Fandom is social—a big part of it is interacting with other fans. So here’s an alternative hypothesis: works that especially appeal to a narrow subset of the population are more likely to develop a fanatic fandom (with things like conventions), because they allow fans to get together with other people like them, form a fanatic community, and radicalize as a group. With broadly popular works, fans won’t be all that similar to each other so they’ll be less likely to come together to form a fanatic community. Trekkies and Randians seem consistent this hypothesis.
Fandom is social—a big part of it is interacting with other fans. So here’s an alternative hypothesis: works that especially appeal to a narrow subset of the population are more likely to develop a fanatic fandom (with things like conventions), because they allow fans to get together with other people like them, form a fanatic community, and radicalize as a group. With broadly popular works, fans won’t be all that similar to each other so they’ll be less likely to come together to form a fanatic community. Trekkies and Randians seem consistent this hypothesis.