The chapter ’The Cativerse’ introduces us to the digital world in which we find cats in various ways and modes. We go into the underlying reasons for feline success, not only on the Internet and especially on social media but also in the offline world. We look at the historical roles of cats in our culture, at biological and psychological explanations for the cat effect on us, and at the feline presence in popular culture. This chapter sets the scene for the linguistic description of the purrieties we encounter on social media.