What do clear plastic sandals, Taylor Lautner, and the Harlem Shake all have in common?
You forgot about them.
Obscure pop culture trends are a bizarre phenomenon. They erupt from the wilderness of social media to overhaul school assemblies and the pedaled goods of middle school hallways.
Or they're a little bit more legitimate: an actual product that has an incredible two quarters of revenue before a massive drop in sales when everybody moves on to the next best thing.
Or, they're a pop culture anthem or artifact that we all like to emulate, like some line in a hip hop track or a weird catch phrase.
A recent Reddit thread drudged them all up. Strap in for one blast from the past after another.
Alternative_Ad_9598 asked, "What was a huge trend everyone forgot about?"
What Was Happening
"Yik yak" -- gibbsge
"Yik Yak was the shit. Everyone knew what was going on on campus within seconds. People within the same classes used it to sh**-talk professors and cheat on tests."
"It's too bad people had to ruin it with death-threats and such which kind of forced Yik Yak to make it non-anonymous, killing the appeal it had in the first place."
"As a commuting student at the time it was key for me to keep up with the happenings and drama around campus." -- Nikflame
Never Made it to the Olympics
"Cup stacking...what was that all about?" -- Emotional-Fruit
"Holy sh**. I forgot about that! Our school made us do cup stacking in gym for a few weeks." -- AllUrFail
"My elementary school had a cup stacking competition and I got 1st place....I've already peaked" -- Yumina23
An Excellent Marketing Strategy
"Yo-yos who was that motherfu*ker that came to my school? And why did he do a sales pitch for Yo-yos? And why did so many of us buy them?" -- istilldontreddit
"Fast Eddie. I can't remember but I'm sure he wore a track suit." -- mydogisamy
"Wow I thought that was just a weird thing that my school did, I had no idea that the yo-yo guy had established global domination." -- scherrzando
Not Gone, But Niche
"Cell phones that worked like walkie talkies" -- ThoughtIWasDale
"These were very big for contractors. People on sites used these all the time; they almost became a requirement for any builder." -- culb77
"This functionality is in an app now. We have them at work. It sucks compared to the old hard button on the Nextel phones, but it works." -- jinxes_are_pretend
An Engine of Middle School Entrepreneurship
"Silly bands" -- u_asked_i_answered
"they died because every school banned them" -- Bigchango69
"Holy sh** I forgot about those. There was a silly band trading black market at my elementary school lmao" -- zirzeal
Everybody Was Into It, Whether We Liked it or Not
"Flash mobs. I miss the awkwardness of school teachers and office managers to entice others to join." -- gozba
"My boss made us do this one year, as a kind of bucket list for herself before she retired. I had scheduled the day off since it was my birthday so I was hoping I had a gracious out to skip it."
"Instead, she told me if I came for the flash mob I'd get the rest of the day off with pay and I wouldn't have to use a vacation day."
"It was exactly as awkward as I expected but the 20 minutes was worth it for 8 hours pay." -- othybear
Hell of a Year
"Planking and YOLO." -- Cheetodude625
"Yolo is one of those words I started saying ironically but to this day I keep saying it from time to time because it unintentionally became part of my vocabulary." -- Kea_birdy
"My mom has a three page scrapbook spread of me and my friends planking all around the town when we were 13." -- buzzybee3333
Zombies in Hoodies
"I'll never forget the summer Pokémon Go came out. Everybody and their grandparents were playing it, all the parks were full of people just talking and meeting each other."
"I hate to sound boomer-y but it made me remember what life was like before smartphones, which is ironic I guess because an app made it happen."
"I wish more technology had the goal of getting people active and outside and interacting with others."
-- br34kf4s7
A Polarizing Figure
"Furbies, absolutely needed to have one and when it woke up in the middle of the night I was over it." -- Jaegek
"So I finally get to tell this story. I had a furby as a kid. The thing learned my name. You also could not turn them off so it would randomly talk throughout the day and night."
"It's batteries started to die so it sounded weird to say the least. So one night, at ~3am, I'm about Seven years old. I hear, in this demonic sounding voice from my closest, say my f***ing name."
"The furby was evicted from my room after that." -- The_Titam
Blow Up, Fade Away
"LMFAO. LMFAO may be a total trainwreck of a music group, but they were also everywhere in 2011-2013."
"You couldn't turn on the radio without hearing 'I'M SEXY AND I KNOW IT!' played five times in the span of 30 minutes, and 'PARTY ROCKERS IN THE HOUSE TONIGHT!' was a line scream-sung at any night club."
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