celebrity gossip, academic style

Last Sunday, Kanye let loose a torrent of Tweets — he apologized to Taylor Swift, but also did a little media studies self-scholarship, declaring himself the big black “King Kong” of the incident, an analysis that echoes Kristen Warner’s own reading on my blog in the days after the VMAs.

I would copy the full litany of Tweets below, but my screen shots necessarily make it appear in opposite order. You’ll get a better sense by reading Gizmodo’s rendering of the Tweets into “letter form” or by simply checking out Kanye’s Twitter Stream yourself — if you scroll down, you’ll happen onto the end of his Sunday tweets. But here’s just a sampling:

I picked this particular section because it emphasizes the authenticity of the comments — “these Tweets have no manager, no publicist, no grammar checking….this is raw.” Obviously, that was how these comments were received: as a pure conduit of Kanye-ness. Gizmodo says that Kanye and other artists on Twitter “mark the death of music magazines,” while Mashable goes to far as to claim that Kanye proves that Twitter has not only changed the way that we communicate, but “set information free.”

These articles demonstrate a utopian embrace of new interface — and to do so, they must take Kanye, and all celebrity Twittering, at face value. For these writers, the fact that the celebrity twitter account is “authenticated” (via a little check mark in the right-hand corner: yes, this is really Kanye!) means that the artist has dismissed all publicity and intermediaries, choosing instead to speak directly to the consumer/fan. And this move on the part of major artists, celebrities, and stars — everyone from John McCain to Snooki, from the Dalai Lama to Conan, harkens a new age in accessibility and, apparently, the end of the publicity apparatus.

Twitter (and its champions) have cultivated an image of authenticity and immediacy around the service. But just because the interface itself has embraced that image does not mean that it is necessarily true. Nick Muntean and I explored this concept (and its drawbacks) at length in our joint piece over at M/C Journal , and I explored the “cloud of authenticity” around celebrity Twittering on FlowTV way back in May 2009, when Ashton Kutcher raced CNN to the most followers.

The bottom line: just because Twitter claims to offer unmediated access does not mean that it is not mediated. Put somewhat differently: just because Kanye says that his Tweets have no publicist does not mean that they are not part of a generalized publicity strategy. Or, finally: Kanye is a publicity mastermind, and he — and his people — know exactly what they’re doing. The idea that we are gaining access to the “real,” intimate Kanye is the goal. The fact that most readers — and journalists — have bought into it affirms its efficacy.

As I’ve written about before, Twitter is most often used to buttress the existing star image. When a celebrity Tweets about his/her personal life, thoughts, inclinations, etc., it reaffirms that his/her pre-exisiting image is, in fact, more than image — it’s the “real” person. Thus when Kanye Tweets “sometimes I get emotional over fonts” or “just looking at my closet, wool suits, fedoras, trenches, and furs…I’m bout to put fall in the hospital…Ima hurt the season” , he is absolutely (and hilariously) reifying his existing, bombastic, over-the-top, and, yes, brilliant, image. And he’s no stranger to using New Media to cultivate this image — as many remarked when he first joined Twitter, it was surprising that he had even waited this long, as he has long used his own blog to speak “directly” to his fans (including a drunken post immediately after the Taylor Swift incident). He’s smart about reassuring his fans that it’s really him — regularly claiming that the existence of bad grammar and spelling proves that it’s him and not one of his publicists/employees.

Even in the above paragraph, I’m revealing my own vulnerability to the image-making machine. I attribute the entire Twitter stream to Kanye, even though there is no proof whatsoever that it is, in fact, Kanye West himself that is sitting at the computer typing these words. It’s just that all signs seems to point to the fact that it is him — and it’s much easier to believe than disbelieve. Of course, “Kanye West” (in quotes) is, in fact, Tweeting — the IMAGE of Kanye West is providing information to fans, providing access to the intimate details…..but of the IMAGE, not the man. if we consider the Twitter stream in terms of Kanye’s IMAGE, it makes no difference whether the man himself or others responsible for the cultivation of that image are actually writing the words.

What’s frustrating, then, is the illusion, or perhaps the neat acceptance, of Twitter accounts as the end of organized publicity and manufacture of image. Twitter is simply this particular moment’s medium of choice for transmitting image. Under the studio system, stars “wrote” columns, confessionals, and responded to fan letters personally — and the vast majority of readers believed that they were in fact gaining intimate access to the star. We look back on those interactions, and the willingness of fans to believe that their stars would in fact spend the time to write for a fan magazine or responding to individual fans, and recognize the absurdity. But in the ’30s and ’40s, what reason was there to doubt that a star wouldn’t want to tell you the “true story” of her childhood, her marriage, her rise to stardom? Her name was on the byline; she posed for the pictures, the quotes sounded like things she would say. To doubt the authenticity was tantamount to declaring your star a liar, a fake, and an image — and, by extension, your willingness to like that image was embarrassing and juvenile. So why doubt?

In fifty years, we might be thinking the very same thing about Twitter — and our willingness to believe that every Tweet comes from the fingers of its namesake, a pure extension of his/her mind and “real” self simply because it pops up instantly on our computer screen and bear’s the celebrities “authenticated” handle. No matter how real the Tweets seem, no matter how often the celebrity replies back, it’s still part of his cultivation of image, and our belief in its authenticity is absolutely crucial to sustaining the illusion.

But don’t get me wrong: I *love* following celebrities on Twitter. But as those interested in interrogating / thinking through stardom and celebrity, we should be just as “wary” of a Tweet from Kanye as we would be of a signed picture, arriving on our doorstep, signed “You’re the greatest, Anne Helen Petersen, I love your blog, Love, Kanye.” Ultimately, thinking and analyzing and doubting is not mutually exclusive to taking pleasure in these things. You can be smart about celebrities and love to “consume” them — all at the same time.