You'll go down in history

[Mike]

What people of the last 100 years will still be household names 200 years from now? Or 500? Or 1000?

Same questions for books written in the last hundred years. Or films. Or other media.

The majority of people in the U.S. today have a concept of who Cleopatra is. Caesar. Beethoven or Mozart. Shakespeare. We all know Romeo and Juliet. Most people have a concept of the Canterbury Tales. Grimm's Fairy Tales. What parts of our history/culture will survive the ages?

Will it be Superman or Batman or Spiderman? I've got money down on Einstein making the cut. And probably Lord of the Rings for a good long time. Maybe Star Wars. What sort of lifespan does Harry Potter have? Ten years ago, I would have bet on Marilyn Monroe, but I think 100 years from now she may be mostly forgotten. Martin Luther King and Hitler already have some staying power and every sign that we'll still be teaching them to kids for the next couple centuries. Nixon seems a safe bet, and probably Trump. What about Obama? Elvis and The Beatles seem like the best bet in music, but I don't know. Will anyone but classical scholars know who Prince is in the 23rd century?

Opinions?

[Mike]

By the way, of everyone I've listed so far, I think Hitler is the name most likely to be still widely known 1,000 years from now. Like Attila and Genghis Khan. It will be a while before he can become a casual and unoffensive-to-anyone joke/reference like the other two, but it'll happen.

[poorpete]

I could see people pour over the great Pixar films for centuries to come. There's a universal quality to them. Two characters on an adventure: pixarian. And they'll be easily ported to future entertainment technologies.

I hope Obama is more well known than Trump, but that all depends on who's the flash-in-the-pan and who was the sign of the future.

I'd like to think Beatles will be timeless, and 50 years at the top is a good sign, but I could see them fall into a class like Cole Porter where it's like "yes, the songs are nice, but we've moved on to something else now." Makes me think, maybe people will return over and over to punk music, because great can become good, but raw is raw.

If an asshole like Columbus is known 500 years later, safe to assume same for a nice guy like Neil Armstrong.

[Mike]

When it comes to Trump being remembered, I'm imagining it's in the sense of being a next-level Nixon. My personal preference would be to see him known as the first president to actually be removed from office for gross incompetence or because he's actually convicted of a crime.

Obama would be remembered as a good president who also happened to be the first non-white president.

[Kyle]

It's hard to say about Trump because he's not done with his history. Right now, his mediocrity won't merit remembrance.

I don't think Pixar (or maybe any films) will be remembered in 100 years because we'll be consuming media differently. So these movies will seem like antiquated black and white silent films or radio plays.

Gandhi? Maybe Gandhi. Einstein. Martin Luther King.

Maybe Obama? Probably Obama. I think history is going to be very kind to Obama.

[FlameBlade]

[mimekiller]

Yea Presidents can be tough to predict, James Buchanan is probably most singularly responsible for getting us into the Civil War and thus in my view the worst President of all time but who the hell remembers him when the best president of all time good old Honest Abe followed soon after.

OBAMA I think will be ironically less remembered the more black presidents we have, if he's the first and last for lets say the next 50 years he will be remembered more.

Same with 9/11. In my mind we will have even larger terrorist attacks in the next 100 years that will overshadow 9/11.

My MIMEKILLER LOCKS for what will be remembered in 100 years..

Starbucks coffee shops
HIGHWAY FATALITY rates will be looked at with astonishment, even more so than spree shooters or violent crime
Good Whiskey
BASEBALL
and
President Mimekiller

[poorpete]

[Kyle]

No one will remember any modern music in 100 or 1000 years. I understand what you’re saying, but your subjective opinions about the Beatles are tainting your view of their objective, universal appeal. Kids today (16 and younger) might know who the Beatles are but couldn’t name a single song. In 100 years all modern existing artists will only be as famous as Quicksilver Messenger Service- which is to say- not at all. None of these artists are close to Beethoven. They are great, but they are not legendary.

[mimekiller]

[WillyGilligan]

[El Jefe]

will always be remembered.

[Phoebe]

Classical music was popular music in its day at one point. Musical geniuses are running around today all over the place, whose works merit being remembered just like composers of past generations in the West (not even getting into music around the world yet).

We also live in a world where more people with the relevant talents have a hope of pursuing them. In some branches of my family tree, written literacy is a relatively recent gift, and that's true for so many people. Creative genius can take root in many places where it would have been crushed under in the past, or still in parts of today's world.

We have better ways of ensuring that those memories are passed on, at least as long as we can maintain the methods. Think about how some of the most revered and memorable ancient writings have been passed down to us! The development of different media or genres didn't mean that we failed to remember or care about different past genres that were preserved through different media, and I assume the same will be true in the future with respect to today. Already we have shifted away from seeing movies in a theatre, but we are still watching movies. Maybe in the same way they colorized old b&w movies, someday we'll wander 3D simulated VR scenes while watching Luke Skywalker or Cool Hand Luke.

Popularity that depends on fleeting trends - even a whole generation's trend - may vanish as soon as those special circumstances dissipate, but some things appeal across generations with different tastes and life circumstances, and across the whole globe, and those I expect to endure.

[poorpete]

[mimekiller]

The OBAMA legacy had me thinking about JFK, which at the time, him being CATHOLIC and dealing with rabid anti-papists that assumed he would take his marching orders from the pope(foreign influences, seem familiar?) but yea, now that's a non issue.