Heidi Montag?? Really??

Do you know who Heidi Montag is? Well, after I'm done writing this, you probably won't care or will try to forget, but I'm going to start off by saying that she is releasing an independent album costing around $1-$2 million to produce. So those who DO know who she is can start laughing while I explain to the rest of my peers that she is a random chick from The Hills, MTV's annoying reality show about girls having a tough life living off of their rich parents in the heart of L.A. as they all navigate their way into young adulthood. Heidi, I recall, was one of Lauren Conrad's friends who has been in celebrity gossip mags a billion times because of her relationship with that loser boyfriend, Spencer. I admit, I watched the first season of Laguna Beach during my MTV fandom days, when I was a personal fan of L.C. I happened to see what she was going to be doing once moving from the serene atmosphere of Orange County to the chaotic atmosphere of L.A. Chaotic is far from what these girls had to deal with; chaotic was having to rearrange a nail appointment. Heidi was one of the stupid girls who has come out of this being a bigger name than deserving to.

I'm not really writing about her foray into music; a lot of people make albums when they shouldn't (Don Johnson, Eddie Murphy, Dirk Diggler, etc.). This is more about the power given to jabronies for no reason. I read that among teenagers, where a certain percentage once desired to become that which makes a person a celebrity--actor, musician, or athlete--kids now say they simply want to be "celebrities." I suppose that makes one rethink what a celebrity is in today's standards. Not even five years ago, chicks were becoming famous because of simply having a ton of MySpace friends. And nowadays, douchebags around the world are doing the same with Facebook and Twitter (are people really more interested in hearing what Ashton Kutcher has to say than news outlets like CNN?) . But they'll argue that they're not doing anything wrong, that it's the common folk that are befriending them electronically or following their 140-character updates on what they had for breakfast. I belong in this group as well; I find it slightly interesting to see the personal side of celebs because they're willing to offer it rather than having the paparazzi forcefully infringing upon their privacy. It's one thing to tell me you just had dinner with Chris Pine at Morton's and another to have creepy photographers snap photos and print dinner with Chris Pine simply they think I want to know.

Heidi Montag is a name that some will know more about once news of her album hits more media outlets. Or maybe it never will; I hear her first week album sales are miserable and that she spent as much money as she did on the album so that it could be on the quality level of a Britney Spears album. Hahaha. I'm not even going to get into the plastic surgery crap that I've seen on magazine covers in the checkout lane. But I will say that it got me thinking--what's the future of the celebrity? In ten years, will you become famous for taking a shit? Perhaps you could, seeing as how YouTube makes people overnight sensations with simply sharing a link or word-of-mouth. But what's going to be next? Who are we going to have to hear about next?

The first-week failure of Heidi Montag is sure to make celebrities question their longevity. Few people recover from epic failure; it tells us common folk they aren't worth paying attention to any longer. Heard Tila Tequila on the radio lately? You might start seeing her at Carl Casper radio shows. But what about the rest of them? What will happen to our celeb friends as time goes by? And what will happen to those who become celebrities for whatever stupid reason they become them? At the rate we're going, there will be post-graduate celebrity programs on campuses worldwide, maybe even at University of Phoenix online. It's not going to stop any time soon, not until there's a government ban on free speech (which will happen when the world ends). However, if the gossip mags, the paparazzi, and Entertainment Tonight go the way of the dinosaur.......then what will the news be about?