From Ordinary to Microcelebrity: typology of Iranian Instagram microcelebrities

New media capabilities like Instagram allow people to get involved in the creation of their persona. However, not everyone has the same conditions to become a microcelebrity, it is thus important to identify the mechanisms of microcelebrities in order to understand how they gain fame. The impacts of microcelebrities are not restricted to Instagram and they also affect social relationships in real space. The aim of this study is to present a typology of Iranian microcelebrities on Instagram, as well as analyze their mechanisms and represented themes in different genres like lifestyle, food, motivation, education, and beauty. This study focused on 236 Instagram posts from 50 microcelebrities and the research method was netnography with purposeful sampling. Based on the results, 23 types of microcelebrities in the popular genres were recognized. Also, 23 subthemes, 9 main themes, and 1 core theme were extracted. Life on screen, Instagram as a shop vitrine, Interweaving of emotional bonds and profit, unplanned activism, food as display, the shortcut to success, Individualism, fast-foodization of training, Instagrammable beauty, and McDonaldization of fame were themes extracted from the fivefold genres. Fame on Iranian Instagram is available for users as instant food and they try to become microcelebrities by adopting similar and fast-yielding mechanisms.
Keywords: Microcelebrity, Typology, McDonaldization, Instagram, Fame.
 Introduction
New media specifically Instagram have capabilities that allow people to become famous. Nowadays, Instagram users desire to be well-known in their favorite fields. Regardless of class, ethnicity, and gender, people can engage in autonomous activity in cyberspace without considering social norms and the requirements of fame, a process that is called “democratic fame” which facilitates the increased accessibility of ordinary people to the “ladder of fame” (Driessens, 2012: 646). However, not everyone has equal conditions to become famous, it is important to identify the mechanisms of microcelebrities in order to understand how they gain fame. Celebrity scholars consider the technological platform and the democratic space of social media as necessary but insufficient conditions for being a microcelebrity (Driessens 2012; Senft 2013, 2008; Marwick and Boyd 2013, 2011; Abidin 2018).
They believe that a set of individual and structural conditions in creating microcelebrities and their durability is involved. Regarding these explanations, Iranian Instagram-based microcelebrities practice in diverse genres such as lifestyle, fashion and beauty, food, education, health, travel, and so on. They create their own audiences, use particular mechanisms, generate and share content on their Instagram accounts, and influence their followers. Nevertheless, the impacts of microcelebrities are not restricted to Instagram, they also affect social relationships, lifestyle, body culture, education, and other aspects of everyday life in the real space of society.
Purpose
The aim of this study is to present a typology of Iranian microcelebrities on Instagram, as well as scrutinize their mechanisms and represented themes in five genres including lifestyle, food, motivation, education, and beauty, and examine the consequences of their virtual practices which has not been addressed in previous researches.
Methodology
This study focused on 236 Instagram posts and stories from 50 microcelebrities in five various genres including lifestyle, food, motivation, education, and beauty. The research method was netnography. In addition, the observational approach was adopted as the main strategy in this research. Samples were chosen by purposeful sampling with these criteria; continuous activity on Instagram for more than 3 years, having a business account with public status, and producing content related to their genre. The unit of analysis was microcelebrities’ accounts contents (both posts and stories). And, the thematic analysis was used to analyze the data.
Result
Regarding the findings, 23 types of microcelebrities were recognized in popular genres and also 23 subthemes, 9 main themes, and 1 core theme were extracted from the fivefold genres. Life on screen, Instagram as a shop vitrine, Interweaving of emotional bonds and profit, unplanned activism, food as display, the shortcut to success, individualism, fast-foodization of training, Instagrammable beauty, and McDonaldization of fame were represented themes among lifestyle bloggers.
Instagram as a shop vitrine was a main theme among lifestyle bloggers. The displaying of material assets, entertainment and happiness, and consuming luxurious goods and products, were integral parts of the lifestyle bloggers' accounts that promoted "conspicuous consumption". Also, life on screen was another central theme among lifestyle bloggers. They recorded everyday affairs, considered Instagram as a diary and improved their reputation by dramatizing their daily life. Interweaving emotional bonds and profit as another theme explain the fact that bloggers use their digitalized personas to access social and economic capital. Unplanned activism was a prevalent theme among female bloggers, they bypassed official norms such as hijab by adopting different "tactics".
Food as a display was the key theme among food bloggers. By treating the follower as a customer and creating a media persona, they attempted to gain fame and income, and for realizing this goal, they attracted followers with various tricks and strategies. Themes including the shortcut to success and individualism were represented by motivational bloggers. They promoted neoliberal ideology in society by accentuating personal abilities regardless of the structural contexts with their one-dimensional attitude. Fast-foodization of education was extracted from educational bloggers. They provided simple and fast-yielding content for their followers by combining education, entertainment, and profit. They also cultivated the commoditization of education. And, Instagrammable beauty was a significant theme among beauty bloggers. They displayed the ideal body and reproduced standard body features. Last but not least, the core theme was the McDonaldization of fame. According to observations, bloggers mostly attracted attention and obtained symbolic capital by performing micro-celebrification mechanisms including exhibitive intimacy, authenticity, selective disclosure, self-branding, and life-streaming.
Discussion
According to Gorge Ritzer’s McDonaldization theory and its components; efficiency, calculability, predictability, and control (Ritzer, 2002), microcelebrities are prosumers. They consume content on social media and simultaneously they generate content independently by removing media intermediaries which signify their efficiency. They also have a calculability characteristic with respect to their account visit reports. In other words, more followers bring them firm online status, validity, and further profit. In regard to predictability, the fame industry offers specific and similar practices that users should perform to become a microcelebrity. So, it is easy to replace one microcelebrity with another, since most of them look alike. For exerting the control feature, microcelebrities monitor and control the way content is posted on their Instagram accounts to promote their fame by increasing and maintaining their number of followers.
Conclusion
Despite the different activities of microcelebrities, they often practice similarly to each other and the dominance of quantity over quality of fame is seen in their representations. The results demonstrate that fame is available to users on Instagram like fast food. In other words, McDonaldized fame allows early access to fame regardless of gender, class, and other factors. Eventually, People try to become famous and turn themselves into microcelebrities by adopting similar and fast-yielding mechanisms.