I was having an email conversation with my brother Graham, about some viral* work that we had seen and we were both panning a recent effort. I am not going to give away who or what the campaign was, as it is the holiday season, I don’t want to rain on anyone’s parade and besides ragging on a failed attempt at going viral isn’t the point of this post.

The content used some celebrities and my brother and I were discussing whether it was effective or not. Graham wrote me the following and it really got me thinking:

“Everyone is a celebrity now so they actually have to compete against real people doing things worth watching on youtube. Just being a celebrity is not good enough anymore, the content is still king and this content is barely watchable.”

I started thinking about all of the celebrity stuff I have seen on YouTube and realized that he was right. Celebrities of any stripe rarely have anything interesting to do or say unless they are in character, performing or doing whatever it is they do that makes them famous. The only time I personally find celebrities marginally interesting as people is when they say or do something really provocative, stupid or embarrassing (often due to alcohol, drugs or anger management issues).

Then again, I am likely out on a limb here, since loads of people subscribe to Us and People magazine, watch Entertainment Tonight, etc. to see what famous people are like as “real” people.

Perhaps YouTube and other social media are having a homogenizing effect on people – it makes nobodies famous and celebrities mundane.

* See my next post.

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Posted in Culture Opinion Personal Social Media by dwalker 1 Comment