User:Tigerghost/American Pop Culture (2000 - 2003)

This page is currently under construction as a test page, but will later be up on Wikipedia once the user finds enough sources and references for the material.

TO DO LIST
 * Find reliable sources for the information regarding material.
 * Add all previous information from the 2000s fads and trends in North America article
 * Put the article in sentance and paragraph form rather than list
 * Article needs an introduction to summarize the state of the USA, some major fads or trends should be mentioned–but not overloaded with them, various carry-over pop culture can be mentioned from the 1990s, anything else worth importance should be mentioned as well.

The Decline of Alternative Rock and the Rise of Hip-Hop
During the 1990s, Alternative Rock, especially Grunge and Post-Grunge, as well as Brit-pop and third wave ska became cultural icons of that decade and also to Generation X. However the ever-growing popularity of Hip-Hop in the mid to late '90s started to threaten Alternative Rock's dominence on MTV and the radio waves; shortly thereafter Hip-Hop did replace rock as the "youth music" majority. The Detroit rapper Eminem is widely accepted as the one who popularized rap music towards all of the youth demographic in 1999. Hip-Hop has itself became a cultural phenomenon and icon towards the 2000s and also to Generation Y. Later on artists such as Nelly, Ludacris, and Usher continued to fuel Hip-Hop's popularity.

However, Alternative Rock has not disapeared completely, but more-or-less has evolved past its original sound in the 1990s. Many artists that were popular in the early 2000s such as Hoobastank, Linkin Park, and Jimmy Eat World remained quite popular with the general radio audiences and critics. The subcategories of indie, emo, and nu metal can be said to be the modern "alternative" as opposed to Grunge being the "modern" of the 1990s.

Technology becomes integrated with the Youth culture
Not only by 2000 has Generation Y became the focus of pop culture instead of their Generation X siblings, parents, ect., but they have also become a very wired generation that is nearly dependant on technology to get through their everyday lives. When it comes to firsts, most Generation Y members, especially the large Echo boom sub-generation, have seen many technological advances. The cellphone for example is considered an essential tool for most teens in the early-2000s. Not long after newer features such as built-in cameras, customizable ringtones, and internet connections made such technologies not only appeal to teens, but adults as well. Some have even canceled their ground lines because of the cellphone.

The ever increasing need of technology for the youth of the early-2000s and future generations was also seen in education. The use of floppy discs and conventional CDs began to fall out of favor with teens as more began using the much smaller Flash Drive, which can easily be carried to and from work or school in your pocket.

September 11th Paradigm Shift
Although it is debatable that the September 11th attacks has had a profound effect on pop culture, one must note that it was a major catastrophy and many people all over the world, not only Americans were affected by the attacks. Given that opinions vary strongly on the resulting War on Terror and criticisms of the Patriot Act are seen, we must come to a consensus that the terror attacks did effect pop culture for at least a few years after the attacks, the year of 2002 is a prime example with regards to the Terror Alert System paranoia and related criticism and Clear Channel's decision to pull songs from playing due to questionable lyrics in the begining of the Post 9/11 era. Therefore the September 11th attacks are a reasonable end to the 1990s era and the start of the 2000s, even though many 1990s influences were still dominant at the time.

In the years following September 11, many Americans felt a sense of high patriotism, sparking a fad in patriotic clothing, bumper stickers, and banners reading "God Bless America".


 * Safety paranoia and the increase in sales of safety gadgets such as duct tape, plastic sheets, and band-aids, and the duct tape alert (2003)
 * Anti-French movement during and around the time of the invasion of Iraq (Freedom Fries, "Freedom Toast", boycotting french wine + other products, etc.) (2003)
 * Patriotic clothing, flags, and flag stickers on cars; spawned from the aftermath of the September 11 terror attacks (2001 – 2002±)

President Bush, The 2000 election, and its effect on pop culture
(TO DO LATER)
 * 2000 U.S. Presidential Election jokes
 * Bushisms (2001 - present)

Fads and Trends of the Early 2000s
During the early-2000s, espeacially in 2000 and for the most part 2001, a 1990s lifestyle was typical. Razor scooters, released in 2000, became an icon of pop culture of the early 2000s as their popularity was enourmous among children, teens, and some adults. Later on, some even developted motorized scooters. Several other novelty items and toys such as Bop It and the Big Mouth Billy Bass were also common sights to see in the average home in the early 2000s.

Teenagers in the early 2000s, before the Ipod became big, mostly relied on their old CD players, other MP3 players, or Hit Clips for music. Hit Clips was device that played music on small cartridges. A phenomenon with girls at this time was to own a gel pen, the glossy styled ink and sometimes "scratch and sniff" smells appealed to many girls.

Robotic pets made their debut in the 1990s, but by the early 2000s it became obvious that robotic pets were taking over America. The Techno dog, Rumble Robots, Poo-chi, Robosapien, and other robotic pets were seen in many of kids' homes. Other children toys that caught on well in this time period included the Lego Bionicles, Bratz Dolls ,

Decade nostalgia in the early-2000s is primarily a cusp between the popularity of the retro '70s and the retro '80s, with the 1980s dominating by 2003; continuing until the late 2000s. 1980s nostalgia was fueled in part with the debut of the popular VH1 series "I Love the '80s". The 1980s retro movement can be said to include a rivived interest in Synth-pop music, synthesizers, and the upturned collar.

(TO DO LATER)
 * Energy drinks (2000 - 2007±)
 * Heinz E-Z Squirt colored ketchup (2000 - 2002)
 * Pixter (2000 - present)
 * Low-carbohydrate diet (South Beach diet, Atkins Diet) (2000 – 2004±)
 * "Wassup"; from the Budweiser ads
 * Speed dating (c.1999(2000 - present))
 * TheDOG Artlist collection (2000 - 2004)
 * Nike iD and surrounding controversy (2000 - 2004)
 * Christina Aguilera Doll (2000 - 2002)
 * Bootylicious (2001 - 2003)|DN&p_theme=realcities&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0FE13340094923DF&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM
 * Nostradamus predictions, and the Q33NY controversy (2001)
 * Mountain Dew Code Red (2001 – 2003±)
 * Listerine PocketPaks (2001 – present)
 * P-O-X (2001)
 * Skannerz (2001 – 2002±)
 * Tech Deck Dude (2001 – 2004±)
 * Kidz Bop (2001 – Present)
 * Myachi (2001 – 2002±)
 * Bennifer hysteria and jokes (2002 – 2004±)
 * Botox (2002 - ±2006)
 * DisneyMania (2002 - 2007±)
 * everGirl (2002 – 2005±)
 * Heelys (2002 - 2006±)
 * My Scene Barbie dolls (2002 - 2005±)
 * Pepsi Blue (2002)
 * Poker craze: i.e World Poker Tour and World Series of Poker (2002 – Present)
 * Super Powerball jackpots and the hysteria when the prize is over $300million (2002 – present). Powerball's companion game Hot Lotto began this year.
 * Phlat Ball (2002 – 2005±)
 * Bungee Balls (2003)
 * Dance Dance Revolution (2003 – 2006±)
 * The Da Vinci Code book (2003 - present)

The Internet evolves
Starting in the early 1990s, the internet started primarily as a way for people to communicate and send information with others from around the world. By the 2000s, we see concerns about Y2K before the new millenium, the beginnings of social networking sites, and the sharing of millions of music on Napster. For the first time in decades, television ratings decline due to the influx of people beginning to login to the internet.

During the Dot Com Boom of the late 1990s, businesses thought it was extremely profitable to create websites and buy up domain names, but beyond that it also provided people to share their opinions on blogs, read news from all over the world, browse from countless then-free pornographic websites, as well as watch entertaining videos from video-sharing providers such as ebaumsworld, Homestar Runner, the infamous Peanut Butter Jelly Time Internet Cartoon (2002 – 2005±), and many others.


 * Hot or Not (2000 - 2001, 2006-present)
 * P2P hype (2000 - 2007)
 * Craigslist (c.1995 (2000 - present)
 * Xanga (c.1998(2000 - 2003))
 * Wikipedia (2001: now a commonly used tool)
 * Pop-up ads (2002 - present)
 * Star Wars kid (2003 - 2004)

Fashions
Many of the fashions of the early 2000s didn't change much from fashions of the late 1990s. Baggy clothes still were highly popular with guys as well as Bed head hairstyles also. But, one unique fashion trend for guys occured in 2002 or 2003 when guys began to wear pink clothing, most notably shirts that would read "Tough Guys Wear Pink".

Guy fashions weren't the only changes however, the lower back tattoo started to become enormously popular with girls as did capri pants, Low-rise jeans and ponchos.

Not only was the early 2000s known for the pink shirts and ponchos, but also it saw the rise of two subcultures, the emo and the 21st Century Hipster.

The emo subculture started sometime in the 1980s, but did not hit mainstream status among teens until the early-2000s. This emo phenomenon later would raise the popularity of stores like Hot Topic outside the realm of goths and punks and into the mainstream. Emo itself is described as a poetic form of expressing deep emotions such as depression, self-pity, anger and loneliness; characteristics often found in emo music as well.


 * Nike Shox (c. December 2000(2001 - present)
 * Adio Footwear(c.1998(2002 - present)
 * Axe (2002 - present)
 * Dry Ice (Girl's themed store)
 * Trucker hats (2002 - 2004±)
 * Single strap backpacks become mainstream (2002 - 2005)

Cinema

 * Scary Movies (2000 - present)
 * The Lord of the Rings and related merchandise (2001 – 2004±) (the books have actually existed since the 1950s)
 * Import Scene, grew tremendously, partly due to The Fast and the Furious movie (2001 – 2005±)
 * Marvel Comic Book films
 * film adaptations of Harry Potter

Television
One of the biggest fads of the early 2000s, if not the entire decade, was a television phenomenon called Reality TV. A large amount of Reality shows spawned in the early 2000s such as Survivor, Fear Factor, and many reality dating shows leading to a Reality TV boom during this time period. In 2002, a new style of reality shows based on talent searches became popular such as American Idol and would become a dominant form of reality TV throughout the 2000s decade. Dr.Phil also gained in popularity as a successful spin-off series from Oprah.

Japanese anime, a popular subcategory of animated shows, continued to gain in popularity among teens and preteens. Dragonball Z, Hamtaro , Cardcaptors, Zoids, and Beyblade all were popular anime among children and were some of the most popular shows on Toonami, a television block program that was featured on Cartoon Network. These shows released lots of merchandise including action figures, card games, and launching video game franchises. Beyblade was popular with spawning its spinning tops in 2002 as a fad. Pokémon, the popular 1990s card game and television series was still emencely popular in the early-2000s even though its rival series Yu-Gi-Oh took some of its teen market. Yu-Gi-Oh also had a popular card game.

Children's programming included hit shows that revolved around common issues of the family such as friendship, adolescence, and the "play vs. work" ideology in kids. The Disney Channel started to begin airing more live action shows such as Lizzie McGuire that grew Hilary Duff's popularity to become the status of "Preteen Queen". Nickelodeon after the success of the Spongebob Squarepants series continued by airing yet more hit shows including Jimmy Neutron and the Fairly Oddparents. Nickelodeon also tried to gain an interest from teenagers by launching its TEENick block eventually replacing SNICK. Invader Zim, while a canceled series, gained a cult following amongst the Hot Topic crowd. Ed, Edd, and Eddy and its related merchandise was a popular cartoon during the early 2000s.

Adult Cartoons, while only a handful existed in the 1990s (such as The Simpsons and South Park) expanded to become a full blown trend in animation in the early 2000s. Cartoon Network aired its Adult Swim nighttime block exclusively for adult cartoons. The block became so popular that it revivied Family Guy in 2005 and also Futurama in 2008.

Popular crime investigation shows were a dominant force on television early in the 2000s like CSI:Crime Scene Investigation, and action-drama's like Alias, and 24 were popular as well.

Technology wise, the early 2000s saw the introduction to Tivo and the DVR, a service that allowed users to record their favorite shows without a VCR. The service also had the controversal ability to fast forward through commercial breaks making many advertisers and television networks nervous. The Plasma TV and HDTV started to become affordable to the public and became a common household item in most homes by the late-2000s.

Memoriable advertisements at this time included Jared the Subway Guy promotions for the Subway diet, the "Dude, Your Getting a Dell" commercials, the "I Have Good News" advertisements for Geico , and the "Can You Hear Me Now''" Verizon Wireless ads.


 * X-Men Evolution and related merchandise (2001 – 2003)

Music

 * Napster (c. 1999 (2000 – 2001±, 2006+)
 * Thong Song by Sisqo (2000 - 2001, 2006-present)
 * Who Let The Dogs Out? (2000 - 2001)
 * iPod (2001: Now a commonly used MP3 player)
 * Cha Cha Slide

Computer and Video Games

 * PS2, replacing the original PlayStation (2000 – 2006±)
 * The Sims (2000 -present±)
 * Grand Theft Auto PS2 videogame series and controversy that followed (2001 – Present)
 * Halo series & Halo Parties (2001 – Present)
 * Nintendo Gameboy Advance series (2001 - 2006±)
 * RuneScape (2001 - present)
 * Kingdom Hearts (2002 - 2006±)
 * Animal Crossing video game series (2002 - present)
 * Earth & Beyond (2002 - 2003±)
 * Plug-and-Play video games (2002 – 2005±)
 * Nokia N-Gage (2003 - 2005)

References and Notes
BELOW THIS LINE IS INFORMATION TO BE ADDED TO THE UPPER PART OF THIS ARTICLE

2000

 * Geocaching (2000 - present)
 * Elián González controversy (2000)

2001
Over on the music scene, Alicia Keys kept fallin' in and out of love while Missy Elliott got her freak on along with the tragic death of Aaliyah while shooting for a music video.


 * Moulin Rouge! (2001)


 * P2P file-sharing boom after Napster was shut down and resulting controversy (2001 - present)
 * Segway HT (2001 - present)
 * What would Reagan do? (2001 - 2003±)
 * Windows XP (2001-present)
 * World Without Oil (2007 - ?)
 * XFL football league (2001)

2002
2002 was the year that the new genre of Reality TV took over television with the premiere of Idol. Shows like American Idol and dating shows such as The Bachelor. Two new sodas were introduced, Pepsi Blue and Vanilla Coke. Axe was introduced to the world and caught on big because of its advertising campaign. Geico first began playing their "I have good news" slogans. The Terror alert system was developed this year to alert the public about the risk of terror incidents. The first of many large powerball jackpots begin to occur in this year. Nicolas Cage became a clone while the windiest city in the USA became a flashy musical. Eminem hit it big this year with The Eminem Show. Clipse had a summer anthem with "Grindin'".


 * Snoop Dogg speak (2002 - 2006±)
 * Vanilla Coke (2002 - 2005)
 * Xbox Live (2002 - present)
 * XM and Sirius satellite radio take off (2002 - present)


 * "The" bands: garage rock revival bands such as The Strokes, The Hives, The Vines and The White Stripes (2002 - 2004±)
 * 21st Century generation pop, R&B, hip & hop, and rock music (2002-2006)

2003
The recession that started in 2001 subsided causing more spending power. 2003 also re-introduced Dance Dance Revolution, a popular active dance simulator originally released in 1998 but which hadn't caught on in the US. The controversial Da Vinci Code was published in this year. The newly created MySpace grew into a massive social networking web site in the course of a few months, starting a trend in a way people use the internet. 50 cent was the biggest musical act of the year, along with Beyoncé and Outkast. Ludacris ordered us to stand up while Ashanti was begging for a rainstorm. McDonald's began airing the "I'm Lovin' It" ads. Over on Spike TV, Japanese people were survivng life-threating mishaps. On the cinema scene, Charlize Theron went on a shooting spree, Nemo found his way into our hearts and Tom Cruise became a samurai. More importantly, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of The King crushed the box office and swept their nominations. Guys wearing pink and girls wearing ponchos were trends.


 * Arnold Schwarzenegger's gubernatorial win and the term "the governator" (2003 - present)
 * Banzai (television show) and surrounding controversy (2003)
 * BitTorrent (2003 - present)
 * Blue Collar Comedy Tour and related phrases, such as Git-R-Done (2003 – 2006±)
 * Boho-chic (2003 - present±)
 * Crunk music explosion (2003 – 2007±)
 * Chapelle's Show and related catchphrases such as "I'm Rick James, bitch!" (2003 - 2006±)
 * Ello (2003 - 2006±)
 * EyeToy for the PS2 (2003 - 2005)
 * Girl pop rock - Avril Lavigne, Hilary Duff, Lindsay Lohan, Kelly Clarkson, Diana DeGarmo, Cheyenne Kimball, Hope Partlow (2002(2003-present)
 * Hipster subculture and The Hipster Handbook (2003 - present)
 * Hummer H2 (epitomized the huge SUV craze and is the target of many environmentalist groups) (2003 – 2006±)
 * Fantasy sports boom (2003 - 2007)
 * Finding Nemo (2003 - 2005) and related jokes to the film such as "Finding Emo"
 * Flash mobs such as Pillow fight flash mobs and Zombie Walks (2003 – Present)
 * Jones Soda Co. turkey-and-gravy flavored soda and later offbeat flavors (2003 - present)
 * McDonalds I'm Lovin It ad campaign and their healthy eating campaign with Mya trainer DVD's. (2003 - 2006)
 * Metrosexuality's rise in popularity and acceptance (2003 - 2004)
 * Myspace (2003 -) ---> MOVE TO POP CULTURE (2004 - 2006)
 * Most Extreme Elimination Challenge (2003 - Present)
 * Punk'd (2003 – 2007)
 * Queer Eye For the Straight Guy and spinoffs (2003 - 2005)
 * Simple Life, a television series featuring Paris Hilton. (2003 – 2005±) ---> MOVE TO POP CULTURE (2004 - 2006)
 * Spike TV previously TNN (2003 - present)
 * Spinners (2003 - 2005±)


 * T-Mobile Sidekick and popularity rise after Paris Hilton's Sidekick was hacked (c. 2002(2003 - 2005))
 * Teeth-whitening (1990s) (2003 - 2004)
 * Texas hold'em poker (2003-present)
 * Text speak takes off in America (2003 - present)
 * Ugg Boots (2003 - 2006, 2008±)
 * Che Guevara T-shirts (2003±)
 * VideoNow (2003 - 2005)