"Tripping through blogs of the stars" (LOS ANGELES TIMES article)

 Some of you will be interested in an article appearing
 in the Calendar section of THE LOS ANGELES TIMES
 of Monday, December 1, 2003.   It is called "Tripping
 through blogs of the stars."

 YOU locate and read the article.   As an authentic writing
group poster, *I* will give you my commentary, my original
thoughts and words.   YOU, dear reader will like it or lump it.
As you know, I reject the roles of mere link-poster, just as I
eschew the role of mere summarizer.   (I will leave it to one
my little  white cake frosting bunnies to post the  link, if there
is one.  I got the story from the printed edition,  because the
LOS ANGELES TIMES e-edition is always  annoying me
for personal information when I visit the website.)

Anyway, the Dana Kennedy article was amusing, in a
light, celebrity-oriented way that is appropriate to the
TIMES Calendar section.    The writer seems to think
that Moby's blog is one of the best in the celebrity
group.   Maybe one of these days I will get around to
visiting it.    Having in the past found most celeberity
writers throroughly self-obsessed and boring, I have
generally avoided their websites and blogs.

The article suggests that many celebrities--
unlike Moby--don't even write their own blogs!
Can you imagine that?   "Er, this is my blog but
I don't actually write it, my agent's assistant writes
it for me."   Some people have no sense of
embarrassment.

Of course, to money-hungry airheads like that, a
blog is simply another media tool for trying to
please old fans and get new ones.  It has nothing
to do with creativity and self-expression at all.
Perhaps their agent says something like, "We
want you to get a blog.   Don't worry about writing
it, we will take care of that for you."   Writing the
blog is simply another minor detail for paid
flunkies.

By the way, the article pointed out that Micheal
Douglas originally charged people for reading his
blog!   Poor guy, just imagine being that hard up.
Apparently, someone finally clued him in that
he was totally out of it as far as the current state
of blogdom.   Who can blame him for a natural
reaction, though?  Celebrities of steller earning
power are used to getting paid big money for
just about  everything they do, so why should
they not get paid for gems of wisdom appearing
in their blogs?   Currently, though, the wiser ones
now have apparently concluded that what they
put in their blogs relates to "building good will
among the customer base while advertising
current productions."

Even so, the TIMES article made it clear that
some celebrities in addition to Moby are actually
writing their own blogs and are making a
serious attempt to express themselves.

Essentially,  journalist Kennedy's article was
somewhat a puff piece itself, but it did contain
interesting information too.   My own view on
all this is that I am interested in people who
take their writing seriously and actually have
something original to say.   I don't expect to
find that in many celebrity blogs, but perhaps
I will visit those by Moby and a couple of others,
just to see how they stack up, regarding originality
of expression,  against the blogs I have visited by
writing group regulars.

Sort of like, "Be fair, forget that Moby is a
celebrity.   Whose blog is the most original
and entertaining, Moby's or Archer's?"  (or
substitute the name of any other misc.writing
regular frequently advertising his or her blog
in m.w.)

"Forget a  celebrity is writing this.   If the blog was
written by Joe or Josie Anybody, would you read
it?"    On the other hand, probably many readers
of celebrity blogs are rabid fans, not interested
at all in original writing, but are simply there for
titillating details of the celebrities' glam
day-to-day life.   They harbour this interest
 not so much (as is commonly thought) because
such readers' lives are boring,  as because such
readers' MINDS are boring.   (Someone may
be interested to learn that the TIMES' story
includes seventeen "celeblogs," but, no,
I am not going to type those out for
titillated parties.)   That's another detail
I like to leave to the little white cake frosting
bunnies...


the alt.genius.bill-palmer
--firing postings at passersby at random from the
window of an office upstairs from rec.arts.prose