The web has sped up the fragmentation of culture, spawning niche cultures and micro-celebrities (nimcel) that make up micro factions of the attention economy.
Today's micro-influencers are the creators behind meme pages, authors of discord servers and hyper-local Twitter personalities. They are everyday people with a highly engaged, modest following. They are the people that are driven to cater for their tribe and cult following, disinterested in scale. This means their content is purer, built to entertain than make money, and less capitalist. The Tik Tok algorithm is perpetuating this online phenomenon. Digital monocultures have died and been replaced by microcultures, which presents brands with a challenge and opportunity. Brands must find a way to have multiple, hyper-nuanced expressions that resonate with a webwork of niche cultures.
