At the risk of stating the abundantly obvious, Big Tech has overtaken our lives. It’s difficult, if not impossible, for many of us to opt out of its services. Maybe you rely on Amazon Prime because all the local drug stores have closed, and you don’t have time to drive 40 minutes round-trip for toothpaste and toilet paper. Or, you use multiple Meta products, because Meta controls WhatsApp and most of social media and basically serves as a modern day phonebook plus potpourri of news feeds. Then there’s Apple, Netflix, ChatGPT, etc. The list goes on. Their founders and executives are ungodly rich. We do not like them them — as avatars of societal inequality, for having outsize influence on modern discourse and politics, for kowtowing to Trump for the sake of “shareholder value” — but we rely on their products. We want to opt out and struggle to do so.

Fashion month once felt like a respite from all that. Yes, there’s heavy overlap in the Venn diagram of “high fashion” and “rich people,” and Big Tech is certainly full of rich people. But Big Tech generally stayed in its place, both stylistically (vests and ill-fitting pants vs. fine wool coats and swishy trousers) and geographically (San Francisco, Seattle, the West Coast vs. New York, Milan, Paris). The Venn diagram between “tech industry” and “high fashion” was basically two circles. Yes, Jeff Bezos tried desperately to turn Amazon into a high fashion vendor, but after many years of unsuccessful attempts went off to his midlife crisis and allowed the industry and those who love following it to largely ignore him.

After the fall 2026 show season, this is no longer the case. Tech people have decided they want to be part of fashion, too — why should Bezos be the only one to have his midlife crisis play out at the Met Gala or on the front row of a Dior show? — and now they are here. Maybe because that kind of fame is something money can't buy. Fashion show appearances symbolize approval from the kids at the cool lunch table. I suspect the tech crowd will want to be here for a while.

Mark Zuckerberg took his wife to the Prada show in Milan, like it was some sort of daytime date. Maybe he did it because of that smart glasses partnership with Prada. Maybe he just did it for the ’gram. If you happened to miss it, here’s the gram.

Bryan Johnson — who got rich from selling online payment processing company Braintree, is spending millions to beat death ($2 million a year, he told Bloomberg in 2023, but you know, inflation), and starred in the Netflix documentary Don’t Die — showed up as a model at the Matières Fécales show. “I think being dead might be boring,” he told @Ly.as, wearing super-tight knit mock neck. (It is worth noting, though not quite a tech person, Looksmaxxer Clavicular also modeled in the Elena Velez show.)

And the Bezos-funded Met Gala is coming right up on the calendar so even though they skipped the ready-to-wear shows, they’ll be back in this world soon.

But, dear readers, I have good news. We have been here before! And we got through it. Or, at least, are getting through it?

The Kardashians and Jenners used to be the people we could not avoid. Now they have become a routine part of the proceedings, like borrowed clothes and gift bags. I barely notice them anymore. Though Kendall did her thing at fashion week, sitting front row at Emporio Armani in Milan and later attending the brand's "power of youth" party (they should have also invited Johnson), they were not nearly as present this season. Kim used to sit on around ten front rows per season, but didn't go to anything this fashion week since she was filming a movie with Will Ferrell (funny how that works out — when actors are busy chasing fashion deals she’s landing their movie parts).

Here is why I believe we are on a similar trajectory with the tech people.

At first, we all thought: What are they doing here? Kim entered the industry in a big way thanks to Anna Wintour, who gave her a Met Gala invite in 2013 and her first Vogue cover in 2014. People were disgusted and threatened to boycott Vogue, the same way they were when Zuckerberg showed up on the front row of Prada or when the Bezoses were announced as major Met Gala donors alongside Saint Laurent, the house that Yves built.

And here, one of the most popular comments on the New York Times’s Instagram about the Prada appearance:

One big reason for our collective confusion over the industry bear-hugging tech folk is the same as that involving the Kardashians: These people have No Taste.

Here’s trend forecaster Sean Monahan in his 8ball newsletter:

Zuckerberg presented himself, uncharacteristically, in stealth wealth browns — trousers and a trendy knit polo. It looked borrowed, and I mean that in the least-nice possible way. I'm guessing the look was the result of professional styling because, as we’ve repeatedly seen, he has No Taste. His gold chains are akin to Kim’s 2000s waist belts. Maybe the brown stuff was his attempt at wiping the slate clean the way Kim did when she gave up color and just wore beige Yeezy body tights for a while. Or maybe it’s what Anna Wintour demanded if she were to be seen walking several paces behind him.

Bryan Johnson (not a billionaire but a millionaire) also does not seem much concerned with style. I've had to read up on him since his fashion show appearance, but on Instagram, he wears a lot of sweats and T-shirts. He doesn't seem like a Fashion Guy the way, say, Bad Bunny is a Fashion Guy.

Hopefully, if these people are going to stick around, they will acquire some taste or, at least, buy some taste from a stylist like Law Roach.

Finally, we will learn to live with — and eventually tune out — the narrative of tech people being fashion celebrities, the way Kim Kardashian and basically every member of her family became fashion celebrities. Like the Amazon paper towel orders we place so that we have time both to work and take our kids to baseball practice and ballet rehearsals, we would like to opt out, but we can’t. It’s out of our control. They are at Prada. They are modeling tight sweaters. They are paying for the centerpieces and tiny food at Anna’s big party. They are talking about how honored they are to be paying for these things on the Today show. They are getting hate clicks which often eventually become, if not love clicks, like clicks or at least neutral clicks. If we are keeping up with this industry, we are going to have to keep up with them. We are, apparently, still keeping up with the Kardashians.

If millennial pink was the pink of the 2010s, what are we calling this new, warmer pink that is all over the runways? We can’t stick Gen Z with “Pepto Pink” (or can we?).

Seema R who runs the @art_lust_ Instagram pointed out that it’s “Baker-Miller Pink” or "drunk tank pink" — a shade once used in prison to calm occupants — but does this not lack the zing of millennial pink?

Please share your suggestions in comments.