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Although the early conversations of microcelebrity centered on Anglo-centric theories and context despite the varied backgrounds and cultural context of microcelebrity, this compilation of chapters seeks to assess and reframe the applications and uptake of microcelebrity around the world. Each of the chapters in this anthology contribute to expand the theoretical concept and contextualize the history and cultural affairs of those who are famous online. The case studies provide examples of how a microcelebrity emerges to fame because of their exposure and interaction within a group of niche users, a specific online community, or a specific cultural and geographical context through the social networks that emerge online. Academic scholarship on microcelebrity has crossed methodologies, disciplines and platforms demonstrating the wide appeal as the influence of these figures are on the rise. As preparation for the reader, this chapter offers a brief history of current scholarship, with an emphasis on shifting knowledge production away from an Anglo and Global North perspective. The introduction chapter serves as a road map for the reader breaking down each of the three sections of the book – norms, labors, and activism. Lastly, the co-editors have outlined different ways to read the text group chapters according to reader interest.

This chapter investigates the dynamics of teenage girls' musical.ly productions in relation to microcelebrity inspirations and (non)aspirations, and centrally details the mixed methodologies involved in the research process. The analysis focuses on the flow of the musical.ly app as evidenced through the walk-through method and young girls' engagements with the platform as solicited through personal observations and two small focus group discussions.

I followed Belle (@bellecosby, @bonitaapplebelle), or Hanna, from Twitter to Tumblr. Her presence on the blog was thoughtful, defiant, playful, and informed. Looking through Hanna’s posts as Belle from Tumblr, she struck me as “Tumblr famous” – a type of microcelebity that uses Tumblr to connect with an audience and maintain popularity among other Tumblr users. Well before the #MeToo movement had caught fire in 2017, Hanna was ready and willing to challenge mainstream celebrity on behalf of the voiceless. On Twitter she laid out arguments to challenge the impulse to victim-blame when sexual assault survivors do go public challenging the impulse to victim-blame when sexual assault survivors do go public. This chapter traces how Belle’s online community was an opportunity for relationally understanding herself and expressing her identity to specific Tumblr networks, among like-minded peers that also confront social issues.

This chapter will consider the workings of microcelebrity in the context of an evolving Indian cyber public. In the contemporary moment, large-scale battles for control over the world’s youngest and increasingly digitally active demographic are in full swing – both by corporations like Facebook through efforts like Free Basics, as well as by ideologues who wish to mold the “idea of India” in certain ways. While digital spaces are often framed as liberating, there are also extremely strong conservative forces that are well established. It is within this context that I would like to examine the recent growth of the Indian online comedic scene whose popularity has increased by leaps and bounds. My particular focus will be the comedy collective of AIB (All India Backchod), who are most prominent on Youtube. This collective has garnered significant popularity through their deployment of viral comedic videos riffing off on various aspects of Indian society and have also made socially aware videos around hot button issues like gay rights and women’s rights. I would like to examine their treatment of gender and sexuality particularly in the context of it being made up primarily of straight men and how that has affected their engagement both with the content of their videos, as well as their ability to leverage their online visibility. I will be using ideas of postcolonial cyberspace as theorized by Nishant Shah (2015) as well as theorists of microcelebrity and the use of humor such as Theresa Senft (2013).

Mercado Livre, a site for e-commerce and online auctions, is popular in Brazil. Given the accessibility of user-friendly technology, any person can open an auction on the internet to trade items such as cars, mobile phones, and domestic electrical appliances. In 2012, a media mobilization was sparked after the online auction of Brazilian Catarina Migliorini’s virginity. Described by the Brazilian media as one of the events of the year, the auction was promoted by Justin Sisely, an Australian filmmaker who designed the project Virgins Wanted. Tracing media reports, this chapter focuses on Migliorini’s savvy attention literacies, upon which she capitalized upon the situation to obtain her celebrity. Seizing the opportunity given by a watchful internet audience, she established herself as an iconic personality through press coverage and the curation of online profiles, and became a microcelebrity.

In defining microcelebrity, media technologies are often described as integral to the self-branding process. This chapter argues that social network platforms are not social utilities, but, in fact, celebrification utilities. That is, they are programmed to necessarily brand users by extracting and filtering identifications to be easily consumed by advertisers, just as microcelebrities promote specific, “authentic” aspects of self that can be easily consumed by fans. Through a discourse analysis of Facebook’s functionalities and in-depth interviews with 45 emerging adults, I present an analysis of microcelebrity culture through the narratives of everyday users who are not actively involved in self-branding but are instead compelled by the site’s inherent design to unintentionally brand – they unknowingly align with corporation-like mission statements; ignore multiple, dynamic selves; and discard their right to anonymity.

While in common English-language parlance speaking of “online celebrities” encourages the conflation of new forms of famousness with existing discourses on mass media stardom and fandom, the Mandarin Chinese term wanghong, a shorthand term for wangluo hongren (literally “person popular on the internet”), frames the enticing shores of online celebrity through the peculiar lexical domain of a grassroots popularity. The figure of the wanghong has in recent years accompanied the development of social media platforms in China, becoming a profitable profession, an inspirational role model, a morally condemnable by-product of internet economies, and in general a widely debated social phenomenon among local users. Drawing on interviews with more and less successful local online celebrities and discussions with their audiences, this chapter offers an up-to-date portrayal of the various forms of wanghong currently vying for attention on Chinese social media platforms, illustrating how popularity is crafted along with narratives of professionalism and economic aspirations intimately connected to the sociotechnical contexts of contemporary China.