flash mob inventor tells all

March 13, 2006 5:40 AM

My Crowd "In fact the flash mob, which dates back only to June 2003, had almost entirely died out by that same winter, despite its having spread during those few months to all the world's continents save Antarctica. Not only was the flash mob a vacuous fad; it was, in its very form (pointless aggregation and then dispersal), intended as a metaphor for the hollow hipster culture that spawned it." -- Bill Wasik, inventor of the flash mob.
posted by raaka (14 comments total)

Does this mean Smart Mobs are not so smart?
posted by jayder at 5:50 AM on March 13, 2006

Previously, on Metafilter.
posted by gsb at 5:51 AM on March 13, 2006

Pointless as any work of art, I suppose. A flash mob was only as pointless as the event's creator designed it. If it took people by surprise and made people go 'WTF?!', it was more than pointless. If it made the participants feel good, it was more than pointless.

Sometimes, the ridiculous is sublime. Doing a flash mob beats the shit out of counting war dead and reading about the latest outrage by unelected leaders.
posted by Goofyy at 6:10 AM on March 13, 2006

As with most art, once it becomes public, it becomes open to interpretation, and the artist ceases to be the last word on its meaning. So what he's got to say about it is really pretty academic at this point.
posted by ab3 at 6:47 AM on March 13, 2006

He was on NPR recently, posing as the inventor of the flash mob and plugging his book. Each person who called in describing the flash mobs they had participated in going back t the '60s was greeted with "fantastic, I didn't know about that". I was amused.
posted by nowonmai at 6:51 AM on March 13, 2006

Exactly what I was thinking as I read the article. But clearly, I'm no 'hipster' (a word which makes me cringe). I took it as art of the absurd, and appropriate to the times.
posted by Goofyy at 6:53 AM on March 13, 2006

Use trendnik instead.

"...I'm no 'hipster' (a word which makes me cringe)."
Goofyy
posted by Captaintripps at 6:55 AM on March 13, 2006

That's pretty funny. I wonder what he'll have to say about bloggers.
posted by carter at 7:04 AM on March 13, 2006

See also 'telephone booth stuffing' or 'flag pole sitting.'
posted by The Jesse Helms at 7:05 AM on March 13, 2006

Bill Wasik did not invent the flash mob any more than Amazon "invented" one click ordering. Larry Niven wrote about them back in the 60s.
posted by Mitheral at 7:08 AM on March 13, 2006

a metaphor for the hollow hipster culture that spawned it

:)
posted by caddis at 7:19 AM on March 13, 2006

I watched a documentary on PBS many years ago, called Making Sense of the Sixties, from which I learned about happenings.
posted by Gator at 7:32 AM on March 13, 2006

...intended as a metaphor for the hollow hipster culture that spawned it...

Ummm - face-saving auto-revisionist pseudo-academicizing poseurdom, anyone?
posted by MaxVonCretin at 7:36 AM on March 13, 2006

face-saving auto-revisionist pseudo-academicizing poseurdom, anyone?

Now that's hip!
posted by carter at 7:51 AM on March 13, 2006