Really is getting through to me how culture engines like “Make Movies With Pretty People” are still going after the internet shattered the media system that integrated that with the rest of life.

Like, it used to be The Teens were into Beverly Hills 90210, or Melrose Place, or Dawson’s Creek, or The OC, and other mass media like E! and supermarket tabloids and late night TV would pick up and repeat out like “oh, these are the few people that are important now” even if you weren’t in their specific target demo

And the cutting edge was maybe talking on the internet but that would mean likely over 1-to-1 IMs or melee “chat rooms” but even if there were specific scenes for it it was general-knowledge stuff, like the real nerds might be on alt.tv.x-files but even people with no internet were aware of The X-Files, and read about it probably mostly in TV Guide

The “Zendaya is Meechee” song really captures the difference now because I still have no idea what that movie was or who Zendaya is. I hear she came from the DisneyLodeon Celebrity-generating neo-studio systems, those were already going in the ‘90s but when Lindsay Lohan was declared a Thing I, with no Disney Channel, could still say “oh, the girl from The Parent Trap, which I saw commercials of on TV, which are things I still see and a place I still see them!”

Hilary Duff I couldn’t pick out of a lineup but it got through to me that there was a person in that life role with that name, I guess that’s about the level Zendaya’s made it for me