MM #3: Being an Internet Celebrity

From the topic title, one might assume that I consider myself an internet celebrity. In actuality, I do not. Rather, I wish to talk about what I've noticed about people who become famous through the internet. I've noticed that the actual effects of being an internet celebrity are not that much different than becoming a celebrity in real life. Millions people know your name, your personal life suddenly becomes non existent and every mistake you make, no matter how small, has dire consequences.

This video: So hated, yet people still watch it.

One of the most recent examples I can think of is Rebecca Black and her "hit" music video Friday. Although the quality of the music and video is questionable, there is no doubt at all that it made her famous. The video itself has over 80,000,000 views at the time and the number still grows every day. However, this is more due to infamy. One look at the number of dislikes shows that is over 1,000,000 with the likes only reaching about 200,000. And the less is said about the comments section, the better (hint: it is not the most civil place).

It's quite amazing how a simple upload to Youtube can end up making you famous almost overnight. It's even more amazing when you don't even intend to become famous and yet, the internet makes you do so anyways. After Antoine Dodson, a man from Huntsville, AL manages to save his sister from an attack, he goes on the news to talk about the incident and threaten the attacker. While an incident like this, important as it may be, wouldn't exactly go down in history, someone else, schmoyho, turns it into a dance mix, complete with a catchy beat and copious amounts of autotuning. It boasts over 77 million views, which, although it is not as much as Friday garnered in a much shorter time span, is still an excellent example of how the internet has managed to make people famous.

The intruder picked the wrong place to break into...

Although it is possible to become famous without the internet in this day and age, the fact that it exists will only serve to boost your fame. The fact is, the internet can reach a much wider audience on an international level than many conventional media ever could and with the more viewers that can be reached, the bigger the chances someone has at getting famous, intentionally or not.