Death by Twitter

How is it that a career can live or die in 140 characters?  In the last few months we have seen several celebrities torpedo (to use a Charlie Sheen phrase) their own careers in as little as 1 tweet.  Recently American Psycho author, Bret Easton Ellis dropped the Twitter bomb "I like the idea of 'Glee' but why is it that every time I watch an episode I feel like I've stepped into a puddle of HIV?" I have a feeling his book sales are going to be dropping faster than his tweets.

Gilbert Gottfried is another casualty when he was fired as the spokesperson of Aflac after he tweeted extremely horrible jokes after the tragic earthquake and tsunami hit Japan.  Even though he took them down and apologized... death by Twitter.

Today films, actors, books and music all live and die by public opinion.  Because of social media, the media has lost control of the media.  I was having a conversation with a prominent reporter the other day who was upset because her paper's website allows comments under her articles and people... oh my gosh wait for it... have different opinions than she does!

And then there's Charlie Sheen.  He is the exception to the rule... every rule has one.  His #winning, #TigersBlood and #troll rants should have brought him down, but it revived his spiraling career for a tour of crazy!  Unfortunately some of the stuff he said and tweeted about Warners, CBS and Chuck Lorre have made his chances of returning to Two and a Half Men a million to one, but he managed to grab the public.

And that's the secret to social media.  It's not some deep rooted mystery.  It's about grabbing the attention of the public and well, entertaining them.

The rest:
Taco Bell = death by Twitter
Dominos = death by YouTube via Twitter (to be revived by new recipe)

Lindsey Lohan = multiple deaths by Twitter (Twitter zombie)

Chris Brown = death by Twitter (and his general craziness)