Cultural items your age demographic should have knowledge of but you don’t

[kphoger]

Actors and actresses.

Telling me who starred in a movie will not help me figure out what the title is.

[Takumi]

All I really know about Pokémon is that the current version has to do with people going to parks and other public places with their phones to chase rare creatures.

That's a spin-off game. It's one of many, but certainly the most popular one. The newest main-series Pokemon game generally follows the same formula as the older ones, but expanded on the open-world format experimented with in a couple different games, including its predecessor, over the past few years.

[skluth]

I have a huge gap when it comes to cultural events from 1975-1985. The first five years I was living a rather vagabond life, living off temp jobs, and didn't have access to a television. The latter five years I was in the Navy, including a year each on Midway and Diego Garcia and two years in Spain (which I called the Mississippi of Europe at the time). I'm still finding out things that were big news events back then. I had a huge culture shock after my enlistment, especially when it came to cable with channels like MTV and ESPN.

[Big John]

Actors and actresses.

Telling me who starred in a movie will not help me figure out what the title is.

yep

The only reason I heard of a Kevin Bacon was that people were talking about the 6 degrees game.

[Road Hog]

I have to think about this, because the OP implied the question about "cultural items your age demographic should have knowledge of but you don't" (straight from the topic title).

I don't give a damn about comic book movies. Not my thing. I'll watch one or two of them in a series but will appreciate it for what it is ... LCD mass-market opium.

If you're 60 and don't give a fluck about SnapChat or Gram or whatever, then God love you. I'm not that far behind you. But you need to be able to tune in to what your kids and grandkids are posting. (And in a few places where you're lucky, your wife)

[kphoger]

I don't give a damn about comic book movies. Not my thing.

Oooh, good one!  Me too.

[Max Rockatansky]

I don't give a damn about comic book movies. Not my thing.

Oooh, good one!  Me too.

When I was a kid I was big into reading comics.  Half of my interest in modern comic movies is actually seeing if I can predict what story is being paid homage to.

[epzik8]

When I was in high school I didn't know or care about what music was on the radio at the time or what kinds of mobile technology were in, however things have shifted and I'm more on top of it now.

[Takumi]

Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. The trifecta of "popular franchise with quirky millennials"  and I haven't seen a bit of any of them. My fiancée plans to change that in the near future.

[kphoger]

When I was a kid I was big into reading comics.  Half of my interest in modern comic movies is actually seeing if I can predict what story is being paid homage to.

I was into reading comics.  But it was Calvin & Hobbes, The Far Side, and Garfield.

[triplemultiplex]

Actors and actresses.

Telling me who starred in a movie will not help me figure out what the title is.

It's fun watching Saturday Night Live for me now, because pretty much every episode, I'm hearing about the host and musical guest for the first time.  Not only that, I'm usually also hearing about the host's show/movie for the first time, and for a while there, I was also hearing about the streaming service/obscure cable channel it was on for the first time.
It's never like, "I'm sure you all know me from my hit three-letter-network sitcom..." anymore.

[abefroman329]

Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. The trifecta of "popular franchise with quirky millennials"  and I haven't seen a bit of any of them. My fiancée plans to change that in the near future.

I was asked to read the Harry Potter books by my then-girlfriend, and I suggest you start practicing pretending you enjoyed them now.

[formulanone]

I don't give a damn about comic book movies. Not my thing.

Oooh, good one!  Me too.

I skipped these in the theaters for years, but found they're great for killing time on 3-4 hour flights. My son got into the Marvel franchise out of curiosity, so we've been watching one a week for the last two months.

They're good dumb fun, but a few like Black Panther actually deal with tough questions; where right and wrong is ambiguous and not a bunch of absolute tropes, so you think about that after the movie's over...to me, those are some of the best types of movies.

[zachary_amaryllis]

I just made a phone call and I got a busy signal. I found myself wondering how many people age 30 or below would not know what that sound means.

Fairly common when calling a business.

But, for people under 18, who rarely ever call a business...

In the same vein - in the landline days, seems like most people set their answering machines to answer at ring #6. Most cells go to VM after what .. 4? so no one leaves messages.

We get: "The line is busy. For 95 cents, we'll keep trying, and call you back when we get through".

And what i realize, is that I'm just too damned old to be relevant to anything anymore.

[formulanone]

Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. The trifecta of "popular franchise with quirky millennials"  and I haven't seen a bit of any of them. My fiancée plans to change that in the near future.

I only know anything about Harry Potter thanks to my kids reading the the books and and then wanting to watch the movies. I don't really reference them much but after wearing progressive bifocal lenses for three weeks (and subsequently giving up on them), I felt like Professor Moody. If you asked me to comprehend and explain how things happened the way they did I'd probably give you a blank stare.

I read the Fire and Ice series of books (well, five of them) and caught up with the TV episodes later on. Since then I haven't had much interest in any other series because I just don't have the enthusiasm and interest in them. So if someone makes a reference to Breaking Bad or Walking Dead, et al I'll have to look it up.

My wife likes the Drive to Survive series more than I do...I kind of nodded off after season three because the amount of editing and hearing 95% of the drivers drop f-bombs is getting predictable. Other than listen to Gunther Steiner and some interesting viewpoints, I feel like I've taken on the aspect of correcting a lot of what gets said.

So I'll watch TV and movies with the kids, and that's usually enough entertainment.

Actors and actresses.

Telling me who starred in a movie will not help me figure out what the title is.

I've almost always been bad at this, with a few exceptions. If someone told me to pick out a famous actor or actress from a police line-up, there's a 90% chance they'd be set free.

And what i realize, is that I'm just too damned old to be relevant to anything anymore.

I think this was the best part about turning 40. Society places no impetus for you to know popular stuff after a certain point. For example, other then being closely involved in the recording industry, there's no reason to know anything about the lives of this minute's pop music happenings. And so forth...so you can just go your own way and feel free to fly one's freak flag.

[skluth]

Actors and actresses.

Telling me who starred in a movie will not help me figure out what the title is.

It's fun watching Saturday Night Live for me now, because pretty much every episode, I'm hearing about the host and musical guest for the first time.  Not only that, I'm usually also hearing about the host's show/movie for the first time, and for a while there, I was also hearing about the streaming service/obscure cable channel it was on for the first time.
It's never like, "I'm sure you all know me from my hit three-letter-network sitcom..." anymore.

This is exactly what I'm talking about when I said I have little knowledge of many events from 1975-85. That was the early golden years of SNL with the original cast and then the Eddy Murphy-Billy Crystal years. I got back just in time for the disastrous Season 11. I may have seen a half dozen SNL episodes of the early years and mostly know only the highlights like the Julia Child Bass-o-matic.

[Dirt Roads]

A post yesterday reminded me of this one:  Red Hat.  I was once a wizard at Unix, but never migrated over to Linux.  (I'm barely proficient at Microsoft Windows for that matter and have zero experience with Apple products.  Fortunately, I still remember most of the Windows hotkeys, so I can still fool the best of them). 

[Scott5114]

A post yesterday reminded me of this one:  Red Hat.  I was once a wizard at Unix, but never migrated over to Linux.  (I'm barely proficient at Microsoft Windows for that matter and have zero experience with Apple products.  Fortunately, I still remember most of the Windows hotkeys, so I can still fool the best of them). 

You should give it a try sometime when you're feeling bored. X11 actually works these days!

[Takumi]

Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. The trifecta of "popular franchise with quirky millennials"  and I haven't seen a bit of any of them. My fiancée plans to change that in the near future.

I was asked to read the Harry Potter books by my then-girlfriend, and I suggest you start practicing pretending you enjoyed them now.

From our conversations about it, I think just the movies will suffice.

[jlam]

Like many others, mine is social media, which is surprising for my age. I have accounts on Reddit and Facebook, but I don't use either much. There are also certain video games many of my friends play, but I don't get their appeal. Overwatch and Valorant are big ones. In the knowledge vein, there isn't much. I try to keep up with my knowledge of current trends, but I often don't enjoy them.

[abefroman329]

Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. The trifecta of "popular franchise with quirky millennials"  and I haven't seen a bit of any of them. My fiancée plans to change that in the near future.

I was asked to read the Harry Potter books by my then-girlfriend, and I suggest you start practicing pretending you enjoyed them now.

From our conversations about it, I think just the movies will suffice.

I never had to see the movies since she hates them.

[1995hoo]

I rather enjoyed the Harry Potter books despite being older than the target demographic. My mother was an English teacher and read them because she wanted to know about these books all her students were reading; she, in turn, told me she thought I'd enjoy them, so I read the first three on a trip to Europe in 2007 (which also explains why my set of them is an odd mix of American and European releases after I bought book two in Denmark and book three at Heathrow). When we passed through Heathrow on the way home, the final book had just been released. Seemingly 75% of the people in the British Airways business class lounge were reading it.

It was interesting how closely the movies adhered to the books, but I understand JK Rowling was particularly insistent on that because the books were aimed primarily at kids and they notice changes to the story.

[Henry]

As a diehard Cubs fan, I never cared about the White Sox; in fact, I didn't take notice of the South Siders until their World Series season of 2005.

[abefroman329]

As a diehard Cubs fan, I never cared about the White Sox; in fact, I didn't take notice of the South Siders until their World Series season of 2005.

That's OK; nearly all of the sports media forgot about the Sox eleven years later, with all of their "first World Series to be played in Chicago since 1945/first time the World Series trophy came to Chicago since 1908" crap.

[skluth]

Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, and The Walking Dead. The trifecta of "popular franchise with quirky millennials"  and I haven't seen a bit of any of them. My fiancée plans to change that in the near future.

I was asked to read the Harry Potter books by my then-girlfriend, and I suggest you start practicing pretending you enjoyed them now.

From our conversations about it, I think just the movies will suffice.

I never had to see the movies since she hates them.

Weird. I enjoyed both the books and the movies. Some book plot elements were omitted from the movies but they don't change the essential nature of the story much like Jackson's changes didn't change the feeling of Lord of the Rings (and Jackson changes far more than the various HP directors). You will miss a few things like Hermione's attempts to improve the lives of the house elves, the Rita Skeeter is yet another unregistered animagus, and Winky, the house-elf with a butterbeer drinking problem. But the movies are entertaining and features great performances from a who's who of British actors like Maggie Smith, Gary Oldman, Imelda Staunton, and especially the late Alan Rickman as Snape. The first two movies are really children's movies but every subsequent movie becomes more adult much like the main trio of Harry, Hermione, and Ron.