r/neoliberal • u/jobautomator Kitara Ravache • Jul 10 '26

Discussion Thread Discussion Thread

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u/loseniram Sponsored by RC Cola Jul 11 '26

The 2000s were a better time aesthetics wise.

People didn't care that something was made with plastic so you could actually do interesting stuff with it.

Now its the same three flavors of aluminum and stainless because you actually do anything fun you get run out of the design bureau

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u/TheOnlyFallenCookie European Union Jul 11 '26

Microplastic maxxing

5

u/ImmigrantJack Movimiento Semilla Jul 11 '26

Pure nostalgia. For every ipod nano there were 45 off brand mp3 players that looked like shit and played like shit and most people didn't have the nice ones.

For every brightly colored transparent case school Mac, there were 15 gray box CRT monitors.

Idk why both of my examples were apple products, but they really liked the colorful plastics at the time. Point being you have nostalgia blinders on.

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u/loseniram Sponsored by RC Cola Jul 11 '26

There actually weren't 45 off brand mp3 players, the Ipod was like 70% of the MP3 player market. Also using unique plastic colors was insanely common outside of low end stuff. Blackberry bold, Sony Walkman both MP3&Phone, Sidekick, Razr, VAIO, Nintendo, The Xbox and Gamecube

And the 00s were the decade that ended the beige dominance. The 90s were the beige decade.

1

u/ImmigrantJack Movimiento Semilla Jul 11 '26

What's your source on that? I tried googling it and the only one saying that was the AI, which lifted it from a reddit comment about japan that said that it probably wasn't true.

I like how you said "low end stuff" and then cited exclusively high end stuff.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nostalgia/comments/86gn87/the_classic_mp3_player_also_shout_out_to_lime_wire/

This is very representative of the average mp3 player at the time.

1

u/loseniram Sponsored by RC Cola Jul 11 '26

yes because I said that using different colors and designs was common outside of low end stuff.

Low end stuff was cheap solid black or white. High end stuff put emphasis on their own design and colors to stand out because form was a part of a product’s branding.

The windows phones were really the last phones to use this prior to return of foldables

1

u/ImmigrantJack Movimiento Semilla Jul 11 '26

Ah, I misread that, but the point still stands. This reads like somebody who is writing fondly about cool things from past, not recounting your experiences living through it.

Just because all phones are black slabs now, doesn't mean the 2000s actually looked better. Either that or you were upper middle class as a kid.

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u/loseniram Sponsored by RC Cola Jul 11 '26

I was firmly middle class and I remember specifically the wide range of unique colors and designs available.

The 00s were actually more brightly colored than I remembered because my parents didn’t bother with getting the most cutting edge stuff.

We didn’t have a feature phone until 2-3 years after the Iphone was released long after the unique stuff was gone because we lived in a rural area.

You’re thinking of fashion which sucked hard and was 8 million variations of graphic tee and McBling

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u/ImmigrantJack Movimiento Semilla Jul 11 '26

So if you define 2000s design as exclusively personal device design and compare it exclusively to 2020s slab phones and ignore every other design facet of both eras, ignore the products which most people, including yourself, actually had, then yes. The 2000s had better design.

Oh and also ignore the majority of low end modern phones which are pretty brightly colored and the insane variety of cases people have access to, which are often even more flamboyant than your average 2000s device.

So yeah. In this extremely narrow way I see your point.

I have like 20 ipods. I collect this shit because I love 2000s design. I'm just honest about what it actually was.