The celebrity-industrial complex is a social and economic construct which involves a symbiotic relationship between

celebrities Celebrity is a condition of fame and broad public recognition of a person or group due to the attention given to them by mass media. The word is also used to refer to famous individuals. A person may attain celebrity status by having great w ...

and business corporations. First proposed by '' Vanity Fair''

columnist A columnist is a person who writes for publication in a series, creating an article that usually offers commentary and opinions. Column (periodical), Columns appear in newspapers, magazines and other publications, including blogs. They take the ...

Maureen Orth Maureen Orth (born 1943) is an American journalist, author, and a Special Correspondent for '' Vanity Fair'' magazine. She is the founder of Marina Orth Foundation, which has established a model education program in Colombia emphasizing technolog ...

in her book, '' The Importance of Being Famous'' (2003), it is fueled both by the celebrities' seemingly continual search for fame and attention and the business corporations' search for catchy headlines as well as viable name brands that could be sustained by such celebrities. In the celebrity-industrial complex, the celebrity either has a particular feature that is attractive to a public audience or is a victim of an occurrence that wins sympathy or condemnation from that same audience; this celebrity, for an initial period of time, becomes a subject of media scrutiny or marketing by properly funded media publication distributors. This media scrutiny, however, can often become a source of income for the celebrity, or the media scrutiny becomes an outlet of promotion for future manufactured publications or initiatives by the celebrities, and the media scrutiny around the celebrity expands to include coverage of such products. At the same time, the fans and followers of the celebrity may adopt the celebrity's values, products, and attitudes as a basis for using their following as the basis of an identity. The term "celebrity-industrial complex" is an homage to the much older term

military–industrial complex The expression military–industrial complex (MIC) describes the relationship between a country's military and the Arms industry, defense industry that supplies it, seen together as a vested interest which influences public policy. A driving fac ...

, which refers to a similar bilateral relationship between national militaries and industrial corporations which profit from each other.

References

Industrial complexes Celebrity {{Econ-stub

See also

References