I had a thought last night…….will Twitter will be the tool that breaks the last decade’s obsession with celebrity gossip?
Like so many obsessions, that of following celebrities’ every supposed move in the press, visiting gossip sites and pouring over papped photos is often fuelled by a desire to feel part of that world.
So if today I can follow @celebrity and hear where they are going tonight/what they are wearing to the Oscars/who is the next guest on their show from the horse’s mouth, why do I need to scour the Internet for rumours? And surely Twitter provides the ultimate fan experience? True two-way conversation…..can that ever live up to expectations?
Moving on a step will the smart celebs post pics themselves using services like Twitpic, thus rendering the papped shots in the next morning’s paper or celebrity website out of date and with less narrative?
Wouldn’t a Twitpic of Sarah Harding hammered outside a club posted on Cheryl Cole’s Twitter account spread far and wide and kill the need for papped shots showing the same? {this is an example – as far as I know they don’t have Twitter accounts…yet}
We’ve been due a backlash on the celebrity obsession trend for a while now, will this be it?
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Surely Twitter just brings more celebrity obsession? Twitter lets you follow your favourite celebs even closely. Twitter is still far from hitting the mainstream yet, most people still use Facebook, MySpace and/or Bebo as their way of communicating with friends. Services such as Twitter and Flickr seem more niche.
I doubt people are going to start joining Twitter in masses unless they see it offers them anything. At the moment I think they feel that Facebook offers them everything with Status Updates and sharing pictures with friends.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by and comment David.
In answer to your point, I don’t think it will. I think obsession is often built on the percpetion that celebrities are out of reach whereas Twitter makes that two way communication so much more attainable. agre with it not being mainstream but I have seen an uplift in followers (friends and unknown) from outside the typical Twitter pool since Jonathan Ross’ widespread Twitter coverage in the mainstream press and see this as a trend that will grow and continue.
Time will tell though eh?
I see your point and for some celebrities it will indeed help bring out the more human side and a better interaction with fans. Stars such as Stephen Fry use it very productively. However, I am not convinced that many celebrities will have the time, know how or be allowed to post tweets personally. More often than not it is someone else posting on their behalf. This is probably for protecting their image if they have a drunken night out and post something they later regret! Time will tell though and I hope Twitter does have a positive effect.
I am now following you on Twitter, you have many great blog posts :-).
a side point to what you write about really…but what I find weird is that the presence of celebs on Twitter turns some people into desperate semi-stalkers, who are hoping that a response from a celeb will accord them some sort of glamour by proxy. Clue – it doesn’t.
So no more ‘great post celeb x, that’s really funny’, no more mindless sycophancy and please no more re-tweeting of every single thing that famous twitterers tweet.
More on celebs on Twitter from Wadds here: http://www.rainierpr.co.uk/blog/2009/01/hardcore-users-unsettled-as-twitter.html
The cult of celebrity been around for hundreds of years, it’s just modern technology that has allowed it to spread so much more widely.
Obsession has been around for eons and will continue, Twitter or no. The obsession moves but does not go away.
I admit an interest in it all; I like to follow a few old style stars (my term for celebrities who have earned their chops) and like to see things from their perspective; a different sort of spin from that of the newspapers.
I read that he that he wanted do a Home and Away cameo lmao. Not sure how true this is, has anyone else heard it? There’s a part of me that kind of hopes this is true lol.