End of Celebrity, Birth of Influence
The attraction of celebrity was the thought that a larger community was sharing an experience by following a person, knowing some personal details and then wanting to watch or listen to their next creation. The mystique of the person was part of the genius and the studios supported this arrangement in order to get engagement from the audience.
Today is just about influencers, but they are just being commoditized. This trend was literally started by the guy who built a website called “Hot or Not” and the person of the moment does not hold an audience's attention like a celebrity. But the big tech gatekeepers like this arrangement because they get the content for free, the makers are disposable and they only need to achieve distraction.
Hollywood knows better. An audience is about the relationship of real people sharing stories in order to relate to one another.
