Laptops with Stickers

> Your real middle class refuses to show any but the most bland books and magazines on its coffee tables: otherwise, expressions of opinion, awkward questions, or even ideas might result. -Paul Fussell, Class

The greyification of our lives, the loss of whimsy and kitsch and being too afraid to be a little cringe, I get the sense that a lot of people associate "growing up" as the loss of any and all expression: we wake up in our grey beds in our millennial grey house, drive to work in our grey car to work in our grey cubical, etc, etc. If you want a gauche laptop covered in stickers, do it, embrace the gauche. Everyone sneering at you is more miserable than you.

Thank you. I have tried to raise my daughters that way despite, potentially, (occasionally) embarrassing myself or the family.

God, I can't stand living in an artless world.

"Go ahead on Mr. Businessman You can't dress like me"

Jimmy Hendrix, If 6 was 9.

Has another relevant spoken word bit about waving his freak flag :)

It has nothing to do with that.

A good portion of these stickers are to do with things that are political or quasi political. What tends to happen is that a lot if times people have been burned in someway for supporting an idea or a cause. This is often because people have been fooled by charlatan, or it was later revealed that things were more complicated or different than they were led to believe.

Cringe and why people hate it is best explained by watching the very first episode of the UK office.

Most people want to go to work, turn up and do their time and go home. People that are often top enthusiastic are difficult to deal with day to day. People that adorn their personal possessions with slogans are seen as a warning sign.

its cringe because its not an original expression, its overdone and heavily political and obnouxious.

But why so many stickers? Why so many tattoos? Why not pick one you very much like and agree with? Less noise. More signal. Less is more.

I don't like many of the ones mentioned on this website but here are some minimalist examples [1] [2] [3] [4] and an exception I do like a bit because of the custom shape [5]. [1] is more like a skin.

[1] https://stickertop.art/content/images/2025/11/20250221_00333...

[2] https://stickertop.art/content/images/2025/11/laptop_cover.j...

[3] https://stickertop.art/content/images/2025/11/IMG_1259.jpg

[4] https://stickertop.art/content/images/2025/11/IMG_5753.JPG

[5] https://stickertop.art/content/images/2025/11/54917193947_1f...

> But why so many stickers?

I 'unno, it's fun I guess?

I see a sticker I like somewhere, brain goes 'heh, neat' and so I put it on my laptop with the other stickers. There's not much more to it.

I happen to heartily agree with you but now we're talking taste and... yeah.

Prior to secret ballots being a thing you would have voted "viva voce" by saying your preference aloud. Violence and intimidation were common.

There's no problem with publicly engaging in politics. In fact, it's a great thing to do.

What is a problem is doing it on an environment where participation is mandatory or required for basic survival.

Why? Because your aesthetic taste is not universal.

I think generally people are I'll equipped to engage publicly in politics. Politics is an extremely dirty game and can be extremely divisive.

My friends are willing to give me the benefit of the doubt. Strangers usually only offer shallow ridicule and trolling- especially online.

> sacred knowledge?

I think you might be romanticizing this, a bit. When you convince the public that not talking about something is the best course of action, they become a lot easier to control. We learned this during WWII with the propaganda machine that was fully employed on all fronts, and arguably before that with the work of Edward Bernays and people like him. If public discourse and debate could be quashed, then it was much, much easier to simply tell everyone what their opinions of a thing should be.

I think it's more a very lame flex. Macbooks were expensive and if you were walking around the office with a Macbook it was because you were important enough to convince management to buy you one instead of some crappy Dell. Eventually enough people get Macbooks that you need another way to stand out so you slap a bunch of cheap stickers all over it to show everyone, "See, you coddle your trophies. I beat mine up because it's just a tool and I don't care. I'm too busy gettin' it done!"

Where do I say not to talk about it?

I like to view it as living authentically and seizing every opportunity to add a little color or whimsy to the mundan, but to each their own.

I don't judge people who put stickers on their laptop, but for me I don't simply because it brings me no pleasure or joy. I have never really understood decorative things in general. It is probably part of my neurodivergence, but I just don't get value from decorative things.

I think that on its face the term "sacred knowledge" kind of communicates an intimacy that indicates that it's not something that's shared with people who don't have a privileged relationship with you.

I think the big difference now is that people have a megaphone in the form of social media and they forget just how wide the statements they shout through it can spread.

Yeah, OP's username seems pretty appropriate

Authenticity is in your heart. Putting stickers onto your laptop, which is the least authentic thing for a software developer to do, makes you just look ridiculous.

I'll be honest I think that dying on the hill of "putting stickers on your laptop [...] is the least authentic thing for a software developer to do" makes you look pretty ridiculous.

Doing something, which is so extremely commonplace does not make you unique in any way.

Do you really think something, which is so extremely common among software developers, has the potential to showing your uniqueness.

The hill I will die on is that I despise outward signaling, especially outward signaling of something like "uniqueness".

TBH I think putting stickers on your laptop is a practical imperative, as it makes it much less likely that you'll accidentally grab someone else's.

You so perfectly verbalized the semiotics behind those stickers.

My work devices don't have much on them, mostly corporate asset tags and the like. My own, though, I make my own. The stickers reflect things I like or find amusing; maybe they'll get a smirk or a chuckle from someone else, maybe not.

In the end, they're like the tattoos that someone else commented on. (I have those as well.) If you appreciate them, great! If you don't like them, that's fine too. Fundamentally, they're not for you.