“I’m not like regular, I’m cool”, said everyone
Alexis* is over 25 of age and experiencing what he calls – or the society does, really – a “quarter-life crisis”. Or maybe we can all blame the X-Factor for the mental scar that is being categorised as “over 25s”. I don’t think I’ve ever agreed with that expression because who can even live until when they’re 100 years old? Imagine 70-something more years of this much anxiety and disruption – inflation, wars, stagnant wages, social and political polarisation, Emily in Paris being renewed for another season.
Alexis*, however, whenever finding himself in that situation, turns to Twitter (or X) and TikTok – sometimes for a good few hours – to dwell on what he argues to be “internet culture or Twitter personality” (read: being chronically online) so that he doesn’t feel left behind. In this late-stage capitalism, that’s one of a few things he can control, which somehow makes him “powerful”. He admits much of what he sees online has become part of his personality – the way he uses certain jokes or expressions, the way he interacts with people, the way he writes, the way he has to be to keep up with culture.
Alexis’s story isn’t unfamiliar though, nor individual. A quick look at brands’ TOV and interaction with its customers tells us one thing: they sound either so sarcastic or extremely peppy. Every brand jumps on the same bandwagon with the same tone of voice. Don’t get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. Either way, being able to establish a certain tone of voice has to go through heaps and bounds of marketing experience with various teams. Much of a brand’s personality also depends a great deal on internet culture and its implications. Since we’re all living in an era of algorithmic and data-driven culture, it begs the question: to what extent brands’ personalities can become so homogeneous?
Is there such a thing as a Twitter personality?
Before TikTok, Twitter was the go-to platform for inside jokes, funny content and snarky humour. Much of it is still lingering these days. What has made Twitter a playground for “brandter” – brand and banter – where brands are humanised and interact with each other is its “collection of inside jokes that build on one another”, journalist Alex Norcia notes in his 2019 article for VICE. “It’s a medium that’s held up by so much irony, snark, and meta-awareness that it’s hard to know what’s remotely sincere,” he continues. It has been a platform for these brands to come up with timely (not in Heinz’s Barbie sense) and relevant content while being at the center of cultural conversations. It was a staple in culture.
Just like Alexis navigates his quarter-life crisis, brands find solace and connection in the echo chambers of Twitter and now TikTok, where internet culture shapes their online persona, tone of voice and personality. Their tone of voice, once meticulously crafted through marketing expertise, now mirrors the zeitgeist of memes and viral trends. As if authenticity didn’t become elusive amidst the cacophony of online chatter.
Everything every trend all at once
But everything is trending and nothing is ever really trending. Vanilla/clean girl aesthetic; mob wife era; coastal grandma; office siren; to name just a few. It’s like we’ve lost the plot. Every day we wake up to the same aesthetic but branded differently which might have just driven us to the brink of insanity. What chapter are we currently living in? Who is sure to say these trends or aesthetics are not created by and catered to specific demographics? One prominent Black TikToker, @OliviaLayne6, for example, said that the name “vanilla” and the examples being used to demonstrate it in mainstream media trend articles almost make it seem like the trend is only for “pretty, thin, white women.”
Yet, brands of course waste no time in taking part in those “trends”. In an opinion piece for Contagious, Reddit’s head of global foresight Matt Klein warns that trends have “lost all meaning”. “In the process of chasing cool, brands have lost the purpose of analysing culture. Most of the signals considered ‘trends’ today are really nothing more than frivolous entertainment,” he notes.
Culture isn’t created by a single moment; subcultural forces don’t happen overnight. They are created by a catalog of activity; people come together to curate and manifest a point of view. The problem with an algorithmic system is that all of a sudden everything has billions of views, yet the engagement is lower than the bar you set for the guy you’re dating who texts you once a week.
By jumping into those conversations, brands can appear to be relatable. Yet there is a fine line between “being authentic and relatable” and being manipulated by the algorithm. Take the bandwagon off the equation, what would people say about the brands? Sure a brand can pretend to be depressed or broke to be relatable and we won’t know you’ve generated millions of pounds in profit.
As the internet culture fades away…
The lifestyle era is passing by. Coined by researcher and technologist Toby Shorin, this era was about brands, culture and supply chains tied together by technology in the 2010s which resulted in a particular organisation of culture. This era was never about creating culture, it was about attaching brands to existing cultural contexts.
But it is being reorganised. “We are transitioning out of the era of Lifestyle, and into an era where the production of culture is valued—both subjectively and financially—on its own terms,” Shorin explains.
When the Internet culture fades away which, mind you, will, the surface-level cultural contexts that brands have been latching onto will disappear resultantly. Trends come and go but brands shouldn’t. To be part of culture or branch out into a subculture, brands should learn to participate in culture below the tip of the iceberg: learning the language, cultivating community, “adding another layer of depth to the community” they’re operating in.
It makes sense that we’re in a period of reflection. From an increasingly split on political issues between young men and women to much of Twitter (or X, again!) being left with chatbots and disinformation, the culture we’ve experienced and are part of is constantly changing. Perhaps in a distant future when some species do a deep dive into human anthropology, they’ll be confused by many of the aesthetics, “cores”, “waves” and I’m pretty sure they won’t be interested with which sped-up song has been used in the TikTok posts. What might be interesting, thought, is how we – and brands – react to the change tide.
*The name has been changed for confidentiality reasons. Or perhaps the author just calls himself Alexis for the extra added dramatic flair, and to avoid embarrassment.
