Fandom & stan culture

● Aliven.✎ 2

Taylor's Version

The suffix on Taylor Swift's re-recorded albums — '(Taylor's Version)' — from 'Fearless' in April 2021, made after her original masters were sold without her, and the phrase that became the internet's name for any reclaimed thing: a rebuilt friendship, a redone tattoo, a second attempt at anything. The record notes she bought the original masters back on 30 May 2025, which made the phrase both complete and a little historical.

▸ 2021peak 2023still up

◐ Dyingphr.✎ 3

Think, Mark

A father beating his son while asking him to think — 'Think, Mark!' — from the Invincible finale, and the format for any argument in which the losing side is being asked to reconsider. The record's entry for the superhero meme that outlasted its season by years.

▸ 2021peak 2023still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Bluey Sleepytime

An episode of a children's cartoon about a small dog dreaming through space to Holst's 'Jupiter', which became the thing adults cried at on the internet in 2023 and the record's entry for a seven-minute episode with a fandom of parents.

▸ 2020peak 2023still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Iceberg Chart

A diagram of an iceberg with a topic's known facts at the top and its obscure horrors at the bottom, explained tier by tier in a long video — the format that made 'the deeper you go' a phrase and every subject a mystery. The record's entry for a chart as a genre.

▸ 2020peak 2021still up

☠ Deadn.✎ 3

K-pop Stans Tulsa Rally

The June 2020 episode in which K-pop fans and TikTok teenagers reserved tickets for Donald Trump's Tulsa rally with no intention of going, so that a campaign boasting a million requests faced an arena a third full on 20 June 2020 — the moment mainstream media discovered stan Twitter as a political force. The record notes the same fans had flooded a police 'snitch' app with fancams weeks earlier, and that the fancam was the weapon.

▸ 2020peak 2020†2020

● Aliven.✎ 3

Payola Discourse

The stan-Twitter argument that a rival's hit is 'payola' — paid radio play, paid playlisting, a label's thumb on the scale — a 1950s word revived around 2020 for the streaming age, at its loudest whenever a song no one claims to like is number one on the radio. The record's entry for the conspiracy theory that is also partly a business model.

▸ 2020peak 2024still up

◐ Dyingn.

Zoom Fatigue

Exhaustion from watching your own face while other people talk. Named within weeks of everyone getting it, and still with us in the way a chronic condition is.

▸ 2020peak 2021still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Chart Manipulation

The accusation, thrown between fandoms since around 2019, that a number one was bought — bundles, remixes, a dozen vinyl variants, a discounted digital single at 69 cents, a streaming party with rules — and the record's entry for the Billboard chart as a battlefield where everyone is guilty and only the other side is charged. The record notes Billboard has changed its rules four times in response, and the accusations have not.

▸ 2019peak 2023still up

☠ Deadn.✎ 3

Endgame Early Screening

The 2019 request from a terminally ill Marvel fan, known online as Alexander, to see Avengers: Endgame before its release, and the response: a Reddit thread, a wave of shares, and an email from Disney offering to discuss options. The record's entry for one of the times the internet organised itself to be kind.

▸ 2019peak 2019†2019

◐ Dyingn.✎ 2

Fan Cam

A short edit of a celebrity, set to music, posted in reply to anything — a news story, a funeral, a maths question — by stan accounts in 2019–20, and the reason 'fancam' became a word for irrelevance. The record's entry for the reply that ignores the post.

▸ 2019peak 2020still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Isekai Fatigue

The exhaustion of a fandom with the genre in which a man is hit by a truck and wakes up in a fantasy world with a menu — which the industry produced by the dozen every season. The record's entry for the complaint that has not stopped a single truck.

▸ 2019peak 2023still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Mariah Carey Defrosting

The joke that Mariah Carey is frozen for eleven months and thaws on 1 November to sing the Christmas song, which the singer now performs herself annually with a video of her being defrosted. The record's entry for a meme adopted by its subject as a calendar event.

▸ 2019peak 2024still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Redraw Trend

A panel, frame or photo redrawn by hundreds of artists with their own characters — the Frieren chin, the Thragg cover, the bra strap — as the art internet's most reliable format. The record's entry for the trend that turns a single image into a gallery.

▸ 2019peak 2026still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Skeleton Meme Season

The annual arrival of skeleton memes on the first of October — the dancing skeleton, the 'spooky scary skeletons' song, the countdown — and their departure on the first of November. The record's entry for a meme with a season ticket.

▸ 2018peak 2025still up

◐ Dyingn.✎ 3

Surprise Song

The acoustic slot in a Taylor Swift show where she plays a song not on the setlist — the surprise song — a Reputation-tour habit from 2018 that the Eras Tour of 2023–24 turned into a nightly internet event, with tracking spreadsheets, predictions, and a genre of tweet reading 'she played WHAT in Kansas City'. The record notes the tour ended on 8 December 2024 and the spreadsheet is still maintained.

▸ 2018peak 2023still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Anime Awards Discourse

The annual argument about whether the right anime won — Frieren, Solo Leveling, the one you liked — which has the structure of the Grammys discourse with more edits. The record's entry for a fandom that treats an industry awards show as a referendum.

▸ 2017peak 2025still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Spooky Month Countdown

The September ritual of counting down to October with a specific cartoon — 'it's spooky month!' — and a skeleton, which the record files alongside skeleton season as the internet's most reliable annual behaviour after Wrapped.

▸ 2017peak 2024still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Streaming Party

An organised session in which a fandom streams a song at the same time — the streaming party — with a hashtag, a playlist rule sheet ('do not loop, add three other songs in between') and a goal, from K-pop fans' chart campaigns around 2017 to every pop stan base by 2021. The record's entry for listening as labour, done for love and for a Billboard number.

▸ 2017peak 2021still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Truck-kun

The truck that hits the protagonist of an isekai and sends him to another world, personified by the fandom as a character with a job. The record's entry for a vehicle as a plot device and a recurring cast member.

▸ 2017peak 2021still up

◐ Dyingn.✎ 4

Lemonade (Beyoncé)

Beyoncé's sixth solo album, released without warning on 23 April 2016 as an hour-long film on HBO and then on Tidal. The internet spent the following week on one line, 'Becky with the good hair', and one emoji, the lemon, deployed at anyone suspected of being Becky. The record's entry for the surprise release and the search that followed it.

▸ 2016peak 2016still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

VTuber

A streamer represented by an animated avatar — the body is a rig, the voice is real — from a 2016 Japanese YouTuber to a global industry by 2021, with agencies, subathon records and fans who know the person and the drawing as one. The record's entry for the anime avatar as a career.

▸ 2016peak 2021still up

● Aliveabbr.✎ 3

OT7

'One true seven' — the BTS fan who loves all seven members equally and will say so in the bio — from the mid-2010s, and the template for 'OT4', 'OT5' and 'OT9' in every group, used to mark the difference between a fan of the group and an 'akgae' who follows one member and disparages the rest. The record's entry for loyalty expressed as arithmetic.

▸ 2015peak 2019still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Stan Twitter

The fan side of Twitter — the pop girls, the K-pop groups, the charts, the wars — with its own vocabulary, most of which is now everyone's: 'ate', 'mother', 'flop', 'reheating nachos'. The record's entry for the community that coined more of this dictionary than any other.

▸ 2015peak 2021still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Ult

Short for 'ultimate' — a fan's ult bias or ult group is the one above all others, the favourite in a fandom where having many favourites is the norm — in use on K-pop Twitter since around 2015 and now applied to any devotion that outranks the rest. The record's entry for the word that turned a hierarchy of love into a bio line.

▸ 2015peak 2020still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Renaissance Painting Meme

Any photograph of a crowd, a pitch or a brawl with the composition of a Baroque painting, annotated with golden-ratio lines and a caption about art. A decade-old format that peaked, by volume, at the 2026 World Cup, where every touchline argument was a Caravaggio.

▸ 2014peak 2026still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

ARMY

BTS's fandom — ARMY, 'Adorable Representative M.C. for Youth', named on 9 July 2013 — the largest and most organised fan base of the 2010s and 2020s, capable of moving a song to number one in a day, funding a charity match to the dollar, and replying to any critic in seventeen languages within the hour. The record's entry for the fandom that taught the internet what a fandom could do.

▸ 2013peak 2020still up

☠ Deadn.✎ 4

Red Wedding Reactions

The videos of people watching the ninth episode of the third season of Game of Thrones, filmed by friends who had read the books and knew what was coming. The episode aired on 2 June 2013; the reactions were online by morning. The record's entry for the moment a television twist became a format for filming other people.

▸ 2013peak 2013†2013

↺ Undeadinterj.✎ 3

Agüerooo

Martin Tyler's scream as Sergio Agüero scored in the 94th minute against QPR on 13 May 2012 to win Manchester City their first league title in 44 years — 'AGÜEROOOOO' — the most replayed piece of English football commentary ever recorded. The record notes it returns every anniversary, every title race, and every time a Manchester United fan is having a good day.

▸ 2012peak 2012†2013

◐ Dyingn.✎ 2

Arianators

Ariana Grande's fandom — Arianators, named around her 2013 debut and at its most powerful during the 2018–2019 'thank u, next' run, when 'yuh' and the high ponytail were reply-guy currency. The record notes the Wicked press cycle of 2024 brought them back in force, and that they are now largely indistinguishable from film Twitter.

▸ 2012peak 2019still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Bias Wrecker

The K-pop group member who is not your favourite ('bias') but keeps threatening to become it — the bias wrecker — a term from fan forums around 2012 for the loyalty crisis of watching a second idol do something devastating on camera. The record's entry for the most affectionate treachery in fandom.

▸ 2012peak 2019still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Elf on the Shelf Discourse

The December argument about the surveillance doll, the parents who forgot to move it, and the increasingly elaborate scenes staged at midnight by people who resent it. The record's entry for a tradition that became a competitive sport with an annual meme cycle.

▸ 2012peak 2024still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Beyhive

Beyoncé's fandom — the Beyhive, named around 2011, with bee emoji as its signature — the fan base that filled fashion designer Rachel Roy's Instagram with bees in April 2016 on suspicion she was 'Becky with the good hair', and swarmed a chef, Rachael Ray, by mistake. The record's entry for a fandom with a weapon and, occasionally, the wrong address.

▸ 2011peak 2016still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Sasaeng

A fan who invades an idol's private life — following taxis, obtaining phone numbers, breaking into dorms — the Korean 'sasaeng', a word international fandom learned around 2011–2012 when recordings of JYJ members confronting stalkers circulated, and now used everywhere to name the line ordinary fans say they would never cross. The record's entry for the fandom's own word for its worst member.

▸ 2011peak 2012still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Barbz

Nicki Minaj's fandom — the Barbz, from her Harajuku Barbie persona of 2010 — the most feared reply squad in pop, known for organised defence, chart pushes and an intensity that made 'the Barbz are coming' a genuine warning to journalists by 2023. The record's entry for a fandom whose name is a doll and whose behaviour is not.

▸ 2010peak 2023still up

◐ Dyingn.✎ 2

Directioners

One Direction's fandom — Directioners — from the band's X Factor run in late 2010, the first fan base built entirely on Twitter and Tumblr, capable of trending a member's name for a haircut and of writing several million words of fan fiction about two of them. The record notes the band's 2016 hiatus never ended, that Liam Payne's death on 16 October 2024 reunited the fandom in grief, and that the old accounts are still there.

▸ 2010peak 2013still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Photocard

The small collectible card of an idol randomly inserted in a K-pop album — the photocard — first tried with Girls' Generation's 'Oh!' in January 2010 and by the 2020s the reason people buy eleven copies of one album, trade cards on Twitter, and keep them in toploaders like currency. The record's entry for the object that made physical albums outlive physical music.

▸ 2010peak 2022still up

◐ Dyingn.✎ 2

Selenators

Selena Gomez's fandom — Selenators — from around 2010, at their peak during the 'Revival' era of 2015–16, when Gomez was the most-followed person on Instagram and the fandom's job was mostly to defend her from the Beliebers and, later, from Hailey Bieber's fans in a 2023 TikTok cold war. The record's entry for a fan base defined, unfairly, by other people's boyfriends.

▸ 2010peak 2016still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Swifties

Taylor Swift's fans, self-named 'Swifties' by around 2010 and trademarked in 2017 — the fandom of friendship bracelets, Easter-egg hunts, midnight album releases and a collective memory of every date on her 2009 calendar. The record notes the Eras Tour of 2023–24 turned them from a fan base into a measurable economic phenomenon, and that Swift herself uses the word.

▸ 2010peak 2023still up

◐ Dyingn.✎ 3

Beliebers

Justin Bieber's fandom — Beliebers — from around 2009, the first YouTube-born fan base and the one that made Twitter's trending topics a permanent Bieber column through 2012, when 'Baby' was the most-watched video on Earth. The record notes they aged with him, through the 2014 arrests and the 2015 'Purpose' comeback, and that the 2025 album 'Swag' produced a surprisingly large reunion.

▸ 2009peak 2012still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Comeback

In K-pop, any new release by an existing group — the comeback — a Korean industry term for the promotional cycle of teasers, concept photos, music show performances and streaming goals that international fans adopted around 2009 and that now makes 'comeback' mean 'they were gone for four months'. The record notes Western fans use the word for artists who never left, and Korean fans find this hilarious.

▸ 2009peak 2020still up

◐ Dyingn.✎ 2

Little Monsters

Lady Gaga's fandom, the Little Monsters, named during the Monster Ball tour of 2009–2011 and organised on Gaga's own social network, LittleMonsters.com, in 2012 — the first pop fandom with a name, a hand sign (the 'paws up') and a mother. The record notes they were the model every later fan base copied and that they are, by 2026, mostly in their thirties with mortgages and the old claws.

▸ 2009peak 2011still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Fanchant

The synchronised shout of members' names and phrases at set points in a K-pop song — the fanchant — a Korean concert tradition that international fans learned from phonetic guides around 2008 and now rehearse from YouTube before a show, so that a stadium in São Paulo can shout Korean names in time. The record's entry for the most disciplined thing a crowd has ever done voluntarily.

▸ 2008peak 2019still up

● Aliven.✎ 3

Ship War

A fight between fans over which characters should be together, conducted with charts, fanfiction and the intensity of a religious schism, and revived in 2025 by hockey players and a teen drama's summer. The record's entry for the argument that has ended more friendships than politics.

▸ 2008peak 2025still up

☠ Deadphr.✎ 2

Wenger Out

The banner, the hashtag, and the grudge — 'Wenger Out' — from Arsenal supporters wanting Arsène Wenger gone, first argued on forums around 2008 and by 2017 a global sign appearing at WWE shows, cricket matches, a Kenyan protest and a Congolese election rally. Died when Wenger left in May 2018 and the fans discovered what the alternative was.

▸ 2008peak 2017†2018

● Aliven.✎ 2

Headcanon

Something you have decided is true about a story that the story never said. The word that made private reading a public position.

▸ 2007peak 2013still up

● Aliven.✎ 2

Lightstick

The official glowing baton of a K-pop fandom — the lightstick — from Big Bang's crown-topped original in 2006 through BTS's 'ARMY Bomb', each one shaped to the group's lore and, at concerts, synchronised by Bluetooth into a stadium-sized light show. The record's entry for the object that turned a crowd into a display, and for the emoji of it in every stan's bio.

▸ 2006peak 2019still up

↺ Undeadn.✎ 3

Malice at the Palace

The Pacers–Pistons brawl of 19 November 2004 in which Ron Artest went into the stands after a thrown cup, nine players were suspended, and the NBA's image changed for a decade — a pre-YouTube event that lived on message boards and grainy clips until Netflix's 'Untold' documentary in August 2021 brought it back as a meme. The record's entry for the fight that is also a history lesson.

▸ 2004peak 2004†2005

● Aliveabbr.✎ 2

OTP

One true pairing. The couple you would defend to a stranger, and have.

▸ 2002peak 2012still up