Celebrities and Social Media

Taylor Swift is one celebrity that I follow on Twitter. Her social media presence is very charming and real, similar to how she comes off as a person. It appears to be her speaking. Her tweets are fun, bubbly, and she is grateful to her fans even on Twitter. She has many personable tweets such as “Hi from backstage at the ACMs” and “in hair and makeup.” She imagines her audience as young and interested, just as she does over any other medium such as T.V. She is still very polite to the viewing audience and is grateful for their support, for example: ”This is one of the best night I’ve ever had. Thank you so much.” Her ethos still remains very credible because her tweets are always respectable and innocent, just like how she is on T.V. or in interviews. She always utilizes kairos and pathos in her tweets. She obviously only tweets relevant things such as award shows going on or concerts she just performed. She also uses pathos because her tweets are so personalized, it makes her followers feel like her friend. She uses humor, love, honesty, and gratefulness in order to appeal to her fans emotions. Many of her tweets are funny which shows her fun side and sense of humor. The appearance of her page is similar to her attitude and image. Her picture is simple of just her and looks like a picture she took on her laptop, which makes her seem more relatable and “friend-like”. The background is the plain Twitter with the blue clouds, that presents the idea that she’s laid back and doesn’t care what her background looks like. All of the images she puts on Twitter connect with the other images about her celebrity persona. They’re all quirky, fun, and humorous. 

I also chose to examine Ke$ha’s Twitter. Her tweets and image is completely different than Taylor Swift’s. She appears to be speaking because her tweets are all quirky, crude, and ridiculous at times. Kesha talks to the audience as if they were one of her friends who doesn’t judge and who she can tell anything to. She doesn’t hesitate to use bad words or vulgar statements. She knows her audience follows her because they like her eccentric personality and want to hear her scandalous tweets. Her ethos is not very strong, although many people do love and admire her. She just doesn’t present the credibility that Taylor Swift does. Her tweets are more of a joke and reflect her outgoing and eccentric personality. She does use kairos because she tweets about events and parties that are happening at that moment. She also talks about her concerts and her experiences from the night before. She does have conversations with other celebrities and her friends who are also very like her. One thing she does do that Taylor Swift does not is that she “re-tweets” or has conversations with regular people who are not celebs. That shows that she does truly care about her fans enough to give them a shout out. The visual impact of the page is spot on to her celebrity persona. Her picture looks like it was off of a music video because her hair and makeup are done. Her background is tile pictures of dinosaurs which is random. Everything from her background to the text connects with her eccentric, fun, and wild image. 

Taylor Swift and Ke$ha are very different. They both portray their true images and seem to be actually writing their own tweets, but they do it in their own ways. Taylor Swift’s background is more simple and her tweets reflect her bubbly personality. Kesha’s background shows her crazy and random side. Her tweets reflect her party girl side and are usually humorous, random, and sometimes crude. One thing that Kesha does that Taylor Swift doesn’t do is talk to, or retweet, her fans. It makes Kesha seem a little more personable. 

The purpose of social media for celebrity culture brings a great amount of publicity and attention to the celebs. Many people become celebrities through the internet these days, so social media helps celebrities become even more famous. Through Twitter, celebs are able to show their “true” personalities and say what they want. Overall, it causes celebrity culture to grow and become a bigger deal since their names and tweets are always popping up on our newsfeed. It’s almost like we can’t escape the world of celebrities.