4520 sats \ 2 replies \ @davidw 25 Dec 2023 \ on: How to change culture? culture
I don’t have any evidence but my gut tells me that this perhaps occurs due to monetary/market incentives as well as being able to hijack or bootstrap on top of another community or trend. And so once an idea or behaviour picks up steam, it spreads because of businesses scaling and following their own self interests. Otherwise there’s a danger it reaches a crescendo too early and fizzles out..without reaching a critical mass outside of that particular niche.
- Standing desks became common because they rode the wave of a remote revolution. And they could be priced expensively with electric motors. Being healthy for posture as well as operating in a premium profitable niche.
- Bee pollen became a trend recently, riding the environmental movement and interest in people creating their own honey, whilst apparently there being anecdotal evidence of benefits for women. Plus there was a tonne of money to be made when it was marketed that way.
- Protein powder became commonplace because businesses wanted a use for a waste product from the dairy industry. So they were able to push a profitable product onto the consumer. And because people had less time during their 9 to 5s to prep a plate of proper protein. I suspect it won out because it both saved people time AND helped people with their health goals at the same time.
- Perhaps minimalist footwear hasn’t got critical mass, because there’s not much money to be made from telling people to go barefoot and most “barefoot-like” shoes look like you’ve developed Turkey feet. Not seeing another wave it could ride, unless it helped people run faster for example.
Trends usually need a pathway, that already exists and is in a growth phase. Like how you improve keywords is not through throwing 20 articles at ‘earn bitcoin’ but targeting more niche keywords like ‘earn bitcoin without kyc’, ‘earn bitcoin with your content’. I’ve no idea if those keywords are popular but you get my point.
Loosely related, I also really enjoyed this YT video that was posted on Game Theory the other day on SN. Showing how a healthy moral minority can gain increasing influence in an otherwise unhealthy system.
Bitcoin is arguably different because it is hijacking multiple trends at once, over and over.
It clearly has the libertarian market tied-up. Bit biased here, but I actually think it’s likely the privacy-focused & the coming censored communities that will be the next wave of hardcore advocates to adopt both Bitcoin & Nostr. Like we have seen with Snowden & Whitney Webb already. Those seeking refuge from the increasingly creepy institutions, or trigger happy mods or forced-ID for nyms. They’ll all naturally find the worlds biggest trustless network and particularly this site.
Some thoughts on latest & future markets to tap into:
- Libertarian > Maturation phase
- Developers > Growth phase
- Energy > Growth phase
- Privacy > Early adopter phase
- A.I, Music, Freelance > Super early minority
That’s why I’m excited to see how SN navigates the challenge of non-custodial social media… because it’s going to be far far stronger for it, by needing to prioritise it now.
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I'm not sure ifthis is the right episode of Econ Talk, but they talk about the "Minority Rule" in it. I imagine it's what's discussed in the video you posted.
I could see our analogue being acceptance of LN payments. If more of us make more of a point of using LN with vendors, it could have extremely rapid adoption.
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