In: 2025. Out: Whatever That Was

The internet's predictions for the new year

Jan 03, 2025

Welcome to Gen Z Translator, where I break down trending topics on Fridays. If you’re new, you can subscribe here. Views are my own. Happy reading!

I relate to the meme that goes “i genuinely could not do 2024 again. thank you for the lessons diva. i think it’s time i move on tho. ready for a new aura. let’s wrap this up.”

Moving onnnn.

Over the past year, “That was not on my 2024 bingo card” became a beloved Internet catchphrase to express growing cultural discontentment with the unpredictably of a post-Internet age.

The internet also likes to make “in” and “out” lists. A good example is The Washington Post’s hot takes here. Yapping is “out,” and disassociating is “in.” Following is “out,” blocking is “in.” “Celebrity look-alike contests” are out, and “celebrity digital replica laws” are in. Etcetera.

As a collective, we’re tired of “unprecedented” after “unprecedented” event. We cope the best way the internet knows how: humor. Perhaps by defining the culture ourselves, we gain back a semblance of control.

New year predictions are easily memeable due to their straightforward Notes App format. Pop culture, à la carte. Instead of mocking the unpredictable news cycle after-the-fact, the internet mocks the potential for tomfoolery beforehand. The result is ridiculous, ironic, and occasionally believable bullet points. Some accounts are already checking off their bullets.

I thought it would be fun to log some of the internet’s “predictions” and take a look in, say a year, if they were on the nose (or at least, on the face).