You know when you find out about something, whether it’s an activity, a product, or a TV show, and you think you have it all to yourself? It’s always such a great feeling to think that you’ve discovered something so precious. But then? Everyone finds out about it and all of a sudden…it’s just way too popular. We all know the feeling.
A Reddit user recently asked the internet “What was a great thing ruined by popularity?” And, of course, the responses came flooding in.
Here are 65 things that have been completely ruined by popularity.
Remember when that restaurant down the street wasn’t featured on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives? It was so much better!
1) The highest mountain in the world
“Mount Everest. Especially since there’s only one or two days a season that people climb (when conditions are optimal). There are literally queues of people waiting to go up some sections and the overcrowding contributes to the number of deaths there each year. That’s before you even start to think about the rubbish/trash left up there,” said TannedCroissant.
Who knew so many people wanted to conquer this crazy thing?
“Any restaurant Anthony Bourdain featured in his shows. Even he acknowledged this. These fantastic gems would subsequently be overrun with diners that they suffered from overcrowding and lower standards,” said NealR2000.
Anthony Bourdain would be rolling in his grave if he saw the popularity of some of these restaurants now.
“Have you ever noticed there’s a threshold where a song gets too popular and will live on with the memory of everyone thinking it was overplayed and annoying,” said TransCrabby.
We all know that one song. Chumbawamba’s “Tubthumping” is a great example.
“Bothies. Basically they’re small cottages in remote parts of the Scottish highlands that are left unlocked, free to be used for shelter by people travelling the mountains. They’re not well furnished or anything, but they act as a freely usable weatherproof shelter for anyone to use in a country where summer usually just means the rain is slightly less frigid,” shared A6M_Zero.
“Beaches. Once tourism starts, it usually has devastating effects on the flora and fauna. They had to close a beach off from the public in Thailand to give nature time to recover,” said Ohmmy_G.
Nothing gold can ever stay. Why can’t we all treat our planet with respect?
“The tulip fields in the Netherlands. Despite signs telling people to stick to the path, whole groups of people are just laying between the flowers/ trampling them to get the “perfect” picture of themselves surrounded by a sea of tulips. It’s very frustrating to witness how some people just really do not care at all how they leave the place, as long as they were able to take advantage of the beauty themselves,” said cheersmyfriends.
Everyone always doing it for the Instagram. STOP already!
“Arches really seems to attract people doing stupid, dangerous stuff. The iconic Delicate Arch is like a magnet for morons who don’t prepare for the trail, take risky selfies, vandalize and climb on things, and drink in places where there’s 360 degrees of cliffs around you,” said ThadisJones.
What is with people wanting to ruin the beauty of nature?
“Remember back when your father knew a faster, alternative route around a major traffic jam that actually was faster? Since the handheld availability of realtime traffic data and route optimization by google maps, an equilibrium of travel time has established such that everyone knows whats the best route is and the traffic jam actually takes as long as the alternative route,” said realultralord.
Dads always knew the faster route. Now? No such thing.
“Ok I’m going to mix it up. Silphium, the plant used as a form of (likely very effective) birth control in the ancient Mediterranean.
For this reason (and because it was apparently delicious), it gained popularity as a spice, aphrodisiac, and general cure-all and became worth its weight in gold. Julius Caesar stockpiled the stuff, and it is one of the most plausible origins of the “heart” symbol (and the association of that symbol with romance and doing the sex to people).
Unfortunately, it only grew wild in and around Cyrene, and over-harvesting by the Romans after their takeover of the city drove Silphium into extinction by the time of Nero.
Aaand that’s why we had to wait 2,000 years for the pill,” shared badass_panda.
“The original facebook required an active college email and was a cool chill place, now its just a breeding ground for political horse crap and karens/anti vax moms,” said demonardvark.
Back in the day, you needed an email address that ended with .edu at the end to even have a Facebook account.
“To some extent, Amusement/Theme Parks. They have to be popular to justify building new, state of the art attractions, but eventually get so crowded that you need to buy special passes and get on a ride in less than 2 hours and can barely even find a place to sit when you want to rest for a minute,” said homebrew_ken_.
Hope you don’t have to go to the bathroom because you’ll be standing there for a while.
I absolutely fell in love with the country when I was there, but the popularity of it means, like any other trendy tourist destination, that it’s now ruined by tourists being jackasses. I grew up near a national park that is ALSO now ruined by overcrowding, so maybe I have a lower threshold for that sort of stuff than most, but watching idiots stomping all over fragile geothermal features two steps away from the “no walking on this area” sign just boils my blood,” said _MaddAddam.
“The “Joker Stairs” in the Bronx was a nice little piece of architecture in a quiet area of Highbridge. Now Instagram idiots are ruining it. There’s more trash there than ever before. I feel bad for the local residents who have to put up with it,” said Bobik8.
“Yik Yak. I loved Yik Yak in college. It was hilarious and had juicy anonymous gossip on it and it was a great place to just put down random thoughts. Then it started growing and people started using it for making blatantly racist comments anonymously. That led to more stuff that jerks would put on there like putting peoples’ full names in their stories and making bomb threats. A great example of a few people ruining it for everyone else,” shared evilpotato1121.
“Drones. They’re an amazing and useful tool for Surveyors, Photographers, Inspectors, Filmmakers, etc. But they’re so ubiquitous, Johnny Dumbass can go buy one at Best Buy, and crash it into a Bald Eagle nest, and make the rest of us who’ve gone through training and FAA licensing look bad,” said beatsnbanjos.
Just when you think you’re relaxing, a drone flies overhead and ruins everything.
“Any nice nature place to go hiking/swimming/barbecue/any cool outdoor activity. Some sweet nature spots have been ruined because of too much popularity: either there’s a landscape planning with paths, guards etc. to protect it, or the amount of people coming here wrecks the place. Or access becomes forbidden “for safety issues” (well… I KNOW a cliff is a dangerous area where I could fell, you don’t need to forbid access to it because of the unavoidable Karen who, eventually, won’t watch his kids and sue you for lack of safety),” said natooDidou.
“For me it’s a lot of movies and media and general. American media has always been shy about certain themes, but lately there is just so much controversy over every little thing. I just want movies that can depict things, take risks and have odd plots without a whole Twitter campaign attacking them over one small decision,” said whyImcalledqueen.
“I’m definitely going to get hate for this cause Fortnite bad, Minecraft good. However, I would imagine that if Fortnite didn’t quite blow up like it did; it would’ve been a vastly better game than it is now. Publicity literally ruins tons of things, man,” shared Allustar1.
“Basically every social media site. Also, meditation is not a corporate, productivity or relaxation tool, but a rocky path toward self-actualization. Same could be said about psychedelics,” said Resurgam1.
“Rick and Morty. The amount of entitled neck beards that think they’re better than everyone else solely because they enjoy that show is shocking,” said nonconformistnugget.
“Online dating. When you think about it, it’s a great way to meet people if your other social prospects are lacking (I love my friends, but there’s nobody to date there and I don’t have time for more friends).
But in practice, the sheer NUMBER of available singles has us turning our noses up at perfectly good people because someone “better” might come along,” said Ysara.
“Harry Potter. Yes, I was an original (like, before there were any movies or a fourth book) fan, and I was obsessed. Could recite anything from the books from memory obsessed. And no, I’m not mad that everybody started liking them.
I’m mad that the popularity made the author so goddamn rich that she wouldn’t quit, and keeps going back to wring the udder dry and give us constant updates that are ever more stupid, convoluted, and contradictory, and you have to watch prequels and play mobile games and visit theme parks to even get it all, and I can no longer care to even find out the new canon, let alone try to revel in it like I once did. Sometimes less is more,” said howsthatwork.
36) Real estate investments
“Flipping houses.
When/where I grew up people bought houses to live in.
They weren’t “investment properties”, you didn’t buy a place, paint it all, update the crown molding and try to sell it for $30K more.
I am sure some people did it, but it got crazy and fucked up the real estate market,” said ITworksGuys.
“Game of Thrones. I think (among the other host of problems towards the end) that they started to gear the show and writing to a more general audience. Plots started to get dumbed down, character nuance was reduced, and big ‘wow’ moments were given more emphasis in place of character development and coherent plot,” said JCkent42.
They were great when everyone was too intimidated to use them. I could buy 50 items and be out of the store before the granny that was ahead of me who went to the cashier even started ringing her shit up. Now stores have forced them on people by only having 1 actual cashier so everyone uses them, even people who have no business doing so,” posted RearEchelon.
“Dry sense of humor. Nowadays a lot of people try to be edgy and controversial or super socially awkward so humor is to way to express themselves,” said Jay_Sunshine.
“Any fandom can be ruined when it gain a lot of popularity really quickly. I used to like kpop but the fandom just turn into a lot of stan fangirling over any revealed body part or a boy drinking water, i just stopped following anything to avoid that,” shared Naiko372.
“That ‘secret place’ you have with your friends/couple that become way too popular and its no longer funny/intimate.
Yes, the ‘secret place’ can be literally anywhere, its just the feeling of having a quite place to be with your ppl and then it ruins bc of tourism and stuff. We can share local places, but not destroy its ‘magic’ just bc its economically worth it (or not),” shared Mortlaw.
“Swimming in the East River. It was good for exercising every muscle in the body and great for the back. Then a chiropractor told all of his patients. Too many people out there now,” said BushwoodCountry-Club.
You might still find bodies floating out there though.
“Star Wars. Not the media itself per-se, but the community is horrific. It’s always been popular, but I remember a more wholesome time pre-Disney but post-prequels where it was a bunch of nerds laughing about Extended Universe comics and whatnot. It’s not necessarily Disney’s fault that it devolved into a community of jerk YouTube ranters, but their purchase of the franchise sealed that,” shared 2-for-price-of-FUN.
“Video Games. Now that everyone plays them, seems like every game nowadays is some sort of “live service” and has some sort of online multiplayer. I work 12 hours a day, I don’t want to play a multiplayer game filled with toxic high schoolers and annoying 10 year old kids. I also don’t want to have to have an online connection just to play a singleplayer game because it has an in-game shop for cosmetics. I just want to open the game and play the game. I really love my Switch,” said IgniteThatShit.
“Records and LP’s. I got back into record collecting again in around 2009/2010. Back then multiple albums were being given away for free in my local area, nobody really cared. I must have got at least 50 or 60 albums for free or literally pennies back then from people who were just going to toss them out. Fairly decent stuff too, ELO, Supertramp, Bob Dylan, Dire Straights, Queen, Pink Floyd, Fleetwood Mac etc.
Contrast to that with now and people seem to think all their albums on vinyl are uber collectable and try and charge extortionate amounts for literally rubbish like Richard Clayderman or Herb Albert or similar.
This is all because the vinyl revival has become so popular with people buying cheap crappy Crosley cruisers and being happy to pay more for a single album than what their cheap turntable is worth. It’s madness lol,” posted macnerd93.
“Casa Loma in Toronto. So many signs everywhere saying ‘hey, don’t write on the walls or scratch words into the furniture.’ and yet, almost every tourist who goes through does,” said sommei.
“Yellow Stone. I was an animal nerd as a kid so when I finally got to visit I was severely disappointed by the fact that it was nothing but a tourist trap. Still some nice views tho,” shared xXKweerKweenXx.
“Being “woke.” Totally serious. I love when people educate themselves on various social/political/economic/whatever issues of the day. But because social-media popularity, people have gone on the offensive and try to find something injust about everything in the world and taken that mindset to a level that actually leads to closed-mindedness, prejudice, and discrimination,” shared principled_principal.
“4 wheel drive. Used to be simple tough vehicles, easy to maintain and repair. Floor shifters and manual locking hubs. Now they are luxurious electronic nightmares. Had 1 push button 4×4 rig. Never again,” posted CrownVic11.
“Minecraft used to be cringy because of all the rat kids who were playing it, in my country you used to be bullied just because you played that game, now is nostalgic and cool but just because we have become those bullies, like with fortnite kids and stuff,” said InsideNobodysMind.
“Living in a city that sees lots of tourists in the summer months, I’ve come to hate even going to other travel destinations elsewhere. People I know that are coming to town will always send me links of things to do that they found online. While I appreciate their effort, I’ve learned that any of the “TOP 20 THINGS YOU NEED TO DO IN THIS CITY” articles online are a good way to find the 20 things to avoid doing in town, as those places are always horribly overpopulated by idiots not knowing where to go and just taking photos to post online instead of enjoying the environment they’re in,” said ShipShipShipShipShip.
“For me it’s Beyblades. I used to have so much fun bringing them to school with my friends but once everyone got them it just went downhill. Two kids fought cuz they gambled their beyblades in a battle and one of them lost. Keep in mind this is third grade. My school eventually banned them because they were too much trouble to have to deal with I guess,” shared mattyaraps70.
“Personal opinion based off the other nature and cultural suggestions by other users: Machu Picchu.
This might sound a bit gate-keepy, but the first two times I went to visit the citadel the only way up for tourists was via the 26 mile Inca trail. This meant very few (relative to now) tourists went to visit, and by they time they arrived they had learned a necessary reverence for the area and it’s majesty. Something about living in the mountains for a week prior to arriving seemed to drastically change the way people saw the ruins. I then went to visit for a third time about ten years ago (hard to keep track of time) and there is now a bus you can take up the mountain via switchbacks. The ruins were completely filled with fellow tourists, many of whom were eager to break off pieces of stone and take them home. Security guards tried in vain to stop people from taking things from the site but they were simply overwhelmed,” onikukki posted.
“Cinema. The more popular it became the more money it generated, the more money something generates the more popularity it garners because people show up to get some of it for themselves. Cut to now where Hollywood is made up of elites handing roles in AAA films to people they know while thousands upon thousands of people hop off the bus every day under the illusion that hard work will get them somewhere when it just wont,” posted R50cent.
Originally Paul Rubens created the character to lampoon the awkwardness of youth, and his jokes were often risque and certainly not suited for children. He appeared on Late Night with David Letterman, at a time when no child should’ve been seeing his act. Apparently, some young kids managed to see him, and just thought he was funny, and he becomes a morning kids show. An example of changes made to his character to not seem unsuitable for children was his weird dance in weird shoes – he originally would dance in spike high heels. He also made jokes about shoving action figures up his a**. Those things magically vanished when he became ‘kids’ entertainment,” shared Euchre.
“Streaming services like Netflix. It was awesome when it was all on one decently priced network… now you have to have a bunch of them to get everything, and they are all much more expensive than they started out as,” shared Youpunyhumans.
You know when you find out about something, whether it’s an activity, a product, or a TV show, and you think you have it all to yourself? It’s always such a great feeling to think that you’ve discovered something so precious. But then? Everyone finds out about it and all of a sudden…it’s just way too popular. We all know the feeling.
A Reddit user recently asked the internet “What was a great thing ruined by popularity?” And, of course, the responses came flooding in.
Here are 65 things that have been completely ruined by popularity.
