I Was Going to Write a Nice Welcome Blog for Michael Jackson Fans. I Chose Violence Instead.

Because twelve weeks of burnout, AI cringe and fan hypocrisy will do that to a person.

This was supposed to be a nice welcome blog.

Warm. Funny. A bit heartfelt. A bit professional. Me introducing myself properly as PopCrown co founder, saying hello to the fans, explaining what we're building, gently inviting people in with a smile and a bit of charm.

I scrapped that version and chose chaos instead.

That is either a genius business decision or absolute commercial suicide. Time will tell.

The original plan died somewhere between the sleep deprivation, the endless workload, the AI social media posts that have chipped away at my dignity on a daily basis, and the messages being sent to my team from people I have supported, deciding they absolutely must let everyone know they're not interested in PopCrown because they didn't like my opinion on a podcast I did six months ago.

Well, imagine my distress while I sprint upstairs, throw myself onto the bed and sob into a pillow for three full days because Darren, and his total inability to function in the adult world, isn't joining the app.

You know what, Darren?

Good.

Don't.

You sound like a dickhead.

Ironically, the whole point of PopCrown is keeping that sort of energy out.

We're not an airport, Darren. You don't need to announce your departure.

Anyway, if you're still reading, let me introduce myself properly.

I'm Tasha.

I'm one of the co founders of PopCrown.

I was supposed to be the one writing the blogs, writing the socials, giving the whole thing its pulse, its humour, its humanity. The warm one at the front. The one saying, come in, put your bag down, get your feet up, no one's going to drain the life out of you in here.

Instead, me and Jo, the other co founder, have spent twelve solid weeks working like absolute bastards. Day and night. Week after week. Pouring our own money into this thing and trying to build something with purpose for fans while life, stress, tech, pressure and general bullshit slowly beat the professionalism out of us.

So the professional plan has been scrapped.

Completely.

Not because I'm unstable.

Because I get to decide how I want to do things here, and I've never been able to do fake. Not even at work.

For me, fake smiling and repeating the words "certainly madam" when madam is being an entitled twat feels like wearing a cheap wool jumper with no bra. It irritates me and gets on my tits.

For me, the world is fake enough already, and there is absolutely no chance I'm building a business that requires me to take part in even more of it every single day.

So this is me.

This is also Jo.

This is the PopCrown team.

This is the vibe.

No fake personalities. No fake politeness for toxic fans and entitled mood hoovers. And absolutely no pretending I want every fan on board.

I don't.

And that is probably the healthiest thing I've admitted in weeks.

Because I do love the Michael Jackson fan community.

No, seriously. I really do.

Some of the best people I've ever met came through a mutual love for Michael. Some of the funniest. Some of the kindest. Some of the most emotionally intelligent. There is a real understanding there when it's good. A shared language. A warmth. A sense of people recognising something in each other that the outside world often doesn't.

But when it's bad, it's really bad.

I'm not talking full black leathers, chain belts and choreography bad.

I'm talking full throttle ego, me me me, over forty, still living at home, full of their own piss and importance bad.

Not all fans, obviously. Not even most.

But there is a certain type of fan who acts like every fan run project exists purely so they can stand at the side with folded arms, contributing absolutely nothing, while moaning about the ticket price, the location, the vibe, the merch, the timing, the line up, the atmosphere, the font, the colour of the chairs, and whether the organiser looked enthusiastic enough while running themselves into an early grave.

Some fans are not interested in community unless they want you to buy an overpriced ticket to their latest performance, blow smoke up their arse, and help fund the fantasy that they are, in fact, the main event.

They are only ever interested in being catered to like the superstar celebrity they believe they are.

They want high quality events.

They want fan spaces.

They want projects.

They want community.

They want creativity.

They want more things for fans.

What they do not want, apparently, is to support the actual human beings killing themselves to make any of it happen unless it somehow centres them, flatters them, or costs the equivalent of a pound and a packet of Space Raiders.

The entitlement is astounding.

And this is not just about PopCrown.

This is about the way some fans behave around all fan run MJ projects.

I've watched it for years.

People begging for things to exist, then acting like spoiled little shits when someone creates them.

People screaming that fans deserve better, then picking apart the very people trying to build better.

People demanding effort while offering none.

Demanding loyalty while giving none.

Demanding community while behaving like self serving arseholes.

And then wondering why people walk away, stop socialising in fan spaces, and why genuine MJ events and spaces slowly disappear.

Really.

What a mystery.

My First Fan Event

My first fan event was Kingvention in 2019, even though I'd been an MJ fan since the early 1980s.

That was my first proper experience of stepping into the MJ fan world at an event and seeing, up close, what goes into creating something like that. The work. The detail. The pressure. The moving parts. The standard. The commitment.

It was impressive as hell.

Properly impressive.

You do not walk into something like that and think, oh right, this just threw itself together then.

Well, I didn't anyway.

I spent the whole day in a state of "bloody hell, somebody has worked their arse off here" and "this must have cost a fortune".

And instead of leaving feeling like I'd handed money to a fan exploiting other fans, I left thinking I wanted to give them more.

I even started thinking of ways fans could chip in monthly to support it.

Even more so after briefly chatting to the organiser and finding out it ran at a loss every year. A loss in the thousands. Out of their own pocket.

That absolutely mortified me.

When I left, I desperately wanted to be able to offer real support and financial help for the next one.

That stayed with me.

I've never forgotten how grateful I was that a fan had bothered to put on such an incredible event, especially when there was no financial benefit in it for them. And to be fair, even if there had been, they'd have deserved it.

And that's exactly why I have such a low tolerance for fans who act entitled while having absolutely no clue what it takes to organise anything MJ related.

They rock up, consume the atmosphere, enjoy the work, take the photos, soak up the effort, and then still find something to complain about as if they personally funded the whole thing and have come back for a formal inspection.

Or the ones who don't even attend anything, but still manage to be first in the comments making sure everyone hears their utterly useless opinion about things they know nothing about.

The same goes for fan led spaces and projects online.

There are people in this community doing genuine work. Good work. Hard work. Work that costs them time, money, energy and peace.

There's an important podcast exposing fake MJ artistry being sold by his own estate, knowingly. It took over a decade to research and put together. It gets barely any attention. Meanwhile I see fans sharing negative media stories far more than I see them sharing positive fan projects.

Too often the response is not support, or even basic decency. It's ego, nitpicking, gossip, weird competition and blatant hypocrisy.

Support Deserves to Be Named

Because if Michael was passionate about anything, it was trying to make the world a bit better than he found it.

That's one of the reasons I want to say this clearly.

Because support deserves to be named too.

Kingvention has been incredibly supportive.

MJ Vibe has been incredibly supportive.

Proper support. Genuine support. The kind that doesn't come with weird conditions, ego, side comments or hidden little barbs tucked underneath it. Just proper support.

That matters.

It matters because when you're in the middle of building something and your stress levels are high enough to qualify as a weather system, genuine support does not feel small. It feels like oxygen.

And that is remembered.

I remember who has been kind.

I remember who has been supportive.

I remember who understands what it takes to build something in this community.

And I remember who behaves like a prick when they don't get to be the centre of it.

That is also remembered.

What PopCrown Actually Is

PopCrown exists because I, along with plenty of other fans, got sick of fan spaces that leave you feeling drained, irritated, vaguely contaminated and in need of a lie down.

That's the truth.

Too many spaces now feel like emotional self harm.

You pop on there for a laugh, a bit of nostalgia, maybe a decent conversation with people who get it, and within minutes you're ankle deep in negativity, fake personas, constant rows, side chat nonsense, attention seeking, performative outrage, and the sort of relentless madness on X that makes you want to drop kick your laptop into the sea.

No thanks.

Some fans love that atmosphere.

They love the rows.

They love the drama.

They love the posturing, the little fan hierarchies, and the endless miserable peacocking.

Great.

Stay there.

PopCrown is not for you.

PopCrown is for the fans who are tired of all that.

The ones who still have a sense of humour.

The ones who still know how to behave.

The ones who want warmth without weirdness.

The ones who want a bit of fun without feeling like they need riot gear just to log in.

The ones who miss when fandom actually felt like a relief.

That matters to me more than sales ever will.

Clearly.

No one obsessed with money writes a first blog like this. Trust me on that.

I care about the vibe inside the app.

Deeply.

I care about who is in there.

I care how it feels.

I care whether people can breathe when they log in.

I care whether the good fans feel comfortable.

I care whether it feels funny, warm, alive and safe.

Yes, safe.

Not in the fake internet way where everyone throws the word around while behaving like absolute lunatics.

I mean genuinely safe.

For some fans, PopCrown is the only place they feel that.

The only place they can relax a bit.

The only place they don't feel attacked, dragged into nonsense, or emotionally pummelled by strangers with personality disorders and too much screen time.

That is a huge responsibility, and I take it seriously.

Because if someone comes into PopCrown and finds relief there, if they feel calmer there, safer there, lighter there, that is not something I take casually.

I am fiercely protective of that atmosphere because I know how rare it is, and how badly it's needed.

That's why I'm not interested in dragging every last fan through the door for the sake of numbers.

I would rather have the right people in there than a bigger crowd full of knobs.

I would rather build something slower and better than faster and full of crap.

The Truth Underneath

The truth is, underneath all the sarcasm and swearing and well deserved irritation, there is something much softer here.

I care about this because Michael mattered.

Not in some fake saint way.

Not in some performative fan way.

In a real way.

In a life way.

In a memory way.

In a comfort way.

In a this-got-me-through-some-shit way.

And for a lot of fans, that is still true.

I care about those fans.

I want them to have a space that brings what a fan community should bring.

Comfort.

Escape.

Connection.

Beauty.

A place to put their feelings.

A bit of magic in a world that can be hard, fake and deeply disappointing.

There is already too much stress in everyday life.

I don't want that carried into PopCrown.

I want better than that.

Everyone's politics, views and opinions get left at the door.

And we focus on the one thing we do agree on. The common ground. The love for Michael, his artistry and his legacy.

A place where fans can take the weight off and feel part of something real again.

More honesty.

More humour.

More warmth.

More actual community.

Less ego.

Less performance.

Less fake support.

Less entitled nonsense from people who have never had to organise a thing in their life but still act like disappointed shareholders every time someone else does.

That's what me and Jo built it for.

Not perfection.

Relief.

Escape.

A bit of enjoyment, for God's sake.

So if you're reading this and thinking, she has not held back, but she's right and there's no lies being told, then it's likely you're exactly the sort of fan we are here for.

If you're reading this and feeling offended because you've recognised yourself in three separate paragraphs, even better.

My new plan to use unpolished savagery as a filtering system appears to be working beautifully.

Because if Michael was passionate about anything, it was trying to make the world a bit better than he found it.

I can't change the world the way he did.

But I can create one tiny corner of it that doesn't require a suit of armour to survive.

One place where fans can expect a bit of peace.

That's what I want PopCrown to protect.

Everything else can stay in the group chat.

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