Analogue bags, analogue planners and hot girl analogue. The phrase of 2026 is here.
It’s easy to see how we’ve got here; it’s been building for a while. The no-buy trend of 2025 saw creators highlighting the absurdity of influencer content and overconsumption. Celebrity and influencer brands have consistently come under scrutiny, while de-influencing videos have gained popularity. But the frustration with influencers and celebrity culture is nothing new. In 2024, many celebrities found themselves on a block list to stop them from financially profiting off the back of our views and engagement. You could even go further back and point to that video of celebrities singing to us in their nice houses during the lockdowns. There is a palpable exhaustion in the air; we’re fed up with being sold to.
The thing is, it’s hard to escape being sold to on the internet. Advertisements are absolutely everywhere. Sponsored search results on Google, sponsored content on TikTok and the dreaded Amazon storefront, eight adverts during a 20-minute YouTube video, plus a product sponsor (and despite this, many creators have still seen a significant drop in ad revenue since 2022). Everything requires an app or a subscription, or both. JaidenAnimations captures this experience hilariously, if you need a laugh.
Social media fills me with existential dread. Tell me, why do I log onto Facebook and not see a single post by any of my friends and family, but plenty from groups, pages, businesses and news outlets that I don’t follow? Why was I getting push notifications from right-wing US Politicians on Threads near daily, when I’ve only ever opened it once, don’t post or follow anyone, and I’m not even American?! It feels like everything is designed to divide and conquer, lure you to argue in the comments and drain your attention span. We truly are living in the Age of Enshittification, thank you to Cory Doctorow for that brilliant verbiage.
I’m one of many hundreds of thousands of people who just want to opt out of this insane environment. 185,000 people are part of the r/dumbphone community on Reddit, where people are deliberately getting rid of their smartphones for simplistic devices. This often means carrying more rather than less. The smartphone is like a multi-tool: it texts, calls, browses the internet, plays music, takes photos, has games, a clock and a notes app. It counts your steps and helps you navigate maps. But that doesn’t mean it does all of those things well. If you needed a screwdriver, you’d probably rather use an actual screwdriver than the tiny one on a pocket multitool. To decentralise your smartphone, you could start carrying around a notepad and pen, a crossword book, an MP3 player and wear a watch.
I’m old enough to remember wired headphones and portable CD players, and when the internet felt like a little treat at the end of a long day. Getting to go home and mess around on Neopets on the family computer for a few hours felt fun and exciting. Perhaps I’m chasing that nostalgia. I spent a week re-learning how to use HTML and CSS to make myself a Neocities site (it was very fun).
I think that’s the crux of it, really. We’re all tired and fed up, and we’d like a bit of peace from the insanity of the internet for a bit. Even the Pantone Colour of the Year is fitting the theme with 11-4201 Cloud Dancer, “a whisper of tranquillity and peace in a noisy world”.
If that means you need to pack yourself an analogue bag to force yourself off your phone, then go for it. Because I’ll tell you what, breaking a social media/smartphone addiction is not easy. I am struggling. I, for one, am glad that it has become a trend with catchy names, and I really hope it becomes even more mainstream because the tech giants need to realise that we see their deliberate enshittification of our internet and we’re not buying into it anymore.
+ crosswords !
dream edc