As fashion companies grapple with the Internet and the recession, things are changing, as they must in all fields over time. Where there is change and a burgeoning, very different generation, there will be some upset among the generation that came before. In a dense op-ed piece, WWD editor Bridget Foley enumerates these changes, and her frustrations that stem from them. She’s sick of labels feeling a need to meet the challenges presented by the Internet and deliver clothes and pictures immediately to their adoring fans. She doesn’t like that people online obsess over bland actresses who wear bland clothes. She also doesn’t sound like she appreciates the culture of fashion fan blogs such as those run by BryanBoy and Tavi.
The Web provides instant access to all: live-streamed collections; the minutia of magazine staff moves (“and the latest intern upgraded to the closet full-time is —–!”); endless photos of any starlet in a cocktail dress, no matter how mundane the girl, dress or event. And all this while the blogosphere and Twitter provide platforms for a culture of self-proclaimed critical experts, some apparently knowledgeable and definitely influential in that proverbial high school seizure-of-power way.
