Venkatesh Rao

Here’s why I think we’re in some sort of dark age: It’s become harder to spot stars and constellations in the zeitgeist to navigate by. I don’t mean memes like “jealous boyfriend.” I mean broad themes like sociopathy or premium mediocrity that are all over zeitgeist for a while.

I’m getting older but I don’t think I’m losing my edge when it comes to spotting zeitgeist constellations. In fact I’ve kept up my production rate of 1 big one every year or two. But it’s getting harder. There are thicker clouds. There are vast patches of “dark memetic matter.”

There’s a lot of stuff, but it Durant cohere into broad macro sweeps the way it used to. Instead it is dark, soupy chaos. As a personal experience what I called the Great Weirding is not do much a new pattern but a pattern void.

There are fewer patterns and they’re harder to spot. This acts as a self-reinforcing thing because fewer people then navigate by those patterns. And the few patterns that ARE spotted tend to attract unreasonable overindexing attention.

My 2-3 big calls in the last few years (premium mediocre, internet of beefs, domestic cozy) have attracted imo like 3x more attention than they would have in 2012, adjusting for me being better known. When there sky is hazy or light polluted, only the clearest constellations pop.

This is literally true. Go into the countryside on a dark clear night. “Easy” constellations like the Big Dipper and Orion will be harder to spot than in a light polluted city because there’s so much more going on. You can even see Milky Way (many urban dwellers don’t know this)

I think, like the Voyager, we’re in a narrative dark patch. Most people are not consciously sensitive to this stuff since they’re not in the business of memetic constellation hunting. But they sense the macrodark and respond with stress.

Initially I thought I was getting old, or just not in tune with moods. Maybe I’m just better at spotting the satire-eye patterns in an optimistic age. But I don’t think so. I don’t see anybody doing it well now. There were dozens of us churning this stuff out 6-7 years ago.