Many of the world’s most famous blog sites are celebrity centred. They are entertainment news, creating stories out of the private lives of public people. Some news junkies argue entertainment doesn’t constitute as ‘real’ news. It’s often dismissed as fluff or spoof yet it makes up a large proportion of the online news cycle.
In Media and Journalism: New Theory and Practice, Jason Bainbridge writes why celebrities are important. Bainbridge says that while they, “may seem incredibly superficial and undeserving of much attention they are culturally significant because: They offer their audiences a wide variety of identities and different ways of being… the celebrity shows an ability to function as a ‘counterfeit person’- to move between different roles, which reflects a perceived need of people to transform… the celebrity indicates a shift in the media sphere as a whole, from the dissemination of information towards the dissemination of identities…”
Eager punters use online updates to follow every move of their favourite star. They follow their twitter accounts, their Facebook pages and gossip sites. It is clear the want for celebrity information exists in online journalism and journalists have a duty to report for their public. Media outlets report on what the stars say on their own pages and even serious publications, such as the Huffington Post, have an entertainment section(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entertainment/ ).
Gossip sites like http://www.perezhilton.com/ have become famous for making attention seeking comments and lewd statements about stars. The site has a massive following and has risen to rule the online celebrity gossip sites since its 2004 beginning.
Gossip site Perez Hilton, is one of the world’s most popular celebrity news sources.
A happy medium must be kept in online journalism. While celebrity news should never dominate over informing the public of key events and hard news, celebrity reporting will continue to hold a worthy, permanent position on multiple news sites.
Many of the most popular blogs are celebrity focused, follow this like to see a list of popular blogs, as reported by The Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/09/blog s
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.