Social Media Influence on Fans-Celebrity Relationship - Essay Example

Social Media Influence on Fans-Celebrity Relationship Author’s Name Class Name Professor’s Name School City and State Date Introduction New technology has fundamentally refigured the celebrity-fan relationship. The innovation of social media sites enables the celebrities to connect with their fans in a more intimate manner. They can post their new albums, and the fans can comment on their music. Further, the fans can listen to their songs through an online platform made possible by the innovation of new technology. The paper chooses one celebrity as a case study and explores ways in which the new media might have altered the forms of intimacy now possible between fans and celebrities. The paper will focus on Lady Gaga as the celebrity. The relationship between Lady Gaga and the fans through social media draws a lot of attention in the current musical world. It is because she engages with the fans at close to a personal level through the messages of self-acceptance she posts in the social media. According to a survey conducted on a celebrity-fan relationship, it was established that Lady Gaga re-diction enabled her to gain acceptance amongst the fans. It is because she enabled the fans to embrace their diversity from different cultures of the world. Discussion In the year 2008, the pop music scene gained a new entrant by the name Lady Gaga. The new album released by her named The Fame produced five hits on the billboard pop songs chart. The album gained viewers through YouTube and popularity in social media. To date, she has sold over sixteen million albums and close to twenty-nine million digital singles. As such, she became the number one artist in the world as determined by the Forbes list in the year 2001. Popularity and fame amongst the fans are used to measure the celebrity index. Further, her following on Facebook and Twitter rose to fifty-seven and thirty-seven million fans as at May 2013 respectively. Conversely, YouTube recorded 1.2 billion views. It is evident that Lady Gaga has cultivated a culture of interacting with her fans through social media platform. The world recognizes her as the pioneer of social media use to create awareness about her work and connecting with her fans. Consequently, it forged a reciprocal form of relationship with her fans thus endearing her to many of them. Additionally, she launched a social networking site for invite-only dubbed the littlemonsters.com specifically for her fans. The site enabled the fans to download her music, purchase tickets for her concerts, and ultimately communicate with her on a personal level. Furthermore, we see ways in which new media has altered the Lady Gaga’s relationship with her fans. For instance, her Twitter bio written as Mother Monster explains her intimate relationship with her fans. It shows a celebrity who is a maternal safe haven and an icon of the cultural differences of her fans. Unlike most of the celebrities who use sex appeal concept to create an overall appeal from their audiences, Lady Gaga offers herself in solidarity with her fans by giving them support and shelter. She encourages her fans to explore their identities and feel unafraid. Further, she publicly champions the creative works of her fans through social media by linking their images and appearing in their designer outfits. More interestingly, she works extremely hard to expose the mistreatment suffered by her little monsters (Click, Lee & Holladay 2013). For instance, in a performance on September 2011, she played a moving photomontage of a fourteen-year-old monster who had committed suicide after enduring harassment because of his sexual identity. She later launched the Born This way Foundation that aims to foster a more accepting society where differences between people gain embrace and individuality is celebrated. Through social media, we see Lady Gaga’s relationship with her fans is blossoming. It is unparalleled because of her constant interaction with them and championing for their rights. She does this by messages directed to her fans of empowerment and self-acceptance. Because of the unique interactive characteristics of social media, it has gained popularity among the celebrities and Lady Gaga is no exception. According to research conducted by the Nielsen online group in the year 2009, the use of social media had significantly outpaced the use of e-mail. It was found to be the most popular online activity. As such, most of the celebrities embrace social media use as a way of connecting with their fans. Unlike in the past, we now see a situation where the new media has altered the relationship between the celebrities and their fans. It is because the social networking sites enable them to build strong relationships with their fans (Brandes & Levin 2014). It is evident that the overall success of Twitter and Facebook fan pages is the ability for a celebrity to connect with their fans. It enables them to get views from their fans and act on such reviews. As such, the new media has altered the intimacy between the celebrities and their fans. In the past, it was a challenge for the celebrities to interact with their fans on a personal level (Lueck 2009). The only way they could interact with them is through live concerts and maybe attending live shows. As such, it was difficult to get the views of their fans immediately. However, the new media has created an online platform that ensures immediate feedback through social media interactions. The fans can post messages on the fan pages of their favorite celebrities thus ensuring constant interaction. Further, the Para-social interaction takes into account the aspect of giving and takes between the receivers and senders of social media messages. As such, it focuses on the manner in which the audiences relate, interact, and develop intimate relationships with the celebrities. One of the aspects of this theory is the one-sided interaction. For instance, the celebrity can attend a live show as a way of connecting with their fans. By doing so, they will only view the show but not interact with the celebrity on a personal level. However, studies reveal that more celebrities prefer Para-social interaction compared to the physical interaction. Conversely, the audiences will seek celebrities with certain appearances and backgrounds. It is evident that the new media can create illusionary behaviors on the part of the fans towards the celebrities. For instance, it can create some form of illusionary intimacy and emotional attachment of the fans towards the celebrities. Consequently, it can make them use social media as a way of expressing their emotions towards the celebrities of their liking. Such reasons can contribute to strained relationships between the fans and the celebrities since it can be seen as a way of invading their privacy (Ferris & Harris 2011). Presently, much has been documented regarding what appeal to fans and their deeds with their fan objects. However, information regarding the interpersonal relationships with their fan objects has little documentation. For instance, there is little information regarding how the little monsters identify themselves with Lady Gaga. However, the use of media texts encourages them to develop a Para-social relationship with her. As such, it gives them an illusion that the relationship developed through social media interaction is more like a face-to-face one. It is evident that such imaginary relationships with the celebrities gain popularity through the new form of social media interaction. In essence, the fans compare such relationships with the real ones as a way of substituting their emotions. Further, the new media has created a psychological relationship between the fans and the celebrities. Studies reveal that such relationships have some form of social benefits that range from reflection of self to the overall adoption of pro-social behavior and values. It is because most of the fans use the celebrities for self-reflection by essentially looking at them as mirrors. Most of them end up mimicking their favorite celebrities. All these is developed through the fans interactions with their celebrities (Brandes & Levin 2014). Studies reveal the importance of fans relationship with the celebrities as a way of self-reflection. Such relationships have the potential to exert significant influence on the attitudes and behaviors of the fans. Further, the musical performance in live concerts enables the fans to reflect on their personal lives and their social position in the world. For instance, Anthony Fung explores the effect of Chinese diva on the society (Soukup 2006). It is evident that the celebrity influences her middle-class fans to engage in gender politics because she is a celebrity who symbolizes rebellion. Thus, her fans end up imitating her and rejecting the norm by confronting the social challenges head on. Based on the previously stated facts, it is evident that the celebrities influence the lives of their fans in many ways. The new media interaction makes it even clearer because presently they can interact with them on a personal level unlike in the past. Innovations in technology have brought these changes. It is important for the celebrities to engage with their fans in a positive manner (Marwick 2011). As stated above, the fans of Lady Gaga use the term little monsters as a way of identifying themselves as her devoted fans. The allegiance makes them devote themselves to her music. Much of the research conducted explores ways in which the use of social media can lead to a sense of intimacy and authenticity between the celebrities and their fans. As such, social media helps the celebrities create a level of intimacy with their fans through sharing of their personal information on their fan pages. They use languages and personal information to increase affiliations with their fans. Some like Lady Gaga end up supporting the creative works of their fans. However, in the current media environment, it is important for the celebrities to observe limits regarding the level of personal information they share with their fans through social media. Additionally, the new media has led to more changes in the current set-up of fan-celebrity relationship. For instance, such interactions allow the fans opportunities to feel closer to the celebrities of their liking. Social media like Twitter ensures that the follower interacts with the account owner on a more personal level. It is argued that Twitter creates a more advanced form of expectation intimacy between the celebrities and the fans. Further, new social media enables the celebrity, and the fans interact online (Laken 2009). Most importantly, it helps in transforming Para-social relationships. Even though the fans and the celebrities interact through a mediated approach, it helps the fans to experience them in a real manner. It thus reinforces their feelings of knowing the celebrities on a more personal level (Click, Lee & Holladay 2013). We can argue that social media has influenced the way the celebrities and their fans interact with each other in a more personal manner, unlike in the past where such interactions were limited to only a few instances. Conclusion From the preceding analysis, it is evident that new social media has influenced the manner in which fans interact with the celebrities. In essence, most of the research examining the use of social media by celebrities points to a media of communication that ensures intimate relationship and closeness. The overall heightened sense of familiarity and interactions through online platforms ensures that the boundaries between the fans and celebrities are eliminated. For instance, it is evident that Lady Gaga’s use of social media has influenced her relationship with her fans in a direct manner. As a result, the relationships have built intimacy between the two parties. Research showed that social media plays an important role in the overall relationships the little monsters have with their mother monster. It enhanced the level of relationship between Lady Gaga and the little monsters. In essence, the new media has created a fan-celebrity relationship. It has ensured that the celebrities interact with their fans on a more personal level by posting about their lives on social media. The effects of the same continue to be felt in the increasing number of followers liking the celebrity fan page through Facebook and Twitter. It has enabled the little monsters to interact and view Lady Gaga as their mother. Consequently, she is referred to as the queen of social media based on the number of followers on twitter and Facebook. References Brandes, S. B., & Levin, D. (2014). “Like My Status” Israeli teenage girls constructing their social connections on the Facebook social network. Feminist Media Studies, 14(5), 743- 758. Click, M. A., Lee, H., & Holladay, H. W. (2013). Making monsters: Lady Gaga, fan identification, and social media. Popular Music and Society, 36(3), 360-379. Ferris, K. O., & Harris, S. R. (2011). Stargazing: celebrity, fame, and social interaction. Routledge Laken, A. R. (2009). Parasocial relationships with celebrities: An illusion of intimacy with mediated friends. Marwick, A. (2011). To see and be seen: Celebrity practice on Twitter.Convergence: the international journal of research into new media technologies,17(2), 139-158. Read More