I want to talk about social media, the car scene, and my experience growing up with it. It was only two years ago that I joined the car community. Prior to that, all of my experience and knowledge about cars came through social media.
From what I have learned, before social media, the car scene was much more underground than it is today. Yes, there were always big events and car shows, but for the most part, local meetups were small, intimate groups organized through word of mouth or among close friends.
The same was true for car clubs back then. They were small, tight-knit communities, but mostly isolated from one another. Each group did its own thing.
From what I understand, the car community back then, while still just as passionate, existed mostly in local circles. It was not as large or connected as it is today.
When social media took off, it changed everything. It made the car scene more mainstream. It allowed bigger communities to form, far larger than what previously existed, and those groups were no longer as isolated.
Social media connected people. If you had the same passion, it suddenly became much easier to find others who shared it.
The Era I Grew Up In
That is the world I grew up in. When I started getting into cars somewhere in my preteens, there was already an abundance of content on social media for me to watch, learn from, and fall in love with.
From car reviews, builds, and events to everything in between, it was all there online, ready for me to see.
With my love for Camaros, I was able to find endless content from people reviewing them, testing their performance, taking them to the track, going to dragstrips, modifying them, and driving them. It was everything I could ever want.
I had all the access and inspiration I needed to build my passion from the very beginning. With each video I watched and each creator I discovered, my passion for cars continued to grow. My love for what the car community stood for deepened.
And I think for many people, especially those of my generation and younger, this is what helped us truly fall in love with cars.
A New Era of Opportunity
Social media changed everything. It removed many of the barriers to entering the car world and the community. Passionate people began posting endless content for anyone to enjoy.
Information about any car became easy to find and learn from. You could love any car, no matter how obscure, and still find a fanbase for it.
But with things going mainstream, it also changed the dynamics of the community. It stopped being mostly small, intimate groups and started becoming larger. More organized. More professional, if that is the right word for it.
Suddenly, it became a way for people to make money from their love and passion. Businesses started forming around it.
As the car community grew, so did the corporatization of it. But at the same time, the community was now able to do things it never could have done before. It could organize bigger, more professional meets, host large-scale shows, become accessible to people all around the world, and bring more diversity to the way people build, modify, and express themselves through their cars.
Anyone now had the ability to go online and express their passion. They could reach thousands or even millions of people. It became a real possibility for enthusiasts to turn their hobby into a career or a business.
The Rise of Clout Culture
With all this newfound potential, it also gave rise to one of the more negative sides of the car community today: clout culture.
Social media, now giving anyone the ability to become rich or famous, naturally drew a lot of people in. But many of those people would rather use the community than build upon it.
It created more toxic ways of getting attention, where people chase views instead of passion and do things not out of love for cars, but for recognition. It built communities around showing off, doing anything to get attention, and being driven purely by selfish interest instead of genuine passion.
And the worst part is that we all, as a community, suffer because of it.
The rise in things like takeovers and reckless behavior, all rooted in clout culture, has painted a bad name for the car scene.
Social media platforms do not care. All they care about is whether the content brings in views. And that means the worst parts of the car scene, the drama, the recklessness, and the noise, are what end up being shown to the public.
People who are not part of the community see that, and it gives everyone in the scene a bad name.
The Turning Point
People are getting sick of it. Real members of the community, people who are passionate about the hobby, look at these individuals and feel disgusted by how they act, by what they do, and by how their actions affect everyone else.
Many people want to go back to the early era of social media, when it was just small content creators who were passionate about the hobby. People who wanted to reach out and connect with others who shared that same passion.
They wanted to share their love for cars with the community and feel connected. It feels like social media has regressed in that way.
Those smaller passionate creators are now drowned out by those chasing fame and money, with no real love for the hobby or the community. And it is time we change that.
As a social platform, I want Carbon to be something that enables the community, those who are truly passionate about it, while filtering out those who try to use it for selfish gain.
I will not have my platform filled with content about takeovers, street chaos, or illegal activities that have stained the car community and the culture as a whole.
I want to empower the people who are genuinely passionate about cars. I want to share their love for the community. I want to help build and grow it with the same passion that I have.
I want Carbon to be a platform that truly connects everyone and builds a community bigger and stronger than it has ever been.
The Future of Car Culture
The car community has always been something special. No matter how much social media has changed it, that passion at its core has never gone away.
The love of the machines. The thrill of the drive. The conversations late at night in parking lots. The friendships that start with a simple compliment about someone’s build. That will always be what this community is about.
My hope for the future is that we can bring that energy back to the forefront. To build something that reminds people why they fell in love with cars in the first place.
Something that brings enthusiasts together again, no matter where they are.
That is what I want Carbon to stand for. Not just another app, but a home for the community. A place where passion is celebrated, creativity is encouraged, and connection is what matters most.
Because at the end of the day, this community deserves more than just a platform. It deserves a home built by those who truly care.
