I want to tell you an absolutely true RL story. As background, I live in the New York City area and I work at a huge old organization that is global in reach. There are well known people around all the time and as NYers we are pretty good at not being impressed and ignoring celebrities when we happen upon them. Having said that, I can get as fangirly as the next person given the right circumstances.
So, the other day I was in an elevator at work and when the doors opened a very familiar looking man stepped in, smiled and said good morning. He was most handsome and had salt and pepper grey hair, a little on the long side. I noticed his beat up hiking boots that looked like they might have recently seen the top of a mountain trail. This guy looked so familiar it was driving me mad trying to figure out how I knew him. I had almost convinced myself he was the father of a boy my son plays lacrosse with when I realized who he was --
Bill Murray. Yep. Famous movie and tv star alone in the elevator with me looking exactly like any dad on the sidelines at a kids sporting event. I had to laugh at myself because the minute I realized who was standing next to me I got nervous in a way I was not when I thought he was a parent just like me.
Why am I telling you this story? I have had cause to think about celebrity in SL lately and I want to write a bit about what I have observed. I am not talking about RL celebrities who come to SL for various and sundry reasons like
Suzanne Vega,
Judge Richard Posner and Mia Farrow among others, although I do think we will see more and more RL public figures using virtual worlds as part of their never ending battle to seek our attention. What I have been thinking about is SL avatars who are famous within our world and how the rest of us react to them.
SL allows us to have closer access to public figures than we have in RL. For example, after a concert in RL I have no expectation I will have a chance to personally thank a performer and let them know I enjoyed the show. In SL after live music I always thank the performer in chat and sometimes I am moved to write an IM and compliment them. Sometimes these exchanges turn into conversations and on occasion I have become friends with SL musicians in this way. Via a simple IM you can meet SL designers, business owners, bloggers, celebrities who appear to be well known for no particular reason kind of like Paris Hilton, Lindens -- you name it. Generally people are open and friendly so if you have a mind to you can meet whoever you want in SL, unlike RL where personal contact information for public people is not readily available.
There are *certainly* people who take full advantage of the easy access to others SL affords us. You know what I am talking about -- people who want to surround themselves with famous people -- the SL social climber. They are at every event big or small and make a show of talking about all the important people they associate with and the faaaboulous events they have been fairly begged to attend. They are on twitter, plurk, facebook, myspace and probably 17 other social networking sites I don't even know about. They have tons of "friends" as you can clearly see on their profile and if you missed it their latest tweet about the event they are at and who they are dancing with will surely let you know how influential and important they are in SL.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are people who are too shy to talk to people they consider SLcelebs. They presuppose "famous" people would not be interested in them and don't reach out even though they might have something to say. They may even TP away when they find themselves face to face with someone they admire out of sheer lack of self esteem. "Why would they want to talk to me? I had to leave." These people miss out on interesting conversation and friendships because of their assumptions about well known people, which may or may not be based in fact.
I am more likely to be shy and not talk to people than I am to make an effort to surround myself with famous friends. I dislike social climbing and when I smell it I immediately distance myself. Every person no matter how well known has good days and bad days, great successes, some failures and a whole pile of insecurities and fears. No one is more important or more worthy of adoration than anyone else. We all have the same mesh underneath our designer clothes or our freebie finds.
More than anything I wish the culture of celebrity we see in RL did not follow us to SL. I wish people would see the real person in the elevator, the dad at the lacrosse game, instead of the superstar.
