[QUOTE=Eonwe]
For me, it’s about feeling over-saturated with something before I’ve even had a chance to experience it.
When I was in college, one of my roommates went to see the South Park movie. She and a friend of hers spent the next six months singing songs from it loudly around the apartment (weeeeeeell, Kyle’s mom is a big fat b!+@&, etc etc) and quoting from it in Cartman’s voice. I got so sick of it that my desire to actually see the movie was ruined; didn’t see it until maybe two years ago (and loved it).
Harry Potter was similar. It was so amazing and awesome and everybody dressed like Harry Potter and look I have a scar on my forehead for Halloween, and look I’ve been standing in line for three days to get the next book and it’s the GREATEST fantasy story ever written because look at how many people love it and it’s so original and awesome!
Ok, fine, but none of that behaviour actually makes me interested in the book(s). This is the same general public that has, after all, kept scads of crappy TV shows on the air year after year because they love them so much as well. Why should I trust general opinion, particularly when their opinion makes everybody act like idiots? (only Trekkies are allowed such latitude
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[/QUOTE]
I know the thread’s moved on a bit, but Eonwe has provided an excellent answer to a question I get asked a lot myself, and I’d like to take a moment to expand upon it, if I may.
For me, one of the things that makes me dislike things that are hugely popular is that they become “less special”, for me at least.
I enjoy a number of TV shows that could be described as “Not widely viewed” in my age group- Red Dwarf, Peep Show, Black Books, Goodness Gracious Me, and a lot of other stuff that you only find on ABC at 11pm on a Tuesday night. 
Sure, these shows are popular, but if you take a fairly average group of twentysomethings (say, the people I work with) and say “So, did anyone watch Black Books on ABC last night?” I can be assured of the sound of crickets chirping and maybe a tumbleweed blowing across the store. And this is part of the appeal for me- I’m free to enjoy these shows the way I want, and for want of a better term they’re “Mine”. I don’t have to share them with hordes of obsessed people who ruin my enjoyment of the show with their overzealousness and general acting like hyperactive teenagers over it.
It’s certainly interesting how, the more popular something in popular culture is, the less likely it is that I’ll like it.
There are some popular current TV shows that I like- The Simpsons, Family Guy, American Dad, Futurama, South Park and so on, so I’m not saying all popular culture is bad, but I do admit to being an elitist bastard that has naught but disdain for most of the TV shows of the general peasantry. 
Such is my disdain, in fact, that I have banned discussions about Reality TV and The Footy when I’m managing. The customers are stupid enough, I don’t need the staff contributing to it as well. We all agree on the Reality TV point, but it’s taken a few months to get The Footy point across as well…