Kate Wagner's essay "404 Page Not Found" published in January 2019 was an enlightening reminder of how fleeting yet resonant the internet has been. I found it difficult to comprehend how fast everything has moved until reading this essay. It often feels like social media has always been a part of our society and it’s interesting to acknowledge how dependent we are on it yet we mourn the days when iPhones, TikTok, and Instagram were not even on our radar. Wagner’s essay walks you through a whole evolution that we all witnessed but rarely think about or question. There’s a big trend of purchasing and yearning for what used to be. Websites and games that no longer exist are constantly making a comeback now that nostalgia has become the latest thing.
I think it’s so interesting to see how even as websites, apps, and technology in general become more minimalistic, clean, and user-friendly, most of us still miss the charming, customizable, and often ugly interfaces. Above all, it’s astonishing how we’ve gone from a customizable web to a web that customized our lives. Wagner wrote, "I barely need to mention the dark side of the platform, the side that leaves people lining up for hours just to get a selfie, that has changed how we design products, furniture, even buildings, and neighborhoods—all of this is well-documented." Social media has taken over our lives in every aspect possible. What we eat, how we dress, how we talk, everything is dictated by our feed that is spoonfed to us every day. It makes sense to miss a time when we had to work a little harder to find something, where we could make technology fit our aesthetic and not vice versa.
Wagner also briefly talks about social media’s role in politics. '"The Social Network” is known now as a “Racist Boomerland." No wonder 44 percent of people ages 18-29 have deleted the app this year." Like anything, when put in the wrong hands, it can be a disaster. Wagner says "It’s generally accepted, especially after the election of Donald Trump, that the bad things about the contemporary internet pretty much outweigh the good." Donald Trump's election did bring forward a huge downfall for Facebook, though it was already dying. Place the blame on whoever you want but ultimately the bad guy in this whole scenario is Capitalism. The web was not shared with the world with the intention of companies copping on people's ideas, lifestyles, and thoughts. Influencers would not exist if the web were not capitalized. Now we have presidential candidate Kamala Harris gaining an enormous young following because of her campaign through social media. While brilliantly marketed, it’s interesting to see how it’s all about appealing to the target audience, finding these aesthetics, and trends that can sell your product or your idea. This goes back to what I previously said about how the web is now controlling so much of our lives. We have learned to use this capitalist system to our advantage and can get millions of people to think one way or another.
And aesthetics play a big part in this. It’s learning to tap into these nostalgic aesthetics that have made online campaigns, albums, and trends so successful. Charli XCX’s album "Brat" is a perfect example of this. Pulling from early 2000s aesthetics, her album has caused an enormous trend on social media to the point where Kamala’s campaign relied on this. The "Brat" album pulls on nostalgic times of the population now using most of social media and because of this, it was a great success. Just like Wagner said, "Like many people my age and older, I miss the pre-social media internet. The new internet knows this, and it capitalizes on my nostalgia as it eats away at the old internet"