Why would anyone want to be famous?

[b33nz]

ego and the feeling of importance.

[El Diablo]

GR,

I think the answer is probably very close to the answer to "Why would anyone want to hook up with famous people?"

[adsman]

I got a taste of what fame might be like when living as a white guy in Africa. When I walked down the street complete starngers wanted to talk to me as if I was their best friend. When I walked into a restaurant or bar people stopped and stared, (in a friendly way). Girls would constantly come up and try to hit on me.

After about two weeks it completely sucked.

[context]

People think "X will never happen to me". Combine that with; Fame = Fortune.

Most people don't consider that the darker side of fame will effect them. Or, even if they realise that some of it will catch up with them, I'd guess many people secretly want it to. Celebs are treated differently in society. They get away with murder (literally true in some cases) and can abuse others almost with impunity. Certainly in the UK this seems to be universally true (it's nice to see some celebs being made to do community service over in the US lately, though I wonder if they would have received much harsher penalties had they not been celebs). Is Pete Docherty famous in the US? He's a two-bit pop star with almost no tallent (in my opinion), he's had very little chart success (I know that's not a good indicator of tallent) and is totally drug riddled, has been arrested (literally) dozens of times for drug offences, fails to appear in court, trashes hotel rooms, abuses people, squirted a syringe of his blood over a film crew that were supposed to interview him (nice! the bloody of an intravenous drug user...), yet he walks free every single time! The press love him, he's voted most cool celeb in many mags, people buy his records because of his status NOT his music ability (or at least I'm convinced they do, and yet he still doesn't get many hits) of course his relationship with Kate Moss bumps up his "cool" status. He is famous, and gets away with anything/everything, presumably has money, does what he likes. To a kid growing up in the UK, why would you not want to be like him?

These days, all you have to do is appear on a reality tv show to become famous, or at least that's what many people think. I doubt she's famous in the US, but a certain Jade Goody was on a series of Big Brother over here. She is talentless in almost every way (except perhaps that ability to self publicise). She is ignorant, and frequently goes out of her way to embaress herself. She became a millionaire overnight by appearing on that show. She has been voted at the top of a list of icons and role models for kids in this country. She does nothing, has achieved nothing, other than her "fame".

To be a celeb means you are rich. You are treated as special, will get into any restaurant/event you want to. Can treat others as dirt and be rewarded. If you screw up you can make more money by selling your story to a tabloid, or a glossy mage like Hello. You can sell your wedding photos for a million or two to the same magazine.

Anyone here ever worked in a factory? Having zero education, and zero prospects, a job that means nothing. Why would you not want to be famous? The clamour for reality tv fame seems pretty obvious for many people. Sit in a house for a few months, do something sexual on camera and sell your story to the papers when you come out. If it works you're a famous millionaire, if it doesn't you're still a minor celeb to your friends and family. Down the pub you'll get a string of people want to know you, and girls that want to sleep with you (if you're a guy, or a girl that bats for the same team). Of course, that's one of the other reasons people want fame, as has been mentioned already. You get to sleep with people [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]. I remember a documentary about football players (soccer), a certain player, Ian Walker, was describing how he'd go out clubing in London (he was playing for Spurs at the time I think). As a top sports star he obviosuly got to sit in a VIP area with his friends and his wife. They went to the same clubs in the area where he lived and was well known to the regulars. He constantly had young girls come up to him and basically offer him sex, while his wife was sitting next him. These girls where regulars, by all acounts they went to the club because they knew the players would be there. They knew who his wife was and that she was sitting next him, yet it didn't stop them. So, again, why would you NOT want to be famous?

[Rootabager]

I would think getting chicks would outweigh any downside of being famous.

[samjjones]

[ QUOTE ]
Fame is power and a lot of people like power. It's like why would someone worth millions of dollars want to be Senator or President? For the power and ego boost.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd imagine somebody like Warren Buffet, who is famous and powerful but not visibly recognizable to a large portion of the populice, has the best of both worlds.

[idrinkcoors]

Even the most self assured person wants to feel important, and being recognized in public makes one feel important. Granted, the person donating their time at an Aids clinic is more important than the weekend weather girl, but I'd imagine that the attention is addicting.

Remember the t.v. show "The Bachelor", a fews ago, when the bachelor was Andrew Firestone? (My wife made me watch it so don't start). His family owns a huge winery, he is an heir to the Firestone tire fortune, etc. Now a guy like that, (without fame), would have NO trouble getting chicks right and left, so his appearance on the tv show must be due to some attention-seeking desire.

[guids]

Fame is also the easiest way to obtain power, to obtain power you need to work hard, or have a great idea here and there, or be born into it. anyone can become famous nowadays.

[WhoIam]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Fame is power and a lot of people like power. It's like why would someone worth millions of dollars want to be Senator or President? For the power and ego boost.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd imagine somebody like Warren Buffet, who is famous and powerful but not visibly recognizable to a large portion of the populice, has the best of both worlds.

[/ QUOTE ]
I was thinking the same thing about someone like Francis Ford Coppola. He's famous, well respected, and has made famous movies but I doubt he gets recognized or approached half as much as a D-list celebrity.

[MicroBob]

[ QUOTE ]
I wanted to be famous, I think that's part of why I went into television. After being an on-air reporter/anchor for a few years, I can only offer a very small slice of perspective.

Basically though, I did find it weird once I started to be recognized out in public. Having people stare at you, or ask weird questions, becomes sort of uncomfortable. And I only had a VERY small slice of what that's like. It certainly made me think about what someone like Matt Lauer goes through, where you can pretty much never go out in public without being bothered.

So while it's certainly an ego boost in the short term, yeah, I think in some ways it made me appreciate how difficult being "famous" would be and that the tradeoff probably isn't worth it for a lot of people.

[/ QUOTE ]


kind of ego-boost/attention-whore type of thing.

Didn't get enough attention as a child? Desire to be popular?
I don't know. Something related to that for some people I assume.


My run with 'fame' is similar to nolanfan's except on an even smaller scale.
I did have quite a few people approach me for autographs, etc when I worked in radio doing play-by-play sports-broadcasting so I did get the very smallest of tastes.

Didn't get quite as many weird questions as a news-reporter would I think.
Mostly it was people seeking me out to say how much they enjoyed a specific night's broadcast or funny comment I made or to talk about the team as well as random strangers who knew my name and would wave 'hi' to me.

Would also get occasional baked-goods and one couple had a good time sending in funny poems about some of my inside-broadcast jokes.

Had more than 1 blind or wheel-chair bound person call me or get word to me how much my broadcasts each night meant to them and that they listened to pretty much every minute of every broadcast I did.
That's about 140 broadcasts at 3+ hours each through the baseball season.

Only the regulars at the minor-league baseball stadium would recognize me in person.
But there were several other times I would get recognized just by my voice like if I swung by a 7-11 right after signing-off from a broadcast or something and the guy behind the counter had been listening.
Next thing I knew I would be asked to sign their cap or something.

That's where my experience might differ a tad from Nolan's I suspect.
Much smaller audience for me so I wasn't always noticed and pointed at beyond just friendly waves from a bunch of people when I was at the stadium.

But those who you do run across who listen to you for 3+ hours on end game after game probably feel they already know you on a more personal level.