2008. People think that things change overnight, but they don't, it's gradual. My core childhood years were relatively similar, in the grand scheme of things. Now, if I had of experienced my core childhood between 1994-1999, that would be a completely different story. I wish I had of experienced my childhood during that time. The Mid 2000's were a pretty ordinary time to grow up in.

Yep, I completely agree with you. In comparison with other decades, the 2000s were generally quite consistent. The aspects of Early 2000s culture which I think are still relevant today are pretty much the examples #Infinity provided.


Imo, 2004-2009 are two quite different years. Yeah sure Facebook might have not been very popular during the mid 2000s, but that's only because it was for college students, social media such as MySpace and YouTube became very popular after launch and had a big impact on the culture at the time. I really do think 2004-2007 (basically the core 2000s) were all very changeful years, if you look at something or watch a video from about 2003 or before, things really do start to seem quite old and not very connected today, maybe becasue this was the last time technology wasn't such a big part of our lives I dont know, but then if you see something from like 2008/9 while its not exactly identical today it's still feels like it's connected to the current era.

Yep. I was born on the 13th March 1999. My memories of 2001 are just "still images" though, they're pretty vague

That makes more sense. Again, my only memories of 1994 are a few still images.

Actually, it's funny that you should say that, because I pretty much view the Late '90s (rather than the Early 2000s) in the same way that you used to perceive the Early '90s. I can't believe that I was even alive and breathing in the '90s. In regards to the cheesiness, it's more so just the Y2K-era of music which I view as being a bit cheesy.

I'd say 1997 was all sorts of cheesy in its own right, actually. The biggest things in music were Hanson, the Spice Girls, Puff Daddy, Mase, Aqua, Savage Garden, the Backstreet Boys, and the like, not to mention Steps' "5,6,7,8" came out in the UK (it reached Australia in 1998, though it was also a soccer hit, never charting in America). Even in film, you had ridiculous flicks like The Fifth Element, Batman & Robin, Face/Off, Flubber, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, Men in Black, and such.

Pretty much the examples you provided. I would have also said that Pink's continual popularity is another example as well.

True, but her style of music has been quite inconsistent over the years and has pretty much just latched onto whatever trends are popular at the time. I certainly don't think you'd ever hear anything like "Get the Party Started" in 2017; if anything, that's one of the few post-9/11 songs that sounds much more distinctly 90s than even early 2000s.

Not really, to be honest. As a kid, I didn't have as good of knowledge of the '90s as I do now, but I still thought the '90s (and the 60s-80s) were a much more transformative time. The trouble is, I experienced my core childhood between 2004-2009, which for the most part, was a relatively consistent era. People overstate how transformative it was, which is why we have these completely ridiculous "Late 2006" and "Late 2008" shift threads. I mean, of course, there were changes in the direction of pop culture and the overall vibe during that time, but it wasn't to the extent that many people make it out to be. I can understand the argument for Late 2008 being transformative (because I can remember it being so), but it didn't immediately rush in Early 2010s culture, like some people believe.

That's pretty interesting. In my own childhood, I always saw 2001 as being extremely changeful, but that's mostly because of the kid culture I was focused on at the time. That was the year the 6th generation of gaming really took off; Super Smash Bros. Melee's graphics were like a million years ahead of even the best-looking titles on the Nintendo 64 and still hold up today, making it incredibly hard for me to believe the game was released closer to 1985 than to present day. Also, most cartoons I was familiar with began using digital ink, abandoning the hand drawn look that had prevailed throughout the 90s. I was also highly aware of the teen pop movement, which everybody seemed to love in the 2000-2001 school year (in a yearbook questionnaire, one of the questions asked students' favourite band, and like half of them chose *NSYNC), but then it suddenly became the most unbelievably reviled thing in the world in the 2001-2002 school year. In retrospect, I would say 2002 wasn't honestly that culturally different from 1999, but the way I experienced pop culture at the time certainly made that feel like it was the case.

Also, the talk you hear of people pinpointing the launch of social media websites as changing everything in the Mid 2000s is BS. In retrospect, it was transformative for our society, but it didn't drastically change things at the time. For instance, Facebook was launched in 2004, but I don't remember it becoming popular until about 2008. People think that things change overnight, but they don't, it's gradual. My core childhood years were relatively similar, in the grand scheme of things. Now, if I had of experienced my core childhood between 1994-1999, that would be a completely different story. I wish I had of experienced my childhood during that time. The Mid 2000's were a pretty ordinary time to grow up in.

Well, the thing is, if you had been an adolescent or older in the mid-late 2000s as I was, the advent of not just social media, but iPods, YouTube, Wikipedia, standard broadband video, iTunes, streamed movies, video chat, etc. would have felt like a gigantic deal at the time. It was because of the things that gradually became mainstream during the mid-2000s and fully established themselves by the end of the decade that the exchange and immersion of pop culture became not just much more accessible, but also far more diverse and complex. Suddenly, you could look up almost anything on your mind and find it, and digital communication was much more sophisticated than just typing basic messages.

Yeah, those are all good points. As a 1987 born, everything from the late '80s and early '90s has always seemed ancient to me. As a teenager, when I would watch old tapes from the early '90s, it always astounded me how old everything looked.

But, when it comes to the late '90s, I have never truly seen that time period as old or retro, even now as we are reaching the 20 year point. This is obviously because of my being 9 to 12 years old during those years. Even though the N64 is totally outclassed by today's consoles, to some extent it still seems new to me because it was primarily during my junior high years that I played that console. This goes to another level with the early '00s. A lot of the younger posters see the early '00s as being ancient, but it's still basically like yesterday to me because I was starting high school back then. With 2000 being over 17 years ago, I can still watch some tapes from that period, and it just doesn't seem that old.

I agree that the 1990's were one of the more transformative decades in recent memory, but I do think people typically exaggerate the differences between the early 90's & the late 90's. Heres a few other similarities I've also noticed:





- Kid Oriented Culture

1990 & 1999's kids cultures were relatively similar for the most part.

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Now granted 1990 was dominated primarily by TMNT, NES, BeetleJuice, and Teddy Ruxpin, while 1999 was dominated primarily by Pokemon, N64, Goosebumps, and Tickle Me Elmo, the overall vibe of both eras were relatively similar.


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Kids still typically played outside (with little to no adult supervision). Saturday Morning Cartoon blocks like Fox Kids and ABC were dominant in both eras (of course the late 90's had Kids WB 8)).

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Gaming (while did advance massively in the graphics department) still retained amount of the market catering towards kids (this progressed through the 2000's as gaming by the mid-late 2000's had officially been primarily targeted towards adults) thus genres like platformers were still popular. This also meant Mario and Sonic were still iconic children's mascots in the late 90's/early 00's.

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Also, more obvious but I digress, but technology didn't consume children's lives. Dial up internet was the standard, and even then not all Americans had the internet (let alone a computer) so kids obviously had more of an imagination if that makes any sense.




-Music Trends

Certain music genres and overall trends remained popular throughout the decade.

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Hip Hop as an example went into a more poppish direction around 97'/98' with the death of Biggie and the rise in Puff Daddy and Timbaland that revolutionized the industry. However, rap as whole still had an overt angst to it that I'd argue was fairly consistent throughout the decade. Of course this angst seemed to have peaked sometime in the mid 90's, it still had a reasonable influence within the late 90's.


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While the early 90's were still influenced heavily by the late 80's hair metal/death metal it also featured the seeds of the much larger alternative movement of the 1990's with Grunge breaking into the mainstream with Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Alice in Chains. By the end of the decade, rock was heavily influenced by Nu-Metal and Ska, but the last vestiges of the 1990's grunge movement were still prevalent during that time with the post-grunge movement. Grunge was the metaphorical sticky glue of rock music through out the 1990's.


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Theres other musical examples such as the House Music Genre which was relatively popular through the entire decade, the neo-jazz/50's revivalist movements in the 1990's in films like The Mask and Swingers which were incorporated into songs like Killing Me Softly by The Fugees and Mambo No 5 by Lou Bega, Ballads still being relatively popular with musical acts like Mariah Carey, Janet Jackson, and Whitney Houston being popular throughout, and you'll see the 1990's were a lot more consistent in the music department as you might have or not been pre subscribed to.



-Television

This is one that I barely heard anyone mention, but I'll take a swing at it. The overall trends in television, were pretty consistent for the most part. Heck I'd argue that out of all pop cultural trends of the 1990's TV was definitely one of the most consistent out of all of them.

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Family oriented sitcomes (a trend that began in the 80's) continued to be prominent in the 1990's.

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This was most notably seen on blocks like TGIF on ABC. Many classic sitcoms during the 90's like Full House, Roseanne, Married With Children, Family Matters, and Boy Meets World were all targeted towards families and were relatively popular in the early, mid, and late 90's.


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People tend to bring up reality tv, with the premiere of The Real World on MTV (what many Gen Xers consider the beginning of the end for MTV), while it did first occur in the 90's it wouldn't really explode into popularity until the 2000's with Survivor, American Idol, and The Simple Life.

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Sitcoms became so prevalent in the 1990's, many network executives began creating primetime sitcoms targeted towards Boomers and Xer Adults in the 90's, with some families allowing their kids to watch them as well. Classics like Seinfeld, Friends, The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Frasier, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and Martin to name a few were clearly marketed towards a more adult crowd, but were still relatively accessible for some parents to be ok with showing with their kids (granted with supervision of course).


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These adult oriented sitcoms also lead to some blockbuster scripted hits like The X Files, Law and Order, Beverly Hills 90210, Melrose Place, and Mad About You, all of which were relatively popular throughout the 1990's.

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Of course you cannot talk about 90's TV without mentioning 90's Adult Cartoons. With the popularity of The Simpsons, Beavis & Butthead, Ren & Stimpy (kind of...), South Park, Daria, and Family Guy to name a few.



-Video Quality/'Living Room Culture'

This has been a point Infinity has brought upon in the past (not just in this thread) and I'd like to evaluate it for the newer members on this forum. Video quality, as mentioned above, was still primarily SD, although it was more modernish/sleek SD when compared to the 80's & before. High Definition did come out in the 90's as digital television was first displayed to the public in 1996/1997, and the fist HD TVs went on sale in 1998. Heck there were already HD Camcorders on the market even in the early 90's!!!

Stunning footage of NYC in 1993
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However its important to note that most people couldn't afford HDTVs, let alone the fact that most broadcasters still primarily used analog TV signals over digital TV signals (that threshold wasn't officially passed until 2009!). Heck, for the few people that did have HD camcorders, like the footage you saw above, since there were no HDTV available in the public there would've have been no way to have been able to viably view that footage.

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Most Americans did have camcorders though. Camcorders started to become prevalent in the 1980's with the advent of VHS/VCRs. With this technology, people could now viably record moments with powerful technology, at a reasonable price, and to be able to view to viably at home.

http://www.iretron.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Sony-Handycam-Model-Video-Hi8-with-10x-Optical-Zoom.jpg

Of course the capabilities of camcorders had progressed throughout the 90's (let alone the, regression, of the size ;D), but the overall concept of recording various family gatherings or special occasions were pretty prevalent. Also, harkening back to the concept of video quality, video quality for camcorders stayed pretty consistent in the decade as it was primarily SD based. However, digital camcorders began to become common in the late 90's/early 00's, allowing for the ability to display tapes through other mediums (even theoretically downloading recordings onto a computer).

http://www.umich.edu/~vrl/beier/Thanksgiving/Thanksgiving99/Friends_turk1_med.jpg

http://www.nanharter.com/past/photos/koelelodge.jpg

http://hennegan.net/images/Family%201994%20web.jpg

As you'll also notice in these photos, but there was a stronger sense of 'family values' (you could thank the 'Reagan Revolution for that) that was still present in the 1990's.

http://static2.businessinsider.com/image/59550b20d084cc6a298b5840-480/blockbuster.jpg

This harkens back to the concept of 'Living Room Culture' in which many American families gathered in the Living Room to watch TV, have Blockbuster movie nights, play board games, talk about their days, etc. etc. Families actually used to talk (gasp) to amongst each other. Sure you always had your occasional fights, the annoyed teenaged siblings, the annoying little siblings, etc. However, at the end of the day the family unit was still relatively strong. Ironically, with the rise of the smartphone and Web 2.0 internet in the mid-late 2000's, was also around when the 'Living Room Culture' seemed to had died out.


All in all, these were some of the many trends I've noticed that seemed to have been pretty consistent throughout the early, mid, and late 90's. Heck, I'd argue that some of these (especially the last one) lasted into the 2000's up until 2005/2006 or so.

I was alive for the early 90s


1990 and 1999 felt like 2 different worlds

Now granted 1990 was dominated primarily by TMNT, NES, BeetleJuice, and Teddy Ruxpin, while 1999 was dominated primarily by Pokemon, N64, Goosebumps, and Tickle Me Elmo, the overall vibe of both eras were relatively similar.

What do you mean by overall vibe? The closest connection I can really think of is that shows like Pokémon and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles alike were action-oriented and primarily designed to sell toys, despite having popular stories at the same time. Otherwise, the 1990s were pretty darn changeful in kid television shows. In the year 1990, Nickelodeon only aired live action sitcoms and syndicated programs. By 1999, not only were Nicktoons heavily established, even seeing the premiere of Spongebob the same decade, but Cartoon Network had also gone from not existing to being a major rival of Nickelodeon. Even Disney started with Disney Afternoon shows like DuckTales and Tailspin to more a focus on live action shows and post-DA animated series.

I suppose Nintendo was massive in 1990 and 1999 alike, but the actual nature of home gaming was pretty different between those two years. In 1990, the 8-bit 2D platformer Super Mario Bros. 3 was the title that everybody was mad about, but by 1999, the home market was dominated by 3D titles, many of them 4-player pizza party games like Super Smash Bros., Mario Kart 64, and Mario Party.

Kids still typically played outside (with little to no adult supervision). Saturday Morning Cartoon blocks like Fox Kids and ABC were dominant in both eras (of course the late 90's had Kids WB 8)).

Saturday Morning Cartoons were very much on their way out by 1999, due to Nickelodeon, Disney, and Cartoon Network having become so popular and well-established. Aside from Pokémon and maybe Digimon, Kid's WB was never that popular.

]Gaming (while did advance massively in the graphics department) still retained amount of the market catering towards kids (this progressed through the 2000's as gaming by the mid-late 2000's had officially been primarily targeted towards adults) thus genres like platformers were still popular. This also meant Mario and Sonic were still iconic children's mascots in the late 90's/early 00's.

I strongly disagree with gaming still being primarily targeted towards kids by the end of the 1990s. The PlayStation was released in 1995 and was already far more popular than Nintendo by the 1996-1997 school year. There may have been a few popular kid-oriented titles like Crash Bandicoot and Spyro, but almost from the get-go, you still had a whole bunch of massive successes that were clearly intended for teenagers and adults, such as Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, and Silent Hill. One of the Nintendo 64's most popular games, of course, was GoldenEye 007, which was rated M for mature and really paved the way for the FPS genre's dominance in the 21st Century. Even on the Sega Genesis, a decent number of video games were more mature in nature, including Mortal Kombat.

Also, more obvious but I digress, but technology didn't consume children's lives. Dial up internet was the standard, and even then not all Americans had the internet (let alone a computer) so kids obviously had more of an imagination if that makes any sense.

I would agree with you that 1990 and 1999 were both pretty much in the same era of technology being primary entertainment for children, but not swallowing up their lives.

While the early 90's were still influenced heavily by the late 80's hair metal/death metal it also featured the seeds of the much larger alternative movement of the 1990's with Grunge breaking into the mainstream with Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Alice in Chains. By the end of the decade, rock was heavily influenced by Nu-Metal and Ska, but the last vestiges of the 1990's grunge movement were still prevalent during that time with the post-grunge movement. Grunge was the metaphorical sticky glue of rock music through out the 1990's.

Grunge wasn't really popular on a mainstream level at all in 1990, it only first caught on in 1991 with Alice in Chains' Facelift and Nirvana's Nevermind. As a movement, it was dead by early 1997, even though post-grunge still felt distinctly 90s through the very end of the decade, before being overtaken by its more reviled 2000s wave spearheaded by Creed's "Higher."


Theres other musical examples such as the House Music Genre which was relatively popular through the entire decade

That's definitely true. In the late 90s, you had Jennifer Lopez's "Waiting for Tonight" and Janet Jackson's "Together Again" achieving huge success, versus 1990 being dominated by hits such as "Vogue," "Get Up! (Before the Night Is Over)," and "C'mon and Get My Love."

the neo-jazz/50's revivalist movements in the 1990's in films like The Mask and Swingers which were incorporated into songs like Killing Me Softly by The Fugees and Mambo No 5 by Lou Bega

First off, how is "Killing Me Softly" a 50s swing revival at all? It's a cover of a soul song from the early 70s and brings in a typical 90s hip hop beat and background commotion to give it more of an gritty atmosphere.

Second, was swing revival really even that big a deal in the 90s in general? It was a modest movement at best, and even "Mambo No. 5" is more of a novelty hit than anything else.

Ballads still being relatively popular with musical acts like Mariah Carey, Janet Jackson, and Whitney Houston being popular throughout, and you'll see the 1990's were a lot more consistent in the music department as you might have or not been pre subscribed to.

True, although the production of most ballads changed a fair deal. Those blatantly 80s electric pianos, found on 1990 songs like "Love Takes Time," were long gone by 1999, when even most of the silkiest ballads still had busier, treblier beats than had been the norm in the early and mid-90s.

As you'll also notice in these photos, but there was a stronger sense of 'family values' (you could thank the 'Reagan Revolution for that) that was still present in the 1990's.

This point is very obtuse. In literally any year, there's a mix of "family values" and "angsty," "rebellious" people. I don't think the people who most truly embraced grunge, alternative rock, gangsta rap, and punk in the 90s fit under this tidy image of Americana. Many were outright lampooning this morality.

I'd say 1997 was all sorts of cheesy in its own right, actually. The biggest things in music were Hanson, the Spice Girls, Puff Daddy, Mase, Aqua, Savage Garden, the Backstreet Boys, and the like, not to mention Steps' "5,6,7,8" came out in the UK (it reached Australia in 1998, though it was also a soccer hit, never charting in America). Even in film, you had ridiculous flicks like The Fifth Element, Batman & Robin, Face/Off, Flubber, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery, Men in Black, and such.


I agree, 1997 was indeed cheesy in it's own right, however I don't think it was to the same extent as the Y2K era (although, you could argue that 1997 was apart of the Y2K era, but anyway). The "cheesiness" of 1997 was drowned out by Mid-90s influences, which remained relevant in pop-culture throughout the year. Shows such as Beavis & Butthead and Seinfeld were still on the air, while 90s alternative was still going strong and performing well in the mainstream.

That's pretty interesting. In my own childhood, I always saw 2001 as being extremely changeful, but that's mostly because of the kid culture I was focused on at the time. That was the year the 6th generation of gaming really took off; Super Smash Bros. Melee's graphics were like a million years ahead of even the best-looking titles on the Nintendo 64 and still hold up today, making it incredibly hard for me to believe the game was released closer to 1985 than to present day. Also, most cartoons I was familiar with began using digital ink, abandoning the hand drawn look that had prevailed throughout the 90s. I was also highly aware of the teen pop movement, which everybody seemed to love in the 2000-2001 school year (in a yearbook questionnaire, one of the questions asked students' favourite band, and like half of them chose *NSYNC), but then it suddenly became the most unbelievably reviled thing in the world in the 2001-2002 school year. In retrospect, I would say 2002 wasn't honestly that culturally different from 1999, but the way I experienced pop culture at the time certainly made that feel like it was the case.

That's understandable. Generally speaking, the Y2K era was a progressive time for pop culture as it was and all the hype surrounding the new millennium would have made things appear even more changeful.

Well, the thing is, if you had been an adolescent or older in the mid-late 2000s as I was, the advent of not just social media, but iPods, YouTube, Wikipedia, standard broadband video, iTunes, streamed movies, video chat, etc. would have felt like a gigantic deal at the time. It was because of the things that gradually became mainstream during the mid-2000s and fully established themselves by the end of the decade that the exchange and immersion of pop culture became not just much more accessible, but also far more diverse and complex. Suddenly, you could look up almost anything on your mind and find it, and digital communication was much more sophisticated than just typing basic messages.

I understand that and I remember the advent of iPhones, streaming and social media being a very big deal. However, with that said, it still wasn't a "day and night" change and it was really only a few of those examples which truly revolutionised things in a short-space of time. Maybe things were slightly different in the US. Most of the examples you provided above remained quite consistent throughout the entirety of my core childhood (2004-2009). For instance, iPods were already quite popular by the time I entered my core childhood in March 2004. They remained popular well until the Early 2010s, when smartphones began to replace them in popularity.

As for phones, flip-phones and slider-phones were the phones of choice throughout most of my core childhood. A common misconception is that the iPhone was adopted by the masses when it was first released in 2007. However, they were too expensive for many people and it wasn't until 2010/2011 that they were truly adopted by the public. For me, personally, I didn't get my first phone until Christmas 2011, which was just a month before I started High School. Most people my age didn't get their first phone until the start of High School (or the end of Middle School, in the US), so we weren't really caught up wit

While social media may have evolved quite rapidly during that period, it still wasn't as universal as it is today. For the most part, it was still perceived as being an "adolescent thing". It didn't truly influence people's lives to the extent that it does now. As I mentioned in my earlier post, it really only picked up steam in 2008/2009, when Facebook began to become widespread and overtake Myspace in popularity. Even YouTube was still quite niche up until that point. Until my parents created Facebook accounts in Mid-Late 2008, I personally didn't know anyone who used social media. Seriously, no one ever spoke of it or used it, except for teens who used Myspace.

The biggest difference would be the advent of streamed movies. Streaming services simply weren't around in the Mid-Late 2000s, at least here in Australia. Our commercial TV networks only launched their own streaming services in 2012 and Netflix became available here in 2015. Also, VHS and analogue-TVs were still popular for the majority of my core childhood, although the former began to seriously decline in popularity around 2008.

Really, 2004-2009 was a pretty consistent period of time. The only real transformative change occurred in Late 2008, but even then, 2010s culture had yet to completely established itself and I was in my final year of my core childhood. It wasn't as transformative as 1994-1999 or even 1984-1989.

I agree, 1997 was indeed cheesy in it's own right, however I don't think it was to the same extent as the Y2K era (although, you could argue that 1997 was apart of the Y2K era, but anyway). The "cheesiness" of 1997 was drowned out by Mid-90s influences, which remained relevant in pop-culture throughout the year. Shows such as Beavis & Butthead and Seinfeld were still on the air, while 90s alternative was still going strong and performing well in the mainstream.

Well, the popularity of alternative rock at the time was clearly much more pronounced in Australia than it was elsewhere. Like we discussed before, 1997 was much more mid-90s influenced in Australia than it was in the United States and especially the UK.

The music scene in the UK in 1997 was extremely different from Australia, for multiple reasons. First, the late 90s/early 2000s wave of teen pop was already fully established by the last third of 1996, meaning it was absolutely ubiquitous throughout 1997; conversely, there were only a few exceptions that already made it big in Australia in 1997, including the Spice Girls, the Backstreet Boys, and Savage Garden (who were really to the late 90s what Wham! were to the mid-80s). Grunge and punk, of course, were massive influences on the pop charts in Australia, but in the UK, 1997 instead primarily saw the gradual transition from britpop to post-britpop. Australia was also way behind Britain over pop-dance; mid-90s eurodance was more or less dead in the UK by autumn 1996, and instead there was a lot of very modern-sounding, trance-infused electronica by acts such as Sash!, DJ Quicksilver, and Brainbug, as well as Daft Punk popularizing acid house. Conversely, mid-90s darlings Whigfield and Real McCoy both scored massive hits in Australia in 1997, but those same songs completely bombed in the UK, where they had previously been extremely successful in 1994 and 1995.

I also think 1997 in television leaned a lot more towards the Y2K era than you're giving credit for. Beavis & Butthead wasn't viewed by that many people, and it already had to compete with King of the Hill, Daria, and South Park during its final year. Seinfeld was a massive deal, but the thing is, there were still a whole bunch of other shows growing popular in 1997 that pushed the year much closer to the rest of the late 90s, such as 7th Heaven, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Sabrina: The Teenage Witch, and a decent number of kid cartoons, as well. The transition certainly wasn't complete, but things were nonetheless changing a lot around that time.

I understand that and I remember the advent of iPhones, streaming and social media being a very big deal. However, with that said, it still wasn't a "day and night" change and it was really only a few of those examples which truly revolutionised things in a short-space of time. Maybe things were slightly different in the US. Most of the examples you provided above remained quite consistent throughout the entirety of my core childhood (2004-2009). For instance, iPods were already quite popular by the time I entered my core childhood in March 2004. They remained popular well until the Early 2010s, when smartphones began to replace them in popularity.

Statistically speaking, iPods really weren't super common until around 2005/2006. You were probably one of the earlier adopters of the technology.

As for phones, flip-phones and slider-phones were the phones of choice throughout most of my core childhood. A common misconception is that the iPhone was adopted by the masses when it was first released in 2007. However, they were too expensive for many people and it wasn't until 2010/2011 that they were truly adopted by the public. For me, personally, I didn't get my first phone until Christmas 2011, which was just a month before I started High School. Most people my age didn't get their first phone until the start of High School (or the end of Middle School, in the US), so we weren't really caught up wit

I think part of the issue with your perception of phone culture is that you were still too young to be at an age where it was common or expected for you to even own a mobile device, but with that said, I agree that iPhones weren't really mainstream until 2010/2011.

While social media may have evolved quite rapidly during that period, it still wasn't as universal as it is today. For the most part, it was still perceived as being an "adolescent thing". It didn't truly influence people's lives to the extent that it does now. As I mentioned in my earlier post, it really only picked up steam in 2008/2009, when Facebook began to become widespread and overtake Myspace in popularity. Even YouTube was still quite niche up until that point. Until my parents created Facebook accounts in Mid-Late 2008, I personally didn't know anyone who used social media. Seriously, no one ever spoke of it or used it, except for teens who used Myspace.

Again, I think your age probably influence your perception of how significant social media was in the 2000s. No, it wasn't exactly ubiquitous in the 2000s, even by the end of the decade, but its growth in impact certainly can't be understated. Also, I would say YouTube was pretty darn-established by 2007, even if it was still a little primitive and not quite as diverse as it would be in the early 2010s.

The biggest difference would be the advent of streamed movies. Streaming services simply weren't around in the Mid-Late 2000s, at least here in Australia. Our commercial TV networks only launched their own streaming services in 2012 and Netflix became available here in 2015. Also, VHS and analogue-TVs were still popular for the majority of my core childhood, although the former began to seriously decline in popularity around 2008.

It took that long for Australia to pick up Netflix? That seems insane! :o

Really, 2004-2009 was a pretty consistent period of time. The only real transformative change occurred in Late 2008, but even then, 2010s culture had yet to completely established itself and I was in my final year of my core childhood. It wasn't as transformative as 1994-1999 or even 1984-1989.

How was 1984-1989 more transformative, in your opinion?

What do you mean by overall vibe? The closest connection I can really think of is that shows like Pokémon and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles alike were action-oriented and primarily designed to sell toys, despite having popular stories at the same time. Otherwise, the 1990s were pretty darn changeful in kid television shows. In the year 1990, Nickelodeon only aired live action sitcoms and syndicated programs. By 1999, not only were Nicktoons heavily established, even seeing the premiere of Spongebob the same decade, but Cartoon Network had also gone from not existing to being a major rival of Nickelodeon. Even Disney started with Disney Afternoon shows like DuckTales and Tailspin to more a focus on live action shows and post-DA animated series


While I do agree that the substance of 90's Children programming, toys, and trends was truly different, I was mainly talking about the overall essence of kid culture. When you take out the actual trends that belong in either the late 90's or early 90's, the basic kid culture is essentially the same for the most part. You had hit tv shows marketing sh!t like toys to kids, Nintendo having a huge influence, board games still being popular, outdoor excursions like super soakers and nerf guns, among other things. The vibe of kid culture between 1990 & 1999 was pretty consistent in all honesty, thus is why I have a hard time when someone claims that "1990 & 1999 are in two different universes when it pertains to kid culture".

I would argue the difference between 2000 & 2009 pertaining to kid culture was much larger than the 1990's were, because not only did you have the substantive difference in trends (which is natural, although I'd argue the trends themselves were far more removed from the earlier part of the decade as the later 90's trends were with the early 90's), the overall vibe was DRAMATICALLY different.

The internet was still a novelty for many Americans in 2000 thus many kids didn't have access to it for certain games, by 2009 the internet was everywhere and kids had the ability to play games on computers, smartphones, traditional game consoles, etc. You also cannot forget to mention the rise in video streaming services like YouTube, with channels like Smosh and Fred to cater towards kids, that had essentially replaced the need to watch legacy TV. This is probably one of the biggest changes I noted with kid culture in the 2000's, the progression of childhood centered things being more squarely found at the comfort of one's home, rather than a diverse array of different outlets.

All in all, an 8 year old in 1990 and an 8 year old in 1999 may have had different kid cultured tastes (I'd imagine the 8 y/o in 90' would be a huge TMNT fan while the 8 y/o in 99' would be a huge Pokemon fan) but their daily lives were overall relatively similar.

On the other hand, an 8 y/o in 2000 and an 8 y/o in 2009 would obviously have had different kid cultured tastes, along with their daily lives being drastically different.

Saturday Morning Cartoons were very much on their way out by 1999, due to Nickelodeon, Disney, and Cartoon Network having become so popular and well-established. Aside from Pokémon and maybe Digimon, Kid's WB was never that popular.


??? On their way Out....

I mean yeah, they certainly weren't as prominent as they were in the early 90's due to cable becoming more standardized. However, many kids in the late 90's/early 00's still tuned into SMC's mainly because they still had original programming that was only found on their blocks. ABC had Recess, Pepper Ann, and Buzz Lightyear of Star Command; Kids WB had Pokemon, Batman Beyond, and Men In Black TAS; FOX Kids had Digimon, Power Rangers, and Transformers: Beast Wars.

Rating for SMC's were more on a gradual decline due to the rise in popularity of cable, but this was going through the entirety of the 90's (another point for consistency in my book). But even still, SMC's still retained a good chunk of kids tuning in for original programming in the late 90's/early 00's. It really wasn't until SMC's just became dumping grounds for syndicated cable programming or english dubs of anime that they really started to go downhill (ratings/popularity wise) and the whole concept of SMC's started to die out. This was circa 2002-2006ish.


I strongly disagree with gaming still being primarily targeted towards kids by the end of the 1990s. The PlayStation was released in 1995 and was already far more popular than Nintendo by the 1996-1997 school year. There may have been a few popular kid-oriented titles like Crash Bandicoot and Spyro, but almost from the get-go, you still had a whole bunch of massive successes that were clearly intended for teenagers and adults, such as Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, and Silent Hill. One of the Nintendo 64's most popular games, of course, was GoldenEye 007, which was rated M for mature and really paved the way for the FPS genre's dominance in the 21st Century. Even on the Sega Genesis, a decent number of video games were more mature in nature, including Mortal Kombat.


While I agree that children weren't the primary consumers for gaming in the late 90's, it was the last time that they retained a pretty big market share. People currently stereotype about adult gamers being 'man children' but in all reality the average age for a gamer is somewhere in their early-mid 30's. Gaming is actually not that prevalent with children nowadays, and the types of games being developed and created (cookie cutter FPS or Assassin's Creed clones) are examples of that.

The second half of the 1990's was truly a transformative time with the advent of 3-D graphics, CD-ROM technology being incorporated in games, adult gaming becoming prevalent, and it was most certainly the majority by that point. However, it didn't change overtly into a more adult oriented gaming world overnight and the mere fact that Nintendo (despite sales slugging) was still doing decent with their home console the N64 and their GameBoy Empire being a Juggernaut and arguably at is peak with the Color (of course we cannot forget about Pokemon). Also, even on the 'mature' consoles, PS1 for instance, you still had tons of games clearly marketed toward a younger audience like Crash Bandicoot, Spyro The Dragon, Ape Escape, Parappa The Rappa, any Disney licensed game from the late 90's (take your pick), I could go on and on.


Grunge wasn't really popular on a mainstream level at all in 1990, it only first caught on in 1991 with Alice in Chains' Facelift and Nirvana's Nevermind. As a movement, it was dead by early 1997, even though post-grunge still felt distinctly 90s through the very end of the decade, before being overtaken by its more reviled 2000s wave spearheaded by Creed's "Higher."


Yeah thats what is hard about this comparison. I guess I got too caught up in the moment and just started comparing random musical trends from the early 90's, not specifically 1990 itself ;D.

However, I do agree, that the original Grunge movement died in 96'-97'. I'm guessing there was a misunderstanding but I was just saying how the influence of grunge was still heavily felt in 1999 (especially with the popularity of its successor, Post-Grunge), not that the original genre was necessarily popular itself.


First off, how is "Killing Me Softly" a 50s swing revival at all? It's a cover of a soul song from the early 70s and brings in a typical 90s hip hop beat and background commotion to give it more of an gritty atmosphere.

I'm not gonna lie I wasn't really thinking clearly when I said that ;D. However, I was just using that song as an example of that cool 'chill' vibe of R&B and Neo-Blues/Swing songs that were popular throughout the decade.


Second, was swing revival really even that big a deal in the 90s in general? It was a modest movement at best, and even "Mambo No. 5" is more of a novelty hit than anything else.

The mainstream relevance was short lived, only really lasted from 1996-2000, but it was pretty prevalent in the underground scene from 1990-1995. Here's a few tracks:

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Also as mentioned prior was heavily around in 1990's pop culture like in movies like The Mask or Swingers, or even in anime like Cowboy Bebop. Its a shame, cause the 1990's was one of my favorite decades of jazz 8).


This point is very obtuse. In literally any year, there's a mix of "family values" and "angsty," "rebellious" people. I don't think the people who most truly embraced grunge, alternative rock, gangsta rap, and punk in the 90s fit under this tidy image of Americana. Many were outright lampooning this morality.


I guess what I was trying to convey was that the 'traditional whitebread middle-American family' image was still prevalent in American pop culture in the 1990's, from sitcoms like Step By Step or Married With Children, to movies like Home Alone or Hook. That image of America is still present today, but the overall influence they exert is a lot more meek and subtle than it was 20 years ago. This is essentially the 'Silent Majority', a core group that voted for Trump mind you, whom many voted for him as a backlash of the modern de facto cultural cornerstone of multiculturalism.

I also think 1997 in television leaned a lot more towards the Y2K era than you're giving credit for. Beavis & Butthead wasn't viewed by that many people, and it already had to compete with King of the Hill, Daria, and South Park during its final year. Seinfeld was a massive deal, but the thing is, there were still a whole bunch of other shows growing popular in 1997 that pushed the year much closer to the rest of the late 90s, such as 7th Heaven, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Sabrina: The Teenage Witch, and a decent number of kid cartoons, as well. The transition certainly wasn't complete, but things were nonetheless changing a lot around that time.


That's true. However, the point I was getting across, was that there still an undeniable Mid '90s influence to pop culture at the time, even in the United States. It wasn't entirely Millennial and as a result, I personally don't think 1997 was as cheesy as the Y2K Era, which was predominantly Millennial based. Although, in all honesty, I don't think the amount of cheesiness of a pop culture can really be determined by the concurrent state of television, because there will always be a variety of programs, regardless of the direction pop culture is in.

Statistically speaking, iPods really weren't super common until around 2005/2006. You were probably one of the earlier adopters of the technology.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oLCO3EEkaI

While that may be true, iPods had already become well in-grained into pop culture by 2004. In fact, the IPod dominated digital music player sales in the US in October 2004.  One of their most well-known commercials (the one featuring Jet's "Are You Gonna Be My Girl"), was in force during 2004. As for myself, I personally didn't get an iPod Touch until 2010, although my Mum had purchased an iPod Classic in Mid-Late 2006.

I think part of the issue with your perception of phone culture is that you were still too young to be at an age where it was common or expected for you to even own a mobile device, but with that said, I agree that iPhones weren't really mainstream until 2010/2011.

Again, I think your age probably influence your perception of how significant social media was in the 2000s.


Sorry, but I disagree with this. I think it's more the case of the context of the time, rather than someone of my age not having an adequate knowledge of phone culture. Statistics show that mobile adoption rates have increased over the past 10-15 years. In 2004, only 45% of teenagers owned a cell phone. Fast forward to 2016 and reportedly three-quarters of US teens own or have access to a mobile device. Source

You now see kids as young as 5 years old with their own smartphone device. Someone who is 5 years old in 2017 is more than likely to have greater knowledge and be more influenced by phone culture, because mobile devices have become so much more entrenched within society. It was reported that 95% of Americans owned a mobile phone in November 2016. This is a stark contrast to the 65% of Americans who owned a cell phone just twelve years earlier. source

Also, ages 3-4 are generally the point in childhood development when people truly begin to take in the world around them, coinciding with when people begin to have their first vidid memories. I believe I was well aware of phone culture during the time of my core childhood. I'd also like to point out that i'm not suggesting that most adults did not own a mobile device. More adults owned a mobile device than not, which is how I remember it and is reflected by statistics.

Rather, i'm suggesting that people's perception of an era is skewed by the current context of the time and as a result, it creates a misconception of the extent to which mobile devices and social media were popular. This is because we're living in a time when we are completely dependent on these devices, so it has falsely influenced our perception of different times. As I mentioned in my previous post, people overstate how revolutionary the technological developments of the Mid 2000s were to everyday life. It was a gradual change, not a day and night one. Facebook may have launched on the 4th February 2004, but everyone didn't just suddenly start to use the website the next day. It applies to everything, every technological development ever made.

The point i'm getting at, is that the world was not as dependent on mobile devices and social media as it is today. Someone of my age wasn't expected to own or use a mobile device in the Mid 2000s, because it was the standard of the time. It's not that we weren't able to fully comprehend the phone culture of the time. It's just how the society was. Yet, we now perceive the era differently, because the world has changed since then and mobile devices and social media have become more entrenched into everyday life.

It took that long for Australia to pick up Netflix? That seems insane! :o

Netflix only expanded into international markets in 2010. Canada was the first overseas country to get the service, followed by the UK in 2012 and Australia & New Zealand in 2015. I don't know if it was possible to access the American site prior to it launching here in 2015. It probably was, however the service most likely wouldn't have worked in the same manner as it would in the US.

How was 1984-1989 more transformative, in your opinion?

First off, pop culture was much more progressive. While 2004-2009 did not offer much in the form of new music genres (at least in the mainstream), 1984-1989 saw the breakthrough of alternative-rock (in the form of R.E.M), the explosion of hair-metal, the consolidation of hip-hop music, the first wave of teen-pop, as well as the development of genres such as Eurodance, electro, house, techno and freestyle.

Sticking with pop culture, 1984 saw the establishment of "The Criterion Collection", an American company who introduced letterboxing, film commentaries and special features to home video. This has since become standard to home video and all companies now incorporate these elements into their releases. The first hand-held game console was released by Nintendo in 1989.

It can be argued that 1984-1989 will be remembered as a much more important period of time in human history. In 1984, the Macintosh was released, which was the first commercially successful PC to use a mouse and a graphical user interface. 1986 was the year the first surrogate pregnancy on an unrelated child was carried out, as well as the year the Chernobyl disaster took place, which changed the way humans utilise nuclear power. 1989 alone saw the invention of the World Wide Web, the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the first gene tagging experiment (i.e first "designer babies") and the Tiananmen Square protests.

That's true. However, the point I was getting across, was that there still an undeniable Mid '90s influence to pop culture at the time, even in the United States. It wasn't entirely Millennial and as a result, I personally don't think 1997 was as cheesy as the Y2K Era, which was predominantly Millennial based. Although, in all honesty, I don't think the amount of cheesiness of a pop culture can really be determined by the concurrent state of television, because there will always be a variety of programs, regardless of the direction pop culture is in.

I would agree that 1997 leaned a bit more towards the Gen-X side, but there was undeniably a pretty pronounced difference in tone compared to just a year earlier if you lived in the United States, or a year and a half earlier if you were from the UK. I actually think 1997 was extremely transitional, too; the very beginning of the year was still mostly mid-90s despite some significant changes already underway, but by the end of the year, it was solidly late 90s, with the only real "mid-90s" influences being more general 90s culture, including Seinfeld.

While that may be true, iPods had already become well in-grained into pop culture by 2004. In fact, the IPod dominated digital music player sales in the US in October 2004.  One of their most well-known commercials (the one featuring Jet's "Are You Gonna Be My Girl"), was in force during 2004. As for myself, I personally didn't get an iPod Touch until 2010, although my Mum had purchased an iPod Classic in Mid-Late 2006.

It seems a bit odd that you're so emphasizing the iPod's popularity in 2004 when it was still nowhere near as significant as it would be during the late 2000s, whereas you're simultaneously downplaying the significance of YouTube, Wikipedia, Facebook and such when they first became popular. Whatever the case, there was clearly quite a distinction between the way most people consumed digital technology by 2009 compared to 2004, even if you feel it's a tad exaggerated.

Sorry, but I disagree with this. I think it's more the case of the context of the time, rather than someone of my age not having an adequate knowledge of phone culture. Statistics show that mobile adoption rates have increased over the past 10-15 years. In 2004, only 45% of teenagers owned a cell phone. Fast forward to 2016 and reportedly three-quarters of US teens own or have access to a mobile device. Source

You now see kids as young as 5 years old with their own smartphone device. Someone who is 5 years old in 2017 is more than likely to have greater knowledge and be more influenced by phone culture, because mobile devices have become so much more entrenched within society. It was reported that 95% of Americans owned a mobile phone in November 2016. This is a stark contrast to the 65% of Americans who owned a cell phone just twelve years earlier. source

Also, ages 3-4 are generally the point in childhood development when people truly begin to take in the world around them, coinciding with when people begin to have their first vidid memories. I believe I was well aware of phone culture during the time of my core childhood. I'd also like to point out that i'm not suggesting that most adults did not own a mobile device. More adults owned a mobile device than not, which is how I remember it and is reflected by statistics.

Rather, i'm suggesting that people's perception of an era is skewed by the current context of the time and as a result, it creates a misconception of the extent to which mobile devices and social media were popular. This is because we're living in a time when we are completely dependent on these devices, so it has falsely influenced our perception of different times. As I mentioned in my previous post, people overstate how revolutionary the technological developments of the Mid 2000s were to everyday life. It was a gradual change, not a day and night one. Facebook may have launched on the 4th February 2004, but everyone didn't just suddenly start to use the website the next day. It applies to everything, every technological development ever made.

The point i'm getting at, is that the world was not as dependent on mobile devices and social media as it is today. Someone of my age wasn't expected to own or use a mobile device in the Mid 2000s, because it was the standard of the time. It's not that we weren't able to fully comprehend the phone culture of the time. It's just how the society was. Yet, we now perceive the era differently, because the world has changed since then and mobile devices and social media have become more entrenched into everyday life.

Just because these technologies didn't completely consume everybody's lives yet in 2009 like they do now does not mean they weren't still extremely revolutionary when they did first come out. The mere fact that they were now widely known by the late 2000s meant the possibilities people had were extremely distinct compared to the mid-2000s and earlier. In my opinion, the initial breakthrough of these technologies, even if they were far from their peaks, is a much bigger deal than the majority of things you listed as being transformative in the mid-to-late 1980s.

First off, pop culture was much more progressive. While 2004-2009 did not offer much in the form of new music genres (at least in the mainstream), 1984-1989 saw the breakthrough of alternative-rock (in the form of R.E.M), the explosion of hair-metal, the consolidation of hip-hop music, the first wave of teen-pop, as well as the development of genres such as Eurodance, electro, house, techno and freestyle.

I would argue that most of those things were even less mainstream by 1989 than social media was by 2009. The two things that were ubiquitous in 1989, teen pop and hair metal, were barely developed compared to what already existed in 1984. Hair metal was already a pretty big deal in 1984 with Van Halen, Quiet Riot, Bon Jovi's debut album, Ratt, Twisted Sister, Motley Crue, Def Leppard, and the ilk; they weren't quite as image-centric as bands like Poison and Warrant were, but the difference still isn't that significant. Most teen idols in the late 80s simply embraced styles of music that singers like Madonna already thrived off of back in 1984; even teen pop itself enjoyed some popularity in the mid-80s thanks to Wham! and New Edition. Music in 1989 still mostly had the exact same spirit as music from 1984, just with generally louder drums and rougher synths. The only drastic development in the mainstream by 1989 was early new jack swing, which didn't sound 90s yet but was at least different from what was generally common already in the mid-80s.

Sticking with pop culture, 1984 saw the establishment of "The Criterion Collection", an American company who introduced letterboxing, film commentaries and special features to home video. This has since become standard to home video and all companies now incorporate these elements into their releases.

This is what makes 1984-1989 more changeful than 2004-2009's onslaught of new technologies?

It can be argued that 1984-1989 will be remembered as a much more important period of time in human history. In 1984, the Macintosh was released, which was the first commercially successful PC to use a mouse and a graphical user interface.

The first Macintosh totally bombed. I do agree, though, that computers were much more common in 1989 than 1984; there are lots of computers in Ghostbusters II, but nothing but typewriters in the first Ghostbusters.

1986 was the year the first surrogate pregnancy on an unrelated child was carried out, as well as the year the Chernobyl disaster took place, which changed the way humans utilise nuclear power. 1989 alone saw the invention of the World Wide Web, the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the first gene tagging experiment (i.e first "designer babies") and the Tiananmen Square protests.


Aside from the Berlin Wall falling, those aren't really that changeful to pop culture as a whole. Personally, as far as the 80s go, I would refer more to how much music format changed, since vinyls went from still being the preferred format to being virtually dead, and CD's began getting quite popular near the end of the decade.

Well, my early childhood pop culture was indeed what I remember it as: cheesy.

I'm not sure about #Infinity's theory. I've talked to people who were teens or adults  during the early 2000s and they too felt it was a much different world from the late 2000s.

I'm not sure about #Infinity's theory. I've talked to people who were teens or adults  during the early 2000s and they too felt it was a much different world from the late 2000s.


I think the late 2000s were really distinct from the early 2000s too, but my specific point is how radically different your infancy and few years prior to your birth feel compared to the first few years of your childhood, primarily because you never experienced the former two as being the present day, so not only do they lack the same type of first impression of currentness that the latter does, your only knowledge of the early period is from word of mouth and archives, thus arbitrarily putting them into the same category as the distant past. When 1998 and 1999 were going on, everything coming out, from Mulan to Pokémon to Super Smash Bros., was solidly "new" in my mind, whereas stuff from 1990-1994, despite being from the same decade and really not always that fundamentally different, only ever existed as "past" things, which sprung from a time and place that I did not fully experience and therefore seemed so much older to me than they actually were.

I also think 1989 is still a very 80's year. I've always felt that even for the last year of the decade, a lot of quintessential 80's material was still being released.

The early 1990s didn't feel that old to me when I was a kid, actually. I thought movies like Home Alone and Sister Act and shows like Fresh Prince of Bel Air were contemporary for the longest time.

A part of this might be because I travelled and spent quite some time in a few third world countries in the late 1990s, and they were stuck in the 1970s, never mind the high tech early '90s. ;D Technologically, I didn't feel any portion of the '90s were dated.  Another part of it might be that I think there was still some early '90s sticking around in 1996/1997 (which I remember somewhat), more than people are willing to admit. My aunt and my mom still had their poofy curly perms back then. There's also a photo on our wall of me from '97 wearing acid wash jeans and a neon pink shirt, it screams early '90s. My grandma (who lived with us) had a TV with bunny ears and a dial, haha, it was old even by early '90s standards. I had an NES and Atari plugged into it. I had a very advanced PC running the latest Windows 95, but I used to play '80s/early '90s floppy disk games on it all the time, my neighbour and then best friend had a massive collection! One of my still best friends from kindergarten also had a Genesis at his house in the late '90s and I got to play Sonic, Ecco the Dolphin, Street Fighter 2, and a lot of the Disney games on it.

So while I obviously never experienced the early '90s (or most the mid '90s for that matter), there's still a feeling of familiarity and some sense of "homeliness" that I have with the early '90s that I don't have for even the late '80s. It never felt all that old to me. I won't deny though that the '90s were very transformative and the difference between 1990 and 1999 is huge.

The early 1990s didn't feel that old to me when I was a kid, actually. I thought movies like Home Alone and Sister Act and shows like Fresh Prince of Bel Air were contemporary for the longest time.

A part of this might be because I travelled and spent quite some time in a few third world countries in the late 1990s, and they were stuck in the 1970s, never mind the high tech early '90s. ;D Technologically, I didn't feel any portion of the '90s were dated.  Another part of it might be that I think there was still some early '90s sticking around in 1996/1997 (which I remember somewhat), more than people are willing to admit. My aunt and my mom still had their poofy curly perms back then. There's also a photo on our wall of me from '97 wearing acid wash jeans and a neon pink shirt, it screams early '90s. My grandma (who lived with us) had a TV with bunny ears and a dial, haha, it was old even by early '90s standards. I had an NES and Atari plugged into it. I had a very advanced PC running the latest Windows 95, but I used to play '80s/early '90s floppy disk games on it all the time, my neighbour and then best friend had a massive collection! One of my still best friends from kindergarten also had a Genesis at his house in the late '90s and I got to play Sonic, Ecco the Dolphin, Street Fighter 2, and a lot of the Disney games on it.

So while I obviously never experienced the early '90s (or most the mid '90s for that matter), there's still a feeling of familiarity and some sense of "homeliness" that I have with the early '90s that I don't have for even the late '80s. It never felt all that old to me. I won't deny though that the '90s were very transformative and the difference between 1990 and 1999 is huge.


Yeah, I totally get what you're saying here. For me, I could say that I have a similar vibe with the mid and late '80s. Though I wasn't actually around during the mid '80s, and only have a few vague memories from the late '80s, those years never totally seemed foreign to me because a lot of things from those years were still popular during my early childhood. My first console was an NES, my parents didn't get cable until 1994, and my first computer was a Commodore Amiga which was popular during the late '80s. Also, many cartoons I liked as a young child were '80s cartoons like Alvin and the Chipmunks, G.I. Joe and all of that.

Most people, from what I've seen, can relate to the decade when they were born at least a little bit.

Just because these technologies didn't completely consume everybody's lives yet in 2009 like they do now does not mean they weren't still extremely revolutionary when they did first come out. The mere fact that they were now widely known by the late 2000s meant the possibilities people had were extremely distinct compared to the mid-2000s and earlier. In my opinion, the initial breakthrough of these technologies, even if they were far from their peaks, is a much bigger deal than the majority of things you listed as being transformative in the mid-to-late 1980s.


I have never denied that those technologies were revolutionary when they came out. However, with that said, I believe the only technologies which you could argue as being more transformative (than the examples I provided) are YouTube and Wikipedia, because there had not been anything like those technologies before they were developed. Facebook and iPods were proceeded by Myspace and other portable music players (i.e Walkmans) respectively, so they aren't quite as revolutionary in that regard.

My main point (which you mentioned above), was that they didn't instantly revolutionise people's day-to-day lives and it was a gradual change, not an immediate one. I personally think that the examples I gave for the Mid-Late 1980s were more revolutionairy to general society and humanity, but i'm not going to start a dispute over it.

Acid wash jeans and a neon pink shirt sounds more like 1988 than anything else. :P

Acid wash jeans and a neon pink shirt sounds more like 1988 than anything else. :P


I told you I was the ultimate '80s kid.

I told you I was the ultimate '80s kid.


Here we go again... ::)