The blogosphere deconstructs the dichotomy of “public” and “private”. Gossip blogs make public the opinions and daily happenings of the blogger himself. Although academics such as Kris Cohen criticize bloggers as “narcissists” because “they persist in publicizing their boring lives,” an appealing factor of gossip blogs is in fact their publicizing of private thoughts (2006: 165). As Rebecca Blood states “it is captivating to see the biases, interests and judgments of an individual reveal themselves so clearly” for once one “reads any weblog for a few weeks it is impossible not to feel that you know its writer” (2002: xi).
The act of reading a blog is hence akin to the guilty pleasure of reading someone else’s diary (Miller and Shepherd, 2004). Go Fug Yourself, for instance, often uses the “Dear Diary” format while criticizing wardrobe malfunctions of celebrities, creating an illusion of secrecy. In addition, The Independent notes that part of the reason Perez Hilton has succeeded in commanding vast web traffic is because “he says what we are all thinking” (2007). Therefore while the scathing tones of gossip bloggers is in alignment with the traditions of entertainment news, the illusion of interaction with one such blogger is a voyeuristic pleasure limited to the blogosphere. Furthermore, the interactivity of blogs shifts entertainment news from a one-way conversation to a two-way conversation where the reader can make public his own private musings and interact with persons who also have a vested interest in celebrity culture. The blogging platform hence enables gossip blogs to be interactive as well as fuse the public and private. Both aspects are central to the appeal of entertainment culture where audiences regularly seek the private and the public and “pointless conversation” functions as a “powerfully healthy social elixir” (Brooks, 2004: 21a).
The act of reading a blog is hence akin to the guilty pleasure of reading someone else’s diary (Miller and Shepherd, 2004). Go Fug Yourself, for instance, often uses the “Dear Diary” format while criticizing wardrobe malfunctions of celebrities, creating an illusion of secrecy. In addition, The Independent notes that part of the reason Perez Hilton has succeeded in commanding vast web traffic is because “he says what we are all thinking” (2007). Therefore while the scathing tones of gossip bloggers is in alignment with the traditions of entertainment news, the illusion of interaction with one such blogger is a voyeuristic pleasure limited to the blogosphere. Furthermore, the interactivity of blogs shifts entertainment news from a one-way conversation to a two-way conversation where the reader can make public his own private musings and interact with persons who also have a vested interest in celebrity culture. The blogging platform hence enables gossip blogs to be interactive as well as fuse the public and private. Both aspects are central to the appeal of entertainment culture where audiences regularly seek the private and the public and “pointless conversation” functions as a “powerfully healthy social elixir” (Brooks, 2004: 21a).
