

The Tie is Back - pg
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/11/fashion/11CODES.html?ei=5070&em=&en=0866acc43f0e321e&ex=1192334400&pagewanted=all

======
vegashacker
Context: <http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html>

------
electric
I agree that the tie is back. I wear a tie to my lab everyday. Sometimes it
gets in the way as I fiddle with the calibration knobs on my oscilloscope, but
people take my research findings a lot more seriously these days as a result
of it.

~~~
chaostheory
is this the tie that you're wearing:

<http://www.thinkgeek.com/apparel/hats-ties/9352/>

~~~
electric
That's a little too binary for my liking. I wear the analog variety.

------
auferstehung
Ties are an abomination. They are the apex of everything that is wrong with
western civilization; the culmination of fluff utterly drained of whatever
utility they once may have had. Ties are the peacock feather of man. OSHA
should ban them as an occupational hazard. An MSDS should be required to be
provided with each tie sale.

It is a little known fact that the B-Ark contained all the neckties from
Golgafrincham in additiion to the hairdressers, telephone sanitizers and
others. The Golgafrincham neckties were initially considered as the form of
legal tender on prehistoric Earth, however, it was discovered that it was too
difficult to tie a proper Full Windsor with a leaf.

"People with ropes around their necks don't always hang."

------
eposts
Last time the "Tie was back":
[http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE5DB163AF...](http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE5DB163AF933A25751C1A9649C8B63)

------
gibsonf1
This almost looks like it's not a PR piece for Men's Warehouse.

~~~
pg
This time the client is the necktie trade association. Just follow the quotes:
user, expert, expert, client.

~~~
daniel-cussen
How do I go about following the quotes?

~~~
pg
_With trend stories, PR firms usually line up one or more "experts" to talk
about the industry generally. In this case we get three: the NPD Group, the
creative director of GQ, and a research director at Smith Barney. When you get
to the end of the experts, look for the client. And bingo, there it is: The
Men's Wearhouse._

<http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html>

------
ivankirigin
Here is how to wear a tie: don't button your top button of your shirt, and
don't tighten the tie to your neck.

Many tie wearers cut off circulation to their heads to a certain degree. Bad
idea.

Also, ties can be designed really well. I have a few that are made from older
ties with nice high-contrast silk-screened patterns.

Given how good they can look as an accessory, and how impressed many people
are with them, they should be worn more often.

------
reidman
Lucky for us, Out just became the new Back!

------
ereldon
i don't think this article is about PR gaming reporters, even though PR sadly
does set the agenda with reporters sometimes.

my read of the article is that some hipster NYT reporter's narrow hipster-
centric view of the world made it through the NYT editorial filter. why?
because the reporter was no doubt influenced by their hipster friends in ny/la
who were wearing this crap.

beyond the reporter, the NYT prides itself in its NY bias, whether its fashion
or politics or whatever else. they love this local fashion hype, because its
local and strengthens the paper's own image as a part of the local scene.
that's most likely why some aging NYT editor let this BS through.

all that said, i'm pretty sure we can all agree that the dudes in those NYT
pictures looked really, really annoying. punchable, even.

~~~
jamesbritt
Anything that helps makes hipsters identifiable at a distance is a Good Thing.

My favorite quote:

"ThereaEURXs no question that there has been a dramatic increase among younger
guys, who are age 18 to 34, expressing themselves by dressing up", as said by
Some Important Fashion Person.

I'm pretty sure I read or hear that exact line every 3 years.

BTW, is 33 still in the ballpark range for the "younger guys" category?

------
Alex3917
To quote Wikipedia:

"The use of coloured and patterned neckties indicating the wearer's membership
in a club, military regiment, school, et cetera, dates only from late-
nineteenth century England. The first definite occurrence was in 1880, when
Exeter College, Oxford rowers took the College-colour ribbons from their straw
boaters and wore them as neckties (knotted four-in-hand), and then went on to
order a proper set of ties in the same colours, thus creating the first
example of a college necktie."

Ties are only out until you aren't allowed to wear one.

~~~
nailer
19th Century England? That's terrible.

Cravattes are much older than that. Croatian mercenaries used by Louis (I
think XV) used to wear red garments around their necks. The mercenaries had a
reputation as being fantastic soldiers, and French men copied the military
trend with what they called a 'Cravatte' derived from 'Croat'.

(My girlfriend's in the fashion industry - she works at an Australian lingerie
label now but used to work at Aqua Scutum)

------
naivehs
I love zipper ties.

<http://www.absoluteties.com/whisziticlhe.html>

------
nailer
So many workplaces have relaxed dress for men, the best position to be in is
where you don't have to wear a tie to work is to wear one.

You stand out, will be socially tested by your peers for doing so, and will
hopefully withstand these tests, and gain social value.

Your ideas will also be noticed more, simply because _you_ are noticed more.

~~~
ereldon
have you actually worn a tie to work to be different? did it work for you?

~~~
nailer
Yes. Silly people think you're non technical, but they get over it pretty
quickly (I spent four years of my life walking into rooms of people twice my
age to tell them about Linux, I'm used to having to prove my merit).
Managerial folks think you're somehow different to your colleagues, and if
you're congruent with it - ie, you let your ideas be known when most of your
colleagues would rather have a quiet grumble, and say no when you mean it,
they'll respect you more often. I've had a continual stream of project
managers recommending me for architecture jobs to my superiors, asking for me
for other projects, and a whole bunch of beer couriered to me as a work
expense.

It's not how you dress that makes you, but how you are. Dressing well,
however, is a good way to show people that - provided you back it up with
something real.

------
yyy
I love The Submarine, it's my favorite pg essay

------
khoerling
Skinny ties are becoming en vogue.

------
edw519
What? Startup hackers following the herds and their fashion fads? Next thing
you know, they'll expect all of us to go out and get jobs too, just like
everyone else.

Moo.

~~~
eposts
Are you being sarcastic? You need to read PGs essay "The Submarine" to put
this in context.

~~~
edw519
Are you being sarcastic about my being sarcastic?

~~~
alaskamiller
it wasn't all that funny nor sardonic

------
daniel-cussen
I just saw a guy in my dorm print this article out and post it outside his
room. We live in SV.

------
ardit33
ok, people, we have to admit, the average startup guys are bunch of fugly
mofos.

We totally lack fashion sense, beauty (gym is just a disctraction), etc...
etc...

Unfortunately, we are cursed of working and being in a very male oriented
industry, in which the very few females we get to interact, are not good
looking at all.

oh, well.....

~~~
DaniFong
In the wrong light, that comment could be seen as quite insulting.

~~~
ardit33
There is nothing insulting. I am saying the truth. Reality is not always
pretty. Go to any techie party, and you will see what I am talking about. Too
bad that people just neg. for the fun of it.

~~~
DaniFong
Let's see. You somehow generalized your personal experience to the entire
population of technically able people. This, in addition to being incorrect,
is strangely presumptuous. Who can speak for the demographics of an entire
industry?

Secondly, you're calling those disagreeing with you untruthful. You're
challenging not merely the validity of their view, but their experience. "Face
it", you say.

Finally, you call all the girls in the industry 'not very good looking at
all'. That includes me, and many of my friends, whom you've never seen. It
also includes Jessica Livingston, who, if you deign to recall, is the only
person working on YCombinator fulltime.

So, yeah. It's insulting. And worse, untrue. So wise up.

~~~
ardit33
Riiight Dani.

I am not generalising, I am averaging up. There is an implicity on knowing
that for every group, there are people that are outside that average, but they
are usually the exception, and not the norm.

As in every pool, there are people that wre good looking, and there are less
good looking, but the AVERAGE tech person (girl or guy) is not that good
looking. Add: lack of going to gym regulary, not dressing good at all (usually
we look like just rolled out of bed), we are a fugly bunch. (every tech party
I have been too, this has been the norm). I am including myself there. Even I
can try to dress better, go to the gym, and look good, I seldom do, as that
takes effort and my priorities are somewhere else.

You want good looking? Go work for Gap in SF, or any of the
advertisment/fashion companies in NYC, and you will see that there you are
implicitly REQUIRED to look good, so even if you are not that good looking,
you will make it up with some good fashion sense.

As I said, my statement stays both for guys and girls. Now, add that there are
so few females in our industry, (the ratio is something like 1 to 8 ) the
average tech/startup guy has much much less contact with the oposite sex.

Hence all the jokes we get "Your website looks good, but when was the last
time you had a date?"

And I feel my comment was totally approperiate for this thread, as we are
talking about ties and fashion.

~~~
pg
Stop wasting our pixels, you two.

~~~
DaniFong
I'm sorry. It's a bad habit to engage like this. Brings everything down to a
bad level. I should know better. :-/

