2014 was the last year before “influencer” became a career. But the vice was already there: documenting the party instead of feeling it. DJ Snake and Lil Jon’s “Turn Down for What” was the anthem. The music video—absurd, chaotic, full of dancing body parts—matched the city’s frantic energy.
On the dance floors of Output in Brooklyn, Fabric in London, or Berghain in Berlin, a new vice emerged: the Instagram story (launched in 2013, perfected in 2014). We filmed confetti drops. We captured bottle sparks. We posted blurry videos of the DJ’s laptop. The actual vice wasn’t the alcohol or the late hour—it was the fear of being unpresenced. If you didn’t post it, did you even go out?
In 2014, financial greed was rebranded as a kinetic, high-energy spectacle. The film The Wolf of Wall Street dominated the early part of the year (awards season), serving as a three-hour thesis on vice. Unlike the moralistic tales of the past, Scorsese’s film presented sex, Quaaludes, and fraud as a dizzying carnival. 2014 was the last year before “influencer” became
However, the year’s most poignant critique of urban greed came in the form of the Academy Award winner for Best Picture, Birdman. It portrayed the city as a place where ego was the ultimate drug. The film’s protagonist, Riggan Thomson, battles his own vanity on Broadway, suggesting that in 2014, the most dangerous vice in the city wasn't cocaine—it was the desperate need for relevance.
Looking back, 2014’s entertainment wasn’t just “content.” It was a mirror. The city’s vices—ambition, loneliness, envy, boredom, the terror of missing out—were being algorithmically fed back to us. We wanted darker stories (True Detective). We wanted to spy on real pain (Serial). We wanted to perform our joy for strangers (Instagram). And we wanted to numb the noise with infinite loops (Flappy Bird). Fabric in London
The city didn’t sleep in 2014. It just changed the channel.
So here’s to the vices that raised us. The late nights, the bad decisions, the “one more episode” at 4 AM. We didn’t know we were building the burnout culture of the next decade. We just knew it felt electric. or Berghain in Berlin
What was your biggest media vice in 2014?
Was it Serial? Kim Kardashian: Hollywood? Or did you lose your mind trying to beat Flappy Bird on the G train?
Drop your confession below. The city’s listening. 🚬🌃📱
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