I was being forced to look at images of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang yesterday, entirely against my will, and the whole time I had to look at his stupid smug face wearing one of his ridiculous leather jackets I was thinking two things. Firstly, no amount of bullying this dork would be too much. And secondly, if I were a billionaire, I would buy and wear better jackets.
Much has been written about Huang's leather obsession, from why he does it (it's punk?) to how much those jackets cost, but precious little has been written about how terrible he looks wearing them. This is a man worth over $100 billion, and he routinely appears on stage looking like a guy cosplaying a guy who watches Yellowstone. He has managed to pick a genre of clothing defined by bikers, war heroes and punks and somehow ended up looking like a real estate agent from 2007, or a science teacher enduring one of the worst mid-life crises on record.
Like we explored last week, billionaires are very good at making money, but the sociopathic drive that gets them to the top seems to also rob them of the imagination required to spend it. There's so much that today's billionaires could be doing to help the planet, or at least be cool, and instead dipshits like Huang only want to get even richer by boiling lakes and destroying the consumer computer market, all so he can wear the kind of jacket I would have seen on clearance in the corner of a dying mall in 2011.
This morning I opened Instagram and was serendipitously shown the exact opposite of Jensen Huang. I follow designer Errolson Hugh, the co-founder of Acronym, and this morning he shared the latest images of Hideo Kojima wearing one of Acronym's excellent (but also expensive) jackets. I say “latest” because Kojima has been a big Acronym fan for a long time, and has been snapped wearing the jackets (and pants, and even sneaker collabs with Nike) on red carpets, to press events and even in Acronym product shots.
As I've written on this website previously, Acronym is Techwear, a fashion style best defined as "waterproof stuff that looks good but can also cost thousands of dollars per piece". Techwear, and Acronym's designs especially, tend to live at the intersection of streetwear, outdoor equipment and cyberpunk, so it's little wonder the guy behind Snatcher, Metal Gear and Death Stranding is very into this stuff.
Luke Plunkett
Look at all these times he's worn Acronym jackets in public! Look how many of these different jackets he owns, how many of these photos are with Errolson Hugh (the bald guy with the moustache; the two are mutual fans, which is why Hugh has a cameo in Death Stranding), and look how good he looks in them! Kojima is 62 years old, only a year younger than Huang! He looks cool as hell!
These images span over a decade! | Images: Instagram
In closing: Jensen Huang is a billionaire who looks like he took out a car loan for a Cybertruck that he didn't understand the fine print on. Hideo Kojima is a mere millionaire who looks like a billion dollars every time he wears a cool jacket. The lesson I think here is simple: I don't want to teach billionaires how to dress, I just don't think there should be billionaires. Cool millionaires is enough.
