  We present an individual based model of cultural evolution, where interacting
agents are coded by binary strings standing for strategies for action,
blueprints for products or attitudes and beliefs. The model is patterned on an
established model of biological evolution, the Tangled Nature Model (TNM),
where a `tangle' of interactions between agents determines their reproductive
success. In addition, our agents also have the ability to copy part of each
other's strategy, a feature inspired by the Axelrod model of cultural
diversity. Unlike the latter, but similarly to the TNM, the model dynamics goes
through a series of metastable stages of increasing length, each characterized
by mutually enforcing cultural patterns. These patterns are abruptly replaced
by other patterns characteristic of the next metastable period. We analyze the
time dependence of the population and diversity in the system, show how
different cultures are formed and merge, and how their survival probability
lacks, in the model, a finite average life-time. Finally, we use historical
data on the number of car manufacturers after the introduction of the
automobile to the market, to argue that ourmodel can qualitatively reproduce
the flurry of cultural activity which follows a disruptive innovation.
