mediajunk

I must admit that I am surprised that, nine months into 2003, the list of celebrities who keep weblogs is still modest.

The names are still much as they were in January of this year; Moby and William Gibson are still probably the best-known celebrity bloggers. But the list of famous blogs at the end of the right-hand column on this site hasn’t changed much since I started it nine months ago.

So why hasn’t blogging taken off among celebs, in a culture that is increasingly celebrity-focused? It’s certainly not because the blogging phenomenon has come and gone. No, the blogosphere is growing all the time: the phenomenon; has moved into the web’s mainstream, while the internet itself has moved into our culture’s mainstream.

So why aren’t our "idols" blogging? Here are some of my guesses:

The advantages of celebrity blogs haven’t yet become obvious. For those who are already famous, a weblog can serve as a great marketing tool; as a way of interacting directly with fans; as a way of making press releases and statements without the need for an intermediary; etc. These features would be even more relevant to “up-and-coming” celebrities, such as a music artist trying to break it. However, I don’t think these messages have yet filtered through to the marketing departments that manage celebrities’ identities.

Blogging involves a commitment. Few celebs have the time – or the energy – to invest in regularly updating a diary. Again however, an emerging talent might have some more time to invest, so we might see many more celebrity weblogs in the future – when some of today’s blogging drama students etc. become famous.

Bloggers expose themselves on a world stage. You wouldn't imagaine that global exposure would be a problem for celebrities, but I'm referring particularly to the instantaneous nature of blog-publishing, which makes it more likely that your text will have grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. You also run the risk of publishing an angry post, or saying something otherwise embarrassing or regrettable. I’m sure many celebrities, whose interactions with the public are nomrally meticulously coordinated, would be wary of taking such a risk.

Despite these disadvantages, however, I still think that celebrities who make the commitment and take the risk stand to gain much respect, and to greatly increase their fanbases through regularly updating a simple site. Fans would get an insight into their heroes’ (or heroines’) lives, and their minds – one that isn’t intermediated by some trashy “reality” television show.

Conversely, we as surfers and readers should watch out for any celebrity blogs that clearly don’t involve the genuine participation of the stars themselves. I expect that some marketing departments will simply hire individuals to manage post “on behalf of” stars, who may have no authentic interaction with the site or the fans. This practice (which effectively is an attempt to dupe the audience) is already occurring in the US political arena…