No wonder it was so high

One of the big reasons I sold my F87 BMW M2 Competition was the surprisingly high insurance cost. As a late 30s male with zero accidents in the past decade plus of driving, the insurance bill should be going down. Plus the fact the BMW was a completely leisure car - no commuting - and entirely paid off. It should be rather low on the vehicular actuary tables, but it definitely wasn’t. Towards the end I was paying almost as much for the M2 as I was for the 911 GT3.

And now I know why. It seems the late model BMW M cars are a hit with the Gen Z instagram driving crowd. The G80 generation M3’s popularity with the young enthusiasts has morphed into a meme. Broccoli heads paying huge monthly payments for the privilege of piloting Bavaria’s finest. The lament around the past two Monterey Car Weeks is that the youths with M cars have taken over and ruining the fun.

Who would have thought! Olds heads like me couldn’t have imagined it when the G80 first launched with its hugely polarizing “beaver tooth” front end design.

Of course then, when the demographics of a vehicle skew young, insurance rates are elevated commensurately (looking at you, Toyota GR86). What are younger drivers more prone to? Crashing. A quick infinite scroll on instagram and it’s easy to see many banged up G80 M3s. Locally, there’s one that crashed on Highway 9, sadly with fatalities. It’s no wonder the insurance on my M2 not only remained high, but increased year after year.

Glad to be done with that.

Silver lining: who said the youths weren’t into cars? I think it’s great to see Gen Z drivers share enthusiasm and passion for this thing of ours, even if it seems to be largely concentrated on one model line of BMW (Audi and Mercedes Benz madly punching the air right now). Social media is memetic after all; copycats and herd mentality. These kids are the future to which the enthusiast flame will be kept burning. So don’t be so quick to dismiss them next time your highfalutin car event gets invaded by the G80 army.

View fullsize

Generations.

Are you threading?

Facebook (I’m not calling it Meta), via its Instagram division, have launched a twitter competitor. It is called Threads. In five short days since launch, the service have already amassed over 100 million accounts. The major brands and personalities you're following on twitter have likely all jumped over to the new thing. So why haven't you?

I haven’t signed up for Threads because that would break my own rule of having nothing to do with anything Facebook (again, not calling it Meta). My own Facebook account have been long deactivated. So have the instagram handle. I’ve essentially convinced my friends to join me on Signal, therefore no need to keep the WhatsApp around. There will be zero nefarious ad-targeting (and probably spying) on me!

Besides, the whole point of leaving twitter is in large parts eliminating all social media apps from my everyday life. The other part obviously is Elon Musk’s utter mismanagement.

It’s sad to see twitter dying on a proverbial vine. Now that a worthy replacement have appeared - back by the biggest social media company of all time - I don’t see how twitter can survive. Locally here we speak of a doom spiral in San Francisco - the same can be said if people start ditching twitter in droves. There comes a point of critical mass, and there would be nothing worthy or notable remaining on the bird app. The party’s over at Threads.

I have to say, it’s a masterful way to set 44 billions dollars on fire. Monsieur Musk is like the Joker in The Dark Knight - torching the money he stole from the mobsters simply for sport. It’s sad to watch, honestly, because twitter will be but a beautiful memory. Forever lost to the pantheon of bygone social media apps.

View fullsize

Morning glory.

Farewell, Instagram

While Mark Zuckerberg is being raked over the coals by Senators who don't understand the Internet (one Senator said the Facebook user agreement sucks as if he or anybody else actually reads the damn thing), I on the other hand have finally gotten rid of the last vestige of Facebook in my life: Instagram. It joins my Facebook account into the big bin of social media platforms I no longer use (rest in peace, Xanga).  

Indeed Zuckerberg's monolithic company won't profit from me any more (we are the product, not the customer), that is assuming they've kept their word and actually delete my information. Judging from Facebook's track record I'm certainly not counting on that happening. A good few years of my digital life will forever be locked in a data-farm somewhere.  

Another reason for deleting Instagram is I no longer see the point of it. On the base level Instagram is like a photo-centric Facebook, and since I've no use for a Facebook account (couldn't possibly care less what my elementary classmates are up to), keeping an Instagram account doesn't make much sense either. 

As a hobbyist photographer I used Instagram to follow other creatives for inspiration and whatnot (i.e. steal ideas) but I can easily do that elsewhere and be way more productive because I won't be bombarded with images from non-photographers I follow. 

And of course I used Instagram to do what every other red-blooded male does: to follow and thirst after Instagram models. Alas, push comes to shove we can do that without Instagram, can't we? (Shoutout to Tumblr in its early days)

Instagram have turned into a massive time-sink and not worth the value I get out of it. Posting my own photos have become more chore than fun. Having to input metadata like using the appropriate hash-tags and composing a funny caption or compelling short story to tell - for each and every photo - is tiring and not the best place to focus creative energy on; it'd be better spent on this website instead. Pictures on this website have permanence, while on Instagram it's gone and forgotten as soon as the next one is posted. 

Having done the deed and leaving me with Twitter as the sole social media platform I'm on, I feel lightweight and refreshed. More focus on doing the good work.