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Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain
Fans and the internet have a symbiotic relationship. The digital age has made fan culture more productive and visible, and it has had a huge impact on how we all behave online.
Fan communities existed long before the Internet, but the proliferation of online platforms has changed the way fan communities connect and participate.
Here, we will briefly introduce the history of how fan culture was formed by the Internet and how it has been shaped by the Internet.
early adopter
Fans were already participating in the digital space in the 1970s. Some of the first email mailing lists and digital bulletin boards were utilized by Grateful’s Dead fans, or Deadheads, who came together to create an online archive of lyrics.
In the 1990s, science fiction fans established online repositories and used Usenet groups for fan discussion and distribution of fan fiction.
As the internet became more popular, so did fan culture. Search for your favorite TV shows or bands to find like-minded communities online. This ushered in the era of forums and blogs, and fans quickly jumped on sites like his LiveJournal to write and build communities.
With the rise of social media platforms in the 2000s, fans incorporated them into their fan activities. MySpace fans have helped launch many music careers. One Direction fans are putting Tumblr on the map.
As Twitter became popular, so did “Stan Twitter.” As a verb, “stan” means to show excessive fandom. The public nature of Twitter (now X) allowed fans to gather in large groups and start trends and campaigns. This collective power has been praised for its digital activism efforts and criticized for its harassment.
public and private
Fans move between private and public spaces online and negotiate different identities.
On platforms like Tumblr and LiveJournal, fans often choose pseudonyms, but Facebook enforces a real name policy.
Different platforms offer different privacy settings, which determine fan behavior. While private spaces allow for private conversations, fans utilize public channels to share fan works and conduct campaigns such as polls and fundraisers.
Each platform has different social norms and features. Fans adapt and develop their fan habits accordingly.
In doing so, they shaped the social internet as we know it today.
Fan migration
The launch of the new platform introduces new ways to participate. Tumblr became the place for the “fuckyeah” fansite, where fans could share fan works and communicate via GIFs. Fans jumped on her TikTok and created video edits, sounds, and mashups.
Fans may decide to leave a platform because it no longer meets their needs or because it undergoes major changes, like when Tumblr announced a ban on adult content or when Elon Musk acquired Twitter. You may also choose.
The launch of Meta’s Threads offered a potential alternative to Stan participation, but some fans were hesitant to make the transition. Users must log in to Threads through their Instagram account, a platform many people use to stay connected with friends and family.
On Twitter/X, fans expressed that they are tired of the new platform because they don’t want to connect their fan activities to their “real life.”
When existing platforms don’t meet the needs of the community, fans create their own. Archive Of Our Own (AO3) is a place for fans to share works inspired by the subject matter of their fandom, created in response to design or policy changes made by other fan fiction sites. It’s a repository.
conversion
Fans are known for their creative productivity in transforming and remixing their favorite cultural objects, including fan art, fan fiction, videos, zines, and music remixes.
Advances in technology have made creative production easier to master, and the public and networked nature of platforms has allowed fan works to circulate to a wider audience. Fan-edited audio often becomes his sound trending on TikTok.
How fans shape brands
The mainstreaming of fandom across digital platforms has also led to changes in brand behavior.
Some brands are starting to act like their fans online, learning from their actions and forming connections with their engaged audiences.
On TikTok, brands participate in fan-based trends and leverage the community’s unique knowledge and jokes.
The Empire State Building is committed to #swifttok and regularly creates content showing their love for Taylor. One of his most successful videos is a fan edit of him professing his love for the Eiffel Tower, set to a sped-up version of Wildest Dreams.
Brands also incorporate the words and tone of their fans into their captions and comments. A look at Taylor Swift’s recent comments on his TikToks shows brands like DuoLingo, Spotify, The Natural History Museum, and Peter’s Pasta using words like “Blondie,” “mother,” and “icon.” You can see that there are.
On Twitter/X, he regularly posts about trends in cookie brand Chips Ahoy! fan culture, demonstrating his inside knowledge.
On Threads, official Star Wars accounts rave about their favorite characters and adopt fan-like personalities. And on TikTok, Penguin Books Australia is “shipping” Draco and Hermione to promote Tom Felton’s new book.
In an ongoing doctoral study, research has found that fans work as social media managers for brands, leveraging their expertise to connect with their fan audience.
Given that fan culture and habits are widely adopted across platforms, it’s no surprise that fans’ digital literacy is beneficial to brands.
As one Harry Styles fan I interviewed explained:
“I think if you’re a brand that wants to capitalize on culture, you need to hire people who are involved in it. If you want to be on trend. […] To talk to people in their own language, their first social language, you need to hire people who already speak that way. ”
