Generators
A few months ago, Ezra Klein—founder of Vox, New York Times and podcast personality—was on the Search Engine podcast talking about media consumption.
Except he stopped short of using the word “consumer” himself. Instead, he argued, we should think of ourselves as “generators.”
If you like something or value something on the Internet, Klein argued, you should view yourself as someone capable of sending signals that more of it should be created. Likewise if you don’t like or value something.
The conversation was similar to Future Commerce’s ongoing discussion of curating algorithms, but struck us slightly differently. Perhaps, because GameStop’s stock has been back in the news.
GameStop, if you recall, was the meme stock of 2021, which went from $1 per share to $80+ per share, simply because a group of Redditors said “we can be (stupid) longer than you can be solvent.”
As we wrote at the time:
What’s happening on Wall Street is a clear expression of our postmodernism: We’re turning stocks into memes and memes into currency.
And we’re celebrating it.
Consider: There’s little discussion about what this means about our trust in free markets, the viability of economic stability, or how a fundamental disruption of power structure alters our daily lives. The only thing anyone wants to know is: Are you in on this?
We thought about this again when reading CivicScience’s coverage, which reported that ~30% of Gen Z had invested in a meme stock and another ~20% plan to do so.
No other age range came anywhere close to those numbers.
The difference, it seems, is striking not just in terms of the “what,” but, also, perhaps, the “why.”
Gen Z, more than any other generation understands algorithm curation and the power of being a “generator.”
This insight is often hidden from public view, since feeds are personal, but the knowledge of the individual power does appear to be showing up “in public.”
The stock market might currently be the most public—and most interesting.
Nearly every other generation has been taught, at some level, that the market is something you consume. You invest and others—banks, namely—move the market. You are not in power, but you can accumulate wealth.
Even those most active retail traders sort of subscribe to this.
But those who buy meme stocks (Gen Z), apparently, don’t really care about the traditional power structure. They’ve learned that they can change feeds through small actions, and look as if they may be applying that lesson elsewhere.