Marc Johnson and the Increasing Lameness of the Skateboard Industry

Yes, I'm going to talk about Marc Johnson's move from Lakai to Adidas. I know every other skateboarding blogger has already talked about it, and I know people are either already bummed about it or just don't see what the problem is. But I'm going to use what Marc Johnson did as  jumping off point to talk about a much bigger topic, and that topic is really more of an exploration of this question: Does anyone really like the direction skateboarding (its industry, media, and culture) is going?

For starters, let's recap what we know about Marc Johnson's move to Adidas. Adidas recently put out Away Days, a full length skate video. At the premiere, they announced that Daewon Song and Marc Johnson were joining the team.

For Daewon, the move was somewhat expected. Marc, on the other hand, stirred some people up, because back in 2013, he said in an an interview with Jenkem that he would not do that sort of thing. Literally. Here's the quote:

"If a big sports shoe brand paid you 2 or 3 times your current salary, would you consider leaving Lakai to ride for them?

Okay. No, I wouldn’t ride for a mainstream sports footwear brand. I would not skate for Big Company Footwear."