Yes it’s true; I am following Ashton Kutcher, Demi Moore, Wil Wheaton, and Neil Gaiman on Twitter.

MySpace.com Blogs - a brief retort to the critics - Ashton Kutcher MySpace Blog

I wish to confess: I am following Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) and Demi Moore (@mrskutcher) on twitter.  There, I said it and damn-it, I am not ashamed.  It started out because of curiosity really.  I had already been following two of my favorite writers and bloggers that I had been linking to for years from this hardly followed blog (@wilw and @neilhimself).  As I have followed their blogs, writings, antics, and creative efforts for years, it seemed a good follow or "cyborstock" as I like to call it (get it? stock like in a soup starter? huh?  whatever!).

Regardless, I do not want to be a "star" follower, mostly because I am not interested in that kind of thing.  Yet with Ashton's frustration with the construction next to him home, and later watching Demi and Kutcher on twitter, I got hooked and so I caved and started to follow them along with the 80 or so anonymous folks who I "listen" to.

But I cannot help but thing why are these people tweeting where their life is already on public display???  As you might or might not remember, I blogged back in August about the odd feeling of going "public" (read Tweaking my Twitter on Twinkle or Tweeting Vegetarians Vex Intelligence-Put your Hands Up and Slowly Walk Away from the String Bean) with your life on Twitter.  But MY sense of "public" and Demi or Ashton's sense of public are two entirely different things. For me, tweeting is both public and private.  No one really knows who I am except for a few friends who "tweet" with me.  For the most part, my tweets become lost in the crowd and it's that feeling of "have you ever felt really along in a crowd?"  "Why yes, in fact I have! Thanks for asking."  Indeed, hardly anyone "follows" me and many of those who do are actually scam artists (so many of my followers have been actually kicked off by twitter) or people trying to sell me something (there are a lot of these folks).  I am not apparently controversy or captivating.  I simply am.  My bitches do not garnish criticism, or praise, or, I am sorry to say, much of an audience.  I can be alone in a crowd easily.

But in a matter of days, thousands of people have decided to "follow" Demi, Ashton, Neil, and Wil (notice how because we are all on twitter, I feel I can assume a first name bases with these folks?).  These are people who cannot be alone in a crowd but by default are "public" because of their fame, no one more so that the super Demi and Ashton paring.  According to several tweets as well as the above linked Ashton blog entry, their flirtation with twitter and their tweets are being twisted, distorted, and exploited by the media and paparazzi like reporters. Their tweets are being taken out of context, and intent behind communication attempts are being placed in theirouths.  This intent is being, in a word, destroyed.

 
These media-ites who report such empty "bling" are missing the real story behind these tweets, because they do not understand that Ashton, Demi, Wil, and Neil, as well as I am sure many other "celebs" who are using twitter, are partly responding to not only a new medium, but to a new kind of audience as well.  I have written about this for FlowTV.org, but it's important to note that social media tools such as twitter, YouTube, my favorite 12Second.tv (they have an excellent application available for the iphone by the way) has nurtured a different kind of audience.  One who demands a different type and measure of interaction with content, text, their "stars," and social causes.  And starts like the ones currently offering the twitterverse "stock," they are looking for a different type of audience as well--an audience that engages in the creative process--this is revolutionary and the mainstream media folks better wake-up or they will be left far behind.  Maybe we all would like to be a little public, but I suspect we are all looking for a bit of contact in an increasingly un-personalized world.

R