Celebrity Twitter or Twitter Celebrity?

Having promised to blog a little more, I was thinking where to kick off this new series. I went back to the charity auction held by Comic Relief a couple of weeks ago – i’m sure you know the one – selling of SUPERFOLLOW. Before I go off on a tangent (as I invariably do), firstly credit to the fundraising team at CR. A brilliant idea and raised shed loads for their charity. My followers will know that I did comment about the stupidity of some of the general public for paying over two grand to be tweeted by Mcfly’s publicist for 90 days, but then some of the other ones there were great – characters named after you in a book, walk on film parts, dinner with a celebrity of your choice are actually dreams come true for a lot of people. They remembered the principle of ‘buying something that money can’t buy’ for a charity auction, and did it brilliantly.

But that’s not the point of this blog – this blog is about following somebody on here BECAUSE they are a celebrity. And how sometimes it can be a bit of a let down.

Now like everyone else I know on there, I follow some celebrities – not really to be entertained by them as such, but to be informed by them. I know that any conversation with them is going to be one way – they probably get far too many mentions to physically reply to them all. But I thought I’d share with you a few of the better ones with you, and a couple of ones I think are, well fucking awful to be honest.

OK lets start with some goodies

Armando Iannucci – @Aiannucci – Personally I think he gets it right – has lots of information to pass onto his fans, and occasionally retweets things he likes and the odd opinion. And occasionally will reply back to people. Just has that great balance of twitter of using it to help him but understanding its value.
David Quantick – @Quantick – One of the most intelligent ‘celebrities’ on twitter. He’s one person i follow who I’ll always read. Knows shitting loads about everything, to such an extent that you could be intimidated by him, but he’s not that type. Again will reply bacl to you if you write something worthwhile (I remember having a convo on twitter with him about how great Thin Lizzy were). 

Lizzie Roper – @lizzieroper – ah dear Lizzie – utterly hatstand, but brilliant with it. Never shy, and utterly filthy at times, but most importantly never pretends to be something she’s not and doesn’t actually care if she offends people, which is admirable. Always worth reading her tweets, especially when she’s pissed

And now for a bad one….

Peter Serafinowicz – @serafinowicz
Ah it must be hard being dear Pete. I could say “he’s not been funny since Look Around You”, but even if that was the case Horne and Corden still make him look better than Monty Python ever was. To his credit he’s a lot better now, but a few months back, he was just throwing tweets out like a spoilt child trying to get attention, and had his famous ‘Question and Answer’ which looked like he was getting his disciples to write jokes for him (I know he hit real lows there). And yet he has over half of a million followers. Seems twitter was keeping a flagging career going. Which is a shame, because he was actually quite funny and clever in various situations, but it felt like he could say any old crap and everyone thought he was great….which leads me onto my last point… 

There seems to have developed a “Twitter Celebrity” mentality. Interesting. You’ve become a celebrity BECAUSE of twitter? Hmmm i don’t buy that. If you replace Youtube instead of twitter, there are instant images of wankers miming to songs in their bedrooms, or your cat falling down the toilet. Do you really want to fall into that category? Do you even WANT to be a celebrity? Are you mental (the last 2 questions are obviously linked).

This is where I see it. If I had 1 follower on twitter and they read what I wrote, I see it as a compliment. Double that if I have 2, x4 with 4 etc etc. Its always a compliment when someone makes a decision to follow you and they are doing it because they want to. Of course there will be people who playing the numbers game and want to be as popluar as celebrities, but if you really want that, then go out there and do it, but don’t do it behind Twitter – its not Twitter that makes you famous, its your talent. And a lot of people who have made it are very talented (not all sadly!).

I feel sorry for all those ‘Myspace Celebrities’. Their time is up.