Tag Archives: celebrity on twitter

On Facebook’s “On this Day” and Nostalgia

Dear Mark Z, congratulations on the new baby. And kudos for knowing Chinese. I’ve just added you to the list of “See? These people can learn to speak Chinese. Why can’t you?” to show my kids. Oh, don’t worry. I am not asking you for money like Kanye West just did. To be fair though, he’s also asked Larry Page for help.

I know you don’t use Twitter. Aww. How quaint. But Kanye’s Tweet is the best parody account there is. He’s a parody of himself, a mirror reflecting back on a mirage, a meme of a meme. This somehow makes him the realest paradoxically.

Is your birthday really on Valentine’s Day? That’s a pretty cool thing to include as “The three things about myself that most people don’t know” when you have to do one of those awkward get-to-know-you self introductions.

I am rambling. You are so easy to talk to.

All I set out to write is this: STOP FUCKING SHOWING ME MY “FACEBOOK MEMORIES”!

Seeing pictures from a year ago does not make me happy. The more years it has transpired, the more depressing they are. I have peaked a long time ago. My life has since been going downhill. Those memories mock me for having wasted another year of my life with nothing to show for. (You’ll have to agree that Facebook posts do not amount to “things to show for”).

They are signposts, marking my march downward.

When I see “On this day,” I inadvertently think to myself, “Yup. And ON THIS VERY DAY, I am crying for all the wasted breath I’ve taken and what have I done and I should go jump off a bridge.” Pass the donuts.

Did you know that in the 17th to 19th century, nostalgia was considered a psychopathological disorder? I bet you don’t. I bet you are not a very nostalgic person either. Most winners of life aren’t. So thank you for pushing to cause a global pandemic of nostalgia with this fancy Facebook feature while you yourself has nothing but the future to look forward to.

In Greek nostalgia literally means “the pain from an old wound.” It’s a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone. This device isn’t a spaceship, it’s a time machine. It goes backwards, and forwards… it takes us to a place where we ache to go again. It’s not called the wheel, it’s called the carousel. It let’s us travel the way a child travels – around and around, and back home again, to a place where we know are loved. — Don Draper

And we all know what that place is.

Facebook.

Nice try.

There has been NO way for us common denizens to converse with celebrities. That is, until Twitter opened the door…

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This is Twitter’s stated mission (or designed usage) on its homepage:

“Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?”

Here is my observation: most of the people are using Twitter, not to keep their social network updated with what they are doing, how boring would that be? but to keep track of what celebrities are doing in real life.

Because they are famous, anything they say seems to carry so much more significance. A one-word Tweet becomes some sort of cypher waiting for you to discover its higher meaning. Their random observations of life are so much more hilarious simply because they are famous — on the Internet, you cannot argue that it is funny because of the delivery. This is NOT Seinfeld. “Newman!”

(Speaking of Jerry Seinfeld. Did you hear that he is going to do a reality TV show about marriage? I bet he and his wife are happier than the lot of us because they have a 24-hour nanny…! So what would his advice be? Become really wealthy and then your marriage life would not be bogged down by arguments about who does more when and what…)

Rainn Wilson. MC Hammer. Luke Wilson. Elizabeth Banks. Jimmy Fallon. Neil Gaiman (he WAS already a celebrity in my household, now with the movie Coraline, he IS a celebrity…), LeVar Burton (of Star Trek fame, Yes, the cool blind dude!, and of Reading Rainbow, eh, fame), Shaq (yes, THE Shaq, under the moniker, The Real Shaq), and I am sure I probably miss quite a few. With some of them tweeting constantly. One cannot help but imagine Rainn Wilson tweeting on his BB in between takes of The Office. Does he show his Twitter stream to his co-stars? Do they suggest to him what he should tweet next? Do they laugh at clever responses back to @RainnWilson?

Yes, responses!

In the Twitterverse, you, apparently, are allowed to “Reply to” these celebrities’ Tweets. And if you are lucky, if your star shines on you, THEY may actually Tweet back @ you. This stuff is what dreams are made of. And the real stuff that the wet dreams are made of? That is when the stars FOLLOW you back.

Then you will be a made man (or woman). You have arrived in the Twitterverse.

Here is my brush with fame today with a 10-foot pole:

Wil Wheaton, Gordi in Stand by Me, and also of Star Trek fame, although he probably prefers to be known as one of the Geek gods, a published writer, and a celebrated blogger (see: The Geek Gods), lives in the Twitterverse (again, see: The Geek Gods).

In one of his hundreds’ of Tweets today, he gushes about The Onion:

“I love the Onion so much, I want to marry it!”

After I alerted The Onion about the raging endorsement, The Onion responded with a ringing rejection:

“America’s Finest News Source Politely Turns Down Marriage Proposal From @wilw”

(My seminal role in this comedic exchange can be proven by the timeline shown in the search result, and of course, this picture).

God, I am a loser…

“Congratulation, Neil Gaiman!”

2 Replies

Came upon this blog entry on Geed Dad (part of the Wired blogosphere). Was surprised to see that Neil Gaiman’s book won the Newberry Medal. Well, not really surprised. Actually was surprised that Gaiman was surprised.

My 5th grader couldn’t put this book down. True to Gaiman’s fashion, the book is dark (judging by the cover of the book… yeah…): it starts out with a little boy’s family being murdered and with the little boy being abandoned in a graveyard (hence the title) and raised by ghosts… Kids nowadays are so much more mature than when we were growing up so I was not concerned that my son was reading about the subject of death and murder at the age of 10. Glad to know that the judges (and many teachers and parents) feel the same way. We should never talk down to our children as if they live in a cocoon. I believe that’s a main reason why Gaiman is so popular with kids with a good head on their shoulder – he treats them like adults and speak to them truthfully about unpleasant subjects.

“On Monday Neil Gaiman was awarded the most prestigious award in children’s literature, a Newbery Medal, for his new book, The Graveyard Book. The news rocked the world of kid’s literature and was a surprise to Gaiman himself. Neil Gaiman is a beloved author for many GeekDads for his children’s literature. The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish and The Wolves in the Walls have been bedtime storybooks for my daughter since she was tiny. But Gaiman is also famous among GeekDads for his more adult literature, such as Sandman and American Gods; his movie adaptations, such as Stardust and the upcoming Coraline; and he is also a GeekDad in his own right, often relinquishing his blog to his daughter Maddy.” (Jan. 31, 2009)

The Absence of Alternatives

My therapy sessions…

Tag Archives: celebrity on twitter

“Congratulation, Neil Gaiman!”