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Even a casual follower of the news over the last few years is likely to have encountered stories about research showing that digital technologies like social media and smartphones are harming young people’s mental health. Rates of depression and suicide among young people have risen steadily since the mid-2000s, around the time that the first smartphones and social media platforms were being released. These technologies have become ubiquitous, and young people’s distress has continued to increase since then.

Many articles in the popular and academic press assert that digital technology is to blame. Some experts, including those recently featured in stories by major news outlets, state that excessive use of digital technology is clearly linked to psychological distress in young people. To deny this connection, according to a prominent proponent of the link, is akin to denying the link between human activity and climate change.

In an effort to protect young people from the harms of digital tech, some politicians have introduced legislation that would, among other things, automatically limit users’ time spent on a social media platform to 30 minutes a day. If the evidence is so definitive that digital technology is harming America’s youth in such substantial ways, then reducing young people’s use of these devices could be one of the most important public health interventions in American history.

There’s just one problem: The evidence for a link between time spent using technology and mental health is fatally flawed.

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Know thyself – easier said than done

Absent from the discussion about the putative harms of digital tech is the fact that practically all academic studies in this area have used highly flawed self-report measures. These measures typically ask people to give their best guesses about how often they used digital technologies over the past week or month or even year. The problem is that people are terrible at estimating their digital technology use, and there’s evidence that people who are psychologically distressed are even worse at it. This is understandable because it’s very hard to pay attention to and accurately recall something that you do frequently and habitually.

Researchers have recently begun to expose the discrepancy between self-reported and actual technology use, including for Facebook, smartphones and the internet. My colleagues and I carried out a systematic review and meta-analysis of discrepancies between actual and self-reported digital media use and found that self-reported use is rarely an accurate reflection of actual use.

This has enormous implications. Although measurement isn’t a sexy topic, it forms the foundation of scientific research. Simply put, to make conclusions – and subsequent recommendations – about something you’re studying, you must ensure you’re measuring the thing you’re intending to measure. If your measures are defective, then your data is untrustworthy. And if the measures are more inaccurate for certain people – like young people or those with depression – then the data is even more untrustworthy. This is the case for the majority of research into the effects of technology use over the past 15 years.

Imagine that everything known about the COVID-19 pandemic was based on people giving their best guesses about whether they have the virus, instead of highly reliable medical tests. Now imagine that people who actually have the virus are more likely to misdiagnose themselves. The consequences of relying on this unreliable measure would be far-reaching. The health effects of the virus, how it’s spreading, how to combat it – practically every bit of information gathered about the virus would be tainted. And the resources expended based on this flawed information would be largely wasted.

The uncomfortable truth is that shoddy measurement, as well as other methodological issues including inconsistent ways of conceiving of different types of digital tech use and research design that falls short of establishing a causal connection, is widespread. This means that the putative link between digital technology and psychological distress remains inconclusive.

Social media has a lot to answer for, but in terms of time spent on them, the mental health of young people might not belong on the list.
images.theconversation.com

In my own research as a doctoral student in social work, I found that the link between digital technology use and mental health was stronger when self-report measures were used than when objective measures were used. An example of an objective measure is Apple’s “Screen Time” application, which automatically tracks device use. And when I used these objective measures to track digital technology use among young adults over time, I found that increased use was not associated with increased depression, anxiety or suicidal thoughts. In fact, those who used their smartphones more frequently reported lower levels of depression and anxiety.

From believer to skeptic

That the link between digital tech use and psychological distress is inconclusive would have come as a big surprise to me five years ago. I was shocked by the levels of depression and thoughts of suicide among the students I treated when I worked as a mental health therapist at a college counseling center. I, like most people, accepted the conventional narrative that all these smartphones and social media were harming young people.

Wanting to investigate this further, I left clinical practice for a Ph.D. program so I could research why these technologies were harmful and what could be done to prevent these harms. As I dove into the scientific literature and conducted studies of my own, I came to realize that the link between digital technology and well-being was much more convoluted than the typical narrative portrayed by popular media. The scientific literature was a mess of contradiction: Some studies found harmful effects, others found beneficial effects and still others found no effects. The reasons for this inconsistency are many, but flawed measurement is at the top of the list.

This is unfortunate, not just because it represents a huge waste of time and resources, or because the narrative that these technologies are harmful to young people has been widely popularized and it’s hard to get the cat back in the bag, but also because it forces me to agree with Mark Zuckerberg.

Getting at the truth

Now, this doesn’t mean that any amount or kind of digital technology use is fine. It’s fairly clear that certain aspects, such as cyber-victimization and exposure to harmful online content, can be damaging to young people. But simply taking tech away from them may not fix the problem, and some researchers suggest it may actually do more harm than good.

Whether, how and for whom digital tech use is harmful is likely much more complicated than the picture often presented in popular media. However, the reality is likely to remain unclear until more reliable evidence comes in.

Craig J.R. Sewall is a Postdoctoral Scholar of Child and Adolescent Mental Health at the University of Pittsburgh.

This article first appeared on The Conversation. You can read it here.

Dexter had some good seasons, but only one unquestionably great season. That would be season four, where Dexter Morgan, played by Michael C. Hall, learns how to have a healthy work (forensic technician for the Miami Metro Police Department) / life (murdering people) balance from Arthur Miller, better known as the Trinity Killer. John Lithgow won an Emmy for playing the canny serial killer, and although — spoiler alert — he died in the season finale (although not before murdering Dexter’s wife, Rita), the actor will somehow reprise his role in the upcoming Showtime revival.

Deadline reports that Lithgow “is set to make a short but decisive appearance in the Michael C. Hall-led revival coming from Showtime this fall… Which begs the question: How will Lithgow’s Arthur Mitchell will return? Details are scant, but scribes on the Clyde Phillips-showrun 10-episode limited series have concocted a pathway for the Trinity Killer to come back that works within the larger Dexter narrative.” Lithgow’s cameo is only expected to take a day of filming, so he can quickly go back to screaming about gremlins, or whatever he does in his free time.

It’s unclear who else will return from the original run, outside of Hall and Lithgow. Julie Benz (Rita) won’t be back, but Jennifer Carpenter (Debra) was reportedly spotted on set. There’s also been speculation that lil’ Harrison, the “cereal spiller” himself, will show up. We’ll find out later this year when the Dexter limited series debuts on Showtime.

(Via Deadline)

The easiest way to discuss the Fast & Furious franchise, to the extent an easy way exists, is to break the nine films into three separate but connected trilogies.

FILMS I-III: Let’s race some cars and take down local bad guys

Stealing DVD players and doing battle with Southern California crime families. Jetting off to Miami and stumbling into an undercover operation run by Eva Mendes. Introducing all-new cast members and sending them to Tokyo to drift with Bow Wow and a mysterious figure named Han who dies before the end of the movie. It feels a little crazy to say even though it makes sense in context, but these movies are damn-near straightforward and simple. Most of the action is tethered to reality. A reasonable argument can be made that the wildest thing that happens in any of them is Tyrese wearing cut-off button-up dress shirts throughout an entire feature film. But the returns start to diminish quickly this way. Things can get watered down and repetitive. Changes need to be made. And so…

FILMS IV-VI: Let’s do some heists and cheat death a little

Han is back despite dying in the third movie. The entire timeline has folded itself into a bright orange origami Honda. There are fuel heists in the Dominican Republic and vault heists in Rio and The Rock and Gal Gadot are here now, at least temporarily. Michelle Rodriguez dies in a car explosion in the fourth movie and then turns up alive with amnesia in the sixth movie, which ends with Vin Diesel driving a car through the nose of an exploding airplane after Gal Gadot falls to her death on the runway. A mid-credits scene reveals that Han’s death in the third movie was actually revenge for the events of the sixth movie and was caused by Jason Statham, who is also in these movies now as a villain. It becomes clear that the secret to success is the size. Things must press forward and grow at all times, regardless of reason or the laws of gravity. This is the way. And so…

FILM VII-IX: Let’s… screw it, let’s just do everything

Cars are flying through the air, both between Abu Dhabi skyscrapers and out of cargo planes, sometimes with parachutes. The Rock and Jason Statham are good guys now, kind of, but are also spun-off into their own franchise due to plot congestion and/or on-set beef. There’s a submarine. Academy Award winners Helen Mirren and Charlize Theron are in the franchise now, both as crime bosses. There is barely any street racing anymore, with brief exceptions made when someone needs to gain entrance to some new underground culture that will assist in the theft of a device that will thwart evildoers and/or save the world. Kurt Russell is introduced as a mysterious government official named, I swear to God, Mr. Nobody. Ludacris, who started the franchise as a Miami mechanic and jet ski race officiant, is now one of the world’s premier computer hackers and physicists. It’s a whole thing.

And this paragraph barely even touches on the events of F9, the latest and largest of these increasingly massive movies. Let’s switch from paragraph to a list to hit the highlights here:

— Han is alive as a result of some Mr. Nobody-related shenanigans, making him the second major character to “die” in a car explosion only to turn up alive a few movies later

— Ludacris and Tyrese go to space in a rocket-powered Pontiac built in part by Bow Wow

— Helen Mirren shows up for about five minutes to pull off a diamond heist in London, evade police in a neon sports car, and drop off Vin Diesel at a massive mansion party attended exclusively by whiskey-sipping international criminals and supermodels in tiny white dresses who dance on or near expensive cars

— Everyone is shockingly proficient at the use of high-powered magnets in high-speed chases through many cities they are visiting for the first time

— Vin Diesel’s character has a younger brother played by John Cena who is a bigtime spy who went rogue and started working with a weasel financier with daddy issues

— Multiple characters watch a parent (or parents, plural) blow up in a car explosion during one of the literal half-dozen flashbacks that take place

— Vin Diesel, as he is nearly drowning, has a vision that reveals his father’s death was not actually the sole fault of his brother

— Charlize Theron spends about 80 percent of the movie imprisoned inside a toilet-less clear box while sporting a stylish bowl cut and red leather pants, which, while certainly not the biggest logical leap the movie asks us to make, can’t be comfortable

It’s all, to understate things to a ridiculous degree, a lot. It is so much, honestly, all the time, in so many different and occasionally hilarious ways. It would be really fun to take someone who has never seen these movies and then show them only the first and the ninth and have them try to guess how any of the things happened that got us all from one place to another. Secret siblings, faked deaths, amnesia, associates getting murdered and their murderers getting invited to the barbecue anyway. It’s all kind of like what I think would happen if some sort of accounting error funneled $500 million into the budget of a daytime soap opera. Which I would also support. Let Susan Lucci fly a stealth bomber. See what I care.

And, to be extremely clear about all of this, I think it’s great. It’s delightful. Right around the time the franchise kicked off the third trilogy, everyone involved seemed to realize that its many plot holes and questionable developments were more like features instead of bugs. They presented opportunities. They gave everyone involved a chance to go back and make everything bigger and wilder and more ridiculous. Han’s death went from a Tokyo street racing casualty to an elaborate revenge plot carried out by a dirty spy to a ruse concocted by a secretive government official with an unlimited budget. The legend of Dominic Toretto beating a guy with a wrench now involves both his father’s death while throwing a race and his younger brother’s abandonment issues that led to that younger brother also going to work for the secretive government official. Tyrese is now the voice of reason who expresses disbelief at it all on behalf of the audience. It’s the equivalent of digging yourself into a hole with a shovel and trying to blast yourself out of it by strapping dynamite to your back, and, yes, I’m a little shocked no character in these movies has attempted this. Yet.

All of which makes for a wonderful way to spend two or three hours in a theater on a hot Saturday in June. These are not movies you are meant to think about much, at least not beyond the extent we are doing here, just admiring the open audacity of them as a whole. I don’t even think most of them are meant to be rewatched on cable or a streaming service more than once or twice, with the possible exception of Fast Five, the midpoint of the franchise where it found the sweet spot and delivered a legitimately classic action movie. This isn’t a Mission: Impossible situation, or even a John Wick one, where the movies have artistic merit and performances and a somewhat linear story that at least tries to adhere to its own mythology. This whole thing is like an order of cheese fries: a delicious treat when fresh that contains zero nutritional value whatsoever and becomes a soggy gross mess when reheated in a microwave at a later point in time.

Which, again, is fine. It’s a blast. (Cheese fries are great!) Because while you could, I suppose, exit the theater and harumph your way through a “so you’re telling me that Paul Walker’s character, Brian O’Conner, an actual trained law enforcement officer, who is still alive in the franchise’s universe, would just stay home with the kid while his wife and best friends risk their lives to battle cyberterrorists who want to destabilize the entire world as we know it” rant if you want and just get all dismissive and disdainful about it all, if I really can’t talk you out of it. But it’s a lot more fun to picture him at that barbecue at the end, Corona in one hand and a child in the other, big bemused smile on his face, as Ludacris and Tyrese explain to him that they just got back from outer space. That’s the vibe you should be looking for here. Just have a seat and enjoy the cheese fries, people. You can start eating healthy again tomorrow.

The story on Cyberpunk 2077 is well told by this point. It was a highly anticipated game that was teased as early as 2012, but a chaotic development process led to a game that was nowhere close to ready at launch. After multiple delays, and a worldwide pandemic, the game was allowed to launch in a state that was very clearly not ready to be played. The glitches were legendary with most of them ranging from funny to extremely frustrating.

However, one ridiculous glitch in a playthrough is a memory forever. Multiple game-breaking bugs throughout the experience are a problem and created massive player frustration. That frustration eventually led to players demanding refunds. When CD Projekt obliged, the game was pulled from PlayStation stores indefinitely. So yeah to say the game was an absolute disaster at launch would be an understatement. It was a colossal failure.

It’s been six months since then and multiple patches have been pushed through. The game is back in the PlayStation store, which has a lot of people asking a simple question. Is the game actually playable now? If you trust the word of CD Projekt CEO Adam Kiciński, then yes. During a WSE Innovation Day conference, Kiciński stated that the game is playable and at a “satisfying level” for players.

Via VideoGamesChronicle:

“We have reached a satisfying level in this regard,” the CEO said regarding the current stability and performance of the game.

“We have also been working on improving the overall quality, which we are also quite happy about. Of course, we also removed bugs and visual glitches and we will continue to do that,” he said. “Over time, we will also be introducing improvements to the general game systems that players have highlighted.”

With the game finally back on the PlayStation Store, and Microsoft recently announcing that no questions asked refunds will be ending soon, it definitely seems like Sony and Microsoft agree that the game is at a satisfactory level. Of course, what does satisfactory in this context mean? It means that the game is actually playable and probably won’t crash a PlayStation 4 or Xbox One. This doesn’t mean that the games are bug-free. What this also means is that, had the developer of the game had time to fix Cyberpunk instead of letting it launch the way it did, the current state of the game is probably what it would have looked like at launch. Use your best judgment when deciding if you want to get back on the Cyberpunk 2077 train.

For the past year, rumors about certain fan-favorite gaming icons getting their very own television series have been circulating, and a (since removed) Buzzfeed report has added some serious fuel to the fire. According to the report, both Spyro the Dragon and Crash Bandicoot series are currently in the works over at Apple TV+. Both shows are scheduled to hit the streaming service by 2022, with the upcoming Crash Bandicoot series coming as early as this September.

Based on the report, the Crash Bandicoot series — apparently titled The Adventures of Crash Bandicoot — has already been greenlit for two seasons. Each episode of the show will be divided into three segments, similarly to other children’s sketch comedy cartoons such as the recently revived Animaniacs. Peter Hannan and Monique Beatty, known for their work on Nickelodeon shows CatDog and Invader Zim respectively, will serve as the show’s producers. The Adventures of Crash Bandicoot is said to be coming to Apple+ TV this September.

The upcoming Spyro series, Spyro the Dragon’s Guide to Treasure Hunting, is seemingly quite a bit further out and does not yet have any names attached. However, the Buzzfeed report claims that whereas The Adventure of Crash Bandicoot will follow a more traditional cartoon format, Spyro the Dragon’s Guide to Treasure Hunting will be a 30-minute animated series that is “serial in nature.”

This news follows the recent and very successful revival of both of these game series. However, while both these series’ original trilogies were remade for modern consoles, only Crash Bandicoot has a new game — 2020’s Crash Bandicoot 4: It’s About Time. Only time will tell when a new Spyro entry, and these upcoming shows, will make their way onto our television screens. As of right now, Apple has neither confirmed or denied Buzzfeed’s report.

Being a woman in music seems exhausting. Billie Eilish regularly pointed out fans and media’s fascination — borderline obsession, really — with her body, from covering herself in baggy outfits to avoid creepy comments to shutting down the perception of her revealing Vogue cover constitution “growth.” Lizzo constantly battles derogatory comments about her weight and shape despite the extreme level of fitness it takes to play flute, dance, rap, and sing at the same damn time.

The latest target of users trolling on social media is Coi Leray, the breakout artist who spent the last two years building a buzz before landing a huge hit with “No More Parties” earlier this year and becoming a 2021 XXL Freshman. Commenters have compared her to a boy in the past, and today, her name is trending on Twitter in light of her appearance at the BET Awards, where she wore a pair of baggy pants with a bikini top, a look that has become something of a trademark for the artist, who seemingly loves to embrace her shape and show off a lot of skin (her twerking videos get nearly as much attention as her music).

The negative attention prompted her to wonder at the fascination with her shape, tweeting, “Is there a certain way I’m supposed to look? Help me understand.” She then questioned, “In the Bible is it a Sin to be thin?”

She also pointed out the hypocrisy inherent in these comments, subtly imploring empathy for women from those commenters, saying, “I hope all yall mothers got beach bodies.”

A quick look at the Coi Leray trend on Twitter sees plenty of users echoing her sentiment, decrying the abusive commentary surrounding her and other women’s bodies in the music industry.

So long as social media gives a platform to every Tom, Dick, and Harry to share their worst opinions (and continues to reward them with engagement), it seems unlikely that there will ever be much change on that front. However, Coi’s post, and the current conversation, highlight the problem, and spreading awareness is the first step to resolving it.

One of the more impressive feats in gaming is World of Warcraft. The MMO that has been running since 2004 is still extremely popular and is receiving updates to this very day. However, while WoW might be the most famous long-running game, there are others that have been running just as long if not longer. Some games were once extremely popular, but have now simply cater to a hardcore crowd that still love it. Others were cult hits that never reached peak popularity but have always been held up by a fanbase that kept it going the entire time. These are the games that many developers today are striving to make and replicate, but with maybe a little more notoriety. Here, we’ll highlight five classic games that are still going strong all these years later.

Ultima Online

Arguably the game that started the entire MMO genre. Ultima Online launched in 1997 to incredible success thanks to an extensive player vs. player mode and a lot of roleplaying. This was one of those games where the major fun of it was going off and making your own fun. Very Dungeons and Dragons-esque. It has now evolved into a bit more of a modern MMO experience, but many of the old design choices can still be seen in today’s MMOs. It also is still being updated! It received an expansion in 2020 and has a subreddit of about 6.8K followers. It may be old, but Ultima Online is still beloved to this day and is one of the most impactful games ever.

Everquest

If Ultima Online was the original MMO then EverQuest was the remix that perfected the genre. The first 3D MMO, EverQuest was also inspired by the Dungeons and Dragons style of giving players freedom of choice. It had huge commercial success and laid the foundation for a lot of what later successful MMOs would use. The fantasy setting, alongside multiple playable classes, and subsequent expansions were incredibly popular. The sequel, EverQuest II, was moderately successful as well but stood no chance against what World of Warcraft was going to become. As a result, many people fell back to their old favorite in the original. It reportedly had 82,000 active players and 66,000 subscribers in 2020. Not bad for a game that came out 1999.

EVE Online

Released in 2003, one year before World of Warcraft, EVE Online has never had quite the level of popularity we’ve seen as some other games at their peak. However, with a reported player count somewhere in the 300K range it’s pretty clear that people are still showing interest in this longtime space-faring MMO. Despite being one of the more challenging MMO’s out there, players and developers have built plenty of safeguards to keep new players from feeling like they can’t join. This has actually helped increase interest in the game and given them some of their highest player count numbers in years. EVE Online is a game that’s hard to learn, but those who do can’t speak enough to how fun it is to play.

Runescape

Remember Runescape? While World of Warcraft and Guild Wars dominated MMO’s in the early to mid-2000s, Runescape was everyone’s favorite free-to-play option. Runescape itself isn’t the most in-depth game. Go do simple tasks and make your numbers get bigger. Complete some quests. The player vs. player combat is extremely simple, but there’s something relaxing to all of it and there was some extra content for anyone that would pay for the members’ subscription. Of course, as games became more complex Runescape tried to follow along, but many of the original players had already left by that point. Eventually, developers, Jagex did something interesting. They split the game. Anyone that wanted to play the new modern Runescape could do that and anyone that wanted to play the game they grew up with could play Old School Runescape. Both are fully supported, but bigger updates to Old School Runescape can only be made when fans approve of it. While Runescape is nowhere near its peak popularity there is still a hardcore player base keeping it going all these years later.

Phantasy Star Online 2

This one is kind of cheating, because Phantasy Star Online 2 technically released in the United States back in 2020, but the original game released in Japan back in 2012. Fans of the first Phantasy Star spent years waiting for an official release to the United States, or Europe, before giving up and going through alternate means to play the game. The dedication the community had to Phantasy Star was finally rewarded with a western release and a major update in June of 2021 called Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis.

Team Fortress 2

The original popular team based shooter, Team Fortress 2 was the king of that genre before Overwatch. Quirky and weird characters with stronger teams winning more often than not. It was basically the formula that Overwatch copied. First released in 2007, it has seen a decent amount of support from Valve but only on PC. The console releases have seen no support. That said, everyone who plays TF2 is playing it on PC anyway and despite Overwatch existing that hasn’t killed the game. In fact, it’s arguably more popular than it’s even been before with a recent broken record. With over 150,000 concurrent players that’s an all-time record for the almost fifteen year old game.

The Euro 2020 (in 2021) tournament has featured some sensational goals and also some incredibly dumbfounding moments. Entering Monday, the leader in the clubhouse for most self-destructive moment belonged to Mats Hummels of Germany who headed one into the top corner of his own goal in the opener against France.

However, Spain’s Unai Simon decided to give Hummels a reprieve on Monday when he created an even worse own goal when he completely bottled a pass back, whiffing on the ball as it screamed past him and into his own net to give Croatia a 1-0 lead despite not having a shot on goal to that point.

It is absolute pain for Unai Simon, who can’t do anything about it once the ball gets by him. It was certainly a forceful pass back, but not one that should get by a world class goalkeeper in a major international competition. The expected goals chart after that own goal was especially hilarious.

The good news for Spain is that they would eventually get an equalizer on the other end before halftime to draw even at 1-1, but that they weren’t leading and in full control of the game at the break was nothing short of ridiculous given Croatia ended the first 45 minutes with two shots and none on goal.

Spain will likely still manage to find their way to victory as they are dominating the first half, but in soccer, one goal can be the difference and just gifting the opposition one is never the best path to the next round.

Freaks and Geeks, one of the greatest TV shows of all-time, was famously canceled after one season. The injustice gets worse: the season aired out of the order, and NBC didn’t even bother to show three of the 18 episodes; they debuted months later on Fox Family. It’s no wonder that Freaks and Geeks didn’t become the hit it should have been with a cast of future-comedy stars, including Linda Cardellini, Seth Rogen, Jason Segel, James Franco, Lizzy Caplan, Busy Philipps, and Martin Starr. But there was still an offer for a second season… that co-creators Paul Feig and Judd Apatow turned down.

“When the show was canceled, there was an offer from MTV to continue making the show at a much lower budget,” the Knocked Up director told Collider. “And we all decided we didn’t want to do a weaker version of the show.” Feig added, “It was a weird time for me because my mom died two days before we got canceled. So I was a little out of sorts, but I remember hearing that [MTV offer]. We probably just had to lose so much stuff and music and budgets. We were already always strained on our budget as it was.”

Freaks and Geeks without a period-accurate (and therefore, expensive) soundtrack is not Freaks and Geeks. That’s like watching Beavis and Butt-Head without the music video commentary. So good on Feig and Apatow for declining the offer — even if I’m bummed we never got see Lindsay work “in Greenwich Village as a performance artist.”

(Via Collider)

Last week, DaBaby and Ludacris trended for the better part of a day when comedian Lil Duval compared the two, calling DaBaby “this generation’s Ludacris.” While fans on social media debated whether the two artists really were analogues of each other or not, DaBaby prepared for his overstuffed BET Awards performance and Ludacris went to space in the latest Fast & Furious film. Fortunately, Billboard was able to get ahold of DaBaby on the BET Awards red carpet and ask him about it, giving him an opportunity to set the record straight.

Although DaBaby didn’t outright reject the premise, he was careful to point out how limited — and limiting — it is. “I feel like that’s too commonly used,” he said. “I think people use that too lightly. I was inspired by Ludacris’ creativity with his music videos. [I was inspired] by a lot of people. Not only people like Ludacris but people like Nelly. I mean, everybody. I feel like as the generations unfolded, people from every era was inspired by somebody from the era before them. Even when it boils down to 50 Cent, Eminem, and Mystikal, everybody’s videos used to be crazy. Busta Rhymes’ videos used to be crazy [too]. So I definitely was inspired by Ludacris, Busta Rhymes, and several other artists with their music videos.”

DaBaby, who first broke out with the comedic video for his song “Walker Texas Ranger,” might be onto something there. If nothing else, he’s far from the first younger artist to take inspiration from his forebears; Uproxx even has a whole show about it. From Busta to Eminem to Missy, modern artists have been looking to many of the icons of days past to inspire their own standout visuals because if you’re going to take from anyone, you’ve got to take from the best.

Read DaBaby’s full interview with Billboard here and watch his BET Awards performance of “Ball If I Want To” here.