Yesterday's Gone

I was browsing BlueSky yesterday.  A probably futile activity, I know.  My low-engagement presence there doesn't garner anything like my former reputation on Twitter did a decade ago, mainly because I don't do many "interactions".  If anything best describes BlueSky, it's the word "beige".  The butterfly logo should really be replaced with that of a bowl of tapioca pudding.

I'm not the only one to have noticed.  It seems that BlueSky isn't,  you know, as exciting for beer discourse as Twitter was.

Normally on BlueSky, such sentiments would engender rapid condemnation, if not outright cancellation.  But not this time.  Most said that yes, despite the wholesale migration of Beer Twitter to BlueSky about 18 months ago, there is a lot less discussion than there used to be.  Everyone is there, but they're not saying much these days.

If you can remember the beer scene of 10 years ago, everything seemed new and exciting.  New breweries and bars were popping up weekly, especially in the places where there were large concentrations of Young People.  Out were the staid old locals, dull beer and Wetherspoons habituees and in were cloudy IPAs, street food and "progressive" events.  But like all things that were popular, they eventually became unpopular as the trend-seekers either grew past it, or sought better remunerated activities elsewhere.  The world, apparently, can't be changed one pint at a time.

So, as the old scene declines, there is simply less to talk about.  Craft beer is rarely discussed in the mainstream media any more, unless some scandal or financial disaster happens.  The few remaining niche writers trundle about the remaining craft outlets picking up the last scraps of news and freebies (all YOURS on Patreon for £1 a month!).  And the world, as ever moves on.

Perhaps one day the pendulum will swing back, maybe in a decade when the next lot of 21-year-olds come along and need something new to define themselves against the previous generation.  But the present, the "beer social" scene has retreated back to niche it occupied 20 years ago.  It will never truly die completely, but it won't be as visible as it was in 2018.

Maybe like Doctor Who, it needs a bit of rest before a new group of people can make it relevant again.