HardOCP.com: Status Quo is No Mo

[Rizen]

I agree with everything except the part where you mentioned millenials. Bro we are almost 40 now. I've been reading HardOCP since I was 14 (look at my join date, I had been reading for over a year before I made an account).

The switch to TikTok, techtubers, video reviews etc is definitely a Gen Z preference.

 

[Darunion]

I agree with everything except the part where you mentioned millenials. Bro we are almost 40 now. I've been reading HardOCP since I was 14 (look at my join date, I had been reading for over a year before I made an account).

The switch to TikTok, techtubers, video reviews etc is definitely a Gen Z preference.

right? my first pc was a 486 with windows 3.11 and ms bob lol and am still a millennial, i guess that means i grew up with internet devices, damn kids:/

 

[Lakados]

Elder millennial here, my first computer was an IBM 8088 that my dad's office retired so he took home for me to play with, complete with an acoustic modem.

 

[Armenius]

Also a millennial pushing 40. I think my posts in this thread illustrate how I generally despise the video format for reviews.

 

[Kckazdude]

I seem to remembr this stuff all starting its slow down back when sites like Sharkyextreme and Chicks Hardware were being bought out and 'streamlined'. I actually liked the more in depth reviews of old. I respected and even looked forward to Kyle's real world gameplay reviews over the standard benchmark norm of the era. Am not a fan of the new influnencer and Youtube reviews that are the standard now. But do understand all the moving levers driving them these days.

 

[M76]

I just learned that the latest generation born after 2010 is actually called generation alpha. That's some irony if I've seen any.

us millenials have made the internet great, and gen Z is currently in the process of destroying it.

 

[Furious_Styles]

I just learned that the latest generation born after 2010 is actually called generation alpha. That's some irony if I've seen any.

us millenials have made the internet great, and gen Z is currently in the process of destroying it.

I wouldn't say we made it great. Gives us too much credit. As much as I hate sweeping generalizations I do think the golden age of the internet was pre-facebook.

 

[staknhalo]

there used to be a churn in social media/internet sites (now would be apps) that I think helped - with stagnation of all the same sites, eventually deterioration - but the internet is big business now and companies aren't gonna go back to how it was

 

[M76]

I wouldn't say we made it great. Gives us too much credit. As much as I hate sweeping generalizations I do think the golden age of the internet was pre-facebook.

Well, I'm not claiming credit for myself, I did scant little for making the internet better, apart from about a hundred thousand forum posts scattered among a half dozen sites, most of which are long gone by now.
And a short stint as a writer / news guy on an IT site, but I quickly realized that it's not worth it to do it right, and I didn't want to do it badly, so I quit before my probation was up.

And now many would argue that I'm just making the internet worse by criticizing every game.

I don't even think it was facebook, specifically. It's more mobile devices that ruined the internet. You can't contribute meaningfully from a 5" screen and a on-screen keyboard.

 

[Armenius]

I wouldn't say we made it great. Gives us too much credit. As much as I hate sweeping generalizations I do think the golden age of the internet was pre-facebook.

To me, what made the internet great was individuals creating their own websites to host their own content. Every website was unique in their own way, and the amassing of content eventually led to the ability of being able to find almost anything on the internet. This started to change abruptly when Facebook came along and everything became centralized and homogenized by large corporate entities seeking to control the flow of information and monetize it. Now I suspect at least 75% of the internet is made up of bots, paid shills, and advertorials, which leads to the meme about the fake internet. That abundance of information and knowledge is disappearing in favor of government and corporate interest.

No, I don't think millennials are solely responsible for making the internet great, but I don't think anyone can deny the ambitions and creativity of the young contributed to the trends we can still see images of today. Let us also not forget Gen X, which Kyle is a part of.

 

[GNUse_the_force]

Let us also not forget Gen X, which Kyle is a part of.

Everybody forgets Gen X

 

[FrgMstr]

Let us also not forget Gen X, which Kyle is a part of.

And Billy Wilson, Redwood, ShugaShack Steve, Sharky, Tom, Anand, and the list goes on....

 

[Aireoth]

I agree with everything except the part where you mentioned millenials. Bro we are almost 40 now. I've been reading HardOCP since I was 14 (look at my join date, I had been reading for over a year before I made an account).

The switch to TikTok, techtubers, video reviews etc is definitely a Gen Z preference.

Millenial is the worst demographic, its too broad a time range during a massive tech boom. I have next to nothing in common with those born in the later 80s and then 90s. They have such a different life experience, by the time they where teens smart cell phone where a thing.

I have more life experience in common with those born 75-85.

 

[LukeTbk]

Millenial is the worst demographic, its too broad a time range during a massive tech boom.

It is even worst outside the US (because I think it is quite 9-11 based, has people that never lived their adult life in a pre 9/11 world,
The Pew Research Center defines millennials as born from 1981 to 1996, choosing these dates for "key political, economic and social factors", including the September 11th terrorist attacks, the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Great Recession, and Internet explosion

If you think it is bad has an American, imagine for the rest of the western world

I have next to nothing in common with those born in the later 80s and then 90s. They have such a different life experience, by the time they where teens smart cell phone where a thing.

I think you are a bit offbase, smartphone existed but were not much of a thing specially for young people a before the iPhone got popular in 2008 and it took a little while to matter after that.

Someone born in the late 80s/early 90s almost certainly grew all is teens years without smart cell phone being a thing no ? Or maybe teens mean something a bit different than what I have in mind (12-16 year's old)

 

[Armenius]

Millenial is the worst demographic, its too broad a time range during a massive tech boom. I have next to nothing in common with those born in the later 80s and then 90s. They have such a different life experience, by the time they where teens smart cell phone where a thing.

I have more life experience in common with those born 75-85.

Generation X is also a wide time range, representing 1965-1980. It's the same 15 year time range that millennial represents (1981-1996).

I think you are a bit offbase, smartphone existed but were not much of a thing specially for young people a before the iPhone got popular in 2008 and it took a little while to matter after that.

Someone born in the late 80s/early 90s almost certainly grew all is teens years without smart cell phone being a thing no ? Or maybe teens mean something a bit different than what I have in mind (12-16 year's old)

Biologically, adolescence is defined as ages 10 through 24. Socially, it varies by culture. I think in the US, at least, it is considered to be 12-17.

 

[Furious_Styles]

To me, what made the internet great was individuals creating their own websites to host their own content. Every website was unique in their own way, and the amassing of content eventually led to the ability of being able to find almost anything on the internet. This started to change abruptly when Facebook came along and everything became centralized and homogenized by large corporate entities seeking to control the flow of information and monetize it. Now I suspect at least 75% of the internet is made up of bots, paid shills, and advertorials, which leads to the meme about the fake internet. That abundance of information and knowledge is disappearing in favor of government and corporate interest.

No, I don't think millennials are solely responsible for making the internet great, but I don't think anyone can deny the ambitions and creativity of the young contributed to the trends we can still see images of today. Let us also not forget Gen X, which Kyle is a part of.

Yeah that's why I picked facebook's general release because it coincided with the cell phone becoming a smart phone and things started changing rapidly at that point.

 

[Aireoth]

Generation X is also a wide time range, representing 1965-1980. It's the same 15 year time range that millennial represents (1981-1996).

Biologically, adolescence is defined as ages 10 through 24. Socially, it varies by culture. I think in the US, at least, it is considered to be 12-17.

You miss the other point, GenX didn't sit over the same degree of technological advancement, in particular personal tech.

If you used a rotary phone, you have a touch point of shared life experience to most people (NA wide) going back to the early 1900's. We used rotary phones, when cells came out I was just starting to drive and had a massive cellphone + battery + antenna that strapped onto the center console of my car. The internet was only just in its infancy for GenX and early millennials, we used dialup, had shitty access services like Compu-Serve and AOL, had to run and use DOS if you wanted to use a PC, made payphone calls collect with the meet up details in the 'so and so is calling you' line.

a 1987 on millennial was 10 or less in 1997, their life experience is much closer to GenZ, by the time their pushing for independence in their teens smart-phones exist, the internet is cable, texting existed, life changed dramatically.

So I still stand by Millennial is the worst demographic because its too broad during a time of way to much change around communication and technology. The shared life experience between myself (1982) and my cousin (1990) is almost non-existent.

 

[LukeTbk]

a 1987 on millennial was 10 or less in 1997, their life experience is much closer to GenZ, by the time their pushing for independence in their teens smart-phones exist, the internet is cable, texting existed, life changed dramatically.

I feel like that either your timeline for pushing for independance in their teens of someone born in 1987 is different that what I have in mind or you have a couple of years too soon:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/185879/number-of-text-messages-in-the-united-states-since-2005/

Texting start to be a changing thing around 2008, the person born in 1987 is 21, when they were a pushing for independant has teens around 2002, maybe smartphone existed but it is a niche business product, they are over 20 before they become popular.

The person born in 1987 or 1990 remember an era where they knew telephone number in their memory and called someone house instead of a person, asking with their voice to speak to their friend to the person that answered. They remember using a regular dictionary to search for a word.

And there is a little (quite small) between something starting and its cultural effect:
https://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/parenting/ct-teens-not-drinking-20170919-story.html

The big cultural shift among say 16 year's old teens seem to be around those who turned 16 in 2010 (the born around 1994):

If you look at the giant sudden decline (versus slow decline before) in drinking, driving, dating, part time or summer working, going to the movie theater the giant shift seem post 2008 for teens, so born a little bit after 1990.

 

[grim4593]

I see the sharpest difference in age groups is the "always accessible era" where the majority of people that you knew had cell phones and were generally a text or phone call away. It really affects how you communicate with friends, family, and relationships.
Also I think the usage of corporate social media and access to smart phones is a significant divider.
I was born in 1986 - saw the conversion of dial up to cable, AIM/MSN/Yahoo messengers, had Nokia bar phones and 9 key texting, MySpace/Xanga/Live Journal. Graduated college in 2008 and at that time a "smartphone" was a Blackberry. Facebook was a thing but it was specifically for college students. Back then social media was still fairly independent, certainly not subject to planning or agendas (yet).

For someone born even 5 years later (1990-1992) it would be a completely different experience in high school or college always expected to be contactable, access to smartphones, and the plague of corporate social media.

 

[ElementDave]

Some of you millennials might really be... Xennials.

The only consistent observation I've made about the various poorly defined generations is that every one of them blames the other generations for the world's problems.

At least everyone can agree that video is usually a terrible medium for PC hardware reviews. (What? No!?)

 

[LukeTbk]

At least everyone can agree that video is usually a terrible medium for PC hardware reviews. (What? No!?)

Not sure I agree to put it that broad, I think it obviously can be a really good medium for something where the visual are a large part of what interest the potential buyer, say PC Case reviews, could also make sense for monitors reviews (like they often do for TV review) or fan noise (there not just DBs but the type of sound that matter), could be a good way to show a dlss vs non-dlss or other things that the effect can look good in a static situation but not in a moving situation or rtx vs non-rtx.

 

[Armenius]

Some of you millennials might really be... Xennials.

The only consistent observation I've made about the various poorly defined generations is that every one of them blames the other generations for the world's problems.

At least everyone can agree that video is usually a terrible medium for PC hardware reviews. (What? No!?)

Sarah Stankorb, the person who coined the term, would fall right into the middle of her definition of "xennial" (1977-1983). "Coincidentally," she was born in 1980. Has "xennial" really gained traction in common parlance anywhere outside of academia?

 

[Markus Guitarus]

Some of you millennials might really be... Xennials.

The only consistent observation I've made about the various poorly defined generations is that every one of them blames the other generations for the world's problems.

At least everyone can agree that video is usually a terrible medium for PC hardware reviews. (What? No!?)

Each new generation also thinks they slid out from between their mother's thighs possessing innate knowledge and wisdom surpassing all previous generations. They'll fix the world's ills where all who came before failed!

The eternal arrogant naivety of youth.

 

[OutOfPhase]

Each new generation also thinks they slid out from between their mother's thighs possessing innate innate knowledge and wisdom surpassing all previous generations. They'll fix the world's ills where all who came before failed!

Only because some parents aggressively pump them full of that as a zero-day malware.

Tell the kids they need to prove their theories. Scientific method and all that. You don't get any free pass with "things were different then". Show me. Prove it.

 

[N4CR]

Pretty soon we will see hardware reviews hosted by the likes of Amouranth clones on Twitch / Youtube. Chicks in bikinis "reviewing" product from a pre-written script provided by the OEMs. With the occasional wardrobe malfunction to keep viewership up.

Slight suspicions that this next 'story arc' of the hardware 'reporting' arena, it'll be like the next NFT/influencer pump and dumps. No passion, no involvement, just money to use their credentials and image to shill something, That might work for half a year, particularly on the less intelligent, what I see long term happening is the same thing that impacts NFTs and most new crypto rug pulls. People are very wary of them, know they are almost always scam and thus engagement drops.

3) Wait, the format was actual text. On a website. Without 12 Next Page buttons. Oh lawdy we loves it.

Absolutely refreshing.
The sticky top bar on the [H] forum redesign drives me nuts on mobile as it is... and almost all sites are worse than [H] forum for clutter and inefficient UI.

 

[N4CR]

3) Wait, the format was actual text. On a website. Without 12 Next Page buttons. Oh lawdy we loves it.

Absolutely refreshing.
The sticky top bar on the [H] forum redesign drives me nuts on mobile...

 

[ElementDave]

Sarah Stankorb, the person who coined the term, would fall right into the middle of her definition of "xennial" (1977-1983). "Coincidentally," she was born in 1980. Has "xennial" really gained traction in common parlance anywhere outside of academia?

Beats me. I wouldn't use any of the terms if clear communication is a goal.

Why? Do you think she made a mistake? Maybe she belongs to the VH1 generation — a short-lived generation that followed the MTV generation. There are plenty of others to choose from, but not a whole a lot of consistency in the names or dates. Capitalization follows the same convention: use whatever style seems coolest at the moment.

... Interbellum Generation, Lost Generation, Greatest Generation, G.I. Generation, Silent Generation, Baby Boomers, Beat Generation, Generation Jones, Thirteeners, Generation X, XY Cusp, Cuspers, Xennials, MTV Generation, Boomerang Generation, Generation Next, Millennials, Generation Y, Star Trek: The Next Generation, New Silent Generation, Electron Generation, Health reGeneration, Generation Z, Smartphone Generation, Post-Millennials, iGeneration, Snowflake Generation, 6th-generation Core processors, Generation Alpha, ...

 

[M76]

Each new generation also thinks they slid out from between their mother's thighs possessing innate knowledge and wisdom surpassing all previous generations. They'll fix the world's ills where all who came before failed!

The eternal arrogant naivety of youth.

Each new generation has access to far more information than the previous. So in theory they should be more knowledgeable. But how they use that vast source of information is up to their individual intelligence which is innate, and not a generational thing.
Also past generations always think the next ones have it way too easy, and their upbringing was the only proper way to become real upstanding citizens.

 

[chithanh]

Yes, there will be more disgruntled editorials and reviews that complain about no MSRP,

Another variable that gets removed from the "review cycle" is that hardware reviewers will no longer be able to compare past cards with a true “price point to price point” focus. This removes a critical part of most reviewers' processes when it comes to comparison data points. I would venture to say this could lean pro or con for AMD and NVIDIA, but it puts the onus back onto the reviewer to make the "correct" evaluation comparisons, and quite frankly, few reviewers will have the ability to pull this off and not upset much of their audience as this will be difficult to get consensus among their varying traffic demographics.

I think the complaints have more to do with being forced to break with old habits than actual disruption. There exist other (and arguably, better) indicators to help purchasing decisions, which is the value of reviewers to consumers. Indeed what good is lamenting about MSRP from six years ago if you cannot buy the card from six years ago today at its original MSRP? Frequently ignoring inflation even? What reviewers now have to conclude is "based on its performance and the market situation at launch, this card would be a good deal at or below $X" (image from gputracker via reddit)

 

[TheGardenTool]

Regarding MSRP had the thought earlier maybe nvidia didn’t set one for the 3080 12GB because they aren’t selling a card of it themselves. They don’t control what AIBs charge so it makes no sense to list one.

 

[M76]

I think the complaints have more to do with being forced to break with old habits than actual disruption. There exist other (and arguably, better) indicators to help purchasing decisions, which is the value of reviewers to consumers. Indeed what good is lamenting about MSRP from six years ago if you cannot buy the card from six years ago today at its original MSRP? Frequently ignoring inflation even? What reviewers now have to conclude is "based on its performance and the market situation at launch, this card would be a good deal at or below $X" (image from gputracker via reddit)

View attachment 443346

WTF? The 2080TI was never €1600 while it was available. This is clearly some leftover stock they are trying to price gouge. Stocks of 2080Ti ran out months before the launch of the 3080 here.

Anyway the point of lamenting is that I'm not going to buy anything at the current prices. Supply does not meet demand. Clearly it is not inflation that is causing this, but a highly skewed market.

 

[harmattan]

I see the sharpest difference in age groups is the "always accessible era" where the majority of people that you knew had cell phones and were generally a text or phone call away. It really affects how you communicate with friends, family, and relationships.
Also I think the usage of corporate social media and access to smart phones is a significant divider.
I was born in 1986 - saw the conversion of dial up to cable, AIM/MSN/Yahoo messengers, had Nokia bar phones and 9 key texting, MySpace/Xanga/Live Journal. Graduated college in 2008 and at that time a "smartphone" was a Blackberry. Facebook was a thing but it was specifically for college students. Back then social media was still fairly independent, certainly not subject to planning or agendas (yet).

For someone born even 5 years later (1990-1992) it would be a completely different experience in high school or college always expected to be contactable, access to smartphones, and the plague of corporate social media.

This "communication divide" meshes squarely with my experience. I recall when my wife and I were first dating years ago (I'm a Xennial, she's squarely a Millennial), she was surprised when I'd call her to plan dates, travel etc. instead of communicating in a flurry of texts. And apropos here, she recently asked me to send her reviews for wireless headsets. I sent her a bunch of in-depth written reviews: she retorted asking if there "were any shorter videos to watch."

There are benefits and disadvantages to both "modes d'emploi". To be high-performing, the trick is to know when to text/message and when to pick up the phone and call.

 

[Wade88]

I see the sharpest difference in age groups is the "always accessible era" where the majority of people that you knew had cell phones and were generally a text or phone call away. It really affects how you communicate with friends, family, and relationships.
Also I think the usage of corporate social media and access to smart phones is a significant divider.
I was born in 1986 - saw the conversion of dial up to cable, AIM/MSN/Yahoo messengers, had Nokia bar phones and 9 key texting, MySpace/Xanga/Live Journal. Graduated college in 2008 and at that time a "smartphone" was a Blackberry. Facebook was a thing but it was specifically for college students. Back then social media was still fairly independent, certainly not subject to planning or agendas (yet).

For someone born even 5 years later (1990-1992) it would be a completely different experience in high school or college always expected to be contactable, access to smartphones, and the plague of corporate social media.

WinMo was a thing in 2008 too... https://www.gsmarena.com/htc_tytn_ii-2024.php the one after it had space between the buttons!!! in 2009 https://www.gsmarena.com/htc_touch_pro2-2690.php I liked the Tytn2/AT&T Tilt because it had external GPS and cellular antenna ports. It might have been the first phone for sale with GPS in the USA at least on AT&T. If you plugged it in and turned the polling rate up with an external antenna it worked really, really well.

 

[D4rkn3ss]

oh yeah linus, that fucking little twerp, truly idiocracy the movie the live-action, these days we are living in

 

[Wade88]

It is even worst outside the US (because I think it is quite 9-11 based, has people that never lived their adult life in a pre 9/11 world,
The Pew Research Center defines millennials as born from 1981 to 1996, choosing these dates for "key political, economic and social factors", including the September 11th terrorist attacks, the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Great Recession, and Internet explosion

If you think it is bad has an American, imagine for the rest of the western world



I think you are a bit offbase, smartphone existed but were not much of a thing specially for young people a before the iPhone got popular in 2008 and it took a little while to matter after that.

Someone born in the late 80s/early 90s almost certainly grew all is teens years without smart cell phone being a thing no ? Or maybe teens mean something a bit different than what I have in mind (12-16 year's old)

I got my 1st smartphone, a Cingular 8125 in my junior year of high school, I hail from 1988. HTC Wizard/8125, then Hermes/8525, then Kaiser/Tilt, then Rhodium/Tilt 2. It was a great time tuning them all to run well. Switched to Android when v. 2.3 was new.

 

[M76]

I got my 1st smartphone, a Cingular 8125 in my junior year of high school, I hail from 1988. HTC Wizard/8125, then Hermes/8525, then Kaiser/Tilt, then Rhodium/Tilt 2. It was a great time tuning them all to run well. Switched to Android when v. 2.3 was new.

What matters is when you got internet access on your phone. Smartphone itself is just a fancy toy without the internet. Smartphones / Phones in general were a nerd thing until the iphone became mainstream.

 

[Wade88]

What matters is when you got internet access on your phone. Smartphone itself is just a fancy toy without the internet. Smartphones / Phones in general were a nerd thing until the iphone became mainstream.

I had internet and T9 on my 1st phone in 2002. I bought the smartphones mostly for the no more t9, faster 2g and 3g modems, and USB WWAN modem plus easy access to searching things without having to write it down and search it next time I was at a connected desk. I argued with the teacher in elementary school that handwriting was outmoded because I would probably never write anything down in my professional life. I was right. I haven't written anything at all since I bought my house and had to sign my name many times.
When the 8525 came out I went and bought it on the day after launch day for the UMTS modem and it worked great for playing battlefield 2 at places that had no or very crappy wireline Internet. I also feigned projectile diarrhea once to get out of 2 a day football practice to play Doom 3 when it came out.

I had to come up with a measly $200 the first time to get the 8125, after that I had more discretionary income and bought them outright. I did dictation for my mom on Sunday afternoons for 20 an hour, sometimes 30 on really nice days/bribery. This was all cash under the table but usually I just let it accrue with my mom until the magic number for whatever piece of nerdery was achieved since I had no credit cards of my own. Since 2000 I have typed faster and with fewer error relative to my mom's associate lawyers, paralegals and secretaries. This funded the bulk of my electronics purchases between 2000 and when she died in 2008. 1949-2008 RIP.

 

[SecretStash]

Too much reconning who the gen xers are. We were told we were gen x up to high school. There is no changing that. Dubbing a people group of gen xers as being millennial or "Xennial" is just fake history after history was made. Too late

 

[OutOfPhase]

Too much reconning who the gen xers are. We were told we were gen x up to high school. There is no changing that. Dubbing a people group of gen xers as being millennial or "Xennial" is just fake history after history was made. Too late

Who cares what some group decides your label is?

 

[Randall Stephens]

I’m old enough to drink, pot is legal in my state, and I have the gpu I want with a 10 year warranty that cost me $60. I’m generation Fuck All Y’all