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4->'''Max:''' It's only Powerline, dad. The biggest rock star on the planet.\
5'''Goofy:''' Ohhh, not bigger than Xavier Cugat, the Mambo King! ''Everybody mambo!''
6-->-- ''WesternAnimation/AGoofyMovie'' (1995)
7
8Pop-Culture Isolation is basically a case of pop-culture myopia of sorts, where celebrities, music genres, media or events are huge and significant in one subculture or ethnic group, but elsewhere nobody knows they exist or is indifferent to them altogether. We're not talking about separate countries here, but ''within'' the same country or region. A lot of this is especially prevalent in entertainment media, affecting music in particular (radio is usually fingered as being the main cause, as it was and still is very isolated in terms of programming and format, leading to accusations of segregation).
9
10Let's face it, there are cultural barriers, and people thrive in their own microcosm. Another likely reason for this is because mainstream media is so homogenized and is prone to favoring monochrome pop culture that other cultures [[StartMyOwn start their own]] pop-culture media outlets. That fuels this trope even further for better or for worse. This isolation of pop culture can lead to such ignorance as CowboyBebopAtHisComputer. It's even possible for this trope to happen within the same culture. This, in turn, resulted in a pop cultural BrokenBase or FandomRivalry. HipHop is a good example of this (see Hip-Hop's BrokenBase entry). This trope possibly could lead to MonochromeCasting.
11
12Expecting Pop-Culture Isolation not to be an issue is a sure way to incur PopCulturalOsmosisFailure.
13
14For [[ItsPopularNowItSucks some people with a certain ideology]], however, Pop Cultural Isolation may be seen as a ''good'' thing.
15
16Contrast SmallReferencePools and PopCulturalOsmosis. May lead to GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff or AmericansHateTingle. Could also overlap with CriticalDissonance. This trope along with PublicMediumIgnorance goes together like peanut butter and jelly. This often is the cause of MinorityShowGhetto. Compare with FanMyopia, which is when the fans of a particular form of pop culture believe it to be far more well-known amongst the general public than it actually is, and ObscurePopularity.
17
18By the way, did you know there are people and places out there who discuss and list the tools of storytelling but have almost no knowledge of wiki editing or Website/TVTropes? It's very true. Do you know about them? Probably not.
19
20-----
21!!Example subpages
22
23[[index]]
24* PopCultureIsolation/{{Film}}
25* PopCultureIsolation/FoodAndDrink
26* PopCultureIsolation/{{Music}}
27* PopCultureIsolation/{{Sports}}
28* PopCultureIsolation/RealLife
29[[/index]]
30
31!!Other examples:
32[[foldercontrol]]
33
34[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
35%%* A good deal of {{anime}} and {{manga}}, outside ''Franchise/SailorMoon'', ''Franchise/DragonBall'', ''Anime/SpeedRacer'' and the like, are not well known outside the fanbase. Just see the TropeNamer for CowboyBebopAtHisComputer for a specific example. It's certainly not helped by the AnimationAgeGhetto and [[AllAnimeIsNaughtyTentacles the stereotype that anime is misogynist, tentacle-obsessed trash]]. (The obvious inconsistency of these two stereotypes doesn't seem to matter.)
36%%* The SuperRobot genre is popular among anime fans but is fairly obscure outside of those circles. If giant robots are mentioned by people outside the anime fandom, they'll usually be referring to the ''Film/TransformersFilmSeries'', the Megazord from ''Series/MightyMorphinPowerRangers'', or ''Film/PacificRim''.
37* This even shows up within manga fandom itself. Creators like Creator/NaokiUrasawa and Fumi Yoshinaga (of ''Manga/AntiqueBakery'' fame) have multiple series published in the US, constantly appear on "best of" lists, and have won tons of awards - yet are virtually unknown outside of the "grown-up comic fans" circle.
38%%* Not only creators but some manga magazines have a chance of remaining obscure despite their large fandoms. Magazines like ''Big Comic Spirits'', ''Manga Action'', or ''B's Log'' don't get much press outside of their respective fanbases outside of one or two well-known series, especially if there isn't a popular anime made from one of them to boost recognition.
39%%* Creator/NorioWakamoto, Creator/RieKugimiya, Creator/JunFukuyama, Creator/KanaeIto, and many other popular Japanese voice actors definitely qualify. Mention the name "Norio Wakamoto" to any random passerby. The chances of it even threatening to switch on a light bulb are low indeed. Even within anime fandom, if a fan primarily watches anime dubbed and/or doesn't interact with fans who concern themselves with the voice actors on the regular basis, it's not unlikely for them to not be familiar with even the biggest names in the anime Japanese voice acting circle. Likewise with dub voice actors and anime fans who don't watch dubs. Most of them know Creator/SteveBlum and Creator/CrispinFreeman, but when you move beyond that, you're likely evoke a "Who?" response.
40%%* The MagicalGirl genre is one of the longest-standing and most profitable genres of anime and manga. Yet, few have much of an international reach outside of the original ''Anime/SailorMoon'' anime. The few that are internationally dubbed either fall into the GirlShowGhetto, are ScrewedByTheMerchandise, or are derided as niche ripoffs of ''Sailor Moon''. Even works with strong internet fandoms, such as the DarkerAndEdgier ''Franchise/LyricalNanoha'' and MagicalGirlGenreDeconstruction pioneer ''Franchise/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica'', haven't reached the mainstream. In Japan, ''Anime/PrettyCure'' is a CashCowFranchise but it suffers strongly from NoExportForYou.
41* ''Manga/{{Gon}}'' is already an obscure manga character in Japan, but few people in America know him for anything more than being in ''VideoGame/Tekken3''.
42%%* ''Manga/OnePiece'' is exceptionally well known in its country of origin, but outside of Japan the manga and anime were hampered by an incredibly poor English dub from 4Kids that fundamentally changed large swaths of the dialogue and edited scenes to make it more kid friendly. Despite this, a cult following found itself watching the subbed version of the original Japanese and people eventually found the English dub from Funimation that keeps most of the dialogue intact without removing any scenes. Bringing up scenes to someone who hasn't kept up to it, or pointing out to them how there is over 900 episodes of the anime can catch someone entirely off guard, and even if they ''want'' to join the series at this point, they have a lot of catching up to do.
43* ''Manga/SazaeSan'' is an incredibly popular anime and manga franchise in its native Japan. Airings of ''Sazae-san'' on Sunday evening regularly have viewership numbering over a tenth of the Japanese population. However, it has never been released outside of its country nor has it been dubbed in any other language besides Japanese.
44[[/folder]]
45
46%%[[folder:Comic Books]]
47%%* ComicBook/{{Superman}}, ComicBook/{{Batman}}, ComicBook/{{Robin}}, ComicBook/WonderWoman, ComicBook/GreenLantern, ComicBook/SpiderMan, the ComicBook/FantasticFour, ComicBook/XMen (at least ComicBook/{{Wolverine}} and possibly ComicBook/{{Cyclops}} and ComicBook/{{Storm|MarvelComics}}), ComicBook/{{Aquaman}}, ComicBook/TheFlash, ComicBook/IronMan, ComicBook/CaptainAmerica, [[ComicBook/TheMightyThor Thor]], and the [[ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk Hulk]] are the only superhero exceptions to this trope. Even then, the only of their supporting cast to be generally known by people are ComicBook/TheJoker, ComicBook/LoisLane, and possibly ComicBook/LexLuthor and ComicBook/{{Catwoman}}. J. Jonah Jameson may have crossed the threshold as well, helped by Creator/JKSimmons' performance in the ''Film/SpiderManTrilogy''.
48%%* Female and black superheroes are a big victim of this trope. Whenever a new (or newly popular) black or female character is mentioned in a news story (especially when the entire point of the story is that most superheroes are white men, such as when a paper interviews a local artist who's just getting into the industry, almost always involving a quote along the lines of "reading comics as a kid, I always wondered why there weren't more characters who looked like me") the article will act as if there are, at most, three black superheroes (the average non-comic-reader ''might'' recognise ComicBook/{{Storm|MarvelComics}}, ComicBook/LukeCage and ComicBook/BlackPanther, and [[ComicBook/GreenLantern John Stewart]] if they [[WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague grew up in the nineties]]) and no superheroines except Wonder Woman. It's the same with gay and lesbian characters, except worse, because trying to discuss gay or lesbian superheroes often seems to attract homophobic trolls, plus there's still the assumption that only kids read comic books. Anytime an article in mainstream media talks about a gay or lesbian superhero, you can expect to see a shitload of comments about the "gay agenda" or "gays forcing acceptance down children's throats"...
49%%* Speaking of the assumption that comic books are for kids, whenever a comic that is specifically ''not'' kid-friendly gets adapted into a movie, such as ''ComicBook/TheCrow'', ''ComicBook/{{Watchmen}}'', or ''ComicBook/{{Deadpool}}'', you're definitely going to hear stories of [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids unsuspecting parents bringing their kids to see it (despite the R-rating!) and then being shocked and appalled when an R-rated movie based on comics meant for adults is filled with graphic violence and sex]]. In fact, the creators of ''Deadpool'' outright predicted this and warned those unknowing parents "don't bring the kids" right in the trailers -- not that this kept them from doing it anyway, of course. Even reviewers get in on this at times. One reviewer of ''Watchmen'' spent most of the review lamenting that we were now marketing extreme violence and adult content to children. When tons of readers commented that the movie and comic both were meant for adults, the reviewer stood by her words, stating that the existence of ''Watchmen'' action figures proved this movie was meant for children. Evidently, she had no clue that nerd culture includes grown men and women collecting action figures and that there are ''many'' lines of action figures marketed exclusively to adults.
50%%* Ask anyone outside of comics fandom to name a comic book writer, and you'll probably get a mention of Creator/StanLee (his legendary cameos in Marvel superhero movies probably help). Maybe Creator/AlanMoore and Creator/NeilGaiman as well, if they're a certain sort of literary. Any other name will be met with a resounding "who?", no matter how popular or prolific they are within the comics industry.
51%%* UndergroundComics: Massively influential in the 1960s and 1970s, read by many young people and graphic artists. Yet to the general public the genre literally ''is'' "underground", because they are hardly aware of any titles or artists existing, or if they happened to read one in a store they assume it's all PornWithoutPlot. The only artist to get some kind of notoriety in the mainstream is Creator/RobertCrumb, yet most people only know him for ''ComicBook/FritzTheCat''.
52%%* Many European comic strips are well-known in Europe and nowhere else. Ask a typical American citizen about ''ComicBook/TheSmurfs'', and they'll probably know what you're talking about, if only because of the cartoon, but ''ComicBook/JohanAndPeewit'' will probably draw blank stares (unless they've seen the episodes of the show featuring them). Some may have heard of ''ComicBook/{{Tintin}}''. A small handful might know about ''[[ComicBook/{{Asterix}} Asterix & Obelix]]''. Anything else might as well not exist.
53%%[[/folder]]
54
55[[folder:Comic Strips]]
56* {{Conversed}} in ''ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}}'' when a schoolboy sarcastically comments on the fact that Dilbert considers it a shocking failure of public education that the boy can't name the highest waterfall in Africa, but Dilbert himself doesn't know who Music/MCHammer is and dismisses it as worthless trivia.
57%%* Most comic strips start out in only one newspaper (usually a paper in a region of a country where the cartoonist works) and ''then'' are nationally syndicated, sometimes not until years later. More than a few strips have ended up dying on the vine -- at least in some parts of the country -- due to [[MoralGuardians censorship]].
58[[/folder]]
59
60%%[[folder:Disney]]
61%%* As strange as it may sound today, Creator/{{Disney}} fell victim to this trope for a very long time within the United States. While the studio was always massively popular from UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} (Walt Disney's birthplace, though he preferred to think of Marceline, Missouri [[note]] the model for Disneyland's Main Street, U.S.A. [[/note]] as his ''true'' hometown) to the west coast (''especially'' in UsefulNotes/{{California}}), everywhere east of Chicago its reception was a bit more lukewarm. Film critics considered the studio's output kitschy at best, and people used the term "Mickey Mouse" to refer to something poorly constructed or put together. The main reason for the Disney attractions at the 1964 New York World's Fair was for Creator/WaltDisney to prove to his studio that there was a market for Disney on the east coast, an experiment which proved successful and ultimately culminated in the opening of Disney World in central Florida in 1971; but even then, they didn't really gain the reputation they have today until [[MediaNotes/TheRenaissanceAgeOfAnimation the late 1980s/early 1990s]].\
62The "proof in the pudding" example of this that really forced the studio to make a push eastward was probably the 1984 corporate leadership change that saw three outside studio executives take control of the company. While new president Frank Wells was a California native who was very familiar with Disney, the two New York City natives were not: new studio head Jeffrey Katzenberg's knowledge of Disney came from seeing ''WesternAnimation/{{Pinocchio}}'' once when he was a kid, while new CEO Michael Eisner had never seen any Disney film growing up, which led to some serious culture clashes (particularly on Katzenberg's end) in the first few years with the California-based creatives that Wells often had to mediate.
63%%* Despite being one of the biggest Broadway stars in history, Creator/IdinaMenzel is known to the mainstream for two roles: Queen Elsa from ''WesternAnimation/Frozen2013'' and, to a lesser extent, Elphaba from ''Theatre/{{Wicked}}''. It reached memetic levels when John Travolta bizarrely butchered her name into "Adele Dazeem" at the 2014 Oscars.
64%%* Almost anything related to the Ride/DisneyThemeParks is going to be confined to that particular fandom compared to the movies and television shows, which due to their relative ubiquity and more easily accessible mediums can reach a far larger number of people. This is true even within the larger Disney fandom - while names like Jack Wagner, Peter Renaday and Wally Boag are revered by a particular segment of the fanbase, other Disney fans may be hard-pressed to have heard of them.
65%%[[/folder]]
66
67%%[[folder:Fan Works]]
68%%* There's a whole subculture dedicated to this. But it's only popular with the geek side of the Internet.
69%%[[/folder]]
70
71[[folder:Literature]]
72* ''Literature/{{Phenomena}}'': is quite a big hit in Norway with the books often sold out in bookstores and the board game is completely out of stock. It has been translated to only a few languages, making it very little known about with other people around the world.
73* ''Literature/{{Zane}}'' novels, black erotic literature, probably count.
74%%* You probably know the Franchise/CthulhuMythos. You probably also know who Creator/HPLovecraft is. But do you know the names of Jim Turner, Creator/RobertBloch,[[note]]At least outside of writing the novel ''Film/{{Psycho}}'' was based on[[/note]] or Robert M. Price? No, Lovecraft didn't write ''all'' the Mythos. It's actually sort of like Franchise/StarWarsExpandedUniverse. Moreover, could you name any of the actual ''works'' of the Mythos? Probably ''Call of Cthulhu'' or if you're really in the know, ''At the Mountains of Madness'' may ring a bell. Same goes for any deities other than Cthulhu like Yog-Sothoth, Azazoth, or Nyarlathotep. Although the Mythos [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff is quite popular in places]] like France, Spain and Latin America in general.
75* InUniverse example meets TruthInTelevision in Creator/JorgeLuisBorges short story '' "Averroe's Search" '': Averroes, a philosopher confined to the Islamic orb, never could understand the terms ''Tragedy'' and ''Comedy''.
76* It's amazing how many people appear not to have heard of Creator/TerryPratchett, even though he is the second most-read author in the UK, and the seventh most-read author in the USA, across all genres. One newspaper interview lampshaded this with the introductory paragraphs including the line "Terry Pratchett, for those of you still pretending to have no idea who I'm talking about, is..."
77* In ''Literature/{{Murderess}}'', when Lu crosses over to [[MagicalLand Greywall’d]], she enters an inn and tries to order a hot cocoa. The owner’s son is bewildered, as cocoa doesn’t exist there.
78%%* Creator/GeorgeRRMartin, best known as the author of the ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'', is another example. He and his series are household names amongst fantasy book fans, but to mainstream audiences, the franchise is only known for serving as the source material for its [[AdaptationDisplacement far more famous]] TV adaptation ''Series/GameOfThrones''. Not only are these audiences probably unaware he's written anything else, most of them didn't even know of the series', or his, existence until after the show became a hit -- or, for that matter, the fact that the book series is called ''A Song of Ice and Fire'' and not ''Game of Thrones'' (the first book in the series is called '''''A''' Game of Thrones'').
79* ''Literature/RipleysBureauOfInvestigation'': Barely anyone, not even fans of [[Franchise/RipleysBelieveItOrNot Ripley's Believe It Or Not]], know about it.
80* ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' and its related works has an intensely fervent fandom on the forum Website/SpaceBattlesDotCom and various places peripheral to [=SpaceBattles=] (its spinoff forums, the [[UltimateShowdownOfUltimateDestiny "versus debate" community]], certain fanfiction sites, this wiki). On those sites, fanworks are so prolific that FanworkOnlyFans are downright common, and those who dislike ''Worm'' have often lamented how it buries discussion of everything else by sheer volume, to the point of demanding a containment forum for it. Outside of those places, it is at best obscure and more often completely unheard of.
81%%* Young adult literature, obviously. Because these novels and short stories are read neither by single, middle-aged or elderly adults (unlike generally "serious" fiction, which is acknowledged by critics and the media) nor by young parents with prepubescent children (as is Dr. Seuss, etc.), they are relegated to the readership of adolescents and tweens, whom mainstream culture tends to ignore except as a marketing demographic (and today's businesspeople are not trying to sell a lot of books). Go ahead: ask your typical fiftysomething Baby Boomer who Wilson Rawls was; they probably won't remember, if they ever knew about him to begin with. Some series, such as ''Literature/HarryPotter'' and ''Literature/TheHungerGames'', do manage to "cross over" and become popular with audiences [[PeripheryDemographic outside their intended 12-19 year old demographic]].
82%%* Same thing could be said for SpeculativeFiction (''SciFi'', ''{{Fantasy}}'', and ''{{Horror}}''). This also swerves into SciFiGhetto territory as well. For SciFiGhetto territory as well. For Sci-Fi, the Big Three of Creator/IsaacAsimov, Creator/RobertAHeinlein, and Creator/ArthurCClarke are most likely to be known, at least in regards to their most famous works. Fantasy writers are limited to Creator/JRRTolkien and Creator/JKRowling, and then only as the authors of ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings''/''Literature/TheHobbit'' and ''Literature/HarryPotter'', respectively. Creator/GeorgeRRMartin is starting to become this as well; see his entry below. The only well-known modern Horror writer is Creator/StephenKing, and most of his best-known works are better-known through film.
83[[/folder]]
84
85[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
86* ''Series/TheGame2006'' is one of the most, if not the most, popular drama/comedies in the black community. Most white people aren't even aware of the show's existence. The show is now on Creator/{{BET}} but even when it was on CW, it never really found a strong white audience.
87%%* [[Series/TheGeorgeLopezShow George Lopez]] and Creator/ChrisRock are interesting examples since before they had their own self titled sitcoms they were well known, but they weren't ''well liked'' by anyone outside of their targeted demographics.
88%%* Steve Harvey is a very popular comedian in the black community, but outside of it, he's mostly known for being the host of ''Series/FamilyFeud'' and [[NeverLiveItDown the guy who screwed up the announcement of the 2015 Miss Universe pageant winner]]. This is arguably true of most Black comedians before they land a sitcom deal, or hell, any comedian since they tend to only be popular within a certain niche (women, college students, blacks, Latinos, Asians, other ethnicities, etc.)
89%%* ''Series/{{Roseanne}}'' contrasted with ''Series/TheCosbyShow'', not in terms of race, but class. In fact, you could swap out ''Roseanne'' for ''Series/GoodTimes'' and get the same results.
90* The popularity of ''Series/{{Martin}}''. Creator/VH1's ''I Love the '90s'' actually brought up that the show was virtually unknown to white viewers, in part because it was scheduled against ''Series/{{Seinfeld}}''.
91* Similarly, ''Series/LivingSingle'' contrasted with ''Series/{{Friends}}'', some even going as far as to say the latter ripped off the former or was at least inspired by it.
92* ''Series/DoctorWho'' provides an age-gap version of this trope all by itself; there are passionate fans of the series who either had (or continue to have) no idea that there was a show before 2005 and/or have no interest in watching any of the old series.
93* In-show example: in the BBC documentary ''Deborah, 13, Servant of God'' (about a young girl from a fundamentalist Christian family who was very zealous in her faith) there was one point where she is asked if she'd ever heard of the likes of Music/BritneySpears- and being not immersed in popular culture like most teenage girls (having no television, being homeschooled etc.) she didn't. In response, however, she asked if most people knew who a certain (fairly obscure) Biblical character was.
94* Arguably one factor counting for the success of ''Series/TheArsenioHallShow'' in TheNineties was the fact that he, being a hip, younger, black late night talk show host in a field mostly populated with older white hosts and audiences, booked celebrities, politicians, music acts, activists, etc. (particularly those who catered to urban audiences or were in an ethnic or sexual minority) that his competition would rarely to never touch, while still being mainstream enough to appeal to a mass audience. Ultimately this would help Arkansas governor UsefulNotes/BillClinton reach audiences he likely would never reach on other talk shows, which would help him get elected in 1992.
95%%* Christian-themed television shows can be slightly puzzling to non-Christian viewers. ''Series/TouchedByAnAngel'' is probably the most prominent example of this; it lasted for 9 seasons mostly off the backs of its devoutly Christian audience.
96* ''Series/AlmostLive'' was a {{Long Runner|s}} in UsefulNotes/{{Seattle}} and a television icon. ''Series/MadTV1995'' was not even going to be ''shown'' in Seattle because the local Creator/{{FOX}} affiliate didn't think the show could stand against it. Even now, you could probably get half of the city to give up coffee for a month to get a box set [[note]]And considering this is a town with [[MustHaveCaffeine 2-3 espresso carts per block]], that's saying plenty[[/note]]. When Creator/ComedyCentral picked it up during the Nineties, during the world's grunge-induced fascination for all things Seattle, it crashed and burned hard because much of the humor was based on local-area customs and stereotypes. It was still a great springboard for ''Series/BillNyeTheScienceGuy'', however.
97* ''Series/{{Victorious}}''. During its run on Creator/{{Nickelodeon}} it was a very popular show with a large fanbase. After it ended, Music/ArianaGrande (who wasn't even the lead star of the show) embarked on a massively successful career as a pop singer and hasn't looked back since. For most people outside the fanbase, if they even know about it in the first place, they only know it as "the show Ariana Grande was on before she got famous". Those people aren't even aware of its ''actual'' lead star, Music/VictoriaJustice.
98* ''Series/TheXFactor'': One of the most popular shows of all time in the U.K., it's known internationally almost exclusively for discovering five teenage boys and turning them into a boy band. That boy band would be christened Music/OneDirection and would completely eclipse the show they were born on in their global takeover over the next half-decade.
99%%* Although Jimmy Savile was one of the most popular British entertainers when he was alive thanks to his hit show ''Jim'll Fix It'', internationally he was unknown until the revelations of his horrific sex crimes after his death.
100* ''Series/{{Bizaardvark}}''. It’s a popular show with young teenagers on Creator/DisneyChannel, but how many people outside the audience know anything about it other than the fact that highly controversial web video star Jake Paul was on it?
101** As of 2021, with Music/OliviaRodrigo now being a world-famous pop star, people now acknowledge it as the show that Olivia was on before she made it big.
102%%* Creator/{{MTV}} was also the cause of a lot of this, so much so that MTV refused to acknowledge that 90% of the songs on the chart were by black singers and kept trying to push a next Big White Hope like Winger or Warrant. There was such an embarrassing disconnect between their Top 20 played videos and the Billboard charts back then. Music/DavidBowie called them out for it during an interview with the network. They eventually caved in with the meteoric rise of Music/MichaelJackson though. TheNineties version of MTV subverted this trope, though, by basically not putting music in a box or programming block (Yo! MTV Raps, 120 Minutes, and Headbanger's Ball being the exceptions). On the other hand, this might be why they started putting music in a programming block and eventually [[NetworkDecay stopped showing vids all together circa the early 00's.]] Simply put, nobody was gonna wade through rap vids to see a rock vid or vice versa.
103%%* According to Creator/VH1 Classic, New Wave and Hair Metal were the only music genres in TheEighties. Care about [[CollegeRadio college]] [[AlternativeRock rock]] or old school hip hop? Hope you're willing to stay up until 3:30 AM! [=VH1=] Classic's ''Series/ThatMetalShow'' definitely seems to have a bias towards hard rock and heavy metal bands from the 70s, 80s, and 90s. Interviews with metal musicians from more recent bands are few and far between.
104%%* As surprising as it may seem on the Internet, there are other TV shows beside ''Series/BreakingBad'', ''Series/GameOfThrones'', ''Series/TheWalkingDead2010'', ''Series/DoctorWho'', ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'' and ''Series/{{Supernatural}}''. There are still lots of people who don't subscribe to premium cable channels or subscribe to cable at all. And who presumably do not [[NewMediaAreEvil illegally download]] them.
105%%* An interesting example of Genre overlapping with Region. In the '80s, Canada began to aggressively court American film and television producers as a relatively cheap filming location due to the exchange rate between the US and Canadian dollars. The one genre that really snapped this up was sci-fi/fantasy (''Series/TheXFiles,'' The ''Franchise/StargateVerse,'' ''Series/{{Smallville}},'' ''Series/{{Supernatural}},'' ''Series/{{Arrow}}'', ''Series/{{The Flash|2014}}'' etc.) possibly to allow the lower production costs to offset the higher special effects costs that sci-fi inevitably has. Due to the use of local Canadian actors, it creates an interesting situation of Canadian actors being easily recognizable to American sci-fi/fantasy fans, but unknown to the mainstream. A similar effect happens with the combined talent pool of Australia/New Zealand, thanks to New Zealand-filmed shows such as ''Series/HerculesTheLegendaryJourneys,'' ''Series/XenaWarriorPrincess,'' ''Franchise/PowerRangers'' and ''Series/LegendOfTheSeeker'', alongside ''Film/TheLordOfTheRings'' and ''Film/TheHobbit'' film series.
106%%* Before the 2000s, most Americans who weren't serious comedy nerds had probably never seen a British TV show. Most of the shows that did cross UsefulNotes/ThePond were classic comedy shows like ''Series/MontyPythonsFlyingCircus'' and ''Series/AreYouBeingServed''. These were usually seen on low-rated Creator/{{PBS}} stations. With the rise of BBC America and Internet distribution, ''Series/DoctorWho'' (which was previously only a CultClassic in America) and other British shows have garnered wide stateside audiences.
107* Each entry of the Canadian teen drama franchise Franchise/{{Degrassi}} is subject to this trope in interesting ways:
108** The first three series that make up the "classic" era (''Series/TheKidsOfDegrassiStreet'', ''Series/DegrassiJuniorHigh'', and ''Series/DegrassiHigh'') were among the most respected, well-loved and top-rated programs in their homeland. Stateside, they aired to relative obscurity on PBS, and American audiences were largely unfamiliar with the show's storied legacy by the time ''Series/DegrassiTheNextGeneration'' took off on Creator/TheN. Because of the [[GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff runaway success of ''Next Generation'' in the US]], it [[NewbieBoom attracted legions of new American fans who were not aware of anything that came before]], and the result of this has had a permanent impact on the general public's perception of the show, with the fandom greatly populated by American fans whose first exposure to the series was ''The Next Generation''. A lot has been said about why the reboot overshadowed its roots so severely, and while some fans bring up the generational difference and SequelDisplacement as the likely factors, this trope might be a better explanation, as Canadian media is more likely to acknowledge the franchise as a whole rather than just ''The Next Generation''.
109** ''The Next Generation'' in of itself is mostly known to younger and non-Canadian audiences as the show that Aubrey Graham was on before he became Music/{{Drake}}. Finding someone in that demographic who actually saw the show is a lot harder.
110[[/folder]]
111
112%%[[folder:Pinball]]
113%%* {{Pinball}} has been hit with this extremely hard. Despite being a major part of American culture for nearly a century, most people would be hard-pressed to name more than one or two pinball manufacturers or [[PinballCreators designers]], if at all, and as far as the games themselves, you won't hear much beyond ''Pinball/TheAddamsFamily'', ''Pinball/Terminator2JudgmentDay'', or ''Pinball/JurassicParkDataEast''. The history of the field is an even bigger mystery to most -- folks who recall the controversy behind [[UsefulNotes/AlGore Tipper Gore]] and the Parental Advisory labels, ''VideoGame/{{Mortal Kombat|1992}}'' and the [[UsefulNotes/EntertainmentSoftwareRatingBoard ESRB,]] or [[UsefulNotes/TheComicsCode Frederic Wertham and "Seduction of the Innocent"]] will seldom have any knowledge of the nation's ''thirty-year ban'' against pinball.
114%%** It's rather telling that TV Tropes itself went for nearly a '''decade''' with only one page about {{Pinball}}. Administrivia/ThereIsNoSuchThingAsNotability, indeed.
115%%** On a similar vein, the aforementioned naming of pinball manufacturers and designers would be some very obscure trivia to a normal person, but they are common knowledge among pinball fans, and some of these communities (thankfully just a minority) could mock and look down on you for not being familiar with them, even if you've just gotten started.
116%%[[/folder]]
117
118[[folder:Print Media]]
119* ''Magazine/RollingStone'' has been accused of having a rock bias. ''RS'' is also accused of 60s-70s bias in their lists.
120* ''The Source'' magazine, being a genre-specific mag, is this by default.
121* When ''FineScaleModeler'' did an article on [=GunPla=] -- the hobby of building Franchise/{{Gundam}} plastic model kits -- it was an unusual and controversial step. This despite the fact that the [=GunPla=] market ''dwarfs'' FSM's target market, American modelers of realistic vehicles. This is not unknown in the plastic modelling community; in Great Britain, the "orthodox" historically-based hobby tends to look down on sci-fi and fantasy modelers. The respective readerships of ''Military Modelling'' and ''Magazine/WhiteDwarf'' do not overlap, and Warhammer topics almost never make it into the "mainstream" modelling press - MilMod got complaints from readers when it tested this particular water.
122* ''Paper'' is a small, independent entertainment magazine. While they do have a following in the New York City Area, they're known to the general public only for the Creator/KimKardashian "Break The Internet" cover.
123* Few people outside of France know anything about ''Charlie Hebdo'' magazine other than the fact that its offices were subject to a terrorist attack in January 2015.
124* ''The Idler'' is a British satire magazine claiming to promote the ethics of idling. While they do have a small cult following, they're known to the general public, especially in the UK, only for their ''Crap...'' series of books (such as ''Crap Jobs'', ''Crap Holidays'', and most famously ''Crap Towns'').
125%%* Lowrider mags, vs custom car mags (like DUB magazine), sport tuner car mags, and American muscle car mags. There's overlap but they're somewhat significantly separated. Plus each scene has its own car culture, and preference of female models. Mags like DUB almost always have black girls AND Hispanic females, whereas the lowrider mags are more or less exclusively Hispanic, the tuner mags are almost always southeast Asian, and the muscle car mags are almost always white. Illustrative example: Ask a gearhead what a "Donk" is and he/she will reply that it's any car with huge rims, very thin-walled tires, a very expensive and flamboyant paint job and other hallmarks of "bling." Ask an editor at a Lowrider mag (or any "authentic" Lowrider enthusiast) and he/she will tell you that it's specifically a 1970s Chevrolet Caprice (independent of whether or not it's stock or blinged out - it's just a slang term for that specific type of car. He/she will also tell you that "Bricks" are 80s Caprices and "Bubbles" are 90s Caprices due to their general shape). Of course, ask an average person on the street and expect to get a blank stare.
126%%* Erotic or porn magazines like ''Playboy'', ''Hustler'', ''Mayfair'', ''Penthouse'',... are all well known as brands, but to most people in the mainstream these mags are just "titles". People will probably recognize Hugh Hefner as chief editor of "Playboy", but have no idea what other writers or cartoonists regularly contribute to these pages.
127%%* LightNovel magazines. There's a good chance the titles may reach the mainstream -- ''Literature/HaruhiSuzumiya''[[note]]From ''The Sneaker''[[/note]] and ''Literature/HarukaNogizakasSecret''[[note]]From ''Dengeki Bunko Magazine''[[/note]] to name a couple -- but the magazines themselves will only be brought up in reference to them or remembered as a collected work's publishing imprint.
128[[/folder]]
129
130%%[[folder:Professional Wrestling]]
131%%* The territory days of Pro Wrestling used to define this trope. A wrestler who may have been huge in one area may have been relatively unknown to fans in another area. The WWF expansion and cable tv pretty much put an end to this, however.
132%%* For that matter, wrestling itself could be a victim of this. Wrestlers like Wrestling/BretHart, Wrestling/MickFoley, Wrestling/JeffHardy, Wrestling/KurtAngle, Wrestling/BryanDanielson, and Wrestling/CMPunk are household names among wrestling fans but have little or no mainstream recognition. Only a handful of wrestlers are known to non-wrestling fans (i.e., Wrestling/HulkHogan, Wrestling/AndreTheGiant, Wrestling/RandySavage, Wrestling/TheUndertaker, [[Wrestling/DwayneJohnson The Rock]], [[Wrestling/StoneColdSteveAustin Steve Austin]], Wrestling/JohnCena, etc.)
133%%* It's often joked that wrestling is TwoDecadesBehind in pop culture. A lot of that can be attributed to Wrestling/VinceMcMahon, who is widely cited by just about everyone as incredibly out of touch with not only the wrestling audience itself but with pop culture in general. There are numerous stories of how Vince put the kibosh on a popular gimmick (i.e. Pirate Paul Burchill) referencing a current pop culture phenomenon because he didn't know anything about its source. Hell, despite being seen eating one numerous times, he had no idea what a ''burrito'' was until someone brought it up.
134%%[[/folder]]
135
136[[folder:Radio]]
137%%* Radio is usually blamed for this phenomenon when it comes to music isolation.
138%%** This troper want to lampshade a situation in Venezuela´s music industry. In Venezuela, there is a genre of music called "Joropo", representative of the culture of the country, but is mostly aired on radio in the center and west of the country. Due to the lack of attention, during the 80´s the goverment approved a law of 1:1 representation of Venezuelan singers and composers, with one foreign artist. This led to the rise of many pop singers of the moment (like José Luis Rodríguez or Guillermo Davila), with some Joropo singers like Reina Lucero or Reinaldo Armas. During Hugo Chavez administration, this law was promoted again, but forcing Joropo in all kind of programation, with one foreign singer by one Joropo singer, without considering the type of programation the radio have (like, hearing Joropo during Rock shows).
139%%* Several radio hosts, presenters, and stars are unknown to the general public unless they also happen to appear on TV.
140* Radio/JohnPeel was one of the most influential trend-setters in the British music industry, and famed for his willingness to play just about ''anything'' if he liked the sound of it, [[TheLastDJ regardless of what the higher-ups might think of it]]. A number of artists who would go on to be big names in the punk, metal and alternative scenes got their big break by mailing a demo-tape to his PO box at the BBC. Outside the UK, however, he's almost unknown, outside of a few people who might have heard his show on the BBC World Service and/or have heard of the ''Peel Sessions'' albums by artists who appeared on his show.
141* Willis Conover hosted a daily {{Jazz}} show on the Voice of America that had a huge audience in Eastern Europe during the height of the UsefulNotes/ColdWar, and he's often credited with singlehandedly spurring interest in jazz in the region. But nobody in America had any clue of who he was. There were two main reasons why: one was that VOA only broadcast on shortwave, and just a small fraction of Americans had shortwave radios. The other was that, while VOA was easily heard by Americans with shortwave sets, federal law prohibited VOA from targeting a domestic American audience, so the station couldn't promote Conover's show at all in his home country. What fans he had in America had to discover the show on their own.
142* As with the WGN example listed in Western Animation, the 1937 Christmas-themed children's RadioDrama ''The Cinnamon Bear'' has fallen into obscurity except in a few locations where it airs daily each December. Most notable among these is UsefulNotes/{{Portland}}, which has been crazy for ''The Cinnamon Bear'' since its debut, when it aired on two different stations. Even today multiple stations in Portland air it, and many other stations in Oregon do as well. The Cinnamon Bear and his SitcomArchnemesis the Crazy-Quilt Dragon are still iconic holiday season figures in the city, and there's even a popular Cinnamon Bear-themed river cruise every December.
143[[/folder]]
144
145[[folder:Tabletop Games]]
146%%* To most people, Roleplaying Games other than video games is ''maybe'' something nerds did in high school, and they may have heard the name ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'', but the idea of it being a complex hobby mostly pursued by adults is unthinkable. "Board games" means Monopoly or Risk. Miniature wargaming can only be explained in terms of chess and toy soldiers.
147%%* Similarly, most trading card games. Thousands of dollars in prizes are given away worldwide in some of the bigger tournaments (mostly ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'' or ''TabletopGame/YuGiOh''), but most people still consider them kids' games, and would only recognize a "professional" player if they cross over into something slightly more mainstream, like poker.
148%%* And even with poker, only a few of the big names are well-known. And with the consequences of the poker boom, very few outside hardcore poker nuts could tell you who won the most recent World Series of Poker main event.
149* The ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'' universe is a behemoth in geek circles and on the internet; besides being the dominant miniatures wargame with several other tabletop spinoffs there have been several popular videogames and hundreds of novels, many of which have cracked best-seller lists. In the mainstream, it's almost completely unknown.
150** So much so that the BBC news website headlined one story about it's 25th anniversary with 'Why are grown men still launching tabletop war?' - much to a torrent of derision in fandom pointing out that 'grown men' also watch twenty two millionaires kick a football around a field every weekend. And it was newsworthy that Creator/GamesWorkshop registered £180 million in sales during the Covid 19 pandemic 'despite shop closures', plus the article handily explained that it made 'fantasy role-playing games' in case the reader didn't know, and made a point to note that it was 'FTSE-traded' like a proper public company.
151* To the average board game player who tends to play the classics like ''TabletopGame/{{Monopoly}}'', ''TabletopGame/{{Sorry}}'', ''TabletopGame/{{Trouble}}'', etc, specifically with kids because those games are functionally designed for families, they may be surprised to find that companies like Fantasy Flights or others like Cool Mini or Not have a catalogue of dozens of games with decent rulebooks that are designed for adults. The market on these games is not particularly large (which is why major retailers don't tend to carry them), but is big enough that they are met with large numbers of preorders.
152* Among tabletop roleplayers ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'' is a behemoth, played by millions and probably the second most well known and commonly played RPG around. ''Outside'' of the TTRPG community it is little known as a brand and generally confused with ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons''.
153[[/folder]]
154
155[[folder:Theatre]]
156* The 1712 play ''Cato, a Tragedy'' is largely forgotten today, but odds are you'll recognize a few lines from it: "Give me liberty or give me death," "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country," and "It is not in the power of any man to command success, but you have done more—you have deserved it." That's right, it was so popular at the time of the American Revolution that it was quoted several times by major figures, including Nathan Hale choosing to reference it as ''his last words before being executed''.
157%%* Since theatre actors are usually not famous to the general public unless they appear in film or TV you can have actors who have a long and successful theatrical career, yet are completely unknown unless you often go to the theater.
158%%* Broadway actors often refer to themselves as "only famous for a couple of blocks". There are performers with astounding track records of roles and piles of awards who are absolute unknowns outside of New York City. Some have shaken this with success in film and television (such as Creator/KristinChenoweth, Creator/IdinaMenzel, Creator/CheyenneJackson, Creator/AaronTveit, Creator/LeaMichele, Creator/JonathanGroff, and Creator/MarkRylance in recent years), but going through a list of names of Tony winners will leave the average person scratching their head. From TheNewTens winners alone: Norbert Leo Butz? Sutton Foster? Audra [=McDonald=], who won a record-setting ''sixth'' acting Tony in 2014? This is ''somewhat'' justified. A successful Broadway show can launch a tour or sister production in another city -- most often London; the cities are Transatlantic siblings since it's easy to transfer a show from one to the other as there's no need to translate it into another language -- but the original leads usually don't leave New York. Most theater productions are not recorded for posterity, aside from cast albums for musicals, limiting the audience for these actors to devoted Broadway fans and those who come to New York and see them. This also applies to London's West End stars; just substitute Oliviers for Tonys -- Maria Friedman? Michael Ball? Creator/DouglasHodge? All unknown to the masses, and [[ClassicallyTrainedExtra usually relegated to supporting/minor roles or guest spots in film and TV]] -- [[MoneyDearBoy albeit well-compensated ones]] -- if they work in those media at all.
159%%* Theatre in general, at least in North America, has become something of a niche ''medium'' in the mainstream media. The Tony Awards are still regarded as one of the big four awards shows, along with the MediaNotes/{{Academy Award}}s (film), MediaNotes/{{Emmy Award}}s (television), and MediaNotes/{{Grammy Award}}s (music), but posts far smaller ratings than those three, owing to declining interest in what's making waves in New York City. Even entertainment-focused outlets tend to ignore live theatre unless someone famous in another medium decides to take a stab at Broadway. This, combined with a desire to bring in people who wouldn't see a show otherwise, leads to StuntCasting and/or limited-run shows that can accommodate a superstar's other commitments.
160[[/folder]]
161
162[[folder:Video Games]]
163* In-universe example: ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto'''s radio stations are a great example of this. Some of the [=DJs=] even take shots at the other stations.
164* Consoles (not counting shady NES clones) were a niche market in Eastern Europe for the better part of the nineties. If you went to Poland about 1992 or so and asked a random gamer about ''Metroid'', ''Final Fantasy'' or ''Legend of Zelda'', he'd stare at you blankly, then ask what computer were they released on.
165** In some parts of America, Nintendo was a byword for "gaming console" throughout the 90s due to their enormous market share in the industry, especially due to its revival of the home console market after MediaNotes/TheGreatVideoGameCrashOf1983. For a while, even dedicated gamers of a certain age would refer to most consoles as "a nintendo" (small "n" usually), even if it wasn't Nintendo made. Outside the US, Nintendo didn't have as much of a visible impact since gaming was largely PC driven.
166** In Russia a similar thing happened [[UsefulNotes/TheNewRussia in the 90s]]: in the absence of [=PCs=] and consoles, the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendy_(console) NES clone "Dendy"]] became a generic name for any gaming console, and a lot of popular NES-era games were unknown because they were neither sold nor pirated.
167%%* Similarly, the Platform/SegaMasterSystem was popular in Europe and was so huge in Brazil that production of the console continues there to this day, but it stood no chance (despite its technical superiority on most fronts!) against the juggernaut that was the NES in North America and Japan and is little more than a footnote in gaming history there.
168%%* How many people (including gamers not into gaming history) do you think have even heard of UsefulNotes/TheGreatVideoGameCrashOf1983? Let alone know that it nearly spelled the end for console gaming in North America as a whole?
169* ''VideoGame/JustDance'' is one of the most popular gaming franchises in the world, being the second most profitable franchise for Creator/{{Ubisoft}} (after ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed''). Yet at the same time, gamers and gaming review sites barely acknowledge its existence. It's perhaps one of the few games that sells a lot but isn't talked about a lot outside of its core audience.
170* ''VideoGame/ClubPenguin'' was a casual {{Massively Multiplayer Online Game}} that was especially popular amongst [[TurnOfTheMillennium 2000s]] children, but it rarely gets mentioned outside of the fanbase due to being a "kid-only" game that older gamers and reviewers weren't interested in, contrasted to more "adult" and well-known [=MMOs=] like ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft''.
171* ''VideoGame/PuyoPuyo'' is a pop culture icon in Japan and is seen as the ''other'' face of the FallingBlocks genre alongside ''VideoGame/{{Tetris}}'', but it struggles to find that same status in the rest of the world, even ''with'' localized releases.
172* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' is the biggest CashCowFranchise in the world, but due to its early years during the 1990s being also being the height of its popularity, many assumed that it was another FlashInThePanFad once it stopped dominating the conversation. When ''VideoGame/PokemonGo'' became big with the mobile market in the late 2010s, older adults and former fans who had "outgrown" the franchise were often confused that the series was still ongoing; which led to [[CowboyBebopAtHisComputer countless articles and newsites]] citing ''Go'' as a reboot of a 1990s classic.
173%%* Various 1980s computers, such as the Platform/ZXSpectrum, the Platform/AtariST, the [[Platform/{{Amiga}} Commodore Amiga]], the Platform/AmstradCPC, the Platform/BBCMicro, and the Platform/AcornArchimedes are fondly remembered in Britain and Eastern Europe, but rather obscure in the United States.
174%%* Similarly, the MSX, the NEC PC-98, and the Sharp X68000 were huge in Japan, but unknown in America.
175%%* There are many {{Browser Game}}s that have been successful and gathered a following, but never are brought up in a discussion of video games, including ''VideoGame/{{Webkinz}}'' and ''VideoGame/ClubPenguin'', two casual {{Massively Multiplayer Online Game}}s that have impacted [[TurnOfTheMillennium Millennials]], but are rarely mentioned mainstream.
176%%* Hidden object games can consistently sell well over a million copies on the PC market without them being on mobile platforms or Steam and are big enough to be a thriving industry themselves (though they are moving to the mobile market). Yet very few people into video games and PC games even know what a hidden object game ''is''.[[note]]Hidden object games are point-and-click games in which you find small objects onscreen, or sometimes not-so-small objects. Most of these games are story-driven where you play as a detective, most notably Literature/NancyDrew. They are commonly found in department stores like Target or Walmart on the shelves near the video games and are popular with middle-aged and elderly women, well outside of the usual demographics for the gaming industry.[[/note]]
177* ''VideoGame/BattleGaregga'' is easily one of the most infamous {{shmup}}s within the shmup community, thanks mainly due to its [[DynamicDifficulty rank]] system that cranks up the game difficulty as the player collects items, fires their weapons, and simply survives, and if not managed ''deliberately'' (through [[ViolationOfCommonSense abstaining from picking up power-up items and intentionally dying]]), the rank can spike to a point where the game goes from NintendoHard to nigh-UnwinnableByDesign. The RealIsBrown aesthetic that was unique at its time, the more iconic boss designs like that of [[ClimaxBoss Black Heart]], and the game being Creator/ManabuNamiki's debut as a game music composer also further establish ''Battle Garegga'' as one of the most iconic shmups, and nearly everyone in the shmup community has a strong opinion on it (whether good or bad). Outside of said community, however, almost nobody has even heard of it. While this can be attributed to the game being largely inaccessible to the Western world due to its arcade release being limited outside of Japan and its only port for almost 20 years being a Platform/SegaSaturn port that, in addition to being on a system that sold poorly, was released in Japan only, even after the Platform/PlayStation4 and Platform/XboxOne ports made it to the West it's still not something that is going to catch the average gamer's eye, not helped by its high price for a shmup at 34.99 USD. Likely, by the time the game got a home port in the West, the lack of pre-existing brand name recognition (like for ''VideoGame/{{Gradius}}'' and ''VideoGame/{{Raiden}}''), middling bullet counts (as opposed to the [[BulletHell "dodge THIS" factor]] of games like ''Franchise/TouhouProject'' and Creator/{{CAVE}} games) and lack of colorful visuals made it [[OnceOriginalNowCommon seem like just another arcade shmup from the 90s]].
178* ''VideoGame/{{CHUNITHM}}'' is one of the highest-grossing {{rhythm game}}s in Japan and one of the most sought-after in the non-Japanese rhythm game community, thanks to its refinements to vertical-scrolling lane-based rhythm games, with many people who play it regarding it as one of ''the'' best rhythm games since ''VideoGame/{{beatmania}} IIDX''; particularly rich rhythm game players will gladly pay thousands of US dollars just to have reverese-engineered cabs with the CopyProtection disabled shipped to their homes. Perhaps because of this foreign demand, SEGA would later release an international version of the game in East Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania. Likely due to being an UsefulNotes/ArcadeGame with NoPortForYou, it is virtually unknown outside of the non-Japanese rhythm game community, with many Westerners in particular still believing that ''VideoGame/DanceDanceRevolution'' is Japan's premier rhythm game by a wide margin and only knowing SEGA as "the ''Franchise/{{Sonic|TheHedgehog}}'' and ''VideoGame/LikeADragon'' / ''Yakuza'' company".
179* ''VideoGame/{{BEMANI}}'' is Konami's series of rhythm games, still being top-grossers in arcades in Japan and with several games in the series still being actively maintained, such as ''VideoGame/{{beatmania}} IIDX'', ''[=DanceDanceRevolution=]'', ''VideoGame/SoundVoltex'', and ''VideoGame/{{GITADORA}}''. In just about any rhythm game community you can expect to find many people who are familiar with at least one of their games. ''BEMANI'' is notable for being one of the least-affected Konami video game properties in the wake of the scandals that rocked Konami in the mid-2010s[[note]]although that is likely due to ''BEMANI'' being produced by Konami Amusement (the branch that produces arcade and parlor games) rather than Konami Digital Entertainment (the branch that handles consumer-software games), which ''did'' get adversely affected by these scandals[[/note]]. However, outside of the rhythm game fanbase, and due to arcades and arcade games being not all that big anymore outside of the Asia Pacific region, nobody seems to be aware of the ''BEMANI'' series except maybe for old versions of ''DDR'', i.e. "Konami doesn't make games anymore."
180* RhythmGame music:
181** "conflict" by siromaru and cranky is one of the most widespread songs in all of rhythm games, having appeared in over ''30'' different rhythm games such as ''VideoGame/{{Cytus}}'', ''VideoGame/SoundVoltex'', ''VideoGame/{{CHUNITHM}}'', ''VideoGame/TaikoNoTatsujin'', ''VideoGame/{{Arcaea}}'', and so on. Pretty much every rhythm game player has heard of it or played it...if you live in the Asia Pacific. In the Western rhythm game community, however, "conflict" isn't really that well-known, likely because the Western rhythm game community is centered around ''VideoGame/{{BEMANI}}'' and dance games and "conflict" only appears on one ''BEMANI'' game, the aforementioned ''Sound Voltex''; instead, "FLOWER" and [[Franchise/TouhouProject "Bad Apple!! feat. nomico"]] are more well-known as "cross-over into everything" songs.
182** "PUPA" by Morimori Atsushi has gotten this reputation as well, being "the next 'conflict'" in terms of how it gets crossed over into so many rhythm games, with a surge of new appearances in 2021 and 2022. Once again this reputation only really holds in the Asian rhythm game community, as due to being on only one ''BEMANI'' game, ''Sound Voltex'', most American rhythm game players have never even heard of this song except maybe for a few forgettable glimpses on ''SDVX''[='=]s song select.
183[[/folder]]
184
185[[folder:Webcomics]]
186%%* Virtually ''any'' webcomic, no matter how popular, will go almost entirely ignored by the mainstream media. This can be observed by their Website/{{Wikipedia}} articles -- many webcomic articles have been deleted, while the few holdouts are widely padded with self-reference, and at best one or two third-party sources. NewspaperComics and superhero comics still reign supreme in mass-media-land, but a few webcomics have ascended to mainstream notability:
187%%** ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'', the official Nerd Comic and probably the most well-known webcomic to the general public, though it has many competitors in the nerdy-people community.
188%%** ''Webcomic/PennyArcade'' and possibly ''Webcomic/CtrlAltDel'', the official Gamer Comics, with an ''obscene'' quantity of [[FollowTheLeader imitators]] that the mainstream media never mentions. ''Webcomic/{{Megatokyo}}'', oddly, started out as one of these cult imitators, but reached modest mass-market success through CerebusSyndrome.
189%%** ''Webcomic/AxeCop'' finally ascended into something approximating the mainstream in late 2013 with the arrival of its [[WesternAnimation/AxeCop cartoon adaptation]] on Creator/{{Fox}}.
190* ''Webcomic/{{Homestuck}}'' achieved utterly preposterous levels of fame and infamy, but outside of certain areas of the internet is practically a non-entity; the author did a signing event ''at a Comic-Con'', and the staff was unprepared for the gigantic mob of fans that showed up. Those outside of internet-comics communities who are aware of its existence generally either have friends who are fans, or are only aware of the comic due to the rampant chaos some fans stirred up at conventions in the fandom's early years (infamously, some cons were overrun by mobs of troll cosplayers who failed to properly seal their body paint, left gray paint smears everywhere, and behaved very inappropriately).
191[[/folder]]
192
193
194[[folder:WebAnimation]]
195%%* This is the case for WebAnimation in general. Series like ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'' and ''WebAnimation/HazbinHotel'' are very popular and have numerous fans, who create fanart, fanfiction and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTbfw8_SMmI fan-songs]] about the characters, but they are totally unknown to people who do not use [=YouTube=] often, and even to many who do.
196* There are two giants in the Japanese VirtualYouTuber scene: WebAnimation/{{Nijisanji}} and WebAnimation/{{hololive}}. However, international fans heavily gravitated towards hololive, leaving Nijisanji as a non-entity outside of its home country; this was cemented by hololive being the first to introduce a branch of Vtubers aimed at English-speaking fans that quickly exploded in popularity. Nijisanji would finally solve this trope by introducing English-speaking male talents, which covered a niche completely ignored by hololive to that point and resulted in a massive influx of new viewers.
197[[/folder]]
198
199[[folder:Web Original]]
200%%* A lot of Internet culture and {{meme|ticMutation}}s cause this. Anything that becomes popular on the Internet tends to stay in that particular sector of the Internet and completely unknown to those who don't use the Internet much or stay in a few social circles. {{Meme|ticMutation}}s are an especially visible example: Familiarity with very popular ones like Longcat or Trollface is a good Internet-savviness litmus test. {{Periphery Demographic}}s are another example; ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' is still seen as weird for adults to enjoy, for instance, among casual Internet users. Because things that become popular on the Internet rarely make much headway offline, spending large amounts of time on the Internet can cause a pretty skewed idea of general trends. There are exceptions though, most notably teenage girl phenomena that lead towards mainstream commercial success, like Music/JustinBieber, or concepts that get popularized in mainstream media such as the [=YouTube=] memetic videos referenced in the ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' episode "Canada on Strike." Whether or not an Internet meme has been featured on mainstream media is generally considered a good indicator of whether or not that meme is now a DiscreditedMeme.
201* The Chilean [[Website/YouTube youtuber]] [[WebVideo/HolaSoyGerman Germán Garmendia]] is very popular in Latin American countries (to the point where he has over 40 million subscribers, and at one point, he was the second most subscribed person on Website/YouTube[[note]]after LetsPlay/PewDiePie[[/note]]), but is almost completely unknown outside of them. He didn't even have an article on [[Website/{{Wikipedia}} The Other Wiki]] until May 2014, and still doesn't have one on this Wiki.
202%%* In 2016, some Alt-Right people used Pepe memes (a picture of a stoner frog from the ''Boy’s Club'' comic paired with a random slogan, and sometimes with various edits to the picture) along with many others. Despite the meme having been around for more than 8 years and being relatively old and played-out, the media declared it to be a new white supremacist icon. The comic's creators were ''not'' amused.
203%%* Being a famous video producer on the Internet is kind of a half-fame. On one hand, millions of viewers worldwide can check a certain producer out, but at the same time, many are only famous to people who regularly visit the Internet and even then some may be unaware of highly successful sites unless they stumble upon them. ''WebVideo/TheNostalgiaCritic'' is a good example. He's been active since 2008, gained quite some notoriety due to his high production values -- releasing new videos every week -- and has a large enough following to make a living off of it. Yet he still hasn't made much of a mark in mainstream media and even on the Internet itself, there are many people who have never seen one of his videos or are only vaguely aware of him.
204%%** Even the most famous of Youtubers' popularity is confined to the Youtube world. Users such as Pewdiepie, Sargon of Akkad, and Armoured Skeptic are extremely prominent in the YT community, but not really known anywhere else.
205* Nostalgia Critic affiliate [[WebVideo/BadMovieBeatdown Film Brain]] admitted that this is even tougher for producers who use a video hosting service that isn't Website/YouTube, as the general public isn't really aware that other services exist.
206* ''WebVideo/RyanToysReview'' has over 23 billion views and has his own Creator/NickJr show called ''Ryan's Mystery Playdate'', but he's virtually unknown outside of kids under 8 and their families.
207* Website/FourChan, while a cornerstone of Internet culture, is rather obscure outside it. When brought up at all it's mostly known for "The Fappening", right-wing radicalism, and Anonymous (the latter of which is often [[CowboyBebopAtHisComputer/WebMedia deemed to be some sort of evil ring of hacker-terrorists]], rather than a collective nickname for the various anonymous users of the site).
208%%* YouTubeKidsChannel videos get tens of millions of views, but usually will remain unknown to anyone who isn't in elementary school or younger, or a parent of such child. Some people outside that demographic choose to watch them if they're [[SubvertedKidsShow the shockingly disturbing kind]], but even then, specific videos and channels aren't usually considered to stand out. Even those who are well aware of their popularity within the intended demographic question those view counts because of this; it's been theorized that little kids rely on repetition and may watch such videos dozens or hundreds of times per day, driving up the video view counts well beyond their actual audience's size by some order of magnitude, or that the bots are responsible.
209* Because the series of WebVideo/UnusAnnus was shortlived by design (376 videos posted once a day for a year and then the channel was deleted deliberately), fans within the sphere of WebVideo/{{Markiplier}} frequently reference the Unnus Annus merchandise, quotes, memes, and screenshots to the bewilderment of other Markiplier fans who may have known about Unnus Annus or had seen a few episodes of it, but now have no way of watching it themselves outside of finding an archive by someone who downloaded all of the episodes via an external video downloader. As such, scrolling through the Markiplier reddit can be confusing even for people who have diligently watched Markiplier. This can be made even more confusing as Mark has several LetsPlay videos directly referncing Unus Annus or at least showing the countdown timer to when it is deleted. People who saw Unus Annus will get it. Anyone who missed out or didn't want to watch it will just be confused.
210* Ask anybody who wasn't a internet user in the 2000s or a site member what Website/{{Fark}}.com is, and expect to receive blank stares.
211[[/folder]]
212
213[[folder:Western Animation]]
214* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'': Early during its run, it became popular to the point of ubiquity on the internet, especially in animation fan circles, but was still relatively obscure to a lot of people who didn't frequent forums and imageboards much, or don't get the cable channel the show is broadcast on; other media are [[FirstInstallmentWins more likely to reference or parody]] Franchise/MyLittlePony in general rather than ''Friendship Is Magic'' specifically. Most of its exposure from mainstream media was poking fun at the sudden rise of its [[PeripheryDemographic adult male fanbase]], i.e. "bronies", with such coverage assuming that they were fans of the older cartoons rather than the 2010s one.
215* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': Grandpa Simpson puts the generational divide of pop-culture into perspective for his then-teenaged son, Homer.
216-->'''Abe:''' I used to be with it, but then they changed what "it" was. Now what I'm with isn't "it", and what's "it" seems weird and scary to me. It'll happen to ''you''!
217* In 1951, Centaur Productions made two stop-motion animation musical shorts, ''The Three Little Dwarfs (Hardrock, Coco, and Joe)'' and ''Suzy Snowflake''. Shortly after producing those shorts, the company went out of business and the cartoons fell into obscurity ... except in Chicago, where WGN-TV has been running them every Christmas season since 1956 (along with UPA's ''Frosty the Snowman''). The cartoons are completely unknown to most of the world, while anyone who grew up in Chicago can't imagine Christmas without them.
218%%* As referenced in Anime above, many VoiceActors are unknown to the mainstream unless they've done some sort of live-action acting. It's a rarity that a voice actor is known for just their voice acting; even Creator/MelBlanc was known mostly for being on Radio/TheJackBennyProgram before the popularity of ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes'' shot through the roof.
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