Celebrity, Mass Media in Love with Twitter
A couple of weeks ago, I was listening to a news radio station on the road. Shaq was asked why he loves to tweet. Shaq's response was: what he says to media often gets interpreted wrong or manipulated. Twitter gives him the most direct way to communicate with fans. No media can stand between him and fans to mis-interpret, mis-represent what he tweets.
On the same drive, I listened to a music station. The host asked people to follow the station on Twitter and tweet about the songs they'd like to be played.
The other night, I was watching sportscenter on ESPN. The two hosts were commenting on a sports story and were talked about the tweets fans sent them on the story.
I suddenly realized that celebrities and mass media love Twitter because Twitter magnifies their ability to reach out to and interact with fans:
- Real-time mass-broadcast to their fans.
- Real interactions with their fans that cut out all the middle men.
- Real-time in engaging with fans.
- Before Twitters, there are phone call-ins and SMS for real-time one-way communication originated from fans. None of these mediums shows everything in public like Twitter does with two-day communications. Everyone can see how a celebrity or a media outlet interacts with their fans(except when direct message is used on Twitter).
I guess that's why many people want to be followed on Twitter because it feels like you are a celebrity.
